Why Athletic Women Should Toss the Bathroom Scale

Women are starting to fuel better, lift heavier, recover smarter; they have fewer aches and pains, but yet we still collectively place huge importance on the number we see on the bathroom scale. This can be problematic for women athletes, as that number is not an accurate representation of the gains you are working towards.

Key Takeaways

If You Want to Change Your Relationship with the Bathroom Scale, You Should:

1. Understand that there are many nuances and complexities when dealing with your relationship with the scale
2. Work towards stopping weighing yourself in whatever unique way feels good to you
3. Remember that the scale is not an accurate representation of the strength gains you are making

The Power of the Scale

The bathroom scale has a collective power over many of us when it comes to being an athletic woman who wants to train and be strong. We can make an entire list of things that have been improving since we started training, but if the scale isn't going down, we have been conditioned to think it is not successful. But the truth is, there are so many gains we get from taking care of ourselves that have nothing to do with counting calories, eating less and moving more, or weighing ourselves every day. The scale can get in the way of your ability to feel at ease with things and fully embrace your identity as an athletic woman.

Focusing on What Matters

Weighing yourself less, removing the scale from your environment, and keeping things in perspective when it comes to gaining muscle mass and bone strength are all ways that you can work on your health rather than the number on the scale. This is not just an aesthetics game anymore; we need to move past being ‘toned’ or ‘skinny’ and focus on what really matters.

When you are fueling yourself better, lifting heavier, and recovering smarter, you begin to have more energy, see more muscle definition and size, see improvements in your recovery and your energy, and so much more. These habits might not lower our body weight to what society idealizes, but they will help you stay strong and healthy for as long as possible.

How does the bathroom scale factor into your relationship with your body, your weight, and your training? Share your thoughts with me in the comments on the episode page.

In This Episode

• Why making strength gains has so many benefits that have nothing to do with the scale (8:29)
• How to know if you are fueling enough for your training (13:59)
• The impact of pressure from diet culture when it comes to maintaining unrealistic weight standards (20:45)
• Understanding how body dysmorphia plays into our relationship with our weight (25:35)
• What you can focus on instead of the bathroom scale (28:26)

Quotes

“I want to help you move past the bathroom scale as having so much power over you as a woman athlete.” (2:21)

“Especially as athletic women, who constantly have the message drilled into us that we need to just eat less and move more, eat less and move more, we deserve a little bit more of a sophisticated conversation than that.” (13:33)

“There can be a lot of reasons why we still continue to put so much emphasis and importance on the scale, even when everything else is better!” (26:06)

“As an athletic woman, relying on weighing yourself less as a metric of your strength, as a metric of your improvements in the way that you are taking care of yourself and the things that you are prioritizing, is a smart way to move eventually.” (30:01)

“There are lots of different things that you can think about, instead of just keeping track of your body weight on the scale.” (39:36)

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