Week 8 End - Breaking the 30 lb. barrier!

Jan 1 to Now 2/27

This has been a great week for weight loss. After a disappointing loss of less than 2 lbs. last week I posted a better than 5 lb. loss for this week. The support from family and friends has been amazing. I was originally hesitant about taking this blog and my journey public because of fear of ridicule and the fear that no one would take me seriously and bring me down. That couldn't have been more wrong.

Last night I had the pleasure of attending the annual "Holiday Party" for my motorcycle club. It's a time we set aside after the first of each year, to reflect on the previous year and look forward to the coming riding season. I would like to point out that there was a great food buffet at this event, and I ate well, but stayed within my calorie allotment of the day. It's all about accountability.

GKMC Holiday Party 2/27/16

This is a great bunch of people who collectively raised over $31,000 last year and issued over $21,000 in charitable support to the community. Last night I was shown so much love and support for this journey, I can't help but succeed.

I had the opportunity to talk to several who have expressed their need to lose weight and get healthy, and who said that I have inspired them to take the step. I also was asked by many just how I am doing this. Of course the simple answer is, eat less, move more. But, I think I will take the time here to share what it is I am doing on a daily basis.

Anyone can do this. I'm not taking a miracle drug. I'm not eating special food. I have just adopted a healthy lifestyle. I am now, as the cliche' goes "Eating to live instead of living to eat". Each day is a new challenge and a new opportunity.

MyFitnessPal Screenshot

The day starts with a visit to the two smart phone applications that I am using to track my calorie intake and activity. MyFitnessPal (free) and Fitbit (app is free but trackers vary in cost) are my tools of choice. This is all about how much I eat and my activity. Burn more calories than you eat, and you will lose weight. The proportions determine the speed.

As you can see in the screenshot to the right, I have a calorie allotment here on MyFitnessPal of 2150 to start the day. If I eat this and do nothing else, the app says I should be on track to lose 2 lbs. a week. That's based on the calculated number of calories I burn at rest and normal daily activities (we all burn calories each day, even when we are sleeping). It is calculated to create a 1000 calorie a day deficit (burn more than you eat). That translates to 7000 calories a week or a loss of 2 lbs.. It takes a deficit of 3500 calories to lose 1 lb.. Each person's rate of calorie burn is unique based on your height, weight, and level of activity.

Smarter people than I have figured out the formula to calculate this, and have made it easy for anyone to work out a plan in an app like this. As I update my weight loss within the app, it even recalculates my daily calorie burn and adjusts the calorie allowance accordingly. While today's allotment is 2150, When I started two months ago, it was 2280.

This app (MyFitnessPal) is where I enter all my meals. They have a huge database of foods and the nutritional content (calories, sodium, protien etc.). You can also enter in the recipe of anything you concoct at home, and it figures the nutritional content based on the ingredients. They also have a scan tool that lets you scan the barcode on food packaging and import its nutritional information.

I am faithful in logging all my meals and snacks here, because that is the only true way to know what you are really eating. Most people ignore and underestimate their food consumption. I am eating real food because this isn't a diet, it's a lifestyle change. I have to be able to continue this forever.

As the day goes on, and I enter food, my app keeps track and lets me know how many calories I have left to consume for the day. I allow myself any kind of food I want, but I keep track of it all. You very quickly learn what foods are dense in calories and therefore don't allow you to eat as much quantity, and those which are leaner and allow you to fill your belly. My food choice is based on where my count is for the day, and what I am hungry for. I know that if I indulge in something that has a high calorie count like bread or pasta, I will have to ease up somewhere else later in the day. Likewise, if I know I am going to eat pasta for dinner, I can plan my earlier meals to accommodate that and stay within my allowances.

Now you may look at this and say "I can't cut my eating that much". While I will tell you that if you do, it gets easier with time, I can also tell you that there is an alternative to cutting your eating drastically. Remember that this is about the ratio of calories consumed vs. calories burned. You can always increase the calories burned. Even better is a combination of the two.

FitBit Screenshot

The screenshot at left is of my FitBit app. This app syncs with my FitBit tracker that I wear on my wrist and accounts for all my activity in the day. You'll notice that even though I took the screenshot just after getting up today, it already shows that I burned 853 calories while I slept last night. My particular tracker (the FitBit Charge about $99) also tracks sleep. As you can see, I got a respectable 7 hours of sleep last night, woke up once and was restless 4 times.

This app connects directly with the MyFitnessPal app. It syncs my calories entered there and transfers my activity so that my calories can be adjusted throughout the day in both apps. The cost for the tracker I use is about $99. In my estimation, it's worth every penny to be able to keep accurate track of my activities throughout the day. Knowing what calories you burn vs what you eat is the key to losing the weight. I'm sure there are many fitness trackers out there that are just as good with a smaller price tag, but this one is working great for me and integrates beautifully between my two key apps.

My activity goal for the day (actually the minimum goal) is to make at least 10,000 steps, travel at least 5 miles, have at least 30 minutes of activity (activity as determined by FitBit is at least 10 minutes of constant motion) and burn at least 3890 calories. Before starting at the gym, this was very difficult to do. I have led a rather sedentary lifestyle for many years and working night shift, it's easy to wake up and lounge around the house until it's time to go to work. While there's lot of potential for activity at work (I'm a Correctional Officer/Prison Guard), the reality is that as a whole, we spend a lot of time sitting around. I have started actively increasing my activity at work, and now am going to the gym daily, and am happy to say, that I exceed my goals on a daily basis. The added bonus to the great effect the activity has on your body, is the increased calorie allowance it also creates.

You may notice a slight discrepancy in the calories allotted for the day between the two apps. It because fitbit is tracking in real time and adds calories to the allowance as calories are burned. MyFitnessPal bases the entire allotment on predicted activity, based on current height and weight. By the end of the day, they coincide pretty well (within 100 or so calories).

stats for 2/27/16

As an example of what activity does for your day, let me add another screenshot. This one shows my log for yesterday. I had a total number of steps of 15,556, walked a total of 8.67 miles, burned 4424 calories, had a 1 hour, 4 minute workout burning 1110 calories (and I worked for those). My total calorie intake for the day (as logged in the MFP app and automatically transferred) was 2323. That left me with 1101 calories for the day below my allowance. Because of the added activity, my calorie allowance jumped from just about 2100 for the day, to a whopping 3400 and change. By staying with a number closer to the original allowance, I was able to gain a bigger deficit to push the weight loss. That's how I was able to lose more than the 2 lbs. per week that is targeted.

While I am pushing my deficits a bit, it is important to eat enough calories each day to keep the metabolism going. It is also important to divide up your calories during the day, in effect "grazing" and not save all your calories for one big meal.

The body is an amazing complex machine. It has an innate instinct to survive. If it perceives that it is starving, it will slow down your metabolic rate to conserve calories for survival. In addition, it will try to store what you do eat as fat for future use.

The trick, is to reduce what we take in so as to lose weight, but not so much that the body believes it is starving. The way to do that is to eat often. Once the body realizes it is going to be fed regularly it will allow the metabolism to make use of the reserves it's been holding back. The mistake many people make in "dieting" is starving themselves into survival mode. Also, realize that it takes time for the body to adjust to new things.

Last week I was a little disappointed in the small progress I made on the scale. I had my second full week in at the gym and thought I should be seeing more success. What I now see, is that my body was still adjusting to the huge increase in activity. It wasn't convinced just yet that that activity was going to continue and was holding back to see.

workout screenshot

This past week, I noticed that I was starting to feel hungry throughout the day for the first time since the 2nd or 3rd week. That was a sure sign that my metabolism had kicked up, and the proof was in the weigh in.

The impact of workout activity can be seen on the screenshot at left. This is my workout from yesterday 2/27/16. My calories burned just from the workout were 1110. That was more than I had eaten at that point yesterday. My totals for the day as of that time were around 900 (breakfast, lunch and snacks). I was not scrimping.

My wife and I went out for breakfast where I enjoyed and omelette, toast and home fried potatoes as well as a couple of cups of coffee. For lunch I enjoyed a tuna sandwich, and for a snack I ate some apple slices.

I went in to my party last night with about 2500 calories "in my pocket" and had salad, baked ziti, roasted potatoes, and a tasty vegetable medley (all in moderation) which totalled about 1200 calories. I did pass on the dinner rolls and ice cream for dessert and my drinking consisted of diet pepsi and water. When we got home around 10:30 pm, I was a little hungry again so I had a small bag of chips leftover from a trip to panera bread last week (150 cal) and a big glass of water before bed (about 32 oz).

I know for most of you this is boring, but so many are asking what/how I'm doing this, I just wanted to share the reality of it. There's no magic drug or diet to lose weight and get fit. It's all about living a healthy lifestyle.

Since I started this journey, my blood sugar levels have been great, the weight loss has already made it easier on my knees, and the amount of energy I have is unbelievable. I only wish I had started sooner. I can't wait to see how great I feel when I finally reach my goal weight of 225 lbs.. It seems like a long way off, but I know, with the kind of support I have been getting from all my friends and family, it is easily within reach.

If you want to keep up with my weekly updates, subscribe via email at the top of this page. You will then receive each new post via email. Of course you can also continue to check back here. Thanks again for all the support.

Week 8

I can't believe it is week 8 already. I am really falling into the routine now. In the past several days I have been about 1000 calories below my target. While that's good and if it continues will guarantee good loss at the end of the week, I have to make sure that I don't get caught up in the frenzy and eat too few. I think the metabolism is humming pretty good with the workouts and I have to make sure that I am eating enough to keep that up.

As of this writing, I just returned from a good workout at the gym. I put in about 70 minutes of cardio and burned just a little over 1000 calories. Now again, I know there are those who will say "1000 calories! I don't get anywhere near that in an hour workout!". Remember, I'm probably much bigger than you are. I'm 6'3" and 348 lbs.. Just existing burns more calories than the average person. As my weight goes down it will get harder to reach those kinds of numbers. The good news is, it will also get easier to work out harder.

I want to share a small victory that I had over the weekend. I was out shopping with the wife, and we were in the "fat man" section of JC Penny (they were having a sale and she had coupons that were about to expire). We found this cool t-shirt, but they only had it in 3XLT (I have been wearing 4-5XLT). We decided to buy it for the future (how's that for confidence!). Yesterday, I decided to try it on since it was just laying there. I was pleasantly surprised when it fit pretty well! It's still a little snug (about like my 4X was about 8 weeks ago) so I have left the tags on it and won't wear it until it fits perfectly, but I am sure I will be wearing it to the gym within the next month. I'm getting closer all the time to one of my goals which is to be able to buy clothes in the regular section of most stores. Most go up to 3XL, so I'm closing in.

I do want to take a second to acknowledge all the support I have received since taking this journey public. I was nervous about it because I thought it was likely I would get a lot of flack from people who wouldn't believe that I am seriously doing this. It has been quite the contrary. I have received nothing but positive support from everyone. THANK YOU. While this journey is a personal one, support and encouragement make a difficult task much easier. I didn't however do it just to find additional support. By putting it out there in front of friends, co-workers and family, I now am accountable to all of them. The only thing worse than failure is public failure, so I have a lot of added incentive to see this through. Understand, it is not the fear of failure that drives me. As I said in a conversation with a friend/co-worker last night, I've seen what not doing this leaves me and that's not what I want my life to be. That's my primary motivating factor.

I will update at the end of the week with the official weigh in and whatever else has been going on. Of course if I'm feeling particularly inspired I may update sooner. I have added an email subscription form at the top of the blog to make it easier to subscribe if you don't like to mess with RSS feeds. Just enter your email address and submit it. You will be asked to enter a code to show that you are not a spambot. Then you will receive a confirmation email. Confirm your subscription through the email and you will then receive email updates everytime this blog is updated.

Week 7 End

THON 2016

A great end to week 7. I was able to get out on the bike yesterday (Sat 2/20) and visit with some kids fighting cancer at the annual THON event at Penn State in State College, PA. We presented a check for $5000 to representatives from THON/4 Diamonds Fund. The money was raised by my Motorcycle Club, the Guardian Knights in their annual C1000 Iron Butt Run, in which they ride 1000 miles in under 24 hours. We were then wish granters for some of the kids. They got to look at and sit on the bikes, and we even were privileged to take some on a ride around the campus and past the Bryce Jordan Center where the THON event was happening.

What does this have to do with my weight loss journey? Well... this journey is about a lifestyle change and this is part of my life. I was initially concerned about our lunch arrangements for the day. I didn't know where we would be going and wanted to maintain the progress that I have been making. I'm pleased to say I did just that. We went to Hoss's for lunch (that a local steak house in our region). I had the "light" version of grilled chicken breast (basically 1 fillet instead of two) with rice pilaf for a side and a big green salad with light dressing and a cup of french onion soup. I was very full and satisfied and didn't even break into my snack bag of apple slices and grapes I had packed for the day. We returned home too late to go to the gym, but frankly, after several hours in the saddle for the first time in many months, I don't think I would have been up to it anyway. I will hit it again starting today. My wife and I finished the day with a nice sandwich at a local place.

I would like to say I know how many calories under I was for the day again, but unfortunately, my fitbit charge apparently thinks that riding a motorcycle is exercise, and attributed something like 17,000 steps and 188 floors climbed to my activity for the day. While there is a certain physical component to riding, it's certainly not that much. I did however chart my calories, and based on my normal daily intake, I am comfortable that I stayed well within my allowance for the day. Next time I'll leave the fitbit home.

Now to the important thing, my weekly weigh in. I am pleased to say that I am down another 2.2 lbs. for a total of 27 lbs. in 7 weeks. The easy quick loss is past and now begins the grind. It's simple math really.

WARNING: DIET THEORY TO FOLLOW: It takes a calorie deficit of 3500 to lose 1 lb.. That means that I need a 1000 calorie deficit per day to lose 2 lbs a week. How do we calculate the deficit? We first need to know how many calories we burn each day. That is basically controlled by our activity. We burn a certain amount just by being alive... breathing, circulating our blood etc.. Then there is actual movement. To maintain our weight we must take in an amount of calories equal to the amount we burn. The bigger we are, the more we burn even at rest. Right now I burn about 4000 calories a day with my gym activity. So, currently if I want to maintain my weight, I should eat 4000 calories a day. Of course my goal is to lose weight. To come up with a calorie deficit of 1000/day I would eat 3000 calories. That would net me a 2 lb a week loss (1000x7=7000, 7000/3500=2). If I stay consistent with that, then where do the plateaus come from that everyone laments? The formula assumes a constant calorie burn, but our bodies are not quite so simple. Our metabolism can fluctuate and if we don't eat enough can actually drop. That's why it's important to constantly feed your body when you're trying to lose weight. I know that sounds counter-intuitive, but it's true. Our bodies have a survival instinct built in. If it perceives that we are starving, it will slow the metabolism to try and conserve resources. It will also then try to store everything we eat as fat for future starvation crisis. That's why it is always better to take a slow and steady approach to diet. It's a balancing act really. Feed the body and exercise to kick your metabolism but don't feed it enough to store. Understand that as you lose weight, your body will keep resetting itself. Sometimes that results in an interruption of your weight loss. But, push through and it will return.

Week 7

Well, I finally did it. I put it out to social media that I'm fat and doing something about it. Frankly I have been a bit nervous to put it out there because the only thing worse than failure is public failure. However, I am happy with the progress I'm seeing and have confided my goals to select family and friends over the past weeks and received nothing but support. So, I decided the time was right to put it out there and make myself accountable in front of everyone.

Octane Fitness xR6000

It has been a good week. As of today, I logged 12 days in a row at the gym doing cardio and have gotten my average time of exercise up to 70+ minutes a day. The fast and easy weight loss has subsided which I have been expecting. But, the slow and steady loss continues on schedule. I have done well with my eating as well as the exercise and still remain considerably ahead of schedule to make my 100 before the end of the year. My primary exercise vehicle is the Octane Fitness xR6000 recumbent elliptical machine. I allows me to work out pretty intensely without hurting my knees. I currently do 40 minutes a session on this machine, then move to walking 30 minutes on the treadmill. I want to eventually increase the walking as my knees and weight loss allow. My wife and daughter have talked me into joining them on the Color Run in Hershey PA on June 4. It's a 5k run/walk (for me walk/limp). I'm determined to do this. Last year this would have been out of the question, but I am confident that I can do this.

This weekend is my next weigh in. I must admit I check my weight daily, but it is so up and down depending on time of day and how much water I have consumed (I drink a lot of water) that I do my official weigh in on Sat night or Sun mornings. It seems to allow a relatively consistent showing of where I stand. I am confident that I am going to break the 350 lb barrier this week.

Tomorrow I will get out on the motorcycle for the first time in many months. My knee problems last year really hampered my riding season. Most of the year it was just the pain of riding, then post surgery in October I had a good bit of instability for a couple of months. It is feeling good now (good is a relative term here) and I'm ready to ride. My club the Guardian Knights will be riding from Harrisburg, PA to State College PA (about 80 mile one way) to participate in their THON event which raises millions for pediatric cancer research and direct help to families with children battling cancer. We will be "wish granters" for some of the kids, and will also be presenting a check for $5000 to the organization that was raised in the 2015 C1000 Iron Butt Run. I'm very much looking forward to getting "in the wind" again.

I will make my week end post Sat or Sun with my latest weigh in and any other news that may come up over the next day or two. Be positive my friends.

Week 6 End

Octane Fitness xR6000

Here we are, another week gone. I have had a busy week. The cold that I had last week has improved a great deal and I started going to the gym this past Monday. Now, I joined this gym a few years ago when they were taking pre-opening memberships. Monday was the first time I actually set foot in the place. It's a beautiful place. It has been about 10 years since I was in a gym with any regularity and they have come a long way. The place is huge, and most everything is state of the art. My current machine of choice (I'm concentrating on cardio at the moment) is some sort of hybrid between a recumbent bike, an elliptical machine and a stair climber. I'll try to get a picture of it tomorrow and add it here. I have no idea what it is really called, but it works great with my bad knees. Update: It is an Octane Fitness xR6000 and is listed on the company web site as a recumbent elliptical.

I mentioned in a previous post, that I got a fitbit activity tracker as well. I've had that for a couple of weeks now and it really helps to keep track of your activities and kind of reminds you to be active. I had a particularly active day today, logging over 13,000 steps and over 6 miles travelled. I have 92 minutes of "activity" which includes my workout as well as other activity that is constant for more than 10 minutes at a time. It also keeps track of calories burned (over 3500 so far today and will likely approach 4000 by day's end Update: burned over 4000 calories for the day) and even tracks my sleep. It has been a very worthy investment at about $99.

I have told you before about the app I have been using to track my eating, MyFitnessPal. It has been invaluable in logging calories, and links easily with my new fitbit to share information from that app which harvests the data from the tracking bracelet via bluetooth. My exercise information is shared with the MyFitnessPal app and the food info is shared back to the fitbit app. It's all pretty seamless most of the time. I have noted that the calorie allowance for the fitbit is a little less than MyFitnessPal, so I go with that one since the name of the game here is losing weight.

Today makes day 6 in a row for hitting the gym. I tried to change things up a little and hit the elliptical for about 15 minutes before going to my other machine. That may have been a mistake. The knees have been complaining all day, so I may have gotten a little over ambitious this early on. I know I have only been doing this a week, but I long for those days when I could get a 1000 calorie burn on the elliptical in one session.

2/13/2016 just shy of 25 lbs lost

I have my week end weigh in coming up later. I'm hoping to achieve the 25 lb mark, if not tonight, then before the weekend is over. I'm very close. I'll update this post with my weigh in soon.

Update:
Well... I missed by 2/10 of a pound. I was hoping for an even 25 lbs. lost, but I'm sure it's coming soon. I am still ahead of schedule at nearly 25 lbs. in 6 weeks. The pace I am actually aiming for is 2 lbs. a week so I have doubled that pace so far. It will and has slowed down for now. I'm confident that if I keep up my exercise I will be able to maintain it though.

Week 5 End

Week 5 23.4 lbs 2/7/2016

Here we are at the end of week 5. I'm finally starting to feel better with the whole cold/flu thing. I was able to continue to lose some weight. I made it past the 20 lb. mark and got to a total of 23.4 lbs. lost. That's not bad. I'm almost 1/4 of the way to my yearly goal of 100. The loss is slowing as I knew it would but it would be great to exceed my goal for the year if possible. We will see what the coming months hold.

Yesterday I was able to get out and do some shopping and took the car in for an oil change. It was great to get out of the house after a week of being sick. I was also able to greatly increase my activity by walking around in the stores and around the car dealership where the service was being done. The best part was the fact that I was able to do it relatively pain free. This is a big deal to me. I have not been able to do much of anything without pain for over a year. I attribute the change to both the latest injections in my knees, and the fact that I have taken almost 25 lbs. off of them. My doctor told me that each pound lost, is like removing 4 pounds of stress from the knees. So, that means I've reduced the stress on them by almost 100 lbs.. I can't wait to see how good it feels a couple more months down the road.

I'm feeling excited and energized. I hope that feeling continues. It's sometimes tough to watch some of the ads on TV or read the billboards along the road that are showing great food that I know I won't be eating anytime soon. I really don't even want it, but old habits are very tough sometimes. I don't deprive myself. For instance, last night I had a couple of slices of stromboli for dinner. It was great and I accounted for it all and still came in under my calorie allotment for the day. I'm dedicated to this journey and can't wait for the future.

I also got another bonus yesterday. I was able to use a belt that had not fit in several years. I am definitely getting somewhere with this. Here's to a future of not being fat!!!

Week 5

It has been a tough week. I came down with a miserable chest cold which I think ended up as bronchitis and a touch of flu. I spent most of yesterday in bed with stomach pain, sweats and chills. I must say though, that I woke up today feeling much better and I think I will try to even make it to work tonight (of course it's my Friday so it will be only one day).

I mentioned in my last post that I got a fitbit tracker (charge) over the weekend. I really does allow me to more accurately track my activity. That is good, but with my inactivity of the past week, it has lowered my calorie goal a good bit. I have been able to stay with it, but I look forward to increased activity which will bring my allotted calories back to what I have been used to the past few weeks.

I did pass the 20 lb mark since my last official weigh in.  I do unofficially weigh myself  every day. My weight varies greatly from day to day and even hour to hour, so I save my official weigh in for the end of the week to get a better idea of the real overall weight loss. The next goal... 30 lbs. I am hoping to make that by the end of this month if not before. We will see how it goes. I am bound to hit a plateau soon. I hope to be able to increase my activity as this cold moves on out. That will be a key in keeping the weight loss coming.

I recently found out that the county (my employer) is hosting a "biggest loser" competition. It's a team competition. I won this as an individual competition in the first year they had it (about 10 years ago), losing 95 lbs. in 6 months (I know, not a healthy rate to lose weight). I thought about joining this, but decided that I am better off doing this on my own, for my own reasons and not a competition or prize. This is not something I intend to do for a set period and then it's over. This is a new lifestyle. I have to look at it that way. Will I always have to watch what I eat as much as now? No. Once I achieve my goal, it will allow more leeway in my calories to maintain my weight, but it won't allow me to go back to the old, bad eating habits.

I sometimes think that competitions of this sort do a disservice to those participating. If you are not trying to create a healthier you for your own reasons and goals, you will not have any sustained success. I won the $500 first prize, but then gained back all my weight and more, because once it was over, I went back to an unhealthy lifestyle. The diet I did while competing was unsustainable in the long run (1000 calories/day and staying on the elliptical machine until I had burned 1000 calories). Now my reasons are all personal. I have to do this in a sustainable way so that I can achieve and maintain a weight that allows me to fulfill my goals.

Week 4 End

Week 4 355.8 lbs.

Week 4 ended with a terrible chest cold. My activity level has been very low  (basically in bed). I didn't make the 20 lb mark. I missed by .4 lbs. That's fine. Once I'm back up and moving it will come. I did finish the week with a net loss.

I got a fitbit charge over the weekend, so keeping track of activity will be easier now. Actually everyone in the family has one. We're all working at getting into shape, though I have the most work to do. I'm anxious to get past this sickness and amp up the activity.