Week 52 Progress Report: The Year in Review

Tomorrow will be the anniversary of this program. Since I don’t have tomorrow’s weight, which won’t be that much better than today’s (I’ll explain), I’ll use today’s to discuss the year-end progress. However, let’s start off with the week-ending stats:

Starting Weight:	208.8
Original Target*:	209.0
Adjusted Target:	207.0
Actual Weight:	210.8
Loss/Gain:	+ 2.0
Total Loss:	91.8
% of Goal:	66.2%
Avg. Loss/Wk.:	– 1.8
*Original target calculated from a starting weight of 302.6 lbs. and an average loss/wk. of 1.8 lbs.

At an average loss rate of 1.8 pounds/week, I should have lost 93.6 pounds — and I might have come much closer if I hadn’t broken down while bowling last night and had a basket of French fries. (They’re so delicious when they’re fresh out of the fryer! But they turn into complex sugars almost the minute they hit your mouth.) As it is, from being at one point 19 pounds under the line to 1.8 pounds over the line takes the shine off of an accomplishment that’s otherwise still praiseworthy.

An Episode of Weight-Loss Infidelity

Happy New Year! — as belated as this is.

The good news is, if I stay on top of things from here on out, I’ll still be able to make 164 by August 1, my original goal date. The bad news is, I won’t hit 196 by my birthday, and probably not by Feb. 11 … just not enough time left.

Yeah, I put on weight for Christmas.

I stopped tracking my intake. And I found it hard to start again. I lost some of it after Christmas morning, only to put it back on for the new year. Since New Year’s Eve, I’ve been hovering between 215 and 216.4. Three weeks ago, I was 13.8 pounds ahead of my original plan. As of Monday, I was only two pounds ahead. As of this morning, I’m 12.8 pounds over the monthly goal line.

Yesterday was the last straw: For reasons I can’t quite remember, I made a ham and cheese omelet sandwich. Seven hundred and ten calories, which I didn’t think about until I got around to logging my intake. When I finally crunched the numbers and saw the result, I said, “Okay, that’s enough! Get back to your program, Layne!” Sometimes, you just have to get mad at yourself to get over yourself.

Week 43 Progress Report: Christmas Challenges

Source: Lynda's Recipe Box

First, let’s go over the week-ending numbers:

Starting Weight:	211.8
Original Target*:	225.2
Adjusted Target:	209.5
Actual Weight:	212.6
Loss/Gain:	+ 0.8
Total Loss:	90.0
% of Goal:	64.9%
Avg. Loss/Wk.:	– 2.1
*Original target calculated from a starting weight of 302.6 lbs. and an average loss/wk. of 1.8 lbs.

So yeah, I went backward, which I haven’t done since the end of September. Over the last six months, I’ve averaged about a 1.6 lbs./week loss, about 1.5 lbs./week over the last quarter. Those dates include five weeks in which I went backward, particularly the couple of weeks after I lost my mother and the week I went to the hospital (where I gained four pounds in two days, due to the “shipping backlog”). Although these numbers are a little below plan, I’m still satisfied with the results.

Week 29 Progress Report: Single Servings; or, Sufficient Unto the Day

Yeah, I’ve been silent for a while. This last couple of weeks have been a struggle to get back into the discipline of dieting, during which I had to re-think the decision I made last month to decrease my Lose It! budget adjustment. First, though, let’s get to the weekly numbers:

Starting Weight:	236.2
Original Target*:	250.4
Adjusted Target:	234.4
Actual Weight:	237.4
Loss/Gain:	+ 1.2
Total Loss:	65.2
% of Goal:	47.0%
Avg. Loss/Wk.:	– 2.2
*Original target calculated from a starting weight of 302.6 lbs. and an average loss/wk. of 1.8 lbs.

Since Aug. 11, I’ve only lost 2.4 pounds. Obviously, I missed my goal of ≤ 233.2 by Sept. 1, which by itself is disappointing. However, more frustrating is the fact that I’m almost four pounds over the plan month target line and will have to lose 5.6 pounds in the next week to get back on track. Not impossible, but improbable because difficult without some degree of intentional starvation, which after several months’ consideration I’m not inclined to support even if we call it “fasting.”

I’m still 13 pounds ahead of where I’d originally planned to be, which is good; as I’ve said before, the point is not so much to lose N pounds by D date as it is just to lose the N pounds. But I don’t want the program to sputter to a halt because I lost focus and/or discipline. The first couple of weeks were excusable due to the circumstances of my mother’s death and funeral. Not so the last couple of weeks; in all honesty, I can’t even call it a “plateau.” “It’ll take as long as it takes” is meant to encourage patience, not to rationalize dicking off.

Week 21 Progress Report: Some Episodes of Gluttony

This week, I purposely delayed the report so I could include the month-end report. Here are the numbers from Monday:

Starting Weight:	249.6
Original Target*:	264.8
Adjusted Target:	247.8
Actual Weight:	248.8
Loss/Gain:	– 0.8
Total Loss:	53.8
% of Goal:	38.8%
Avg. Loss/Wk.:	– 2.6
*Original target calculated from a starting weight of 302.6 lbs. and an average loss/wk. of 1.8 lbs.

And now, here are the month-end numbers:

Starting Weight:	253.8
Target Weight:	246.1
Actual Weight:	247.0
Loss/Gain:	– 6.8
Avg. Loss/Wk.:	– 1.6

As you can tell from the chart at top left, I spent most of the month above the targets, with spikes on June 22 (family in from out of town that weekend) and the Independence Day holiday weekend. Nevertheless, after five months, I’m still about 17 pounds ahead of where I originally planned to be at this point.

Week 16 Progress Report: Plateaus Aren’t Really Flat

Here are today’s numbers:

Starting Weight:	257.2
Original Target*:	273.8
Adjusted Target:	255.4
Actual Weight:	256.4
Loss/Gain:	– 0.8
Total Loss:	46.2
% of Goal:	33.3%
Avg. Loss/Wk.:	– 2.9
*Original target calculated from a starting weight of 302.6 lbs. and an average loss/wk. of 1.8 lbs.

This last week is hard to describe. There wasn’t a day since Tuesday that I went over-budget; yet on Wednesday, my weight shot up a discouraging 2.6 pounds, wrecking my effort to achieve the May challenge goal of 3% loss.

I’m almost certain that much of the fluctuation depends on how much sleep I’ve gotten when I weigh in, as well as the vagaries of estimating some portions and the calories I’ve consumed. For instance, yesterday I got up at 3:30 am to pick my cousin up from DFW International Airport, so I weighed in shortly thereafter. After taking him to Gainesville, a 1½-hour trip with a 45-minute stop at Cracker Barrel for a 500-calorie breakfast, having consumed my normal travel mug full of coffee (with a little extra at Cracker Barrel), I weighed again for the heck of it when I got back home. The scale told me I had neither lost nor gained anything. I should have expected at least a fractional difference because I was wearing street clothes rather than pajamas. Weird.

(How do you get a 500-calorie breakfast at Cracker Barrel, where carbs and fat abound? Simple: A side of two eggs — I prefer “over medium” — and a side of their Loaded Hashbrown Casserole. A lot of their breakfast entrees are under 550 calories, so long as you don’t get “All the Fixin’s.”)

Week 7 Progress Report: “Cutting Calories Doesn’t Work!”

Image source: lapbandsurgery.com.

Start Weight:		276.0
Original Target*:		290.0
Adjusted Target:		274.2
Actual Weight:		274.2
Loss/Gain:		– 1.8
Total Loss:		– 28.4
% of Goal:		20.5%
Avg. Loss/Wk.:		– 4.1
	*Original target calculated from a starting weight of 302.6 lbs. and an average loss/wk. of 1.8 lbs.

Compared with previous weeks, 1.8 pounds doesn’t look so dramatic. However, if you look at the bottom of the progress table, you’ll see that 1.8 pounds a week is exactly what I’d hoped and planned to lose from the beginning.

When my article on the deadly sin of Gluttony published on Catholic Stand, the first commenter argued that diets which depend simply on cutting calories are doomed to fail. Why? Because of hunger! Sooner or later, the hunger drives the dieter to overeat, and before you know it, they’re right back where they started! “Why don’t you see reunions on The Biggest Loser?” he asked rhetorically. Because just cutting calories doesn’t work.

Well, yes and no. Many people, when cutting calories, set a drastically low calorie target. For example, one friend of mine decided that she would not only start running again but eat no more than 500 kcal/day. Of course, hunger defeated her, despite her being a very strong-minded woman. The calorie target was much too low!

About the Project Nemesis Blog

Welcome to Tony Layne’s Project Nemesis: The Blog! Oddly enough, I started the Project Nemesis Facebook page before I started this blog. The Facebook page was a whim; I asked my friends if it was a good idea and some said Yes. The blog was Facebook’s idea. I began my writing avocation as a blogger, so it’s nothing new to me.

So what is Project Nemesis?

First and foremost, it’s an obesity recovery program. It’s not a “diet.” The weight not only has to come off but stay off. This means getting rid of the bad habits and the emotional associations that led to my obesity, essentially reprogramming my mind and emotions to live a healthier lifestyle. I can’t stop once I reach my goal weight; I can only shift into “maintenance mode.” This has to be the way I live for the rest of my life.

Second, it’s a video project. As I lose weight, I take front and profile pictures of myself to build into a .mp4 file dramatizing my physical shrinkage. I also hope to include short video clips at highlight points; tentatively, I have planned to shoot a video when the weight loss forces me to buy pants with smaller waists, probably somewhere between 265 and 250 lbs. When it’s completed, I want to publish it in the hopes that other people will be inspired and encouraged to make similar changes.

Third, it’s a social media platform for my family and friends, not only so they can follow me and cheer me on, but also so those who are in the midst of their own struggles with weight loss can share their successes, their tips, their concerns, and their obstacles. While I may let an occasional religious thought or reference slip, it’s not a religious or political blog. I don’t care what race, ethnicity, religion, sex, orientation, or political affiliation you are — God didn’t put me on this earth to judge you but rather to help and be helped by you.