3 Reasons to Get Rid of Your Scale
Written by Isabel Vasquez RD, LDN
How often do you weigh yourself? Daily? Weekly? Never?
Weighing yourself often could be a sign of an unhealthy relationship with your body, especially if you let that number impact your self-worth. It’s often used as a form of body checking.
Unfortunately, society makes it impossible not to feel that that number influences our worth.
So, whether the number goes up, down, or stays the same, it can often cause a cascade of emotions. It may even trigger disordered eating or exercise behaviors.
Here at Your Latina Nutrition, we encourage our clients to get rid of their scales. Here’s why.
Weight is not a great indicator of health
If you’re tracking your weight on the scale to manage your health, then read on because it may not actually be a great way of doing so.
Research shows a correlation (not a causation) between higher weights and higher rates of chronic illness and mortality. (For the record, studies also show a link between exceedingly low weights and negative health outcomes.)
Plus, most studies don’t control for weight stigma and weight cycling—potential reasons for the link between weight and health.
Of course, people at higher weights also face more weight stigma and may be more likely to experience weight cycling—big shifts up and down in weight—since they face more pressure to diet.
Weight cycling is associated with higher risk for cardiovascular disease and diabetes, per a 2019 study in Frontiers in Endocrinology and a 2021 study in the Journal of Diabetes Investigation.
Dieting often leads to weight cycling because initial weight loss is almost always followed by weight regain within a couple years max. In fact, there’s currently no proven means of sustaining weight loss long-term.
Your body typically fights to maintain within its weight set point range with a cascade of responses, from conserving energy usage to increasing your hunger drive.
Related: BMI is BS. Here's Why.
So, focusing on the number on the scale as the main indicator of health may not be the most effective approach.
Focusing on health-promoting behaviors like adding nutrition and incorporating intuitive movement can help improve your health without the stress and potentially disordered behaviors associated with tracking your weight.
It can cause an obsession with controlling your weight.
Especially for those with disordered eating or an eating disorder, weighing yourself regularly can trigger or perpetuate a harmful obsession with weight. You may even start to associate your own self-worth with the number on the scale.
You may become so focused on the number on the scale that you do anything to lower it or control it in some way.
You may neglect your overall well-being to try to change that number by engaging in disordered eating and exercise behaviors.
It can even have a big impact on your mood, whether the number goes up or down.
Unfortunately, most of us have been conditioned by society to believe our weight influences our worth, but that is not true. You have inherent worth regardless of your weight.
Centering the number on the scale in your life can not only be triggering, but it can further reinforce the false idea that that number influences your inherent value.
It may disconnect you from your body.
Our bodies are so smart. They’re constantly communicating with us about when they’re hungry, when they’re full, and what types of food they’re craving, but diet culture teaches us to ignore those cues.
When we focus on the number on the scale, it can further hinder our connection to our body’s cues.
Related: How to Use the Hunger Fullness Scale for Intuitive Eating
We may start to use the number on the scale, instead of our body’s inner wisdom, as our guiding light.
Most of us barely even trust our hunger and try to artificially suppress it. When we ignore our hunger cues for a while, they can get dulled and our trust in our bodies becomes damaged.
When we stop prioritizing the numbers and instead prioritize listening to our bodies, nourishing them adequately, inviting in both rest and movement, sleeping enough, and managing our stress, we can cultivate a healthy relationship with them.
Final Thoughts
If you take anything from this, I hope it is simply to reflect on what the number on the scale really means to you.
To be clear, this isn’t a suggestion that you instead rely on the way your pants fit or some other measure of your weight, but rather reflect on what any of those numbers mean to you.
Consider how it impacts your self-image, perception of your health, and sense of self-worth.
Reflect on how this relates to your values.
Does it align with your values?
Is it in contrast to your values?
Does it help you live out your values or does it hinder you from doing so?
If you currently weigh yourself regularly, try taking a break from doing so and see how you feel. You might just open the door toward more connection with yourself.
For education on how to ADD nutrition to your favorite Latine cultural dishes, make peace with food, and focus on your health without dieting, join our nutrition library for just $27/month.
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