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Monday, April 30, 2007

Week 13 Weigh-In

330 lbs. baby! 4.6 lbs. loss this week! 50 lbs. overall loss!
I know...I know...I won't continue to lose weight at this rate. I will hit a plateau or 2 or 10. Actually, I am astonished and humbled by the amount that I seem to continue to lose each week. I fully expect it to slow down. I thought it would have happened already.

In the meantime, I am excited that there is 50 lbs. less stress on my heart. There is 50 lbs. less bulk trying to squeeze into my clothes. There is 50 lbs. less weight wearing me out while I play with my kids. There is 50 lbs. reasons to consider bariatric surgery.

This 50 lbs. is merely a reflection of my new lifestyle of fitness. Unlike diets and programs, my new lifestyle is for life. My goal is to live like this always.

p.s. Gross pictures will have to wait until Wednesday since I am out of town.

Living Fit is my #1 Job!

Friday, April 27, 2007

Stress

This week is going well concerning my exercise and eating habits. The stress has been a roller coaster ride relatively speaking. It has all been high with some peaks and shallow valleys.

One mile stone to relieving the stress will be next Friday. I will have a better idea of my future in my profession. Actually, I pretty much know as much as I will then. However, I will know officially. I have a meeting with a bigwig in my profession. It will also get the ball rolling wherever it is going to go. Afterwards, each month will have their own milestones.

Part of my stress started last summer. In June, my mother was diagnosed with cancer. By the end of August, she passed away. She had been the caregiver for my father who has been suffering from Alzheimer's for several years. He has been on medication and the decline has been slight over the years. He is still fairly good, but cannot live on his own.

I was left in charge of everything. I have been getting all his assets in order, taking him to doctor appointments, etc... My sister has been a great help in that she takes care of him much of the time. We do switch off though. Anyhow, my sister lives 3 1/2 hours away. My father's banks, house, and doctors are 3 hours away. Since my mother fell ill until the end of November, I was making that trip every week. Since then, it has been 2-3 times a month. This has wreaked havoc with my time spent with family and work. When I come home, my dad's stuff does not get left behind. I still must make appointments, pay his bills, etc... when I am back.

Oh, did I mention that on top of all that, my wife is pregnant. She needs more of my time rather than less. So what does silly me do? I add in an exercise routine and healthy eating. To top it off, I keep telling myself that right now, exercise and eating healthy are more important than anything else (see my post on priorities).

Stress is abundant. If can I survive the next 4-5 months, I think the stress in my life will reduce to a more acceptable level. Next Friday is really the first step.

Living Fit is my #1 Job!

Monday, April 23, 2007

Week 12 Weigh In

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This morning the scale read 334.6 lbs. This is a 4 lbs. loss since last week. So far I have lost over 45 lbs. It's hard not to be happy about that.

In one sense, I am amazed that I have been losing so quickly because of all the stress in my life right now. On the other hand, I have been intentional about my fitness habits. I have made them my number one priority in spite of the garbage happening in my life. I truly believe that my fitness habits are the only reason I have not had a nervous break down...yet.

Living Fit Is My #1 Job!

Thursday, April 19, 2007

Why are the odds so bad?

I have heard a lot of statistics about regaining weight. For example, one study claims that 80-85% of people who lose a significant amount of weight regain it. It is a common story. In fact, many people gain more weight than they lost. I can attest to that. So why are the odds so bad?

There are many theories. Personally, I remember a specific moment. I had lost 75lbs. Then I got sick. I had strep throat. I probably lost a bunch of weight that week, but I never really got back into living healthy again. I slowly started exercising again, but I never returned to the level prior to my illness. I started doing stupid things like baking cookies...for the kids!!! At first, I did not over-indulge.

Gradually I started to let other things interfere with my exercise. Then, I started snacking at night. Eventually, the exercise went out the door and the healthy eating dissappeared. This took about 9 months.

The weight started piling on as I slipped back into old habits...sometimes with a vengence. I kept telling myself that I would get back on track soon. Soon ended up three years later and 115 lbs. heavier.

What is so frustrating is that when I was living healthy, I felt great and had no desire to return to my previous eating habits. Even when I allowed myself to indulge a little, the food never tasted as good as I remembered. Now, I am happy and content with my eating and exercise. In fact, my wife bought me a couple of my favorite Easter candies, but I have had no interest in eating them. They are sitting on my shelf above my computer collecting dust.

So what happened in my brain that led me down that path? What can I do to prevent it in the future? I know...eat healthy and exercise. I did that last time. Maybe the accountability that I have set up for myself by this blog will help. But then again, what started me thinking down this path was the amount of weight-loss blogs I have seen which have been inactive for a year or more.

If anyone has some words of wisdom, please share them.

Living Fit Is My #1 Job

Monday, April 16, 2007

Week 11 Weigh-In

After a solid week with no weigh-in and a horrible week for healthy eating, I weighed in at 338.6 lbs. This is down 2.2 lbs. since my weigh-in 2 weeks ago.

I planned to eat healthy on my vacation. We did eat out a lot, but that was not the entire problem. For the most part I chose healthy foods at restaurants like grilled chicken salads with dressing on the side. Even at the fancy Italian restaurant, I ordered a chicken dish...OK, it was wrapped with prosciutto and covered in a cream sauce...and we all had tiramisu for desert. Even that was only one night.

The problem was the lack of fruits and vegetables and snacks, and control over meals at our hosts home. We visited some friends of ours and stayed at their house. Hence, we were a bit captive to whatever they prepared for us to eat. They served eggs and bacon one morning, fried hash another. We had some sort of pork steaks one night with a fried cabbage dish (so much for the veggies), another night was beer brats with chips. I did avoid the bacon, hash, and chips, but I was not able to maintain the healthy eating habits I had set in place for myself.

I know the real problem was my mouth. I did not open it to tell my hosts about my healthy eating. In fact, nobody knows but my wife and kids and anyone reading here. I just hate how people have treated me in the past when they knew I was on a "diet." For example, "A friend of my nephew's ex-wife lost a bazillion pounds by eating 1 plain bagel a day and nothing else. That's what you should do if you really want to lose weight," or "You're eating too much. I see you eating all day. Did you give up on your diet?"

When people see that I am losing weight, they will start saying those stupid things anyhow. I hate all those well-meaning comments and advice. It's almost as bad as those strangers who come up to you and say, "You really need to lose weight for your health. You are caring way too much weight." Grrrrr!!!

Anyhow, I did not open my mouth to tell our hosts. I am guessing that I had lost more weight the week before and gained a couple back this last week. I am still down, so I will hang on to that and get this week started off better. On a positive note, I was plenty active. I did a lot of walking, not vigorous, but not sitting on my butt all day either. I had a great time and was glad to spend so much time with my kids.

Living Fit Is My #1 Job

Friday, April 6, 2007

Priorities

During this process, I have discovered something about priorities. Life priorities are not always as simple as they seem. For example, if my priority is to save money then I might have to spend money (buy an IRA) or loan it to someone for a period of time (CD). In the long run, I will save more money by using the money, thus keeping my priority. Of course, I wouldn't book a cruise or loan money to a friend to save money.

In my life I have many priorities. I used to think that I needed to rank them.
#1 God
#2 Family
#3 Friends
#4 Work
#5 Self

Therefore, if a matter comes up with the family, I had to brush off work and friends to deal with it. This certainly isn't true. I realized along time ago that God is a part of all my priorities. Therefore, I did not need to rank God in such a way as to make him opposed to everything else.

Recently, I realized that there is a symbiotic relationship between my priorities. For example, spending 8-12 hours a day at work is not putting work over my family. Instead, I am showing that I care for my family by providing for them and giving my kids a good role model. However, if I spend 7 days week, 365 days a year working 12 hours a day, I would be putting work over family. After all, I need to participate in the family sometime.

Now, when I start to think of all my priorities (I have more than I listed, and even those listed can be broken down further), I realized how complicated things can get AND how easy it is to excuse my behavior by hiding behind some priority. What was the biggest thing I was excusing myself for? My fitness of course (which would be a subcategory of self).

If I take those basic priorities I listed above, I cannot truly put any of them first if I am not healthy. How can I make my family a priority if I live a lifestyle that will certainly end in my early death? What kind of lifestyle do I give as an example to my family? Heck, even playing horsie is hard on my back.

How can I make work a priority, if I live in such a way that I will be sick, contribute to the health care burden, and have low energy?

No matter how I look at it, if I don't live a fit lifestyle I am putting all my priorities way down on the list. Instead, I am putting myself way on top, but only in the worst way. I am really saying that eating cookies and Fettucine are more important than being around for my children and one day, grandchildren. I am really saying that sitting, pfft! who am I kidding, LAYING on the couch in front of the TV is more important than having energy to do a great job at work.

On the other hand, if I put my fitness first, I am really raising all my other priorities. By putting my fitness first I am really showing how important all my other priorities are to me.

This might sound like I am putting self in the #1 slot. Maybe so, but I am doing it in a good way. Before, I was doing it in a bad way...a self-destructive way. But I really don't look at it that cut and dried. As I said before, I think that my priorities have a symbiotic relationship. I don't really need to rank them.

What I do need to do is look at how my fitness affects all my other priorities. As complicated as they can all get, my fitness affects them all. So if they are truly priorities for me, I need to focus on my fitness. This is why I adopted the motto: Living Fit Is My #1 Job! To me, this says that all my other priorities are truly important to me.

Living Fit Is My #1 Job!

Thursday, April 5, 2007

Notch-O, Notch-O Man...I Wanna Be a Notch-O Man

I had a nice surprise this week. My belt which previously was too tight on the last notch is now resting comfortably one notch in. I have a feeling that it won't be too long before I need to bring it in another notch. Even if the pictures don't show it, the scale, my clothes, and now my belt show the effects of my lifestyle of fitness.

Living Fit Is My #1 Job!

Great No-Nonsense Article

Here is a nice article that cuts through the hype, the paranoia, the conspiracy theories, and all that garbage. This article discusses the different diets like calorie counting, low-fat/high fiber (The one I follow), High-protein/low-carb, and meal replacement diets. It also talks about the sugar and fat substitutes (Or try snopes.com). If you have heard of Dr. Dean Edell, this is part of his website.

Living Fit Is My #1 Job!

Wednesday, April 4, 2007

Gross pictures

It was not my official weigh-in day, but the scale read 339 lbs. It doesn't count until Monday, but I will be missing this Monday's weigh-in, so I figures I would post these when I had the chance.



Living Fit Is My #1 Job!

Monday, April 2, 2007

Week 9 Weigh-In


Today's weight was 340.8 lbs. a 4.6lb. loss from last week. That was quite exciting, if not surprising. I thought the amount of weight loss would start to taper off a bit. I was quite surprised.

However, I am nervous about about the week after Easter. This week will be fine. Next week, we are going on a vacation to visit some friends. It will be difficult to impossible to keep the same eating regimine I have now. In addition, I have found that it's very difficult to get fruits and whole grains on vacation. Getting veggies is usually easy enough, but watching out for foods with hidden fats is hard.

The exercise routine won't be a problem since it's recommended that you give the body a week off now and then. As long as I am active, I will be fine. We have plenty of plans that include lots of walking, like the zoo, botanical gardens, science center, etc...

Anyhow, that means no official weigh-in next week. I need to be careful and respect myself enough so that they weigh-in in 2 weeks will be good news. This week when the scale dips to 340 even, I will post some more yucky pictures.

Living Fit Is My #1 Job!