Losing a part of me

For no good reason, I started reading articles from my original weight loss blog. In an article I wrote in January 2015 I wrote that when my first wife left me in February 2005, I weighed about 255 lbs. According to the article, his was down from a previous peak of 310 lbs. that I weighed in 2003. I guess I was a little off on my calculations for my best weight in twenty-five years… but only by about five pounds. Okay, that gives me a new milestone to add to my list of mini milestones that I keep handy!

Another one of the entries I read was about everyone who wants to offer their advice and opinions. Thank you, but I am doing well on my own. I looked at one person who tried to tell me how I should lose weight and I said, ‘You know, in this conversation, at least one of us has lost over one hundred pounds. Anyone who has may offer advice.’ This offended them… possibly as much as their unwanted and unwarranted advice offended me.

I wrote my article on food delivery services yesterday, and I decided to share it to my Facebook support group. I got a lot of positive feedback, but one busybody decided to scold me. I told her that before she scolds me and chastises me, she should read the whole article, rather than just the highlights… and if she still wants to speak down to me, she should just keep it to herself. She responded defensively of course, and I blocked her. I do not need that kind of negative energy in my life. I am doing well, and when I face challenges, I write about them. She took offense. Thank you, go away. Why can’t people understand that supporting others can be positive, and if you have nothing positive to say, then just don’t say anything? It took me years to understand that.

I was not expecting a huge drop on the bathroom scale this morning, but I was pleasantly surprised. I was thinking that if I nudged back up to 280 lbs., even for a day, it would not be the end of the world. I did not veer from the program at all, but I was prepared for it anyways. Sure enough, I was down 1.6 lbs., which made me feel elated. Punching that number into the comparative chart from 2020 I am now 2.8 lbs. ahead of Day 17 from back then. What’s more, back then I dropped below but then back up, and it was not until Day 28 when I was at today’s weight, and then continued to drop. It also means that I am now 8 lbs. from achieving my best weight from 2017, which feels good as well.

It took until Day 15 for me to be ahead of the 2020 pace. Now, unless I fall hard and drastic, it is likely that the number in the Compare column will be in the positives for good. If I can lose ten more pounds in the next eighteen days before I fly to Dallas – a stretch, but not impossible – then even if I were to gain two or three pounds during the trip, I would still be on pace to beat my 2020 pace to my best weight ever. I enjoy playing around with the numbers on the spreadsheet, so for the fun of it I did the math for if I came back to Canada on March 19 weighing 270 lbs., and then lost 2.8 lbs. per week, I would match the final day perfectly. Here’s the thing though: I plan to come home from Dallas under 270 lbs., and if I do not veer from the program at all then that is a very conservative estimate of my potential pace. It is not out of the question that on April 1^st I could be at my best weight from 2020… and by April 12 (which would match the best weight pace from 2020) I might be at that best post-Army weight that I recorded from February 2005. Just for fun, I punched that same weight loss pace in from today, which would mean a .4 lbs drop per day. At that rate, I will be 255 on April 18. I could live with that!

My plans for the day will depend on a couple of factors. I have reached out to Sam to see if he is still free to smoke cigars for a couple of hours. It would be nice to see him and Eduardo, but I understand that he is a busy man. The forecast calls for a high of 9° and partly cloudy, which means that if they do not come through, I will almost certainly suit up for a jog. I have not been out in a few days, and it will be good to get active. Looking at the hour-by-hour forecast, the highs are expected between 2-4pm, which is a perfect time for me to hit the trails… so to speak. Although now that I think of it, I might look up online to see what trails there are in Burlington. Even if I have to drive to get there, it would be nice if I could jog through wooded parks, and not on the sidewalks along semi-major streets. I will see if I have time to do that before my study group, which starts in a few minutes.

Once again, I will stay on track. I will stay focused, and I will not fall off the wagon. It felt great when Lyle and Dorothy told me yesterday that even since they saw me last (about mid-January) they can tell that I have lost more weight. Yesterday I changed my Facebook profile picture, and several people commented that I was looking great and must have lost weight. If I can keep this pace up and shatter all expectations, then I can get to Dallas 18 lbs. lighter than when I left just thirty-six days earlier. I love feeling better with every pound I drop, but I am not going to lie… there is one person for whom I want to look good, and that is my wife. When she fell in love with me, I weighed a lot more than I do today, but that does not change the fact that she is younger than I am and prettier than I am, and she deserves the best looking me that I can give her. She was shocked when she put her arms around me and for the first time, she could wrap them completely around me… every drop in my weight will make that even more pronounced.

I said just yesterday how important it was for long-term success to set short-term goals. It astounds me that after hitting all of those short-term goals that I have set for myself over the past thirteen months, I am just over three pounds shy of having lost one hundred and twenty pounds. It is a number that I am still having trouble wrapping my head around. It is hard to believe that yesterday I gave away the last of my fat clothes, and that I will never have to wear a XXXL shirt or a Size-40 pants again… and most of my XXL shirts don’t fit well either, to say nothing about my Size-46 pants that I started in. I look at myself in the mirror and when I am naked, I still see a fat man; when I put on clothes that are somewhat stylish, I am beginning to see the man that I want to be looking back at me. The first time that happened was on Day 267, when I walked into the washroom at the Mexican restaurant where Leslie and I were eating. It has gotten progressively better since then, although it is sad that in 130 days, I have only lost 30 lbs. At least I know that I am past that two-month plateau from Hell, and that I am back on track… I hope for good.

Okay, it is time to get moving. My study group is about to start, and I do not want to be late. Have a great day folks!