Playing Catch-up

First day back from our 7 day cruise I weighed in at 298.5 lbs - back where I started the year - *sigh*. Oh well, back on the program again. I did walk for 1 hour 3 of the 7 days on the cruise but as the week wore on I was walking a lot in port and opted to skip the track. Probably a bad idea.

At any rate, today being Wednesday I'm at 297 lbs and 21% of the way to my weight goal for January. I'll have to really keep on track if I'm going to hit the target. The current snowy/icy weather is not permitting much evening walking but I am getting a lot of shoveling exercise in. I'm not going to force the weight loss. It'll either come off by my normal eating pattern or not but I'm going to do anything different.

Reviewing and Progressing

One side benefit of including weight loss details, like calorie counts, in blog posts is that they serve as a record not only of results, but also of how. In reviewing entries from 2010 I noticed a few things:

• I was eating more fruit in the beginning and less as time wore on
• I was having trouble managing the 3x per week load
• I stuck pretty well to the "never eat" list
• Other than alcohol, the no more than once per week list has been managed well

While I intend to do some more spelunking in the 2010 posts, I'm struck by the first 2 items. In the time since I've plateaued, I'm doing better with the 3x per week list (yogurt, broccoli, avocados, and oily fish) than when I started out. I'm still not a sweet potato fan, but I'm doing well with the others. 

In the beginning I think I was just doing the oily fish 3x per week and some of the yogurt but none of the others. Broccoli and avocados were added sometime over the spring when I was having lower GI issues and stopped eating oranges, kiwis and pineapple. I'm not certain what caused the GI issues and they have subsided to some extent, but the high fruit content stopped. Perhaps I'll try returning to it over the winter like last year.

Per usual Wednesday has rolled around and I've jumped down to 295. That's not unusual for midweek. It's the Thursday - Sunday time frame that gets me off track. As I head into that period, I'm resolved not to break what I've started again. That said, I'm also heading into the beginning of my Cruise week so we'll see how it goes. For my HR weigh challenge I've lost 50% of the weight (3.5/7 = .5) I targeted. Toward my 1-2 lbs per week reminder, I'm not looking to loose any more this week. If it happens, it happens, but I want to be at least 296.5 on Monday of next week.

In the spirit of detail keeping, I'm also experimenting with a new pre-dinner experiment. I've wanted to "get more into wine" as part of 2011 and have decided to try 1 (yes just 1) glass of wine (~ 5 oz) with some bread and cheese. The bread I'm making myself over the weekend and the cheese I'm using is decent quality stuff. I'm concerned it'll be too much, but I'm doing this instead of munching "free form" on nuts, etc. Perhaps eating a measured amount of good tasting stuff will keep me from bindging on the not-so-great stuff, at least in quantity. 

One final review item I picked up: the more I blogged, the more consistant and downward trending was the weight loss.. humm...

A Year On

Here it is the first week of 2011 and I'm lighter by nearly 50 lbs than I was at this time last year. Officially at 298.5 lbs. The holidays "forced" me to put on more weight than I wanted. At my lightest, I was 284 - about 15 lbs from where I am now and 4 lbs then from the 280 lb goal - and unable to take that next step.

Still, 2010 was a good year for me. I'm lighter, in better shape and can honestly say that I'm all the better for it despite my 15 lb weight gain from my low point. I'm thrilled that I've lost the weight and disappointed that I can't seem to loose more.

On the plus side, I can see that geting back on the "live and let diet" eating cycle will cause the weight to come off. My problem is that I can't seem to stay on it. I end up eating a few handfulls of this, some of that, and before you know it I'm hauling down a Pop-Tart and a glass of milk. And when I do manage to break the cycle, I end up getting discouraged by not not loosing more than I feel I should.

I feel I have more weight to loose, the hard part is staying true to the goal and not just being satisfied with the nearly 50 I've lost. In looking back at my 2010, I had some goals - see myself, be at 317, 299, 290, etc. Some of those goals were pretty big - like seeing myself. I had no idea how far I had to go or how close I was to 330. Now I see myself daily and can measure progress (more recently lack there of). I hit most of them by loosing 1-2 lbs a week. Somehow during the year I expected to start loosing more per week - big jumps, perhaps in thinking I needed to catch up for the "yo-yo" effect.

I tried jogging (not me), tried eating new items (more yogurt, granola, etc), and all the while expected large per week jumps in weight loss. Perhaps my expectations got the better of me over the summer and (perhaps) what I need to do is return to the expectations I had last year when I started seeing results: That by staying true to how I was eating and putting in my body I can expect to loose a little bit of weight over time. I'd be happy to loose 5-7 lbs in a month, 15 lbs in 3 or so and not let my expectations get the better of me in the short run. It's a long haul game and I need to play it like that.

So to start 2011 I have 2 interesting items: (1) I have a cruise to go on the second week of January. (2) the HR dept at work is issuing a "weight loss accountability" challenge - report on your percentage progress toward a goal. Do I take that as a challenge to try and stick to my 1-2 lbs per week weight loss and shoot for 6-7 lbs lost in January (back being 290 or so) while at the same time doing a cruise?? Last cruise I lost 3 lbs by exercising, taking the stairs and watching what I ate.

I think I'm up to a January challenge to be 290 come the end of the month.

Dog Days of Summer

Here it is August and I see that then entire month of July evaporated with out a post. Between enjoying the outdoors during our brief New England summer and vacations, posting has not been on my mind.

On the exercise front I started jogging during part of my walking route. About 1/3 of the way is a slow to moderate jog while the rest is "recovery" walking. Although I had great hopes for this in early June, July's heat wave forced me from this new routine. I hope to get back into walking/jogging more regularly when the weather starts to cool again.

On the weight side I'm down to about 290 (give or take a pound or 2 - darn scale). That's 7 lbs in about 6 weeks or so. Not bad for summer time, traveling and out door gatherings. I feel pretty good about a pound a week.

That mark also (finally) puts me past the 50 lb loss mark! So I guess I need a new goal - I'm thinking 280 would be a good target. I've got a 5 lb head start on the goal and hitting it would be 65 lbs gone! My target date is Oct 31. That gives me some padding in case I plateau out.

As far as eating patterns go, I'm getting a little tired of my current lunch rotation - salad with either fruit/avocado or sardines. I'm going to try using tuna instead of sardines and work the avocado in some other way. 6 months of salads is about to drive me nuts!

The Process Continues

Not much to report this week. I'm down to 297 lbs this week. I seem to have gotten past the 30x weigh-point.

I think picking up my daily walking helped move me past that point. I'm trying to walk for 1 hour every evening if it's not raining out. So far I've only missed 1 night in 10 days. On Saturday's I end up walking in the AM and route myself so I end up at the Farmer's Market toward the end of my walk. I end up doing some veggie shopping and bring home local produce. Not a bad way to get in both exercise and healthy eating at the same time.

There and Reconciled

The other week when I was at the Dr's office I weighed myself on their scales - 310 lbs. That morning at home in nothing but a smile I weighed 304. That evening when I got home I weighed myself again in the same atire I had on at the Dr's office and low and behold weighed 310.5! So my scale is nearly dead on with the Dr's scale. It also means that loosing 50 lbs means I'll need to be at about 295 or so when wearing only my smile since that 351 was fully clothed. What's an extra 6 lbs? Ug!

No matter, I'm only 3.5 lbs away from that mark now. Yes loyal fan base I've hit 298.5 lbs and pushed through my latest goal of 299 - Huzzah!! I think the next goal is a "reconciliation" goal to get the weigh loss goals alined with reality. Next stop 294. That'll be 51 lbs lost no matter which scale and what clothes I'm wearing. Hopefully I can hit that before July 4th!

Numbers

There's really one number that I've been concentrating on during this odyssey and that's the one that shows up on the scale - 303.5 lbs. this week. However there are another set of numbers that need watching - cholesterol, triglycerides, HDLs, LDLs, etc.

I've been on Lipitor for a long time and it's been managing my levels, but they were never really great. Just marginal. The last time I had those numbers checked was about when I started this blog. Although I don't recall what my cholesterol levels were I do remember that my triglycerides were 417! Naturally the Dr told me I need to make a change and suggested banding - that went nowhere.

In order to renew my Lipitor and blood pressure medications I need to have the blood fat levels run each year. So this year I was really anxious to see the results. After reading them I feel like a kid with a great report card!

• cholesterol - 110, should be less than 200
• triglycerides - 136, should be less than 150
• HDL cholesterol - 34, under 40 is low, however this is primarily a function of genetics
• LDL cholesterol - 49, under 100 is best

So, with the exception of the HDL cholesterol levels things are looking rather outstanding. I can't believe the change in diet has had such a dramatic effect on the other numbers that my Dr and I care about. Ya the bottom weight/waist line is important too, but knowing that the eating I'm doing has such a positive impact on my blood chemistry is a nice bonus.