4XLT

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Today’s Weigh In: 306.2 pounds

I had a really fantastic mini-vacation / long weekend last week. I lived life. I partied hard. I had a great time. And, yes, I chowed down like a bad mofo. And then got back last Sunday night, weighed in on Monday morning, and cranked in at 305.8. I’ve been floating around the 306 mark again ever since.

I haven’t been to the gym since I’ve gotten back to Portland, and I haven’t blogged since before I left - coincidentally, no weight loss. Actually, that’s not coincidental at all.

I can’t ignore the fact that when I blog, I am paying more attention to my health, and consequently make better decisions like eating right and getting to the gym. When I’m not blogging, I have always failed to work as hard as I should. While I’m certain there’s something underlying that fact that isn’t settling real well with me, I’m not going to be delving into the why’s at the moment.

When I started this blog in December 2007, I was at the very beginning of a weight loss journey that has seen me lose about 140 pounds now so far (at least 60 left to go to make my weight loss an even 200, but probably a good 80 to get lean, not factoring in the loose skin). At the time, I was so desperate to change my life and lose weight that I was recruiting anything and everything to get started.

As the pounds began dropping, I was excited about it and almost as excited to see people read the blog and write about it. But as I’ve been on this journey, I’ve found that the weight loss has intertwined itself with other life changes as well. Socially. Spiritually. Personally. On a few occasions I’ve written about some rather personal issues that I’ve slogged through in the course of it (you can find them if you search around - I’m not going to link to them).

And in the midst of all these other goings-on in life, a funny thing has happened with how I view my blog. At the beginning, I was proud of the work I was doing and how I was writing about it here. I was happy to invite my friends to check it out. I was pretty open about the fact that I was trying to work my way down from the mid-400s. In a weird sense, having this blog and being out and public about my weight loss was a sense of power over it.

But oddly enough these days, I feel exactly the opposite. I don’t want to write about all the inner / mental game stuff going on, but I recognize that it makes the blog worth reading - no one wants to read throw food lists and work out routines. That’s just boring. But at the same time, I’m not comfortable any more putting myself out there in personal ways (and more power to those of you who do), especially seeing how this blog is directly tied to me and my professional work (being hosted on willphillips.org). It’s weird, I sent the link to the blog a few weeks ago to some friends who hadn’t read it and felt really off about it after I clicked the send button. At a church small group meeting, I shared briefly about how I was close to the 200s and I felt even more peculiar about it.

I’m not sure that its because of the blog insomuch as any more I’m just not comfortable being vulnerable with most people about anything that really matters to me. And the weight loss stuff rubs elbows with a lot of similarly personal changes in life and worldview and the like going on these days. To be truthful, I’m very happy having a fun but shallow relationship with pretty much everyone I know these days. That suits me just fine.

I’m not sure what I’m going to do here. Might start up an anonymous blog somewhere. Might stop the blog alltogether, but I don’t think that’s a wise move.

Today’s Weigh-In: 298.0 pounds
Next Goal: 295 pounds
Days to Go: 1
Pounds to Go: 3.0

For the first time in eight years, for the first time since high school, I weigh less than 300 pounds. I’m never going back.

Today’s Weigh-In: 301.4 pounds
Next Goal: 295 pounds
Days to Go: 7
Pounds to Go: 6.4

Still here. Still watching my eating. Still watching a bit of an direct correlary to the amount of food I eat and how much I lose, but not in how your would suspect. I wonder if that by going so low on my caloric intake (sub 2000) for several days in a row that my metabolism starts to shut/slow down and so it holds on to any food and water for dear life, thus the fluctuating weights? And when I eat more than my minimum maintenance level, my metabolism kick starts again? I dunno, that’s just my best guess so far.

My water intake’s been right where it needs to be, and I know that keeping hydrated and flushing toxins out of my body at a firehouse rate certainly helps things.

That’s about my only guess. Past that, there’s not too much to write - or more honestly, not too much I want to write about. I guess you can say I’ve been really questioning this blog and why it exists and if I’m comfortable with what I’m writing here (in the sense of putting myself out there in regards to certain parts of my life).

I can’t say I’ve come up with a conclusive answer, but I do know that when I blog consistently, I am thinking more about my health and weight loss, so I make better choices, and end up losing weight. That right there is a good reason to keep it up, but I may change focuses to write more strictly about the What, When, and How of my weight loss rather than the Why.

Today’s Weigh-In: 303.8 pounds
Next Goal: 295 pounds
Days to Go: 9
Pounds to Go: 8.6

My body is fighting me really hard to get through to the 302 mark, much less 299. I weighed in Saturday morning at 204.6 after eating fine on Friday. Weird and frustrating.

Saturday, I helped some friends move all morning and worked up a good sweat. Things were going just fine. My nutrition was okay, sans the two big homemade cookies and Barq’s Root Beer I had while moving, but I figured I could dial back my nutritional intake the rest of the day and come out ahead. That was all fine and dandy and going pretty well until about 11:00 that night when I hit up Applebee’s with some friends… and had a burger, fries, and beer.

Well crap. or so I thought. I woke up Sunday morning at a svelte 303.2 - the heck?!

And to make matters even worse, I ate right spot on all throughout the day Sunday, even refusing to eat a single thing at Red Robin after church. And my weight in this morning? Back close to 304. Bah.

PS: Go read this article: Seven Keys to a Successful Body Transformation - it’s a really good overview to things. My favorite line(s): “When you turn on the TV and come across a show about weight loss, you’ll see a lot of crying, hugging, and syrupy-sweet one-liners about having a positive attitude. Well, fuck that. In the real world, successful people get pissed off…Now, how does a self-pitying whiner deal with discomfort? He quits. How does a guy who’s willing to be an asshole deal with it? He gets ticked and fights through it. And he wins.”

So, I’m not going to sit here and complain about things. I’m going to go home, cook some chicken, throw the sandbag around, sweat some, and win.

Today’s Weigh-In: 303.2 pounds
Next Goal: 295 pounds
Days to Go: 12
Pounds to Go: 8.2

Well, I hit another weight loss spike yesterday, but I can’t claim it’s anywhere as surprising as the one from earlier this week. A friend of mine from college (Go Pokes!) plays in a band called Other Lives (formerly known as Kunek). Really great stuff - kinda this Radiohead meets Sigur Ros meets folk thing going on. Well, I ended up going to bed pretty late as a result, and that in tandem with my two beers shot me right back up to 304.6 yesterday.

And in a supreme sense of oddity, I ate pretty poorly yesterday and was prepared to see a 304 or even 305 (gasp) this morning, but ended up at 303 again. Weird.

Well, the weekend is approaching, and I’m dead-set on hitting 301 by Monday morning.

Enjoy your weekend. Have fun. Live on purpose. Lose weight.