WEEK 20 - The Great Outdoors

Week 20 | May 29, 2012 | Weight 255.5 | Loss of 2.1 lbs | Total Loss: 55.1

What a lovely week for loss!  Finally the weather is getting better, my injury is better and I'm running regularly again.  I know I'm not posting 2-3 times per week lately and it's mostly because I just don't have that much to report on.  The journey is status quo and everything has been pretty routine - Work out, Eat right and lose weight!

My wife's first 5k run is only a few weeks away and we're planning a large BBQ that evening.  I expect it to be a high calorie and sodium day but I'm preparing for that by ensuring I'm eating clean, logging my food and working out regularly.

I had a physical last week at the Doc's office and he was quite pleased with my progress so far.  I've got to get some blood work done to check on all my numbers but his in-a-nut-shell advice for me was to just keep doing what I'm doing and I'll keep shedding the pounds.

One thing I did discover that I never thought I'd like is Chicken Caesar Salad.  Wow that stuff is good!  Last weekend we decided to take the kids to the amusement park and for the first time since January we were stumped at how we were going to heat food.  Every other mealtime we've been near the home and cooked something up or microwaved something for a lunch but not this day and we refused to buy carnie food as who knows what goes into that crap.  So we pulled out a couple of chicken breasts (we usually have 10 or so pre-cooked on hand at all times these days, sealed and frozen) and cut it up.  I shoved it in a small tupperware dish, loaded the mini-van with a big mixing bowl, caesar salad ingredients, the chicken chunks and some water bottles.  I loaded a small cooler up with ice and off we went.  I was shocked at how delicious that lunch was.  It was pretty much our first picnic during our weight loss journey and even the kids had a great time with it!

WEEK 19 - PIZZA!

Week 19 | May 22, 2012 | Weight 257.6 | Loss of 0.0 lbs | Total Loss: 53.0


Well this was pretty much expected.  I had a craving for pizza delivery this weekend.  I hadn't had any in 6 months.  We've had boxed pizza many times but actual greasy, gooey pizza from delivery was something I ate frequently when gaining weight.  I decided it was time to have some.  I gorged on 4 and a half slices.  I was not proud of myself LOL.

The worst part of it all was - it wasn't even very satisfying.  Now I'm back to eating much better and I'm happy to get back to it.  I've got to get a better handle on those weekends.

I'm back to running C25K again and completed Week 3, Day 2 outside over the weekend and I think I did quite well with it.  I even added in an extra 4 minute run on top of it because I wasn't quite back to the beginning of the pathway where I started when the C25K app said I was completed.  WOOT!  Seems my foot has healed well - still a bit sore but much better now.

WEEK 18 - Injury!

Week 18 | May 15, 2012 | Weight 257.6 | Loss of 2.5 lbs | Total Loss: 53.0

Well the birthday weekend is now long behind and I've picked up the pace again with a great loss.  It would have been a bit more but something happened last week that's been causing me some grief.

After my son's birthday, my wife and I decided to go spoil the kids and get them new desktop computer's (full gaming rigs).  I spent pretty much a whole day assembling and setting them up and I think during the course of that I had injured my Achilles Tendon by sitting too long on it on the floor all day.  As mentioned in my last post, I was in a bit of pain and I could not do any running or workouts.

Since then, I've been moving a lot better but I can still feel that it is not 100%.  I can feel the injury in there even though it isn't preventing me from walking normally like I was before it and I even managed to get in a run.  I'm hoping it returns to normal and I hate not being able to go run without worrying about it.

I decided to setup a doctor's appointment for a physical (which I'm overdue on anyway) and will mention it to him at the same time.  That's scheduled for the 24th so we'll see how that goes.

Eating well is still continuing with not much new in the way of evolution there.  I'm still having chicken breasts for lunch, egg whites with a single omega-3 egg for breakfast and then some lean meat meal for dinner.  We are still making protein bars and I am still chugging a shake each day.  On the exercise front, I've been very slack for the past week which I can feel in my body.  I don't feel as strong and I don't stand as straight as I was.  Maybe it's all in my head, but I don't feel as youthful as I did these past couple of months.  I need to get back at it so starting tonight I hit the weights and tomorrow I pick up my C25K running.  I was almost about to start Week 3.  Hope I don't have to go backward.

Week 17 - Steady As She Goes

Week 17 | May 8, 2012 | Weight 260.1 | Loss of 0.0 lbs | Total Loss: 50.5

So this is the first week I've not recorded a loss and I'm sort of surprised that I never logged a gain.  Over my son's birthday weekend we had Chinese takeout, high sodium steaks and french fries, pizza, ice cream cake and many more treats.  My wife logged a huge gain this week but with proper flushing, we should be able to take care of that pretty quick.

On the party front, it was a pretty good success and we had a great time at Laser Tag.  We then decided on a whim to go buy both kids their own computers.  They love playing some kids games and surfing youtube videos and always bug to use mine and my wife's computer or bugging me to unpack my laptops and use those so we just said, the hell with it.  They have computer desks in their rooms with nothing on them so may as well make use of them.  Needless to say, they went ape shit when they saw them LOL.

I continued yesterday with my C25K and somewhere along the lines between that and putting together the kids computers, I really hurt my Achilles heel - That's the tendon right above the heel and below the calf.  It's been hurting like a biatch all night and I could barely walk today.  I'll be taking it easy this week and slowing down the workouts until this feels better.

On a sad note, my wife had a death in the family that really struck home with her.  We took some time off in order to grieve and ponder the mortality of us all.  At only 28 years old, it was quite a shock and a loss for a wonderful family.  Steven, you will be remembered always.  May you rest in peace.

Happy Birthday!

My son turned 9 years old this weekend and this post is a shout out to him!  Have a fantastic birthday son!  Of course, all sensible eating went out the window this weekend as I had to partake in birthday cake.  Naturally there was no home cooked meal as we were out to Laser Tag for his party, then off to Chop (a fine dining restaurant) for dinner.

After we doused ourselves with sodium from that, we went back home with some adult friends and had a few drinks.. a few too many and ended up dehydrating ourselves and eating pizza.  This afternoon it finishes up with a dose of Chinese Food, again, loaded up with sodium.

I'm certainly glad these things don't happen very often and I fully expect to log a gain this coming Tuesday.  If I get lucky and I get some runs in and hit the home gym, I may break even.  I'll have to drink a ton of water over the next few days and keep my sodium low to try and work this out of my system.

One thing I did notice that eating this way actually gave me an upset tummy - something I haven't had in months.  I've discovered that the foods I used to be able to eat no problem are causing me grief now that I've been eating so much better over the past while.  I'll be happy to get back to eating better after this weekend but I'm setting the expectation of not having a great loss this week now so I won't be disappointed.  Now, time to go flush!

Week 16 - Officially 50!

Week 16 | May 1, 2012 | Weight 260.1 | Loss of 3.2 lbs | Total Loss: 50.5


Well I'm glad I was right about last week's weigh in, in that it was another sodium induced gain.  Afterward, I dropped the rest of the pounds I put on and continued in a downward direction.  As each day goes by, I get a little more accurate in my recipes and can say with confidence that my nutrients are being tracked correctly at this point for just about everything we eat.  It certainly makes fluctuations easier to explain and I'm at the point now where I can almost predict what's going to happen on the scale based on what I ate, drank and did the day before.

Though I hit my 50 pounds lost mark earlier in the week, today makes it totally official as Tuesday's are my weigh in day.  I still can't believe that I've actually lost 50 pounds - heck only 10 more and I'll be the weight I was at when I got married 13 years ago.  The only downside is I won't see the 50 pound club badge on lose it until next week when I weigh in again.  They don't give out the badge until you record the weight twice.

I'm feeling a lot better than I was last Christmas.  Not only health wise but feeling better about myself.  It's sort of weird thinking about it.  I'm looking in the mirror and am becoming happier with what I see and not disgusted anymore.  When I'm riding the train, and some woman looks at me I no longer say to myself.. "She's probably thinking, what a fat piggie".  Now I'm saying to myself... "She's probably thinking, hey, he's not bad."  LOL.  Though I'm probably way off base, it doesn't matter because it's MY mentality that's changed about myself and whether or not I'm getting checked out really makes no difference because the end result is simple - I feel better about myself.

On the updates front, I've changed my lose it goal from 2 pounds per week to 1.5 pounds per week.  This means I can eat a little more and I'm ensuring I'm not under-eating and making myself sick.  It's a fine line but when you start getting the brain fog going on, you know you're not getting enough food so we'll make sure that doesn't happen... again LOL.

Oddly enough I've discovered that even though I started by eating whatever I wanted and just counted my calories for the first half of my journey so far, I've started to gravitate toward eating healthier foods subconsciously.  I no longer eat frozen entrees for lunch and gone are the 100 calorie chips and ice cream replaced with apples and oranges.  I've discovered the joy of the skinless chicken breast and now cook about 12-15 of them each Sunday and split them for lunches between myself and my wife for the following week.  We've started including steamed broccoli in our dinners and tossed the boxed frozen broccoli and cheese.  It's amazing how this is happening and the fact that I actually like it.  One point in my life, if you showed me a piece of broccoli, I thought I'd spontaneously combust.

On the exercise front, I'm still doing my morning cardio on the rowing machine and now treadmill, followed by a brisk walk during work if there's time and I'm working on my C25K in the evenings 3 days a week.  The other days, I'm doing strength training - currently consisting of pull-ups, push-ups, crunches and lunges with weights.  I can feel myself getting stronger and I'm loving this lifestyle.

Go figure.