20 Pounds In 20 Weeks: Week 4, Fighting Optimism

I wasn’t expecting much in the way of weight loss this week.  After my 1 pound drop last week, I figured I might plateau for a bit.  But one thing I should have learned is that weight drops can surprise you.  So I was pleasantly surprised to see 195.5 pop up on the scale.  That meant a drop of 3 1/2 more pounds and brought me a hair away from the halfway mark.

Now, I find myself in the unusual position of fighting my sense of optimism.  Part of me looks at my weight loss this past month and figures that I’ve lost 2 pounds per week on average.  If I continue like that, I find myself thinking, I’ll be pretty much at my goal weight by time we go to Disney World for the Disney Social Media Moms conference.

Some optimism is good, but you’ve got to keep things in perspective.  Like last week’s advice not to give in to pessimism when your scale numbers don’t plummet like they do on TV, too much optimism can be a bad thing.  If you optimistically expect huge weight loss numbers, you’re just setting yourself up for disappointment.  Of course, some optimism is healthy.  You don’t want to go into a weight loss plan thinking “I’ll end this at the exact weight I started at” or “I might lose a couple of pounds but I won’t reach my goal.”  However, you also don’t want to say “I lost 3 pounds last week so I can expect to lose at least that much every single week or else I’m failing at weight loss.”  It’s all about balance.