Please note: the information contained within this excerpt is intended for educational purposes. It is not intended to replace advice given by healing professionals for those whose conditions require them.

THE WORST PIECE OF EQUIPMENT

by Helen Hall, MEd

Why do people buy scales - bathroom scales, I mean?
I suppose the answer is obvious - to weigh themselves.

Why?

They want to know how heavy they are.

Why?

You are standing in the bathroom - get naked and look in the mirror . You can see if you are overfat or not. If you have trouble seeing yourself analytically, ask someone who you know will tell you the truth.

I don't know why people weigh themselves!!

I don't know because their weight tells me nothing. It doesn't tell me how well or sick they are; how rested or tired; how stressed or relaxed; whether they are addicted to certain food or drink types; nor whether they are eating in a health promoting and balanced way nor if they are fit. It tells me nothing more than their total weight. Total body weight which includes: bones, skin, vital organs, water, fat, blood and muscles. I don't want to know how much your bones, skin, vital organs, water, fat, blood and muscles weigh. So why do you?
 
I knew of a man (the father of one of my clients) who weighed himself many times each day.

At least 3 times in the morning, sometime during the day and then again before bed. He had a variety of scales and he was often given another set of scales for his birthday by his family. What better present to give someone obsessed with his weight?
What does he know about his health as a result of all this weighing activity? Nothing except that his weight goes up and down a little every time he weighs himself.
 
Client example:
Linda was completely washed out and exhausted and unable to make it to her training sessions with me on many occasions. She was suffering from chronic stress and adrenal exhaustion caused by enormous personal, business, financial and family stressors - (she had them all covered).

When returning to training after a couple of weeks absence she commented that she had lost a lot of weight.

It defies my logic that someone who is so far "out of health" would even be interested to know what her weight is. What did that figure tell her? She was lighter - so what!
 
What conclusion can we draw from the data given from a set of bathroom scales? Nothing.

In fact, if you are exercising well and increasing your strength and muscle mass through weight bearing exercise, you will gain scale weight. But who needs to know that anyway? You're right. No-one.

Unfortunately, the people who have bathroom scales are not so rational. If they get on the scales early in the morning and 'it' says something more than 'it' did yesterday, their whole day is affected. What happens next is a succession of unhealthy actions.

The bathroom scaler is instantly depressed. They see themselves as fat. They try to eat less. They buy the diet coke at lunch time. They have the salad without dressing. They have more coffee than usual because they believe coffee is a diuretic so that will surely make them weigh less. By dinner time they are absolutely starving - ready to eat the skinny leg of a priest. They have the big bowl of pasta but they are still hungry so they eat something from the "banned substances" list afterward. After all, amnesia has set in by now. They have forgotten they even have bathroom scales. This morning is as distant an experience as their last holiday.

They go to bed feeling pretty darn good because that last late night treat had chocolate in it and the seratonin levels in their brain have been elevated.
Then ...... the next morning they habitually stumble onto the bathroom scales again (what a shame they didn't habitually stumble outside for a walk) AND oh - my - god. The worst news ever hits them between the eyes as the needle settles on a tiny little line ABOVE the one it settled on yesterday. Now they are really depressed. Nothing in the wardrobe fits. They feel dreadfully unattractive. They reach for something looser fitting that won't show the additional poundage/grammage - perhaps a coat today even though it is the middle of summer. They're in for a bad day.

They're hungry (really hungry after that meal last night) so they are involuntarily sucked into the muffin shop on the way to the train station. So hungry are they now that they can see food that their nostrils flare and their mouth salivates. Their brain, which can barely be heard over the now very excited stomach grumbles, tries to help them out by reminding them of their bathroom experience and so they choose the low fat muffin. Unfortunately, their brain was not smart enough to tell them that they are eating cake at 7.00 in the morning - low fat, high sugar cake shaped into something we now call a muffin. When I was little I used to call them patty cakes and they used to be 1/3 the size of today's muffin - something only eaten at birthday parties.

Uh-oh, we're not finished yet in our 'morning after the night before recovery feast' because we smell the coffee. They are feeling a bit slow this morning and haven't been able to lift the roller shutters behind their eyelids yet so a cappaccino is requested in the same breath as the muffin order - after all, they are going to need something to wash that muffin down with aren't they?
 
Muscle weighs more but takes up less space than fat. If you replace your fat with lean muscle, you WILL weigh more.

What is so bad about weighing more? You'll be thinner and you'll live longer.
 
How can an instrument affect how you feel about yourself?

If the reading from your trip up onto the scales is pleasing to you, does that give you permission to eat poorly?

More coffee is had before lunch time comes around again. It's the acceptable office habit to walk to the coffee pot whenever they have a break in their work instead of stretching at their desk. They can still recall the sudden shocking sinking feeling in the pit of their stomach when they read the scales this morning so they skip lunch. They're not that hungry - another coffee will do. Mid afternoon comes along and they can't focus on their work any longer - they feel dull but can't take another coffee (is that their ulcer communicating with them?) All they can think about is chocolate or coke. There's a store nearby so they make a dash during their mid afternoon break - the only exercise they can find time to do all day. The chocolate did the trick - now they are back to work. Their energy is restored - in fact, their on a high. Their mood is good again and they can focus on work.

Dinner is a celebratory affair. Celebrating what? Perhaps that they had such a light dinner the night before, perhaps celebrating that they simply can afford it. Being such a celebratory occasion they share some wine and kick back to enjoy the company. Their smart brain tells them this is a good stress release and they accept another glass of wine - or was that another other? Then, when it's time to order their meal, they are so relaxed (and amnesiac) that they forget that their bathroom scales are waiting for them at home. They order with their taste buds - they are about to entertain their mouth. Their brain has gone to the bathroom while they order their meal completely conscience free.

Another client:
I mentioned to one of my clients one day that I was exacerbated by the actions of a couple of clients who insisted on weighing themselves and therefore negatively affecting their attitude toward their goal. She said (without thinking about my reaction, obviously) that she couldn't believe that she was heavier now but leaner than she ever has been.

Of course my reply was, "How do you know this?"
She said she just had to find out if it was true what I said about muscle weighing more and fat weighing less and that she would probably get heavier but have less bodyfat.

They are now well on their way to having another bad experience on those bathroom scales that lurk in their bathroom like a 'killer virus'.

This scenario is far from uncommon - it happens nearly every day for a lot people. That's why the majority of people are overfat and extremely unhealthy. If this melodrama continues for a while the next drastic step is to try one of those 'promise the impossible' diets. Then they really will be watching their weight - go up - and up.

It's not long before they are so desperate that they try every new diet that is written in every magazine or that their friends hand down to them. If they have the courage to publicly state their dilemma, they might even join one of the larger organizations that take the responsibility of cooking and thinking for them. They like their plan because they encourage people to weigh themselves - that part they can already do. They are now on the cyclical path of going from a little bit 'overfat' toward 'quite overfat' which is heading straight for 'obese'. If watching their weight is the measurement of the success of the plan - I guarantee - they will soon be heavier than they ever were - and it will be all fat.

I will explain how this happens in further detail later.
I bought a set of "bodyfat" scales not too long ago. I thought I might use them as motivation for my clients. When I got the scales, of course I tried them out and subjected some of my friends to my 'research' as well.

To my surprise I registered in at 35% bodyfat which immediately sent me into a search for where I had put the fat on (without questioning the output of the scales, I might add). Then I checked other people on the scales. They all read incredibly high.

Eventually I concluded that the scales were in error. I sent them back.

A replacement was sent out straight away. The same readings were coming from this replacement set as well. I spoke to the salesman at length about the problem I had encountered. He suggested that he measure his office staff using a variety of the models of scales.

We eventually found that the most affordable set (which did not have the 'athlete' mode) was in error - all of them. The calibration was incorrect.

When I expressed my concern for this company knowingly putting the innaccurate scales on the market, his reply was that people could just notice whether they are going up or down in the readout.

Do you know anyone (myself included) who would not be disturbed by having an innaccurately high bodyfat reading? What dangerous action might they take to reduce this inaccurate reading to something close to what the books recommend?
Of course, I sent the scales back.
 
Now, let's do a quick analysis of what happened to our bathroom scale junkie.

They started off with the wrong information - bathroom scales don't tell them anything.

They then made up something in their head about the reading that the scale gave them - it was all bad.

They starved themself in an attempt to 'recover' from what they might have had the day before. The body starts to think there is no food on the planet at this point. The metabolism starts to slow just in case it is true. A 'red alert' goes out to any future food coming in - store it as bodyfat due to an obvious shortage out there.

Lunch was further validation of this fear - there's not much nutrition out there - better store the salad away as bodyfat as well. Yes, you can get fat eating salad. Diet coke? well that's another whole chapter.

Dinner promoted an insulin response bigger than Ben Hur and didn't satisfy. The follow-on attempt to get some satisfaction which was probably more emotionally sourced further spiked the insulin response.

During sleep the blood sugars dropped lower than they otherwise would have had they had a nutritious, well balanced (and satisfying) meal.

The next morning they woke feeling like they had run a marathon (or maybe been run over by a marathon) during their sleep. Their blood sugar levels are very low. They are starving.

The muffin and coffee were required to bring the blood sugar levels up to something resembling functional but they do such a good job that they shoot them right through to a very high insulin spike again. The adrenals are working overtime at this stage and they haven't begun the stressful part of their day yet. Coffee is the only way to keep squeezing out some adrenal energy through the day.

Lunch is skipped because the bathroom scales tell them they are getting fatter.

Their blood sugar levels plummet throughout the afternoon causing an energy slump and a lack of focus - probably the jitters as well. They are probably at serious risk of telling their boss where to get off because their moods are so edgy.

Chocolate and/or coke do the trick - the blood sugar levels are pumped up again through the roof. No wonder the adrenals are exhausted. Not to mind, they are feeling good again (high again) and able to plough on through the afternoon ignoring all the signals their body is telling them.

Dinner is a poor attempt to deal with the stress their body is signalling. Thinking that it is the work that is the problem, they decide to drown a few feelings and frustrations in alcohol. The meal is not chosen wisely and the body does the best it can with what nutrition is available.
 
The daily food intake is basically that of malnutrition. The constant blood sugar spikes will eventually turn to exhaustion and then more serious disease before they stop and address their diet and nutriton. Once they become sick, traditional medicine will pump drugs into the already exhausted body usually without looking into the dietary habits that created it.

What prompted this series of events that quite possibly happens nearly every day? The bathroom scales and lack of good health information.

If you 'see' yourself in any of the previously mentioned scenario, you need to read on. Your health, your physical ability to take care of yourself, your self esteem, your relationships with others, your life ...... depends on it.
 
 Take my advice - throw the bathroom scales away.
It is truly the worst piece of equipment you can own.
Even if you have a healthy 'attitude' about your weight, why do you need to know what weight you measure on the scales?
If you have a negative reaction to that sentence - read this article again.