It may seem hard to believe that the bathroom scale can be your enemy in low-fat living but if you’re accustomed to a morning weigh-in that leaves you feeling guilty, angry, discouraged or demoralized, then it’s worse than your enemy – it’s a skilled saboteur that stands ready to undercut your fat-fighting work.
Think about what happens when you step on that accusatory scale. Most of the time, it just delivers the bad news – that you haven’t lost weight or, worse, you’ve gained weight. Sure, the numbers are accurate, but the tale they tell is not the whole story. Those numbers on your scale typically tell half-truths. Your scale may tell you that you’ve gained ten pounds, when in truth you may have lost 5 pounds of muscle and gained 15 pounds of fat. If that’s happened, the scales give you the illusion that you’re only 10 pounds overweight, when in fact you need to shake off 15 pounds of fat.
On the other hand, the news might be better than the scale says. If you’ve been on a low fat program, for instance, your scale may say you’ve lost only 7 pounds after three months. But in fact you may...