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 42 Progress Update: The Unexpected Milestone

Photos © 2019 Anthony S. Layne.
All rights reserved.

For once, I may be on time! Woo-hoo! So let’s start off as usual with the week-ending numbers:

Starting Weight:	214.6
Original Target*:	227.0
Adjusted Target:	212.3
Actual Weight:	211.8
Loss/Gain:	– 2.8
Total Loss:	90.8
% of Goal:	65.5%
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.

Considering that this last week included Thanksgiving (and the thickest, densest, and most sugary slice of pumpkin pie I’ve ever had in my life), a 2.8-pound drop is fantastic. It also included a four-hour stint collecting for my Knights of Columbus Council’s charity fund, which according to my Samsung Health app meant about 9 miles’ worth of walking back and forth along a highway island. (Nevertheless, I still managed to get a slight uptick on the scale the next day, possibly due to finishing off that slice of pie.)

I started off the day a little depressed. I’d made the difficult decision to send an email to my lead agent resigning my appointment as an insurance agent and start looking for another job. It was at about 8:45 a.m. when I finally got around to logging my weight. After I’d posted it to the ticker (to your right, if you haven’t noticed it before), I looked at it and realized something I hadn’t thought of:

I have 47.8 pounds to go to reach my primary goal of 164. Less than 50 pounds.

Week 41 Progress Report: Giving Thanks On Thanksgiving

© 2019 Bitmoji.

Happy Thanksgiving!

I’m sorry I haven’t posted for three weeks. I recently went back to work as a health insurance agent, so getting my business off the ground has eaten more and more of my available time. During that period, I got seriously off-track for my 90-Day Challenge Goal; I may fall short by a pound or two. First, the week-ending numbers:

Starting Weight:	216.0
Original Target*:	228.8
Adjusted Target:	213.7
Actual Weight:	214.6
Loss/Gain:	– 1.4
Total Loss:	88.0
% of Goal:	63.5%
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.

Next, the month-ending numbers for November 11:

Starting Weight:	224.8
Target Weight:	215.3
Actual Weight:	217.6
Loss/Gain:	– 7.2
Avg. Loss/Wk.:	– 1.6

Now, as of this morning, I weigh 212.4. That’s about 1.5 lbs. over the 90-Day Challenge target line, which (all things considered) isn’t bad. The fact remains that the general trend is still downward. Even if I miss the 90-Day Challenge goal, I can still make the goal of being at or under 196 by my 56th birthday.

I’m grateful.

Week 34 Progress Report: More Medical Matters and Some Compliments

Image courtesy of Shutterstock.

Here are the week-ending numbers:

Starting Weight:	231.2
Original Target*:	241.4
Adjusted Target:	229.4
Actual Weight:	226.0
Loss/Gain:	– 5.2
Total Loss:	76.6
% of Goal:	55.3%
Avg. Loss/Wk.:	– 2.3
*Original target calculated from a starting weight of 302.6 lbs. and an average loss/wk. of 1.8 lbs.

I blew the diet Friday night, when we had tamales (gotta have chili on them), frijoles charros (which I prefer to refrijoles), and Mexican rice. Too much jalapeño — I suffered all of Saturday, and it may have contributed to the resolution of my distribution problem. Alas, the effects of aging. I can no longer eat spicy foods with gastric impunity. But the resolution of that problem is 95% of the 5.2-lb. drop. I finally earned my Lose It! 75-Lb. Club badge.

Speaking of the distribution problem: I spoke with my “Indian mom” (my primary care doctor) on Thursday, during a post-hospital follow-up. She listened with concern to my problem. She gave me a couple of four-pill bottles of Linzess, recommended more fiber in my diet (natch), recommended a fiber supplement, and referred me to a gastroenterologist.

Why the GI doctor? Well, there’s a certain procedure that’s recommended for everyone at age 50 and about every 5 years afterward. Doctor Chandi, however, knew that I had been laid off shortly after my 50th birthday and had no insurance for almost four years afterward, so she never made an issue of it. And if she wasn’t going to bring it up, neither was I. But now I’m insured, so I don’t get to put that procedure off any longer.

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 27 Progress Report: We Now Return You to Your Regularly Scheduled Weight Loss

Here are the numbers from Monday:

Starting Weight:	239.0
Original Target*:	254.0
Adjusted Target:	237.2
Actual Weight:	240.4
Loss/Gain:	+ 1.4
Total Loss:	62.2
% of Goal:	44.9%
Avg. Loss/Wk.:	– 2.3
*Original target calculated from a starting weight of 302.6 lbs. and an average loss/wk. of 1.8 lbs.

Last week, I wrote on Monday as my mother lay dying in her bed. She passed the next morning, surrounded by her family. My sister had come in on Sunday; two uncles and an aunt arrived in the wee hours of Tuesday, just in time. More family arrived in the next three days. And the eating and drinking commenced.

Despite my good intentions, calorie tracking went out the window for a week. Thank God I stopped drinking to excess in my twenties; otherwise, my weight gain would have been much more. Moreover, I still managed to keep a limit on my intake — except for the first night, when we had fried chicken from Babe’s Chicken Dinner House (which, if you ever visit the DFW area, you have to try). Still, by Sunday morning, my siblings and I were “fooded out”; we were all ready to go back to our weight-loss regimens.

And the food just would not stop coming.

Week 24 Progress Report: The Forest and the Trees

So I’m late again, but it’s all for the best because I have something to add. First, Monday’s numbers:

Starting Weight:	242.6
Original Target*:	259.4
Adjusted Target:	240.8
Actual Weight:	241.6
Loss/Gain:	– 1.0
Total Loss:	61.0
% of Goal:	44.0%
Avg. Loss/Wk.:	– 2.5
*Original target calculated from a starting weight of 302.6 lbs. and an average loss/wk. of 1.8 lbs.

As I reported last week, I “gained” about a pound from choosing a permanent spot for my scale, so I wasn’t disappointed by losing only a pound overall. However, I did entertain the hope that today, Aug. 1, would find me ≤ 240. It didn’t happen.

In laying out the Project Nemesis plan, I wrote, “One week, you’ll do everything right and gain 1.5 pounds. The next week, you’ll blow your diet big time one day and your weight at the end of the week is down 1.5 pounds.” It can happen daily, too. Tuesday was full of activity and I had plenty of calories to spare on the budget when I went to bed. When I woke up, however, my wonky scale informed me that I’d jumped from 240.8 to 243. What. The. Hell. Yesterday was full of activity as well; however, I got hit with the late-night munchies and polished off half a bag of Rold Gold pretzels “off the books.” This morning, the aforementioned wonky scale said that I was back down to 241. Fine, except the 2-pound spike had spoiled my small hope to be under 240 today.

Week 20 Progress Report: Ordeal and Triumph

The last two weeks I missed my updates,  partially because I’ve been in a writing slump and partially because my mother slightly cracked her pelvic bone, the latter of which demands more physical assistance from me. But I’m happy to report some very good news:

Starting Weight:	252.2
Original Target*:	266.6
Adjusted Target:	250.4
Actual Weight:	249.6
Loss/Gain:	– 2.6
Total Loss:	53.0
% of Goal:	38.2%
Avg. Loss/Wk.:	– 2.7
*Original target calculated from a starting weight of 302.6 lbs. and an average loss/wk. of 1.8 lbs.

When I started this project, my first major goal was to get under 250 lbs. by Sept. 1. That goal has now been officially achieved—two months ahead of schedule.

Week 17 Progress Report: Should I Keep Cutting My Calorie Budget?

Sorry I’m late again; I’ve overslept the last couple of days. First, the weekly progress report:

Starting Weight:	256.4
Original Target*:	272.0
Adjusted Target:	254.6
Actual Weight:	254.0
Loss/Gain:	– 2.4
Total Loss:	48.6
% of Goal:	35.1%
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.

As you can tell from the monthly progress chart, the scale says I went backward near the end of the week, but I still ended up doing better than my planned loss rate.

Yesterday was the end of the plan month. Here are the numbers:

Starting Weight:	262.4
Target Weight:	254.4
Actual Weight:	253.8
Loss/Gain:	– 8.6
Avg. Loss/Wk.:	– 2.0

Overall, I think I’m doing better. Yes, I still tend to take advantage of my daily steps and weekly bowling because subtracting the calories burned gives me leeway on the budget. But the most that gives me is about 240 extra calories on a busy day (about 400 on a busy Sunday).

Last night, for instance, I overdid it a bit on dinner — at least, as close as I could estimate it — so I ended the day without my usual bedtime snack to keep the numbers in the green. (Besides, I still felt full by bedtime, so it was no hardship.) When I weighed in this morning, I’d lost 0.8 pounds, so I figure my estimate was a little high but good.

Week 15 Progress Report: A Diet Holiday

Let’s begin with yesterday’s numbers:

Starting Weight:	259.4
Original Target*:	275.6
Adjusted Target:	257.6
Actual Weight:	257.2
Loss/Gain:	– 2.2
Total Loss:	45.4
% of Goal:	32.8%
Avg. Loss/Wk.:	– 3.0
*Original target calculated from a starting weight of 302.6 lbs. and an average loss/wk. of 1.8 lbs.

Yesterday was Memorial Day, of course, so taking care of my usual chores plus preparing for the evening’s feasting meant little time for writing. But, as I posted on Facebook, I’d mentally prepared for the day by declaring a “diet holiday” (see Rule #11 of the weight-loss plan).

The whole point of the “diet holiday” is to allow an occasional day of splurging without guilt. Holidays like Memorial Day, when we Americans traditionally overindulge in food and drink, are good days for this sort of thing because they’re few and far between. Big family get-togethers, too. Birthday parties, meh, not so much — it depends on how many parties you really attend; otherwise, you could probably pass on the cake they brought to your office. Unless it’s your birthday.