Final Weigh-In

Yes, this is late in being posted by a few days, but guess what? I made it! In fact, I forgot I was aiming for 146 and thought I'd been off by .2 of a pound from 145, so I super made it. With tenths of a pound to spare! Go me!

This picture was taken bright an early Tuesday morning, 9/20/11.

Okay, we'll call that sock weight, because unlike in the original weigh in picture back in January, I'm barefoot.

Remember this? Me, too! I totally did it. I lost forty (one point four) pounds in 8 months. I accomplished my goal. I'm not a superhero and I'm not particularly known for my willpower, but I did it. Here's how.

How I Ate:

Throughout my fitness journey, I tracked my calories online. Most people don't do this because it's a pain in the butt. I didn't want to do it because it's a pain in the butt. I would absolutely recommend it to anyone who wants to improve their body composition, though, with the caveat that it is absolutely a pain in the butt. I measure almost every piece of food I put in my mouth. I look up nutritional info for restaurants I visit. I plug family recipes into a website and then figure out how much of the total calories I probably ate, and log that. The bad news is, wow, there's a lot of AWFUL food out there. It also couldn't be easier to eat it and get huge, because it's cheap, tasty, and everywhere. The good news is that if you track your eating for about two months, you'll start to know what you can and can't eat to support your weight loss goals, and you can probably wing it from there. I chose not to because I knew I had a problem with overeating and because I had a measurable goal I wanted to reach, and it paid off. There's something really powerful about knowing precisely what foods support your goal, and there's something eye opening about seeing just how much real food you can eat for the same number of fat and calories as junk food from a drive through.

Chris, some homeless guy, and me, June 2010

I wouldn't tell anyone that there is any food to never or always eat. It's a matter of making it work for you. I know to a lot of people, cheese, sour cream, and refried beans spell diet disaster, but I found that those foods are usually worth the caloric trade-off for me, because I'd be eating them instead of things with more carbs and sugar. If given the choice of two foods with the same number of calories, I'm almost always going to go for the one with more protein, fiber, or fat than one with more carbs. I just find that carbs don't fill me up, and a hungry Whitney is a miserable Whitney. I drink little to no juice, soda, or sweet tea and drink a whole ton of water, some skim milk, and some Coke Zero. On that note I don't drink alcohol very much. It's usually a once or twice a month thing with several drinks, then weeks of nothing. I find I gravitate toward sugary drinks that have tons of calories and once I've had a bit, I start eating everything in sight. It's just not worth it to do this on more than special occasions. What else? Hmm, granola is deceptively bad for you, don't dismiss things everyone tells you are bad for you without doing the research, take fish oil, and try to fill up on fruits and veggies. Don't eat white bread or rice, and try to keep ice cream to a minimum, 'cause the stuff is killer caloric. Drinking hot tea fills me up, and measure out and check the calories on all pasta you eat, even the whole wheat stuff. You'd be shocked about how many calories you're consuming with pasta. On the other hand, red spaghetti sauce, even with meat, is great, and you can drown your half cup of noodles in it an feel pretty okay with your choices.

Me and Chris, September 2011

Those are my eating tips. The little ones all come from my experience with the big one. I can't tell you how much I benefited from incorporating MyFitnessPal, a food scale, and measuring cups/spoons into my fitness plan. Or maybe I can. 40 pounds in eight months. Yep, about that much.

How I Moved:

Well, the first few months, I did EA Sports Active 2 with Chris. It was a combination cardio and strength program that focused on short exercises strung together with very little rest between them, and was challenging for me. To say the least. Sometimes I cried. ANYWAY, it was surprisingly effective. I also walked around the city a fair bit around three times a week. Then I moved back to Jax and got a job in a restaurant. I walk a lot in a shift, and I love that there's movement in my job. I don't, however, think this is sufficient for someone trying to lose weight, so I joined a gym and have visited it intermittently since then. I've focused on cardio because my goal has been quick weight loss, but while that has helped get the pounds off, I pretty much look like a smaller version of the fat me. Skinnyfat is the term. I don't have any muscle definition and I feel weaker than I should. I regret that I haven't been lifting, as I know it's a huge help to boosting one's metabolism, strengthening the bones, and making you look like a hottie, but I've been lazy. It's my goal in the coming months to throw my attention on that aspect of fitness. Muscles, ahoy!

How I Felt:

Overwhelmed. Proud. Pressured. Enlightened. Occasionally, deprived. Like I accomplished something amazing. Emotions have been all over the place, 'cause it's been EIGHT MONTHS of working at this goal. I've had great successes, some failure, and holding patterns, so it's been all over the map. Here at the finish line, though, I can tell you this: I'm not happy because I'm 40 pounds down. I'm happy because I set a goal and worked toward it. I'm happy because I got in shape for myself, not for the rest of the world, but honestly, I've gotten a lot of affirmation from the outside world, so that's great and helpful. I think you can be miserable, lose wight, and remain miserable. It's about figuring out why you want to do something, trying to be positive about where you're at and who you are now, and taking the, "I'm awesome and I'm just going to improve on a good thing," approach to health.

It's certainly not about starving yourself. It's never been about hating myself and feeling like I won't be happy until I improve. It's all about this, "I am great, and I can be greater!" approach. I wish I could communicate that to others, because I want to be a sign of cool people getting cooler, not miserable people becoming happy through weight loss. No way, man.



I hope this has been helpful to people with similar goals. I know tracking my weight and being accountable to this blog has been essential to me meeting my goal, and I know I really really want to share the things I think have been most essential to my success. My advice: Set a clear and measurable goal. Build in some room for error/real life, and then work like the dickens. If you see things aren't working, try new things. Learn a lot. Use your entertainment (like Biggest Loser or blogs you read) to keep your head in the game and give you more knowledge in a fun way. Don't give in to stupid, "diet of the month" plans you find at the top of the New York Times bestseller list or in a magazine. Drink more water, eat more vegetables, and find a physical activity you like, from walking to weight lifting to yoga. Be awesome. You were born for this.

Hurdles

This has been a challenging week.

About a week ago, I got my schedule from work and found I'd be working 16 hours total for the next two weeks, something that is going to make money pretty darn tight for a bit here. Then I got pink eye, which I get more than any adult on the planet who isn't a parent or teacher. That made me have to call off one of my days at work, so I'm actually going to be working 13.5 hours these two weeks. Thankfully, Mom and Dad bought me some Similasan drops that really helped a lot. When I woke up today and could see out of both of my eyes, I knew things had turned a corner for the better. I was wrong.

My computer fell on the floor and, though it starts up just fine and makes the happy little Windows noise, there is nothing on my screen. It's black. I am so sad. I'm able to hook it up to the monitor of our desktop, so my data is accessible, I'm just going to have to wait a while before I can have it fixed. In the meantime, I'm going to be organizing and backing up my files onto my Mediafire account just in case the computer gives up the good fight (it had better not), so I don't lose all my pictures, ebooks, etc.

So. Not awesome. It's going to be alright, though. First of all, Dad's numbers were so good that he didn't have to have chemo on Monday, so they put it off for another week. Second, I managed to clean out my room and closet and they both look SPECTACULAR. Seriously, we're not talking about HGTV's Design Star here, but it's functional and clean and I have lots of room to move around and be happy. Third, I'm back on the fitness track. I'm logging my eating, making good choices (mostly!) and just trying to be aware of the impact my decisions have on the bottom line, or my weight. Finally, I'm enrolled in college! I'm going to raise my GPA! My classes are paid for and I can bargain hunt online for books and everything, just everything, is going to be great. It really is.

Looking Back on My Weight Loss

When I started losing weight for this blog, I'd already lost some weight. At my heaviest, I was 212 pounds. I lost a dozen pounds and then participated in a Biggest Loser-style fitness competition with some friends, then lost 15 more. My weight went up a bit and down a bit and then I found huge huge success through a combination of three things: weekly weigh ins, tracking my calories, and increased physical activity.

After a few weeks of this, I settled into a rhythm and have lost more weight more consistently and with less effort than I expected. Oh, there's effort, but it's less than I thought there'd be, especially after a few months, when I knew the basics and just had to stick to them.

The fact is that counting my calories allows me to see exactly what I'm eating, and has opened my eyes to what foods break the bank and what foods are calorie bargains. Even if I stopped counting calories today (which I won't!), I'd be better prepared to cook for myself and go to restaurants because I have a much more accurate picture of just what I'm consuming.

As for this blog, while I haven't always been as diligent as I'd like in updating every week, it has been a persistent reminder. I publicly committed to losing weight and checking in every week until I reach my deadline or my goal, and it pops into my head every day.

When it comes to being more active, that's something I've tackled intermittently and without the routine or dedication I've given logging my food or even updating this blog. It's something I've gotten away with neglecting, but I suspect these last ten pounds I want to lose won't come off without increased physical activity on my part. Yes, I walk around at work, but I really want to incorporate in some strength and more intense cardio. Also I really liked yoga. Between my personal tendency toward spontaneity and my irregular work schedule, I haven't had a lot of success nailing down an exercise routine. This week I hope to improve that.

So that's my not very secret secret. Food, exercise, goal setting, goal sharing, and record keeping. I've got a ways to go, but I've come so far. I'm really, really proud of my success and hope for anyone who wants to accomplish this to actually do it. Certain parts are easier than I expected, like tracking my food (a food scale and measuring cups sure help!) and certain parts are harder (like making myself work out). It's all attainable, though, and you do get partial credit, so don't think you have to be perfect from the get go. I wasn't and I'm still not, and look what I've accomplished!

Weigh-In #11

Sorry to post my progress a day late, I forgot yesterday was a weigh-in day and ate breakfast. I felt like this was going to be a good week and didn't want to waste my scale picture on non-optimal conditions. Sorry! Anyway, here we go. I've officially been back in Jacksonville for over a week, and I'm starting to find effective ways to sync my fitness goals with my life here.

Today's really encouraging weigh in o f 169.8 pounds puts me down 2.4 pounds from last week and 16.8 pounds since I first weighed in on January 20th. I'm still maintaining an average weight loss of 1.5 pounds per week, which is perfect and exactly what I hoped for. I feel like in two weeks I should be halfway to my goal, in less than half my time allotted. That's exciting, and I can't wait to celebrate such a significant milestone on this blog. Alright, onto the breakdown!

How I Ate:

This week I returned to logging all my calories on MyFitnessPal. This week I averaged 1173 calories a day, which is low. I'm not doing strength training, though, so I'm not too concerned, and next week should be a bit higher in the calorie area. Also it's hard to count things precisely when eating out, so I may have consumed my regular 1300-1400 calories and just have logged it incompletely. Speaking of eating out, on Tuesday my parents and I went out for dim sum at Silver Star, which was great. We had tiny spare ribs, sesame balls, shrimp dumplings, leek dumplings, vegetable rice rolls, sticky rice in a lotus leaf, and more that I'm forgetting. It was a lot of fun, and I was so happy to see how much Mom and Dad liked it. I also had some food from Krystal on Monday when Dad had his chemo and Toby's on Friday, but you knew about that.

How I Moved:

This week was decent for exercise, not as good as previous weeks where I was using EA Sports Active 2 four times a week but better than recent weeks. Mom and I walked a couple days this week and did a short but grueling Biggest Loser workout video we found via OnDemand.

Yesterday I put my portable radio and running shoes to work and walked Lilly. We walked for .7 miles until we got to Old St. Augustine Rd. and then we alternated walking and running with each song on the radio. Then we did the same with the commercials that played. We did this for three miles, and while I was hot and tired by the end of it, I wasn't totally wiped out. I felt athletic and capable, and it made me want to run more. I know it's only going to get hotter here in Florida, but I feel like if I start forcing myself to work out in the weather now, I'll be more adjusted when the heat really hits.

 How I Felt:

Great! This has been a really good week for me and for my fitness goals. I loved the reception I got when I came home and everyone was telling me how much weight I'd lost, but I was kind of nervous about meshing my eating/moving style in with life at home, but it's been working out pretty well. I was able to wear some of my new clothes and I felt wonderful about how I look in them.

I realized that I eat better on days when I work out, so I want to work to do at least some of my exercising during the morning/early afternoon hours because then I want to keep up my healthy habits throughout the day. Also, I've noticed that if I have a heavy lunch or dinner I usually feel too full or down about what I've done to want to work out. It's illogical but true. I'd like to work on getting out of bed a bit earlier and running or doing an OnDemand workout before breakfast, before it gets too hot outside and before I get too hungry. I'll let you know how it works out!

Oh, here's a picture of me today. I look a little silly (yes, I'm flexing my bicep) but it's a good barometer of how my body looks at the moment. Not a ton of muscle, definitely smaller, and with a ways to go. Compared to this picture of me working out back in January, it shows obvious progress. I'm getting there!

My weight loss goal: Lose 40 lbs in 8 months

I've decided to attach a concrete number to my fitness goal, which is probably something I should have done January first. The problem is that I decided my goal would be improved fitness. But that's not specific enough at all to really work toward. There's no end point! I could call it quits after a day or be convinced I have further to go after three years. It's like driving with the destination of west. Will you stop after a mile or a thousand?

I wanted a place on the fitness map to call my destination. So I weighed myself, grabbed a BMI calculator from the first place Google directed my browser, and chose a goal weight that corresponded to a BMI on the high end of healthy. Also, yes, it's also an even forty pounds lighter than I am today, which is a nice round number.

As my Wii Fit would say, "That's obese!"

That still isn't a complete goal, though. In the metaphor, I know where I'm driving, but I don't know how fast. Should I burn rubber and try to make it three states over in an hour and a half, or just mosey on over whenever I feel like it? I had to set a pace for myself here. I've heard that 1.5 pounds a week is an ideal goal for sustainable weight loss, and that sounded great to me, so I ran some numbers. That was about six and a half months. I could do that!

The thing is, between now and then I'll also be moving from Canada back to the US, getting a job, dealing with Dad's medical stuff, and who knows what else. In the US, I'll be closer to friends and family who will want to eat out more often than Chris and I do up here, and who knows what access to exercise equipment I will have? Also, I have a lot of other goals for myself I'll want to accomplish between then and now, and I'm not willing to put my life on hold just to reach a number on the scale. Not wanting to see my fitness goal slip away and leave me feeling worse than when I started, I slowed it up just a touch and set my goal at eight months.

You know what? Let's put it in bold.

My weight-loss goal is to weigh 146 pounds on September 20th.

Now, how the heck am I going to do that? Well, that's the flexible bit. I'm working to improve both my diet and exercise. I eat about 90% of my meals at home, where I'm focusing on lowering my intake of processed carbs, eating gobs of lean protein, and as many fruits and vegetables as I can stand. I'm working to cook meals from scratch where possible, instead of relying on processed and pre-made foods. I'm not the most experienced cook, so I still fall back on a decent amount of pre-made foods, but I'm working on mastering the basics of healthy cooking from real ingredients.

I'm also currently playing EA Sports Active 2 on the Wii for my primary exercise. There are a couple programs available for players, and I'm doing the nine-week fitness program, which is an all-over fitness plan that incorporates intense cardio and moderate strength training. I work out four days a week with EASA. It's great, and I will post an in-depth review of the game in the next week or so to come. One of the best things about the program is how it incorporates a heart rate monitor into the workout, so you have an accurate count of calories burned while working out. On my off days, I'm playing Wii Fit Plus for the longer, less intense cardio the game offers, as well as yoga.

I'm currently logging my food and exercise over at MyFitnessPal, if you're interested in an up to the minute log, click here. I'm still struggling with a bit of sickness, so my eating is a little sodium-heavy as I drink soups. Other than that, I'm happy with how my calories have been working out, even yesterday when I had a hamburger and poutine at Harvey's, a kind of upscale fast food place here in Toronto. I also walked for over an hour and ice skated that day and kept the rest of my eating tight, which is what it's all about. It's all in the balance.

So there it is. My goal. My destination in this fitness journey. Even if you call it my resolution, I won't be offended. I have the desire. I have the knowledge. I have a plan. I'm not saying I won't tweak the plan, especially as it gets warmer and there are more activities I can do outside the house, but this is solid foundation, if you ask me.

So here we go. This is it. The journey of a lifetime (er, eight months), starting with a single step.