Let's Talk Woman to Woman (Men, you have been warned)

Every single woman knows that once a month our bodies turn into an alien beings, and the changes that are inflicted upon us MOST CERTAINLY affect our weight and our weight loss. 

This week I have been dealing with the monster inside me that keeps telling me I need to eat, Eat, EAT!  Its not about being hungry. Its about the monster's need for "MORE ENERGY".  What does it need the energy for?  Beats me.  But the monster is hard to deny.  VERY hard.  

Yes, the monster is responsible for other things as well: stomach cramping, back pain so intense it feels as if someone is going to snap you in two, soreness in your chest that makes it hard to even get dressed without wincing, unstoppable tears for the smallest of reasons or even no reason at all, and temper tantrums and snippy comments directed at anyone who comes within a ten mile radius of you (often accompanied by demonic voices and head spinning).  But these things aren't derailing our weight loss attempts.  The uncontrollable urge to eat everything in sight is something which does affect our weight loss.

The other thing?  The weight gain we experience during this time.  I have believed for quite some time that I gain about five pounds each month during this time.  I have never documented it .... until now.  This morning I woke up with that familiar feeling of bloating.  I knew what it was immediately.  (Of course I did, because of all the other lovely symptoms that accompany it).  Now, under normal conditions, I would NEVER step on a scale during this time.  But today I thought, why not?  Why not get proof of what I have always believed.  So I did it.  I stepped on the scale.  Sure enough, I was two pounds heavier than my most recent weigh-in.  I told myself not to panic.  Intellectually, I know what this is.  I talked myself out of picking up the scale and throwing it through the window out onto the lawn.  I took a deep breath and wrote the number down.  Next week, I will repeat the process, and I GUARANTEE you that it will be five pounds less.  I know I am right about this.  

This makes me think about why this "water" weight gain is never addressed on those television weight loss reality shows.  They weigh the people in every week.  Some of those people are women.  Yet when a woman has no weight loss one week, no one ever says, "Well, duh, its my time of month!" Why do they talk about the work they've done and why the weight loss is not showing on the scale when everyone knows why the scale doesn't show the weight loss the woman should be seeing?  This makes me crazy.  

So now, once and for all, I am getting proof FOR ALL WOMAN ON THEIR WEIGHT LOSS JOURNEY that you can tell the scale to bugger off during this time of the month.  Seriously.  

Men are so lucky.  Period.  (Pun intended). 

(photograph courtesy of www.theberry.com)