308 Days and Counting

As I mentioned in my earlier post, I started this journey 308 days ago. Over the next few weeks, I will post the details of my various weight loss adventures over the years. This latest adventure is by far the longest and the hardest.

How much weight have I lost? I really have no idea.

I haven't been on a scale since 2002 and I do not even know what it said (more on that in future posts). I go by how my clothes fit. My current journey started with me wearing size 43 pants, dress shirts with an 18 inch collar, 2X t-shirts, and XL shorts.

I was one Bacon Double Cheeseburger away from having to start shopping at Big and Tall stores. I was one order of scattered, covered, and smothered hash browns away from not being able to fit into an airplane seat (and since I travel A LOT for work, that would have been a big problem).

Oh, I am 5 feet 9 inches tall.

Today, I wear size 31 pants, dress shirts with a 15.5 inch collar, large t-shirts, and medium shorts. Somewhere along the line I lost at least 1 shoe size.

How am I doing it? It isn't that complicated. I eat 1600 calories per day and I workout 5-6 days per week. No food is off limits. However, in order to not be hungry all of the time, you have to eat fairly healthy food (future posts will contain the basics of what I eat). Most of my exercise has been cardio.

So, I can't tell you how much weight I have lost. I have been at this for 44 weeks. I know I have lost more than 1 pound per week and probably haven't averaged 3 pounds per week. So, I am going to guess that I have lost about 80 pounds plus or minus 10 pounds.

How did I let it get so bad? More importantly, how do I keep it from getting that bad again?

One part of my plan is going to include weighing myself. Sometime before the end of this month I will go to WalMart, purchase a scale, and weigh myself. Of course it will be posted here.

My goal weight is 155 lbs. I know this is a good weight for me. It will be interesting to see how close I am when I weight myself for the first time. Once I weigh myself, I will figure out what my target weight is and try to stay within 5 pounds of that number. I will weigh myself every week and all of you will see if I am "maintaining" or not.

I hope you enjoy statistics since I am going to be measuring everything (well, almost everything) and posting it here. This blog is going to be my fitness/nutrition/wellness/goal tracking log. I think measuring everything is the only way I can transition out of weight loss mode without falling back into the habits that made sumo wrestling a viable career alternative.

During the past 308 days, I have not kept a fitness log. I do count calories every day. In fact, I am constantly finding old Post-It notes that show my tally for various days. I knew that if I stuck to 1600 calories and exercised hard 4 to 6 times per week the weight would come off. I was right.

However, now I need a new approach.

By the way, I hate the term "maintenance mode". Someone please give me a better term to use. I am not planning on maintaining. I plan on living. I also plan on getting fitter and achieving more goals. I strongly believe that if you are not moving forward, then you are moving backward. But, there are many ways to move forward besides losing weight.

Sunday was a good workout day. I got in 60 minutes of tennis with a ball machine (during this process I discovered that I had not gotten competitive tennis out of my system) and then I went for a two mile run in 18:49. Of course, before I left the gym -- swish.