The gargoyle vs 12 lbs

I know what you mean. I don't feel I'm missing anything. I've exercised every day for the last two-weeks-plus, and it stopped feeling like a chore some time ago. I again didn't eat much yesterday - not because I wanted to starve myself, but because I'm genuinely no longer that hungry. I bought a veggie wrap in the morning, and nibbled it all through the day. My partner then wanted McDonald's for dinner, so I asked for the grilled chicken sandwich with no mayo, a side salad and a Diet Coke. I ate the salad (with very little dressing), then opened the chicken sandwich...and, bizarrely, thought "I'm not sure I can eat all this". I took off the top bun and ate the rest, though.

Had I tried eating like this the first day of dieting, yeah, it would've been a major chore. I would've forever been dreaming of cinnamon rolls and gooey butter cakes, and physically restraining myself from going to get food. Now - I'm just not hungry. It took a bit of time to get here, but now that I AM here, dieting should be much simpler. At least, as long as I don't push my stomach forwards in a major fashion again.

Apparently, my body took pity on me.

Day 9: 1.3 lbs lost yesterday, 7.9 lbs lost total, 4.1 lbs to go.

Almost two-thirds there! My biggest challenge today - it's snowing, believe it or not, and cold weather usually makes me crave large heavy things to help keep me warm. Let's hoping tea does the trick today. But I did kick over to my Christmas folder on the iPod while I exercised.

[youtube]JPps50bAUJE[/youtube]

Lex

 

It was a dangerous day yesterday. My boss came to my desk with a former employee, and said "Guess what? Sarah started her own cupcake business!" And of course, she had a full box of cupcakes to share. I decided to take one for the team. I smiled and said "My diet hates you, but I'd love to try one." I tried the vanilla with vanilla frosting. (Un)fortunately, it was delicious, but (un)fortunately, her business is miles away.

Then, my partner's father was in town, so we went to a steak house for dinner. I ordered the teriyaki kabobs (with rice and green beans), figuring they sounded somewhat healthy, and decided to get a house salad to start to help fill my stomach. Ends up the house salad is a chopped salad with candied pecans and such in it, which will teach me to read the menu closer. I ate about half of that, most of my dinner (but still left some for the diet gods) and skipped dessert. Then, when I went home, I jogged an extra 30 minutes, hoping it'd be enough to keep the weight off.

It was. Barely.

Day 10: 0.2 lbs lost yesterday, 8.1 lbs lost total, 3.9 lbs to go.

This means I snuck past the two-thirds mark. Also, another milestone is coming up. I got the WiiFit almost exactly two years ago now, and my absolute lowest weigh-in ever was in December of 2009. I'm less than a pound away from reaching that point again, and once I surpass that, I can honestly say I'm in better shape at that point than I have been the entire previous decade.

10 min warmup
10 min fast step
30 min jog

That's a bit light on the jogging, but with the half hour last night, too, I didn't want to push things too hard. I may jog a bit this evening. Did it all to the "Prince" folder, and did much of the jogging to this 10 minutes of awesomeness.

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Lex

 

^ Nice!

Ate my roast beef wrap slowly yesterday, and had a boring grilled chicken salad for dinner (no dressing). I did get 20 more minutes in of jogging, but decided that was enough for one day. Apparently, it was.

Day 11: 0.7 lbs lost yesterday, 8.8 lbs lost total, 3.2 lbs to go.

Which is precisely what I weighed back in December. So I'm once again skinniest gargoyle. I didn't work out this morning, though. I weighed myself, felt great about it, and celebrated by going back to bed and sleeping in. I WILL work out this afternoon, though.

Lex

 

^ I didn't lie. 10 min warmup, 10 min faststep, 60 min jog. I kinda felt I had to, since I went to the Chinese buffet for lunch again. I THINK I did OK there, but time will tell.

Posted a post-workout photo in my gallery. In case you thought my other pictures weren't goofy enough.

[youtube]4q5UdiTOi4s[/youtube]

Lex

 

No points for guessing this one.

Day 12: 0.4 lbs gained yesterday, 8.4 lbs lost total, 3.6 lbs to go.

No worries - it's the weekend. If I can keep the weight gain minimal, I'll more than make up for it in during the week.

Lex

 

Bad choices yesterday cost me.

We went to a Greek place for lunch/brunch. I have had their (presumably semi-healthy) fisherman's salad before - a concoction of cold shrimp and crab meat, onions, and tomatoes in a light oil. But I decided I wanted something...breakfasty. So I picked the spinach and feta omelet. I was expecting a standard issue omelet with perhaps a bit of feta cheese to make it creamy. But no. It was a standard omelet...wrapped around a BRICK of feta cheese. It was more cheese than egg. It also came with hash browns (a fact I neglected to notice on the menu), and they were of the "slice a potato and fry it on the grill in oil" variety...which I have a hard time resisting. I tried to eat around the feta, but didn't do that well.

Did a bit better at dinner. Ordered a chili-glazed salmon on a bed of greens. I did order a vanilla cupcake for dessert, but I was anticipating doing that. My problem was first thinking about ordering an alcoholic drink as well, and then when I decided not to, ordering a side of fries. I really didn't need them. But I ate them anyway. Which is probably why this happened:

Day 13: 0.7 lbs gained yesterday, 7.7 lbs lost total, 4.3 lbs to go.

The most weight I've gained in these past two weeks. Luckily, I've kept the exercise going. 10 min warmup, 10 min fast step, 60 min jog yesterday (split between two 30-min periods). I've already done 10 min warmup, 10 min fast step, and 30 min jog this morning. Here's hoping I can get back on track.

Lex

 

I always assume the worst now. That the food I ate immediately attached itself to my fat ass and isn't ever letting go, but the exercise I got will have absolutely no effect at all. I guess because this way, I'm usually pleasantly surprised, and rarely horribly crushed.

Played it really smart yesterday. I "slow-motion" ate a Blueberry Muffin Pop-Tart - took me four hours to finish it. Had a pizza-salad sandwich for late lunch, and when we went to a dessert bar for dessert, I ordered a Diet Coke float. Not exactly diet food, but it's gotta be better than the brownie sundae, right? I got 30 more minutes in of jogging, too, which apparently did the trick.

Day 14: 0.9 lbs lost yesterday, 8.6 lbs lost total, 3.4 lbs to go.

This means my net gain for the three-day weekend was 0.2 lbs - the same as it was last weekend. So I'm in pretty good shape for this coming week. Got a huge head start on the workout, too - 10 min warmup, 10 min fast step, 60 min jog. I may skip jogging this evening, or I might put in a 10 or 20 min jog. We'll see.

Lex

 

I skipped the evening jog - my legs weren't feeling up to it. I did slow-motion eat my roast beef wrap, and I ate half a (largish) calzone for dinner, hoping it wouldn't mess up my progress too much.

It didn't.

Day 15: 2.2 lbs lost yesterday, 10.8 lbs lost total, 1.2 lbs to go.

Well, all RIIIIght! (devil horn, head-banging motion here) My only concern now is that I don't start assuming that I'll be done tomorrow. Or the next day. Or the next. I know how these things can go. But I did get in my 10 min warmup, 10 min fast step, and 40 min jog this morning. Here's hoping.

Lex

 

So, back to the starting line, then? I know that feeling.

Now I'm pondering if I should press on. Once I lose those last 1.2 lbs, that'll put me at 210. And 200 would just be a nicer line to cross, y'know?

Lex

 

Despite what I said yesterday, I woke up this morning feeling pretty hopeful that I'd lost those last 1.2 lbs. I mean, I stuck to the diet, I had a modest sized dinner, and I jogged for over an hour. Even if I didn't lose it all, I was probably lost most of it, right?

Day 16: 2.2 lbs gained yesterday, 9.6 lbs lost total, 3.4 lbs to go.

What...the...FUCK.

I must have stared at that screen for half a minute, jaw roughly three inches from the ground. I briefly thought about what the WiiFit would look like in a million pieces in the street. Then, i did what i always do. I laughed it off, reset my expectations, and started exercising. I now have three and a half pounds to lose, after all.

Besides, I was made for dancin'. All, all, all, all night long.

[youtube]Hihp_Jjdnsg[/youtube]

Lex

 

Another tough thing about a day like yesterday is not being sure about things anymore. Yeah, I stuck with the diet, and exercised a lot, but I did that the previous day, and look where it got me. I guess a tiny part of me hoped that yesterday was some sort of weird "blip" that would magically disappear the next day, but I was pretty sure that wasn't the case. I was more concerned about possibly gaining weight again - would I be able to stick with this program of diet and exercise if I kept gaining weight? Would I feel the need to drastically change things around to stay motivated?

Luckily, it was all worrying for nothing.

Day 17: 0.9 lbs lost yesterday, 9.5 lbs lost total, 2.5 lbs to go.

Phew. That was enough to keep the motivation going. 10 min warmup, 10 min fast step, 45 min jog. I'll think about jogging this evening, as well.

Lex

 

Never been on that end of it, Fred, but I'm guessing it's presumably tougher going the other way. You don't want to simply pack on pounds, I imagine - you want to gain "good" weight. I'd presumably give up and just start eating crappy food, but I might think that because I've done it for most of my life.

For the first time since starting this, I started getting random food cravings yesterday. For much of the day, I was daydreaming about either pancakes or a big sloppy Mexican meal. Still, I stayed good, ate my roast beef wrap, had salmon and edamame for dinner, and got plenty of jogging in.

Day 18: 1.3 lbs lost yesterday, 10.8 lbs lost total, 1.2 lbs to go.

So here we are again. Back at my low point once more. And now it's the weekend (for me), and I'm still kind of thinking about pancakes. Can I somehow make it work?

Lex

 

^ I know where you're coming from. Each time I get unhappy that I'm not at 210 yet, I remember being at 250.

I did have pancakes. And if that weren't enough, I also ate at McDonald's for dinner (my partner wanted McDonald's as he cooked for a huge picnic tomorrow). But I decided I might still make it work.

At the pancake house, I ordered a half-stack of the sourdough flapjacks. This end up being four pancakes about the size of a CD each. I ate three of them, used less than half the butter, and went really sparingly on the syrup. Had nothing else but Diet Coke and water.

At McDonald's, I had a honey mustard grilled chicken wrap, a 100-calorie bag of SmartFood popcorn, a diet soda, and a small Arctic Orange shake. (I love these things - they taste like St Joseph's baby aspirin. ) I only drank about a third of the shake, though.

I did 10 minutes of fast step, and 50 minutes of jogging, too. That was enough to keep me on track.

Day 19: 0.7 lbs lost yesterday, 11.5 lbs lost total, 0.5 lbs to go.

I'm avoiding one big potential pitfall today (not going to that huge picnic), but I AM going to a concert tonight, and maybe having dinner beforehand. I'll try to keep things in check.

Lex

 

I ended up not going to the concert, but I DID go to the picnic. However, I went long after the eating ended. I nibbled on a few things slowly there, but didn't really "eat" a meal. During the afternoon, I'd jog for 10 minutes, then work on some other stuff for awhile, then jog for another 10 minutes. I was hoping that'd be enough to nudge me over the edge.

It was.



Day 20: 1.1 lbs lost yesterday, 12.6 lbs lost total. Goal weight reached.

So...now what? I would like to eventually get down to 200 lbs. But I'm in no real rush. I may take a bit of time before heading down that road. Take a day off from jogging, maybe eat a bacon cheeseburger. Yeah, I'll probably bounce back up over the 210 lb line, but I'll be ready in a few days to start heading back down. We'll see.

Lex