lose 100 pounds

My annual physical made me get serious about this goal again. A pound and a half a week or so should get me there the Christmas after next (2009) I’ve kept serious for the last three weeks straight. If I keep this up, I’ve promised to reward myself every month on my birthdate.

- I’m basically trying to eat several small meals a day, each of which have a mix of protein and fruit for the most part. (Apples with peanut butter or cottage cheese with blueberries or a roasted chicken wrap with some radishes… Ok so radishes aren’t fruit but you get the idea.) I’m not hungry since every three hours or so, I’ve got something packed that I get to eat. I got one of those cool Indian “tiffin” containers with three tiers that I take to work.

- I have started COOKING pretty much all my food. I’ve always found it a blast to be in the kitchen with my Mib7 and now that I’m not starving when I come home from work, we can cook together nearly every day. Previously, it was easy for me to feel slightly resentful of some lower-cal meals but since I’m the one who made ‘em, that’s not a problem anymore. Also, since dinner is now later in the day, I don’t have the problem of being hungry at night which means I haven’t been having those huge snacks.

- We’ve started walking again. We have three routes, each roughly 5K / 3 miles and we’ve walked one or the other of them at least 4x week, usually more. I also have a couple dumb bells that I use for a routine in the morning. I’m concerned about losing muscle mass but I really don’t have time to hit a gym right now. Maybe when these techniques stop working and I have to jump start the process.

- I log absolutely everything I eat. I weigh it on this cool scale I got several years ago at a kitchen store and I measure everything else with cup measures. The name of that tune is portion control. I’ve been trying to stay near the number of calories I’d burn if I actually weighed what I want to weigh. I use an on-line food journal (fitday.com) which has scads of cool reports including nutritional breakdowns which provides eye-opening data at times. I had a couple handfuls of “cheesie puffs” which I thought were an innocent indulgence but which actually have, roughly, a ga-billion calories mostly from fat. I’m trying to keep carbohydrate calories below 45% of my intake.

I can’t easily IMAGINE 100 pounds let alone conceive of how I’m going to lose it.

I’ve got to change it in my mind so that I “think” it says “Lose 20 pounds by the end of June” or I’ll go crazy!

I just stepped off the scales and I stand before you a penitent yet determined man: I weigh more than I ever have in history. Granted I’m weighing myself at night when I usually weigh myself in the morning and granted it’s the end of a weekend and I usually consume MANY more calories on weekend days than on average week days—still the point stands. I am not heading in the right direction here, folks.

—I’m already logging pretty much everything I eat;

—Stop, just STOP eating anything after dinner. It disrupts my sleep and usually doesn’t have anything to do with hunger;

—I’ve GOT to add muscle mass to increase my resting metabolism. But I am honestly pretty ashamed to go to the Y even though it’s 1/4 mile away and I already pay for membership. I’ve got some free weights at my house and though I don’t have enough room for a bench, I can do quite a few exercises standing or lying on the floor;

—As soon as there’s less snow and ice outside, start that “couch to 5K” program again. I’d like to run/walk one of those by June.

This week begins the season of Lent leading toward its glorious culmination in Easter. That’s a convenient time frame for re-evaluation.

I just re-read my previous entries on this goal and how, I ask you Gentle Reader, how can I expect you to believe that I have once again taken up the challenge of losing a third of my body weight especially as so many apparently sincere attempts have been made in the past?

I frankly cannot believe it myself. I simply refuse to believe that I am actually attempting to lose weight especially in the midst of all the insanity of my life at this moment. Regardless, losing weight I am.

I’ve started again on February 1st and I hope to get down to 300 lbs by the end of February. (I gasp as I type that because it sounds too pathetic for words!) I’ve started logging everything I eat on http://www.fitday.com which is good for no other reason than I become aware of what I’m cramming in my face. If the calculations are correct, I need to eat 4,000 to keep myself as fat as I am right now. If I can eat, say, only 3,000 calories a day then I should be losing 2 lbs a week (assuming of course my metabolism doesn’t crash.) I am trying to drink lots of water and also to “do” at least one activity I normally wouldn’t every day (shovel snow, take walk, etc.) This time of year I would rather hibernate so it’s a bit of a chore to get motivated.

The carrot (yum, carrot) at the end of this 100 lb stick is that I’ve told myself I can quit my crappy job if/when I lose this much weight. Hope I can hold out that long.

Let’s just make this public, OK; no secrets among ourselves here on 43things, right? I just stepped off the scales wearing my sweat-soaked running shorts and t-shirt, no shoes, and the numbers read: 305.5

At a pound a week, I could get below 300 before Hallowe’en, and then into the 280’s by Christmas. That’d be a great goal and a manageable time frame.

Intake: oatmeal in the mornings; no chips; no cheese; skimmed milk (2% milk tastes like cream!); 2 pints of beer a week max. Maybe more of the “scotch broth” oat stew.

Exercise: start the “couch to 5K” plan training plan for aerobics; push around some iron every other day for muscle tone.

I saw a doctor on Monday who was concerned about how “jolly” this Santa had become. He scheduled me for a blood test next week—cholesterol, lipids, liver functions, etc… heck I wouldn’t be surprised if I look like a prune once they suck that much blood out of me. So I am now on a self-diagnosed “Only Oats” diet, at least until the blood draw. Maybe not ONLY oats but I am eating at least some oats at every meal: Steel cut oats with brown sugar in the morning, a cup of dried Cheerios at lunch, a bowl of Cheerios after work and for dinner, I have been really creative. I chopped up some onion and garlic (LOTs of garlic) and made steel cut oats with low salt broth. The result is this really nice and hearty oat stew. The steel cut oats really give you something to chew and I love something warm and savory for dinner. After the blood test I’m going to try cutting out meat and hard alcohol until the follow up test. This means no egg nog, no Christmas roast or gravy or those wonderful pies that Mib7 makes (We were going through a whole home-made apple pie every week there for awhile!) Let alone figgy pudding or sugar plums, though I have no idea what either of those are. On the bright side, I think I can also cut out fruit cakes!

So far I’ve lost 4 pounds! Only 96 to go.

Just to remind myself when the going gets tough:

—It’s hard to find stylish clothes in XXXL. (It’s hard to spell “XXXXL”)

—Land’s End doesn’t even make boring button-down Oxfords with 18 1/2 inch neck in the colors that you want.

—It takes a lot of effort to stay this fat (Remember HOW MANY calories it takes just to maintain this weight.) Give up the effort and let yourself get slimmer.

—It stinks to get out of breath while walking up a hill.

—Wouldn’t it be cool to go snowboarding? (Wouldn’t THAT embarrass the little ones?)

—Wouldn’t it be AMAZING to fit in your old fencing uniform, let alone fence a couple rounds without passing out or something. En Garde!

—Wouldn’t it be cool to get a white linen suit and not remind people of the iceberg that sunk the Titanic or that fat bad guy from “Casablanca?”

—Your high school reunion is coming up and don’t you want to make all the girls cry who broke your heart way back when?

—Your anniversary is coming up in a couple years and don’t you want to make Mib7 remember the handsome devil she saw at the other end of the aisle?

—People as fat as you can’t ride horses, can they? For the sake of the poor horse’s back, drop a few pounds, won’t ya, buddy? Wouldn’t it be cool to ride a horse again? Yee-Haa!

—It’d be easier to do chin-ups if you had to lift 100 pounds less.

—Two words: Muffin top.