My ticker

Not my heart, but the weight-loss ticker above. Yeah, about the current reading...

My husband and I recently joined TOPS together, not only as a way to get some support from like-minded folks, but to give ourselves some weekly accountability to people who might be a little more objective than family and friends.

The last time I'd weighed myself at the gym, I was 406. The first time I was weighed at TOPS (which was only a few weeks later), I was 394. I was surprised that I'd supposedly lost 12 pounds in a few weeks without doing anything differently, and thought maybe something was wrong with the scale*.

I received more ammo for those thoughts at my second weigh-in, two weeks later (we skipped a week because my plane was delayed and got in too late to make it to what should have been our second meeting). I'd gone from weighing in at 394 at the first meeting to 403.5 two weeks later.

Despite the fact that I think the scale was off the first week*, and I probably really did weigh 406, giving me a 2.5lb. loss (as opposed to a 9.5lb. gain), I'm leaving my starting weight as 394, so my numbers here will match my TOPS numbers.

So yeah, it might look like I've gained 9.5 pounds, but I really don't think I did, and in the end it won't matter anyway. If I get to my goal weight, I will have lost over 200 pounds - it really won't make a difference if it's 221 or 231.

*Our TOPS group uses a standard balance beam scale (with the slide weights), and the way they get around the fact that it only goes up to 350 is to attach a clamp to the beam, which adds 121 pounds to the final result. I'm wondering if our weigher clamped it in the wrong spot that first week, resulting in the 10lb. difference. I just can't wait until I no longer need the clamp, so I know it's accurate.