diet success
Weight: 352.8 pounds
Loss since 8/12/14 (101 days): 63.2 pounds
Loss since top weight (423.6 on 9/13/10): 70.8 pounds
Percentage of goal lost: 31.92%
Next Milestone: 76 pounds
Yesterdays food log is HERE
100 days of calorie counting… Results have been good… could have been better but overall results are good.
This chart show my loss and trend line for the last 100 days: 
As you can tell the rate of loss has slowed especially in the last 30 days or so.
This shows my loss since my all time high on 9/13/10
The previous big loss on this chart is when I was on Weight Watchers… It was about as dramatic but not as long, getting down to 354 pounds before gaining again…
So it looks like where I am at now is where I failed during Weight Watchers and I think that is mainly because my lack of staying power… my waning motivation… this is where I have to succeed where I didn’t that time.
It is difficult to stick to.. period… when you have lived with horrible eating habits for a long time sticking to relatively normal ones gets hard… there are no tricks to it… no magic pill… it comes down to mind over matter.. sheer willpower… ans this is where I am at now.
I have ‘backtracked’ a lot recently… over the last 100 days I have actually lost 101.1 pounds… which means I have gained back 37.9 pounds in that same period of time. It is impossible to lose weight everyday without ever gaining anything back, but this shocked me. Going back to one of my Top 10 Diet Motivators, this video talks about ‘backtracking‘… Les says “Why do you want to go on that same journey again?” I have lost focus on this and I need to get that back today!
Going back through my Food Diaries, specifically the ones from the first month, I was eating much simpler, much more often and I had a lot of treats… ice cream cones, salt water taffy, Italian ice, etc… I was also eating more frozen prepared low calorie meals and almost no diet soda… based on all that I need to reevaluate how I am eating as well as what I am eating.
My goal for the next 100 days is to reduce my weight by another 63 pounds (total weight goal of 289.8). I will meet this goal by focusing on what and when I eat, remaining committed to this journey, trying my best to no ‘backtrack’ and adding exercise to my daily routine.
Weight: 354.2 pounds
Loss since 8/12/14 (80 days): 61.8 pounds
Loss since top weight (423.6 on 9/13/10): 69.4 pounds
Percentage of goal lost: 31.3%
Next Milestone: 76 pounds
Yesterdays food log is HERE
Happy Halloween! I haven’t in 9 days… I’ve been busy but mainly I notice that I tend to avoid this if I don’t feel like I am on track… and I didn’t feel like I was until 2 days ago.
In the last 9 days I have had ups and downs, luckily more downs than ups when it comes to my weight. I have lost 7.8 pounds in 9 days which sounds like I have been on track the whole time… not true… I was floundering and then 2 days ago I got back on it and lost 8 pounds in 2 days…
I know weight fluctuates and that most diet ‘people’ tell you to only weigh yourself once a week… I don’t agree… Here is an article about it
Halloween means candy and usually by this time I have purchased many bags of candy (knowing that we get only a few ‘Trick-or-Treaters’) and would have eaten all of what I bought and gone out and bought more… this year I fought the urge.. I haven’t bought any candy yet. I will be going to the store this afternoon and buying a bag or two… and I am going to try to get types that are not among my favorites. It’s been tough at times, but I have to be stronger than the urges.
Oh, this year I am dressed as Half Bearded Pumpkin Man…
Happy Halloween!!!
Weight: 362.8 pounds
Loss since 8/12/14 (70 days): 53.2 pounds
Loss since top weight (423.6 on 9/13/10): 60.8 pounds
Yesterdays food log is HERE
Writing this on 10/22/14… Didn’t have a chance to write yesterday and forgot to weigh myself this morning so I am combining yesterday and today into one post 😉
The weekend and early this week didn’t go as well as I had hoped… I had trouble staying under the calorie limit and felt kind of out of control on my eating… I didn’t go completely out of control but just feeling like I might was horrible… Sunday was the worst day as I went over my calorie limit by 429 calories… the most I have been over since I started this…
I have started eating things that I wouldn’t have thought of eating the first 30 days of this diet… Cheesy Mexican food… McDonalds breakfast, etc. and that shows in the slowing of my weight loss…
So I am going back to basics… something that I haven’t focused on enough is water intake… I know how important that is especially when trying to lose weight… I have been drinking a lot of diet sodas which is something I was staying away from early on… I also have been drinking Gatorade more frequently… So as of now I am using my how to drink more water trick… I have my bottle of water with each cup marked off with the time I need to be at each mark and will be following this starting today!
Another thing I am going to do is review the first couple of weeks of food diaries and see exactly what I was eating… based on that I will be adjusting my current diet to more closely reflect the original foods. Just a quick overview shows I ate much more frequently… smaller dinners in general… Skinny Cow Ice Cream at night… and the big one, Zero Point Spicy Veggy Soup… that is something I will be making today…
Am am reemphasizing my Personal Health Mission Statement which I last revised in February 2011..
I will make myself (my health specifically) my number one priority. I will take steps now to be more active each day. I will prominently display my weight on a graph over my scale and on my blog and update it everyday. I will focus on making the right choices for my food intake both in quality and quantity. I will not punish myself for lapses in my focus.
Which brings us to being active… I have still not added activity to my diet routine and I know this is a huge issue…I have it in my mine everyday and I plan to be more active but it hasn’t happened… I haven’t even been making excuses.. I just don’t do it. This needs to be done now. I will be searching for tricks to make myself more active today and will post what I find that I think will work.
I will keep this quote in my mind…
“Brick walls are there for a reason. The brick walls are not there to keep us out. The brick walls are there to show how badly we want something. Because the brick walls are there to stop the people who don’t want something badly enough. They are there to keep out the other people.” – the late Randy Pausch in his ‘Last Lecture’
I am trying to take this very seriously and regain control now… I want to accomplish this weight loss goal… speaking of goals… next milestone… I was going to set it at 100 pounds lost, but I am setting it as 76 pounds lost… that will make it the largest weight loss I have ever had (beating the 75 pound loss I had back when I was 17-18… going from 273 to 198 in one year)
Weight: 365.0 pounds
Loss since 8/12/14 (69 days): 51.0 pounds
Loss since top weight (423.6 on 9/13/10): 58.6 pounds
Yesterdays food log is HERE
Weight: 364.8 pounds
Loss since 8/12/14 (65 days): 51.2pounds
Loss since top weight (423.6 on 9/13/10): 58.8 pounds
Yesterdays food log is HERE
Big milestone passed… I have lost 50 pounds… in 65 days… that’s an average of 3/4 of a pound a day… If I were able to keep up to that pace I would hit my goal of 218 on April 25, 2015… 191 days… I know that losing as fast as I have been won’t continue… but that was really amazing to me.. less than 9 months since I started this…
Been tough couple of days… still hung in there with the calorie counting.. went to a Mexican restaurant on 10/12… it was fabulous… after eating the way I have been it seemed so decadent… but so good 😉
Moving forward.. .
Weight: 366.6 pounds
Loss since 8/12/14 (58 days): 49.4 pounds
Loss since top weight (423.6 on 9/13/10): 57.0 pounds
Yesterdays food log is HERE
So close!!! I want that 50 pounds!!!
Did well yesterday… went out to the habit and splurged (while staying safely below my calorie limit) and had a double cheeseburger, tempura green beans w/ranch dip and a diet coke.. it was one of my higher calorie meals (1130 calories) but it was something that I was craving and it was so good!
My health is about the same… neuropathy the same… exercise about the same (meaning non-existent)… mood is hit and miss…
Weight: 367.0 pounds
Loss since 8/12/14 (57 days): 49.0 pounds
Loss since top weight (423.6 on 9/13/10): 56.6 pounds
Yesterdays food log is HERE
I have been floundering for a couple of days… eating more foods that aren’t the best use of my calories… I have lost some of the initial motivation… but then… out of the blue… I get a big weight swing… lost 4.6 pounds since yesterday… I have lost exactly 49 pounds in 57 days,, and I am feeling better now 😉 I got through the 370’s and am 1 pound short of 50 pounds lost…
I have to admit that for a long time I told myself that I couldn’t lose significant amounts of weight… I have a strange schedule.. I’m too old… I enjoy life and that includes eating large meals… Once I started losing I still had that little voice in the back of my mind saying that I wasn’t going to be able to continue this weight loss… Well today it is silent… I’m sure it will be back when my motivation lags… I just need to continue to ignore it and power through!
I am renewed with the ‘I Can’ attitude
Weight: 379.0 pounds
Loss since 8/12/14 (42 days): 37.0 pounds
Loss since top weight (423.6 on 9/13/10): 44.6 pounds
(Note: on the graph above you will see where the yellow and red lines jump down.. this is when I reset them to make it more effective.. if you leave the lines the same from day one it makes it easy to slack off as there is a lot of distance to gain before you hit a line.. so resetting them lower makes it have more incentive to stick with it.)
So as expected my weight loss has slowed… I was at a bad plateau for a while… oh course that makes it harder to stick to the calorie limit but I have been able to do it so far. I have been struggling eating much during the day (breakfast and lunch) and then eating a lot for dinner.. this is not the best way to do this.. am still using the MyFitnessPal app on my phone religiously and using their website as well, www.myfitnesspal.com… I track everything that I eat and drink and often plan out my meal on there first and then serve myself accordingly… This planning helps the most when eating out…
I have been trying to diversify my foods… I have added hard boiled eggs to my diet and some more fruit… but one of my downfalls has been diet sodas… I have been drinking too much of this and need to limit them to 1 a day and increase my water intake.My moods have not been good.. grumpiness from the diet and have had no motivation at all for anything. Am going to try my best to stay focused and try to not be in a bad mood.. I should be in a good mood since I am sticking to this and losing weight, right?
My health has been good.. I definitely feel an improvement overall… When I walk a flight of stairs I am not winded… It feels like my low back issue is a little better… My Peripheral Neuropathy pain in both feet is still constant and at times severe… I am hopeful that at some point the weight loss will help, but there is a good chance that it won’t help. I plan to schedule an appointment with my doctor when I hit 10% of my body weight lost (41.6 pounds will be 10%) and have a physical… when I hit 41.6 lost that will mean I have lost 21% of my goal loss of 198 pounds…
No one has said anything about me losing weight but I think it isn’t real obvious to others yet… For me my belly is MUCH smaller… it isn’t hard and protruding as much as it has.. I have been using notches in my belts that haven’t been used in awhile… I have worn a couple of shirts that were too tight to wear before.. so all in all I am happy with my progress so far.
Exercise is still something I need to dive into… there are no excuses really other than me just not doing it. I don’t need anything to go for a walk, ride the exercise bike, play the fitness games on xBox with Kinex…
No one commented after my last post asking people to let me know if they are reading this blog.. so I guess I am doing this for just me at this point… but please comment if you do read this at some point.
Wednesday 1/22/14….
Been having severe sweet tooth issues… but have been trying to be mindful of portion sizes on my meals.. have been avoiding fast food… I am still only exercising once a week (walk with daughter Toria) and have stared my water drinking method today so hopefully that will help also. Weight loss chart below… staying just under the yellow line so far… contemplating doing a 1 meal juice replacement but trying to get the mindset for it.
Below are my accomplishments from my last update (1/8/14) and how I have been doing on them…
- No fast food (had Carl’s Jr. breakfast the morning Cece and I went to Disneyland… no other fast food)
- Less diet soda (sticking with this… drinkking some fruit juice and more water)
- Limited regular soda (been sticking to this one too)
- Smaller portions at meals (Hit and miss.. in general I would say smaller portions, but not always)
- Walking once a week… just under 1 mile (walked on Wednesdays with Toria… didn’t want to last week but I did)
- Trying to eat fruit everyday (not really following this. Will try harder now)
- Just being more aware of my food intake (I am doing okay with this)
Adding:
- Drink more water everyday.
First, let me explain my week… last Monday (6/27/11) I weighed 405.4… I started watching my foods and trying to cut way down on my intake and on what I ate… it was hard sometimes like when my family and I went to a Chinese place for dinner… I stuck to my plan and had steamed fish and veggies.. I took a bite of 2 of the dishes floating around the table… but only a bite… anyway today I weighed in at 394.0… that is a loss of 11.4 pounds in a week… my goal was 10 pounds so I am very happy!
On top of that my two best friends in the world (Stuart and Joe) contacted me and said that they were both going to be at Weight Watchers this week.. Stuart has been going and he talked Joe into going… they asked me to join too… at first my immediate response was to say no thank you.. but then I started thinking… Stuart and Joe have been my best friends since Kindergarten… that is 42 years ago.. they have always been there through thick and thin… and have always been very supportive to me.. how could I pass up the opportunity to get and give support from these two? I couldn’t.. so I sucked it up and got up on a Sunday morning and signed up for Weight Watchers.
Now I have never been involved with Weight Watchers, but I have heard good things about it… and I know that even when I have success with my own weight loss efforts they are usually short lived… the meeting was good.. the instructor was nice and knowledgeable… after the main meeting we had an orientation and the system was explained… pretty much like I figured.. instead of counting the way you do for the Richard Simmons plan you count with Points… there is an easy way to calculate points from nutritional facts.. there are a bunch of tools on the website for members to use that seem very cool… So I dove in! Started right then and there.. my official WW weight was 400.6 which with my gender and age gave me 71 points per day…
During the orientation the lady mentions that the points go from 29 to 71 max.. so that hit me too that I am at the max allowed points for their system.. at first I thought ‘cool’ but then it started to bother me… It is very cool that everything is totally anonymous.. unless I tell someone my weight or points allowed they have no idea and it is never mentioned… I like that.
So after the meeting we stood around and talked for a little while, then I went home and started learning about the WW plan.. I stuck to it with really no issue… we had a BBQ planned for dinner and decided to try a new place out here for lunch… I chose to have 6 buffalo wing appetizer and a side order of sauteed veggies and a fruit cup… It was all very good… and it was hard to watch my youngest eat a cheeseburger that had grilled cheese sandwiches on the top and bottom in place of the buns… and my middle son eating a sausage and chili omelet… but I survived… then at the BBQ dinner I was able to have a rib eye steak, grilled Portabella mushroom, baked potato with sour cream and butter, corn on the cob with butter and a hot dog (no bun) for dinner… note these were all smaller portions than I would normally have… the rib eye was a thinner cut so it was only about 8 oz where I would normally be 16 oz or more…
After all was said and done I had used 66 points so I was under my allowance by 5 points.. and it wasn’t ‘that’ hard.
So now I have a specific plan and I am going to be doing it with my buddies.. I am using the momentum of the successful week and spring boarding into another 2 digit loss week… my goal this week is 10 pounds lost.