How to prevent monthly water weight gain?

[Leslie_C]

Ladies,
can you tell me any successful ways to prevent gaining water weight around your TOM? I tend to either maintain or gain 2 or 3 lbs around the week before my period, and its hampering my weight loss. If you think about it, there are only two weeks a month I can successfuly lose weight, because the week before my period I gain, and the week after I lose what I gained so it balances out to zero loss for two weeks. Im on Weight Watchers so Im not eating more during that time, although I sure feel like it!lol...so its not that Im eating more, its just I retain like crazy.

What are ways to counteract this? I know u are supposed to drink more water and avoid sodium, but other than that, is there anything extra to get the scale moving down even during your cycle?

[Supergirl]

You can't really prevent this, but this shouldn't hinder your weight loss. It is just water weight. You can still lose "real" weight (not water weight) even while you are retaining your water weight at each time of the month. Periods can be brutal, but they don't keep us from losing weight! :lol:

So say it's the week that you retain 2-3 pounds, but during that time you lose 1 pound of fat through diet and exercise. When your weight normalizes and the water weight is gone, your scale should not only show that you've lost the 2-3 pound of water weight, but also the pound of fat. If your scale doesn't show any weight loss in addition to losing the water weight, that would just mean that you didn't have any true weight loss that week, but it's not because of your period or the water weight that it temporarily causes.

Hope this makes sense. :)

[zailless]

You read my mind. This is what I researched this week. if i weigh in the morning, i am 139 and if i weigh at night i am 144. i looked up water retention prevention and most sites advocated the use of 1000 mg of calcium for women and to reduce sodium. I eat alot of high salt foods like nuts and high sodium food such as frozen foods. they recommended keeping sodium intake below 1000 mg. the othe option is diuretic. i dont like diuretics because i am afraid of kidney damage. hope this helps.

[ThickHair]

Drink lots of water. You only retain water when you body needs it. If you drink enough then your body won't have to retain.

[chinyere1]

I dont think you should focus on the scale when it is the tom, because you actually dont gain weight. For my tom the month I gain about 5 pounds and then it comes right off a week later. Focus on inches instead of numbers.
hth