Measurements

I was talking with a friend of mine who is also trying to get rid of a few extra pounds when I realized something for the first time. It came as a surprise at first, but it was very true.

Although I've put myself on diets and exercise programmes before, this is the first time that I've lost a significant amount of weight by my own doing.

It's definitely something for me to be proud of. I'm also hoping that it means that this time the weight loss will stick with me for a very long time.

I've also decided that it yes time to start judging my progress by more than the scale. It's time to start measuring the inches. This kinda scares me, but I know my weight it's not a true judge of my success in this endeavor. The inches tell more of the story.

Guess I better get back to working out. I've got a lot further to go to get to where I want to be.

Wii Fit

So I've been watching my food to help lose weight and as you can tell from my previous entry I've been pretty successful. The first 20 lbs down and far-too-many-too-admit-to left to go.

For Christmas my sister and BIL gave me a gift card to buy a Wii Fit when I got back to Alberta. I bought the Wii Fit and I've had it for just under a week now. In this time, I've used to every day.

I started off just playing with it a bit. A balance game, the step "class" and hula-hoop. Then I started adding in the strength training and the harder step and super hula-hoop. Then the timed Free Step. And then I added extra weight. Ankle weights and dumbbells.

So what am I thinking of the Wii right now? Well I am sore, but not too sore. I work up a good sweat when I use it and I find it gives me the direction and viewable results that I need to keep me encouraged.

I'm finally learning to not hate yoga. In fact I'm finding the programme encouraging me to keep trying at it. It even makes me feel like I might one day get back to the sort of flexibility I had when I was younger.

I know a lot of people who get the Wii Fit intending to use it, but they never do. Well I think it is worth it and I enjoy it. I'm hoping to add this to my daily routine. I know I won't always be able to get a work out in everyday, but I'm sure going to try.

Losing weight isn't just a goal. It's part of a bigger plan and exercise is a part of that plan. Get healthier by getting fitter.

The First 20

I started on my current diet in early November, I may have mentioned it once or twice before. I've been, for the most part, recording steady losses in my weight - which makes me very happy.

Christmas was hard, of course, and I did lost a couple of weeks of hard work. I wasn't going to sweat about it though. It was the holidays and I knew it would be difficult to eat right. Still, I lost the equivalent of 3 to four weeks of weight loss (in actual time and pounds gained).

I am now proud to annouce that I have lost exactly 20lbs as of this morning. The first 20lbs. It is probably the second hardest part of making a diet change like this. The first hardest being the last 20 of course.

The jeans I bought near the end of November are far too loose on me now - which is good, but none of the smaller jeans I own fit me yet. It's got to be the only bad part of losing weight. Not having anything to wear and not wanting to buy anything because you'll shrink out of it too quickly.

And what this first 20 lbs really means? Well to me it means I've made a commitment to my health and well-being. It means that for once I am really going to finish something I've started.

2012

Hello New Year!
Last year I posted what I think was a very nice little entry about the coming of 2011: Letter to a Year Gone By. I certainly did not manage to keep all the goals I had set for myself last year, but that's okay. I always had a problem with setting goals to high.

Looking back:

2011 was a pretty decent year for me. My biggest highlight of the year was running a half marathon. Something that I would have believed impossible not too long ago. I did nearly cripple myself, but that just makes me more careful moving forward.

The low points were the injuries. From the near crippling I just mentioned to slicing of a chunk of my thumb. Not to mention greeting the new year with a tendinitis flare up. Still, I'm not totally broken yet so I'm not going to fret too much!

Looking forward:

I want 2012 to be a year of change for me. I'm working hard to get my weight down. I even have another half marathon goal...but this one is in 2013! Plenty of time to prepare myself properly. Moat importantly, the real goal isn't just weight loss, but overall fitness. I want to be healthy.

The health/weight thing is the biggest thi this year, but I want to do more than that. As I said, I want this to be a year of change. It may seem vague, but I want to make my life better for me.
I want it to be better in a way where I can say that my life is good. That I am happy just as things are. With just the way I am. I want to learn to find a better connection to the world and to other people.  Does that make sense?

So I raise my glass and toast to this new year. May it be the kind of year of which I can be proud of.

One Month Update and Going Home

So it's been a month of dieting now and I am sitting on just over 14 lbs gone. I've found were my failures are (eating out) and where I'm successful (creative low calorie dinners). I've found somethings that work really well for me (weighing in everyday) and what is a total failure for me (free days have been changed to extra calorie days).

I'm at the point where I can start adding in exercise now since NaNoWriMo is now over (I won BTW). I'm really thinking 2012 is going to be a good year for me. Come spring time I'm going to look into joining a running club here in Red Deer depending on how my joints/feet are feeling by that time. I'm hoping that losing the weight will help a lot there, but will, at the very lease, help a little.

And of course, I am going to keep transforming and working with my diet. Although, to be honest, this isn't a diet. It's a lifestyle change. I guess that means I'm more likely to be truly successful, but the "diet" part comes first and the exercise part is working it's way in.

Next week I fly home for Christmas - which will be interesting. Bonus - I do most of the cooking when I'm at my parents house because I like to cook and I'm a better cook than either of my parents. Negatives - it's Christmas. How in the world am I going to resist the temptation of eggnog, chocolate and a giant holiday meal complete with dessert? How about all the restaurants that I know I am going to have to go to because I miss the food so much?

I know those two weeks are going to be tough. I know that going Memphis Blues BBQ House is going to send my calorie count through the roof. I just hope that since I know these things, these dangers, that I will be able to minimize or avoid them.

And of course the very best thing, I can't even tell you right now. Only a few people and my coworkers know the surprise I have in store for my family when I step off that plane on December 18th....there is no public acknowledgement of this surprise save for this post and a single tweet.

Damn, I'm so excited.

Delicious Endeavours

I love cooking. It has always been fun for me to cook for people on occasion. I love to sit down and think up a full meal to serve to others because it's fun. Sometimes people ask me why I didn't decide to become a chef. Honestly, I have thought of it, but I have my reasons for not following such a path.

Tonight my friend Crystal was over. I was helping her work out a new diet plan to get to her goal weight within about two years. I believe she can do it!

The bonus (and sometimes the drawback) of coming to my place is I will always use my guests as guinea pigs for new recipes. She had the luck to try new recipes that worked out, for the most part.

Tonight I served lamb burgers on homemade gluten-free buns with pickled eggplant and goat cheese. A side of fresh baked sweet potato chips (not french fries!) with a curry garlic aioli. And dessert? Well it was so pretty I had to take a picture.




A mini lemon chiffon cake with creme fraiche. Yeah. I made that.

Overall, it was a good meal, the gluten-free buns were the best I'd ever had, the lamb burgers were perfect and the pickled eggplant and goat cheese worked very well with it. The sweet potato chips should have been thinner so that they would have been crispier, but they still tasted delicious and the dip - well my friend took the rest of it home she loved it so much.

And that gorgeous dessert up there tasted incredible, but the outside of the cake was a little tough. I had made them the night before and I knew quickly that the next time I make them, I'll need to adjust the cooking temperature and time for the smaller size of the cakes and the gluten-free flour.

I'll definitely be using these recipes again with a few changes to some of them. It was a wonderful meal and I am quite proud of myself today.

Keep your eye on the prize

Weight. It's something I've always struggled with for most of my life. Every now and again, I get fire under my butt to do something about, mostly I'm not that successful. My greatest weightloss triumphs have usually been due to illness - which is no success.

One week ago I decided to give it a long term shot - all because I got a smartphone.

Yes, you read that right. My smartphone is my dieting tool this time. There are tonnes of apps you can get for smartphones and that means there are apps that help with dieting. I wanted to keep things simple, if it gets to be too difficult, too inconvenient, I'll just say 'to hell with it'. That has been part of my issue with previous attempts.

So moving forward with the KISS mindset, I downloaded a basic calorie counter app. I set myself at a caloric limit that would allow me to lose a reasonable 2 lbs a week with my current lifestyle. Not that I don't want to exercise (or don't enjoy it), but with NaNoWriMo, I knew my exercise would be close to nil. 1500 calories was my daily limit, but I wasn't going to freak out if I was a little over on occasion.

Next came more research, looking for other advice and tips that may allow me to be more likely to succeed this time around. Some tips I ignored, others I considered and some I am actually trying. One of these tips was not to be so strict on my days off. I find it harder to eat healthy when I'm not at work, so I allow myself around 1700 calories, but the firm cap is 2000.

Some of the advice goes against what most experts tell you - such as weighing myself everyday. Yes, I'm well aware that my weight can fluctuate for a variety of reason that have nothing to do with losing weight.

The thing I've found is that even when the scale goes down by .1 lbs, it gives me encouragment, and when it goes up? Well that just reminds me that I need to stay on track that much more. Plus, I love the fact that my app graphs my weight. For me, visual display keeps me interested.

Of course I'm going to keep trying different ideas and suggestions to see what will work best for me over the next month or so. Eventually, I'm going to have a plan that actually works for me - not the diet other people say is the best for me.

So, at the end of one week of my current diet? I'm sitting at a total loss of 6 lbs. I'd say that is pretty encouraging. Can't wait till I can start adding some exercise into the mix.