Sunday was spent cleaning up the house, which included getting the trim paint out and trying to get a start on the office trim so I am ready to redo the floors in the Spring.  It will be nice to have all the floors completely done, even if I don’t know how I am going to keep the cat out, and where I will sleep for a few days while the process is completed.

Food-wise, I kept pretty much on target the last few days.  Sunday night I had some comfort food of mac & cheese and a few fish sticks. I also bought a 6 pack of Zevia soda, which is far better than regular soda, so I am not going to count it against me!

Sunday night I tried taking some new social profile photos, and failed miserably.  I need to make an appointment with a dermatologies to look at the cracking on the sides of my mouth, as well as the peeling and irritation of my eyelids and under my eyes. I also have a wound on my hand that hasn’t healed in at least 2 months. I haven’t been to a dermatologist before, but I really hope they can help.  Ive tried just about ever combination of over-the-counter ointments, and I still end up looking like The Joker.

To say I am unhappy with my appearance would be an understatement.  It has affected my self-esteem lately greatly, and impacts my confidence and the overall way I carry myself.  Losing weight is only half the battle, I know.  And I can’t look 20 again.  But it would be nice not to always have puffy eyes and the double chin.  I am working on it, but it really bothered me trying to take these photos today.

The scale didn’t show any gain or loss for the last few days so that is a good thing.  I hope I can lose a few this week and get under 240 again.  I really need to see some progress right about now.

Until next week…

The big change this week is an addition to the weight loss arsenal.

I have been a big fan of the FitBit (even though I have been forgetting mine at home) and wanted to try the Aria wifi scale.  It is rather expensive, however, so I put it off.  I had seen my normal scale be a little off in its readings (or I thought so anyway)… so it was the perfect time to look at them again more seriously.  After listening to my friend Cliff’s podcast, Pursuing a Balanced Life, he mentioned he uses a Withings scale, instead of the Aria.  It was a little less expensive so I thought I would give it a try.

Shipping took forever. It didn’t ship for a week, despite saying in stock, and it took another 4 days to arrive, but after it did, I got it set up rather quickly (No USB cables on this version) and did a test.  It seemed I had to reload the app on my iPhone in order to update the weight from the scale, but everything seemed to work ok.  Then I paired it with my FitBit profile, and they both live together happily now.

The app has settled down and down reports the correct weight without having to reset anything, which is good.  This, combined with entering food data into FitBit, will give me a better idea of my progress.  Before, I would weigh in, but not necessarily record it.  No saying “I’ll record the one tomorrow since today’s is higher.”

Hopefully these tools will give me the motivation to keep working toward that goal of 185 lbs.  I have an “event” coming up in late May I am working towards, and it would be great to be there at a weight I am confortable with.

I had two snacks: one in the morning and one in the afternoon consisting of baby carrots and light ranch dressing. For lunch it was the Lean Cuisine brocoli and cheese “bowl.”  Water intake was good throughout the day – about 24 ounces every couple of hours.

Dinner however, was a disaster.

After coming home and trying to prepare for the coming snowstorm, I went off to Wal Mart again in search of the oil/fuel mix for snowblowers.  Just my luck – they had removed all of the winter stuff and were preparing for spring.  In a moment of weakness I bought some crackers and Easy Cheese, plus bread, swiss cheese and ham slices to make sandwiches out of.  I had a total of 4 sandwiches (I know) and about half of the box of sociable crackers.  Now, by this time I had only eaten about half of my daily calories, so I probably didn’t go too much over, but looking at it now, all I can say is “ugh.”  Completely let myself down.

But I did stay soda/pop free.

So today my new purchase should be here waiting for me when I get home – can’t wait to get it set up and using it.  Will let you know tomorrow what it is and how it goes!

Started off with my stand-by breakfast: YoLite yogurt and granola topping.  Had a mid-day snack of baby carrots with light ranch dressing.  Lunch was my usual Lean Cuisine pizza.  For dinner, I scrambled 3 eggs, but also had another Lean Cuisine pizza.

The snack bug hit me mid-afternoon as I gazed into the vending machine, wondering what harm just one mini bag of potato chips, or a scotheroo would do.  But I prevailed and decided to have another 24 ounces of water instead, which kept hunger off for a few hours until it was time to go home.  I am a sucker for the “what harm can it do” mentality, so turning down the vending machine is a tough one.

The product I ordered should be here on Wednesday.  I ordered from Amazon over a week ago, and it still isn’t here yet.  It isn’t Amazon’s fault, it’s the manufacturer, but you can be sure I am going to leave a review for their slow shipping times.  Hopefully it will help me track my progress a little better than a fitbit alone.  In the meantime, I threw away my old digital scale so I have no weigh-ins to report.  The next weigh in will probably be Wednesday night or Thursday.

Have not been up to exercise in the wee hours of the morning lately.  I am sure my gym membership will run out soon too, and I only used it a handful of times.  If/when I renew it I will have to make sure I am using it to its fullest or it is just throwing money away.

I am hoping to keep up the good eating habits and no soda for the rest of the week.  It will be tough as more snow is coming, and I tend to want to eat more when it is cold outside.

So, until tomorrow – stay healthy!

The hardest of the temptations occur at lunch, when fellow co-workers may ask if I want to go out to our favorite haunts.  These include Chinese, Mexican, American-Mexican (burritos), and other delicious places in town.  I said no  couple of times during the week, but decided to go out myself on Friday.

I didn’t do so well on the weekend, opting for some chips/salsa on Saturday night with mini taquitos, and then a Chinese buffet on Sunday afternoon. I also went to one of my favorite places, Flame & Skewer for a French Dip sandwich with cheese balls. (Had a gift certificate to use up.)

As I look forward to this week, I really want to do better.  I think I am able to get my daily routine down to manageable, food wise, and I have a purchase coming this week that will help keep better track of my weight fluctuations. More on that in a later blog post.

I am considering auditioning for another show in a few week – and rehearsals start at 6:30 in a town about 20 minutes away, which means I have to go straight there from work. This has traditionally led to late night stops at Wendy’s for a spicy chicken sandwich.  If I audition and get a part, I will definitely need to plan ahead and make a sandwich to eat after work en route to rehearsal, to give me energy to rehearse, and not be ravenous afterwords.

The only way to keep on track is to make choices one at a time.  I took the plunge and ordered a reminder to do just that, and will post pictures and info when the package actually arrives. Until then, I will probably start blogging every day on how the day went starting tomorrow.  Please keep the positive vibes coming.

And then, it started.

Things got busy again.  I decided to be in a local (big) production of The Nutcracker.  Suddenly I told myself it was OK to have that 2 liter of Diet Pepsi, and it was OK to “cheat” and have that frozen pizza all at once sitting.  So things slid more and more.

And the scale showed more and more.

I tricked myself into thinking “well, a couple of pounds is no big deal, I’ll lose it again next week.”  That never came.

So today, I sit before you, back up to 249 lbs.

I feel I have left everybody down, including myself.

But out of this comes the realization and reiteration that losing the weight is only half the battle.  Changing a lifestyle is hard work, and that is what it will require to finally achieve that goal of being under 200  lbs, and hopefully under 185 by the end of the year.

I’m going to be blogging more here.  A lot more.  I really want to hear from you. Whether it is messages of support, or if I fall down to call me on it.

And so today, February 14th, I say I WILL accomplish this goal.  And thank you for being there with me.

A week and a half ago I had a high school reunion. Most of my former classmates who attended are on Facebook so naturally they knew of my progress. I received dozens of “way to go’s” and “you are looking great” comments.  It wasn’t until yesterday when I was reading an article on How Our Brain Stops Us From Achieving Our Goals on Lifehacker that I realized how dangerous receiving compliments are.

Many people who start a diet or lifestyle change involving eating and being healthier have what is known as a “cheat day.”  It is a day of the week where you can eat what you want.  Many diets even require one.  But they can be dangerous.  As the article on Lifehacker details, allowing yourself to cheat by having a hotdog suddenly becomes two hotdogs, a 44 ounce soda, large bag of cheetos and a sugary dessert to complete the meal.

I have echoed this a few times over the past weeks by convincing myself “you’ve been doing good, go ahead and get that bag of chips at Subway” or “Have a regular soda, you’ve been good.”  Having all those compliments thrown at me in such a small period of time was starting to convince me that I was doing fine, and I could take a break and cheat more and more.

I also think they contributed to losing sight of my real goals.

My goal was not to “get compliments” – my goal was to get under 200 lbs and more importantly get off my blood pressure medicine.  The past month or so I convinced myself I had finished enough of my goals, I didn’t need to work on them “as hard” anymore.

And so I’ve been in a huge weight loss plateau.

With August and my birthday just around the corner, I need to keep sight of that goal of getting off the meds by my next doctor’s appointment in October.  I need to realize that cheating can lead to more cheating.  I need to find something else to “reward” myself with than a real pepsi or a dinner out.

By no means am I saying to stop the compliments, I really appreciate them.  I just need to remember there is still a lot I need to do in order to reach the ultimate goals I set for healthy living.   Sometimes the little things we do are not noticed at all, but have the greatest importance. The minute-to-minute choices we make for our bodies is one of those.

This stops here.

Two days ago I began the 200 sit-ups project using an app from the Apple store.  It basically gives you a bunch of reps and a timer so you do say, 10 situps, rest for a minute, then 10 or 12, etc., building you up day to day.  I am now in the third day and the rate at which it adds a repetition is TOUGH.  On day one, I said I could do 20 sit-ups, so I did.  Day two it wanted 40 something and then today it was 54 I believe.  Adding the extra rep doesn’t seem like much, but it is – trust me.

Since I’m only in day three, there isn’t much progress to show either in terms of fat loss or muscle gain, but I am starting to feel it.

I know that in order to continue the weight loss, I am going to have to start actually running instead of walking.  I’m not sure how I feel about that.  Walking is “safe” and I feel like I’ll have to run even further to get my “steps” in.  That is a pretty dumb argument I know.  It may be that I will have to still get my morning steps in and then add a section at the end of jogging/running.  For the rest of this week I will stick to the sit-up program and then will evaluate jogging for next week.

I just know I need to see some kind of results again soon.

It’s been a while since I’ve mention his blog, but please remember to check out Ryan’s journal of his weight loss as well at lockergnome.com.