weight loss

These results are not unexpected. December is never a good weight loss month.

And still I’m disappointed, as the last week of the month saw me go from holding steady to holding fat.

My 2018 goal of getting to 150 pounds meant I needed to lose 12.3 pounds this year. Instead, I gained 5.8 pounds. Now I need to lose 18.1 pounds. This is like math gone wrong.

Yet I remain cautiously optimistic and even feel bold enough to make a prediction: My weight will be down in January. January 2019, that is. Like, the month that starts in less than two hours

But in the meantime,. here are the grisly stats for December and the year to date. I blame the December results on the following:

• Ferraro Rocher
• Ritter Sport bars
• Breaking the “no snacks after dinner” rule about five thousand times

December 1: 165 pounds
December 31: 168.1 pounds (up 3.1 pounds)

Year to date: From 162.3 to 168.1 pounds (up 5.8 pounds)

And the body fat:

January 1: 18.5% (30.2 pounds of fat)
December 31: 19.2% (32.3 pounds of fat) (up 2.1 pounds)

The bad news is my weight went up again. I am getting really bad at this weight loss thing.

The good news is it only went up 0.2 pounds for the month, so it was more a case of not really moving up or down, though body fat crept up a bit more.

I am up three pounds on the year. :sadface: But I have remained donut-free, so yay for that.

But I have not remained oat fudge bar-free. Boo for that.

I have been getting better at post-dinner snacking, though. Yay again.

December is not exactly a month known for great weight loss, but who knows? Maybe if I start running/walking again and stick to the no-snacks-after-dinner thing it may just happen.

The fat figures:

November 1: 165.1 pounds
November 30: 165.3 pounds (up 0.2 pounds)

Year to date: From 162.3 to 165.3 pounds (up 3 pounds)

And the body fat:

January 1: 18.5% (30.2 pounds of fat)
November 30: 18.8% (31pounds of fat) (up 0.8 pounds)

I started the month with a bit of a bump over September and by the end of the month was very nearly in the same place, though the trend for the last week is at least in the right direction–down (helped by a few days with the flu).

For the year to date my weight is virtually unchanged. This is good in one sense, as it’s better than ballooning up beyond all reason, but it’s also depressing. In 10 months I have achieved no actual weight loss. Ten months!

So in November I’m cutting out snacking that isn’t offset by exercise on the same day and I’m not eating after dinner. If I stick to this, my weight should drop, even without actual exercise (which I still plan on doing).

And I am still sticking with the no-donuts, so a small glimmer of light in a dark tunnel of stubborn fat.

The stats for October and the year to date:

October 1: 164.3 pounds
October 31: 164.7 pounds (up 0.4 pounds–basically a [generous] rounding error)

Year to date: From 162.3 to 164.7 pounds (up 2.4 pounds)

And the body fat:

January 1: 18.5% (30.2 pounds of fat)
September 30: 18.3% (30.2 pounds of fat (unchanged)

My quest to get below 160 pounds remains elusively out of reach, with my weight in a holding pattern, completely unchanged from August and barely changed for the year to date. I am really good at neither gaining nor losing weight, it seems.

Several times I started getting close, dipping down to 161.5 pounds, but my weight trend ticked upward in the second half of the month, due to less exercise and unchanged snacking.

I did continue to stay donut-free, so yay for that.

Last October I was 153 pounds. It was then I began to gain weight, bloating up past 170 pounds. My main goal is still to get below 160 first, then down to 150, but my super-secret goal is to not see my weight start getting out of hand and into fat as it did one year ago.

To quote Dan Rather, Excelsior! (I think he actually said that once or twice. Maybe.)

September 1: 162.9 pounds
September 30: 162.8 pounds (down 0.1 pounds–basically a rounding error)

Year to date: From 162.3 to 162.8 pounds (up 0.5 pounds–unchanged from August)

And the body fat:

January 1: 18.5% (30.2 pounds of fat)
September 30: 17.9% (29.1 pounds of fat (down 1.1 pounds)

A strange thing happened in August.

My weight neither went up nor down.

Technically if I go from August 1 to August 31 I was up 0.5 pounds, but my stats for the first and last day of the month are exactly the same as they were for the first and last days in July. On July 31 I weighed 162.8 pounds and on August 31 I weighed…162.8 pounds.

Kind of weird.

I dipped below 161 a few times, hitting a low of 160.4 pounds once, but never quite got to my stated goal of under 160, alas.

It now becomes my September goal.

However, I did run more in August and the nil weight loss may be a result of a little muscle gain. My body fat actually dropped decently over the month and is now at 27.8 pounds, down 2.4 pounds on the year.

And I’ve remained donut-free.

In all, I take these things as signs of a positive trend. Onward and downward! (weight-wise)

August 1: 162.2 pounds
August 31: 162.8 pounds (up 0.6 pounds for the month)

Year to date: From 162.3 to 162.8 pounds (up 0.5 pounds–unchanged from July)

And the body fat:

January 1: 18.5% (30.2 pounds of fat)
August 31: 17.9% (27.8 pounds of fat (down 2.4 pounds)

I am clearly doing this wrong.

First, the good news: I got through the entire month donut-free. Hooray!

A tiny bit more good news: My body fat percentage went down slightly from 18.5% to 18.3%. Yes, it could be a rounding error (there may be a fat joke in there) but I’ll take it. Especially when you consider…

The not-so-good news: I started the year at 162.3 pounds. Not great, but 160 and below was in sight. Today I am improbably up to 165.3 pounds and that goal seems buried under layers of fat.

Still, I will not be discouraged! I am still running and working out on the elliptical, and I’m probably going to get regular road running shoes so I can run at lunch when the golf course trail is a gross mud pit of doom, which it is now most of the time.

One last bit of sort-of good news: In January 2017 I started at 165.9 pounds. I’m still down from that. Yes, by 0.6 pounds, but still–down, not up. So there’s that.

And the official fat tidings:

January 1: 162.3 pounds
January 31: 165.3 pounds (+3 pounds)

Year to date: From 162.3 to 165.3 pounds (up 3 pounds)

And the body fat:

January 1: 18.5% (30.2 pounds of fat)
January 31: 18.3% (30.4 pounds of fat)