Weekly deficit matches, but results differ?

I've been experimenting with the way I distribute my calories across the week. The total weekly deficit comes out about the same, yet the scale seems to move down more when I eat a little extra on the weekend and stay stricter during the week.

It might simply be water retention from more carbs and sodium, but this same pattern has shown up several times now.

Would you base your judgment on the weekly average alone, or would you try to keep daily intake steadier?

nikeboi17 said:

I've been experimenting with the way I distribute my calories across the week. The total weekly deficit comes out about the same, yet the scale seems to move down more when I eat a little extra on the weekend and stay stricter during the week.

It might simply be water retention from more carbs and sodium, but this same pattern has shown up several times now.

Would you base your judgment on the weekly average alone, or would you try to keep daily intake steadier?

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I'll be straight with you: tracking what my body does from one day to the next is something I stopped bothering with. It follows no pattern I can find. Some weeks the scale moves down even when everything I know says it shouldn't, and then I'll have a week where I stick to the plan more rigidly than ever and the number just sits there. Spending your time and energy hunting for a logical explanation inside the least logical bodies around will drive you up the wall. That's how it goes for me, anyway.

Oddly enough, I set 1200 cal as my target, ended up eating around 1400 cal, and the weight loss that actually happened pointed to something closer to 1500 cal per day.

Staying accurate with tracking isn't easy..

So my approach was to set the bar low and then let weight adjustments plus exercise even things out.

That method gave me an average of 2lbs a week across 31 weeks, and I dropped 27% to reach goal.

Measuring is something we're not great at.. still, my belief is that it comes down to weekly averages.

Throughout the whole period I was losing, I logged every single thing I ate, every day.

That makes sense to me. There have been weeks when nothing seemed off, yet the scale moved however it pleased. Looking at the weekly average is likely a far more accurate picture.