How to Track Your Weight Loss Progress

As you get going with your weight loss program, one thing that you’ll want to be doing is making sure that you’re tracking your weight loss progress by taking before and after weight loss pictures and measurements. During those times when motivation begins to lag, a good progress journal can do the trick to get you back on track.

Here’s how to track your weight loss progress results with measurements and pictures.

4 Tips to Track Your Weight Loss Progress

Take Your Starting Stats

First things first, make sure that you take your starting stats. This will help you know where you started and will be what you can then use to evaluate all the weight loss progress you make.

Remember that no one has to see these stats or pictures, so don’t feel shy about getting them down.

Grab a tape measure and measure the following areas:

• Your waist circumference
• Your hip circumference
• Your arm circumference
• Your upper thigh circumference

Also take your body weight and if you have access to it, you may also have a body fat test taken. Assessing your body fat is the single best way to gauge progress, so if you can get that checked, do so. In addition to that, also take your beginning pictures, taking them from the front, side, and if you can, back.

Determine Your Re-Check Intervals

Next, determine how often you’ll re-check these stats. How often you do this should depend on how aggressive your plan is as well as how much weight you have to lose. The more weight you have to lose, the faster the changes will typically be (at least in the beginning). A good interval length is about once every two weeks if you have 40+ pounds to lose or once every three or four weeks if you have less than 40 pounds to lose.

Write these re-check days on your calendar and then every time they come up, recheck those measurements.

Take Your Numbers At The Same Time Daily

One tip to ensure accurate results is to make sure that you take the measurements at the same time every day, preferably immediately upon waking. This is especially important when aiming to get an accurate body weight as if you eat a few meals and then test your weight, you’ll get a very different number. You want everything to stay as consist as possible each time you check. This helps ensure any changes you do see are strictly related to progress you’ve made.

Tips To Perfect Your Before and After Weight Loss Pictures

Finally, be sure that you take good progress pictures. If you’re making the effort to get your weight down, you want your before and after pictures to be as helpful as possible.

Here are some tips:

• Wear the same clothing/underwear each time
• Wear as little clothing as you feel comfortable wearing
• Keep the lighting in the room the same
• Take pictures from all angles so you get the full view of your before and after weight loss progress

Once the progress pictures are taken, you can now compare them back to back and see the real changes that are taking place. Often it’s hard to notice the results you’re seeing when you look at yourself each and every day. But, when you compare how you looked two months ago with how you look today, it will become very clear just how far you’ve come.