Week 30 Progress Report: In the Backstretch

As I promised yesterday, here are the week-ending numbers:

Starting Weight:	237.6
Original Target*:	248.6
Adjusted Target:	235.8
Actual Weight:	234.6
Loss/Gain:	– 2.2
Total Loss:	68.0
% of Goal:	49.1%
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.

And here are the month-ending numbers:

Starting Weight:	239.2
Target Weight:	231.2
Actual Weight:	232.8
Loss/Gain:	– 6.4
Avg. Loss/Wk.:	– 1.4

As I said yesterday, I missed the month-ending goal by 1.6 lbs. However, it’s a new month with a new goal: 225.1 lbs. I’m five pounds away from completing the Halloween challenge; I should have that knocked out by the beginning of October. The next secondary goal is the 2/3rds mark, ≤ 210.2, which is only slightly above my year-end goal; more than likely, the weigh-in that achieves one will achieve the other as well. Already, I’m close to the weight range in which I spend most of my twenties and thirties — still obese, but far less so than when I was in my forties. (My ideal range is something I passed when I was a young teenager and shorter than I am now.)

By the way, I didn’t tell you I have hypothyroidism. Not taking your hypothyroid medication does make it harder to lose weight. That partially (but not sufficiently) explains the period from 8/23 to about 9/6, when my weight went back up and wouldn’t come down: I had run out of levothyroxine and put off picking up the refills. No more of that.

Just shy of 70 pounds in seven months. That’s quite a feat, no matter how you look at it. And it all began pretty much on a whim.

Week 5 Progress Report: The Lost Week

Sorry this is a day late!

Beginning Weight:	280.2
Original Target*:	293.6
Adjusted Target:	278.4
Actual Weight:	281.0
Gain/Loss:	+ 0.8
Total Gain/Loss:	– 21.6
Avg. Loss/Wk.:	4.3
*Original target calculated on a beginning weight 302.6 lbs. and an average loss of 1.8 lbs./wk.

The last week was filled with fluctuations, largely due to bad meal planning, from Friday night’s eggplant Parmesan to Sunday’s combination of corned beef and colcannon (not to mention a rich and fat-laden cake) to yesterday’s scrambled-egg sandwich and homemade pizza (not the same meal). Sunday was intended to be a “diet holiday”; Monday, however, was not.

Call it “the lost week.” As in, “I lost my mind.” The whole point of this program is to become more mindful of my eating habits. I tell people to trust the process; but for the process to work, you have to do your part by budgeting your intake. That means thinking ahead — planning what you eat instead of letting yourself be ruled by whim and opportunity.

So okay, I’ve got the excess out of my system, more or less, and learned how to make a loaf of tasty rye bread. As far as the pizza goes, it would have worked much better and had fewer calories with half the meat. (In fairness, I haven’t worked in a pizza restaurant for almost three decades, so I had forgotten how to portion supreme-type pizzas.) Time to get back on the wagon.

Week 4 Progress Report: Learning From the Past

Weight Loss Progress, Feb. 11 – Mar. 11.

Beginning Weight:	286.6
Original Target:*	295.4
Adjusted Target:	284.8
Actual Weight:	280.2
Loss/Gain:	– 6.4
Total Loss:	– 22.4
Average Loss/Week:	5.6
* Original target calculated on a start weight of 302.6 and an average loss of 1.8 lbs./wk.

Twenty-two pounds. I try to sound positive when I write these posts, but I’m actually a bit of a pessimist and a lot of a worrywart. Losing over 5½ pounds a week when I’d only planned to lose just under 2 per week is actually kinda scary: It shouldn’t have been this easy. (What’s wrong with me? Did I subtract too much from my budget? Am I losing too much water? Have I got cancer and just don’t know it yet? Fret, fret, fret.) However, I’m comfortable with the amount I’m eating, and no other physical problem has shown up, so I’ll take the win.

The last time I weighed in at 280 was in September 2009. It was a heckuva victory — I’d lost just over 46 pounds in 7 months. Then I tried to quit smoking at the same time. I’d grown too confident in my ability to stick to the diet; I thought at the time that I’d gotten to the point where the diet was maintaining itself. In fact, I had stopped tracking my food and being accountable to others. Eventually, as I struggled to keep smoke-free, I began rationalizing deviances from the diet and began to put on the weight I’d lost.

Four months later, I was smoking again.

Add this to my list of intermediate goals: I will consider that 46-pound record broken when I weigh 255 or less. But while COPD/emphysema is a growing concern, the smoking will have to wait for a while longer. I’m trying to keep my focus on one major life change at a time;  right now, obesity presents the more immediate health risks. And this time, I won’t make the mistake of thinking that a few weeks or months of conscious calorie-counting will be enough to keep me on the path to a healthy weight. This is the way I have to live from now on.

Santayana’s maxim about people who don’t remember history comes to mind. I hope I keep and learn from my memory of past mistakes.