weight loss

The good news is I am down slightly for the month, even if it is “margin of error” down. It’s still better than up.

More good news is that my body fat, despite still being up for the year, is trending downward as I exercise more.

The not-as-good news is while down for the month, I’m still up from where I was at the beginning of August, so I am still not yet back to where I was before the re-ballooning began.

Most of the month, my weight bounced right around where it ended, around 177 pounds. I mean, it’s better than 187, my all-time high, but I’d really like to break the 170 mark before collecting a pension.

I remain donut-free, though.

I will make a modest prediction for October: I will be down a little again.

Stats:

September 1: 178.4 pounds
September 30: 177.9 pounds (down 0.5 pounds)

Year to date: From 174.2 to 177.9 pounds (up 3.7 pounds)

Body fat (year to date):

January 1: 22.4% (39.1 pounds of fat)
September 30: 23.3% (41.4 pounds of fat) (up 3.3 pounds)

Whoops!

Now let me explain how I almost but not quite completely wiped out my gains from July.

Basically two things:

• Two weeks of vacation where I did not overly pay attention to my calorie count
• Various and random indulgences to celebrate breaking free of a job that I had come to no longer enjoy after many years

I feel bad, but not really bad.

September should be better, though, as I now have lots of time to exercise, I am already running again, and will be paying more attention to what goes in my gullet.

I remain donut-free.

The stats:

August 1: 176.2 pounds
August 31: 178.1 pounds (up 1.9 pounds)

Year to date: From 174.2 to 178.1 pounds (up 3.9 pounds)

Body fat (year to date):

January 1: 22.4% (39.1 pounds of fat)
August 31: 24.1% (42.9 pounds of fat) (up 3.8 pounds)

More good news for the second month in a row, woo. Actual weight loss that is just outside what I consider a rounding error: Down 2.2 pounds. Most of the weight loss came in the last week of the month, with a handy dip of 0.8 pounds just this morning.

Body fat is still going down, but slowly–but it is at least going down.

Sadly, I am still up for the year, but if I behave in August I may see actual weight loss for the year, which would be nice. I am trying to keep active despite the heat and possible wildfire smoke (they say it may arrive today, in fact).

Still, I am at a point now where I can see myself tracking toward 170 instead of away from it, then onward to that eventual, mythical goal of 150 pounds. I’ve done it before, so I can’t deny it isn’t possible.

I was also good and resisted buying cookies on sale this week. I was tempted, but the temptation waned quickly. Yay for me.

Stats:

July 1: 178.7 pounds
July 31: 176.5 pounds (down 2.2 pounds)

Year to date: From 174.2 to 176.5 pounds (up 2.3 pounds)

Body fat (year to date):

January 1: 22.4% (39.1 pounds of fat)
July 31: 23.9% (42.1 pounds of fat) (up 3.0 pounds)

The good news is I was down, even if it was only what amounts to a rounding error.

The better news is my body fat, although still up for the year, has started coming down more noticeably over the past month, so even though I am largely in a holding pattern, I’m at least starting to trend in the right direction.

I also stayed cookie and donut-free this month. I did have some snacks, though. I’ll beat myself with a wet noodle later. Then try not to eat the noodle.

For July, I plan on applying a firmer hand to food intake and get some daily exercise, whether it’s walking, running, flapping my arms or something else.

Stats:

June 1: 179.8 pounds
June 30: 179.5 pounds (down 0.3 pounds)

Year to date: From 174.2 to 179.5 pounds (up 5.3 pounds)

Body fat (year to date):

January 1: 22.4% (39.1 pounds of fat)
June 30: 23.6% (42.4 pounds of fat) (up 3.3 pounds)

Yeah, oops.

May was not a good month, but some of this was legitimately out of my control. What was in my control were the cookies I bought, which I shoved into my mouth. Repeatedly.

So in that sense, being up only 1.6 pounds is not that terrible. But it is still terrible and as far as weight loss plans, about as well-executed as the Titanic’s dodge around the iceberg. The sole consolation is that I am only up 0.1 pounds over the past month, so despite the cookies I was mostly treading water (fat).

For June, I am going once again with the cold turkey approach: no snacking at all. It will not be easy, but I think this is the only thing that will work. If it does work, I should see some actual weight loss over the next 30 days. If it doesn’t, I will be sad and a little puzzled.

The overweight stats:

May 1: 178.7 pounds
May 31: 180.3 pounds (up 1.6 pounds)

Year to date: From 174.2 to 180.3 pounds (up 6.1 pounds)

Body fat (year to date):

January 1: 22.4% (39.1 pounds of fat)
May 31: 24.8% (44.8 pounds of fat) (up 5.7 pounds)

I successfully erased last month’s weight loss and gained a little more on top of that, so April, even though it was largely a holding pattern, was overall a big fat fail.

I ended the monthat 180.2 pounds. I have not been north of 180 since 2008, before I began my first (and successful) weight loss round, when I tipped the scales at a chunky 187.5 pounds before putting on the brakes to eating everything I could grab hold of. I am way too close to that mark now and feel bad having regressed so much this year.

Sure, I could blame the pandemic and not having a commute which forces me to walk at least a little every day, but those are excuses. The reality is I am just not trying hard enough. I just had breakfast as I type this and I’m already thinking about snacking.

It also doesn’t help that my partner (also very much overweight) is keeping a bunch of snacks around. One of the keys back in 2008 was not having stuff like that handy–removing the temptation. Oh well. I know I should be strong enough to resist.

No predictions for next month.

Stats:

April 1: 179.4 pounds
April 30: 180.2 pounds (up 0.8 pounds)

Year to date: From 174.2 to 180.2 pounds (up 6 pounds)

Body fat (year to date):

January 1: 22.4% (39.1 pounds of fat)
April 30: 24.5% (44.1 pounds of fat) (up 5 pounds)

Even though I am down for the month, the reality is my weight was pretty much unchanged for the last 30 days or so.

I started the month unusually high (178.9 pounds), which made the bar for losing weigh correspondingly low. In reality, I hovered at or just above 178 pounds for pretty much the entire month, dipping slightly below on just a few days.

Clearly my restrained snacking has not worked as well as I’d have liked. It also occasionally hasn’t been as restrained as it could be. But I have avoided the following in the past month:

• Donuts
• Cookies
• Pop Tarts
• Entire cakes or even partial cakes

I must work harder on keeping the snacking down, though, plus some daily exercise might help to goose my body toward shedding some fat, or at least gaining a little more muscle. Or something.

Anyway, it could have been better, but it also could have been worse, so I will take this month as the wash it was and try to do better in April, no foolin’.

Stats:

March 1: 178.9 pounds
March 31: 178.2 pounds (down 0.7 pounds)

Year to date: From 174.2 to 178.2 pounds (up 4 pounds)

And the body fat (now year to date rather than just the past month):

January 1: 22.4% (39.1 pounds of fat)
March 31: 23.7% (42.3 pounds of fat) (up 3.2 pounds)

Fat fat fat.

Although I went up a not-terrible 1.3 pounds month over month, this does not tell the full calorie-rich tale.

The more interesting stat is that since the start of the year I have acquired three solid (or perhaps jelly-like) pounds of body fat. This is not good.

At one point I basically gave up and just started eating whatever. Except donuts, since none are convenient. Cookies? Yes. Crackers? Yep. Pop-Tarts? They want on sale and I laid claim to them.

The result is that I have now undone all but about 10 pounds of the weight I shed in my Big Year of Weight Loss back in 2008 (and remembering, too, that I actually dipped even lower in subsequent years).

Tomorrow is a new month and I will be going snack-free, except for fruit and vegetables. I will not eat giant, fatty meals. I will keep walking and resume running.

And hopefully my weight will finally trend back downward again.

We shall see.

Stats:

February 1: 176.5 pounds
February 28: 177.8 pounds (up 1.3 pounds)

Year to date: From 174.2 to 177.8 pounds (up 3.6 pounds)

And the body fat (now year to date rather than just the past month):

January 1: 22.4% (39.1 pounds of fat)
February 28: 23.7% (42.1 pounds of fat) (up 3 pounds)

It’s a new year but the same old fat.

I started January with good intentions, but the combination of plantar fasciitis (keeping me from running or even walking very often) and a lot of unstructured free time took its toll.

Specifically, it made me fat. I gave up and gave in and while I remain donut-free, I indulged in the worst sort of cookiepalooza. I ate boxes of them. Boxes!

The results are not surprising.

However, I’ve thought of this as the beginning of a purge, in which I will do the following:

• No more snacking (healthy snacks like bananas are OK)
• No more soda or carbonated beverages. This includes diet soda, which I think is just making me feel gross. Back to good old water and the occasional sugar-free Gatorade or glass of milk.

We’ll see if I can stick to this. I really have no excuse not to, but that hasn’t stopped me before.

I’m also going to try keeping a daily journal (not on the blog here) to see if that helps keep me honest or honest-like or even honest adjacent.

But let’s stop avoiding the subject and consider the following. After being up a bit in December, I am up quite a bit more this month, topping out today at 176.6 pounds.

I was 174.2 pounds on January 1st, meaning I am up 2.4 pounds for the year to date.

Ugh.

Here’s to a hopefully slimmer 2021.

Stats:

January 1: 174.2 pounds
January 31: 176.6 pounds (up 2.4 pounds)

Year to date: From 174.2 to 176.6 pounds (up 2.4 pounds)

And the body fat:

January 1: 22.4% (39.1 pounds of fat)
January 31: 22.1% (39 pounds of fat) (down 0.1 pound)

Well, poop.

The bad news is I did gain weight both for the month and the year (I jumped 0.8 pounds overnight, which didn’t help).

The good (?) news is that the wright gain was only 1.7 pounds. Stretched over a year, this is pretty close to a rounding error, albeit a big, pudgy one.

The definitely not good news is that I went from 36.1 pounds of body fat to 39. I have been trading my muscle for fat, which would be great if I was a bear and planning to hibernate through the winter.

For 2021, it will not take much effort to improve. When I look back on the year, I can see that I managed to get into a holding pattern, so if I nudge myself a little, and apply some consistency, I may actually see my weight not only drop below 170 pounds again, but possibly keep dropping.

A boy can dream.

As my resolutions post attests, though, I am aiming at a more modest goal of 160 pounds for 2021–I officially have 13.5 pounds to go.

The stats:

December 1: 171.6 pounds
December 31: 173.5 pounds (up 1.9 pounds)

Year to date: From 171.8 to 173.5 pounds (up 1.7 pounds)

And the body fat:

December 1: 22.1% (38 pounds of fat)
December 31: 22.5% (39 pounds of fat) (up 1 pound)

Being down for the month might be cause for celebration normally, but alas, these are not normal times.

As it turned out, I porked up right at the start of the month, which meant being down was a pretty easy goal as long as I didn’t switch to an all-donut diet (which I did not).

I only managed to stay under 170 pounds three times during the month, a dismal showing after October. There was snacking. Plentiful snacking.

I’m going to try to go completely snack-free in December. Such an effort would normally be considered folly for December, but I’m not exactly feeling the holiday cheer this time around.

Small bright side: I am still down overall for the year–by a little!

Larger not-bright side: My body fat shot up 1.8%.

Stats:

November 1: 172.4 pounds
November 30: 170.7 pounds (down 1.7 pounds)

Year to date: From 171.8 to 170.7 pounds (down 1.1 pounds)

And the body fat:

November 1: 20.5% (35.3 pounds of fat)
November 30: 22.3% (38 pounds of fat) (up 2.7 pounds)