Losing a part of me

Her Floofness looks amazing back from the spa, as she always does. She got home and immediately went to play with her best friend Charlie, and I finished my teaching throughout the rest of the day and evening. In her absence, I realized it was a gorgeous day outside, and I spent my lunch with my wife on the patio… through our rectangles. It is hard to be apart, but at least we have technology to keep us closer. It was the first day in several months that I was able to sit on the balcony without a heavy jacket, wearing only my vest over my shirt and tie. I pointed out to Leslie that I love the look of the vest, but am looking forward to getting new ones that were not tailored for me last March; it is amazing to realize that since my last visit with the tailor, I have lost 80 lbs. The vest is the only piece of clothing from that fitting that was never altered down, but it is also the only one that has a tie in the back that allows me to tighten it. This evening after class I am heading back to meet the tailor and will pick out fabrics for new vests… as well as a new sports jacket and several shirts. It is very exciting!

It is official; my hopes of my weight dropping below 270 lbs. for this evening’s visit to the tailor are over, as are my hopes of dropping any weight at all from yesterday. I did not gain weight, but I did not lose any either. One week out from my flight to Dallas and I am certainly likely to drop below the 270 lbs. mark… but hitting 265 lbs. would require a nearly seven-pound drop in a week; it is just not realistic. I will settle for meeting my goal and will not try to set the even more ambitious one that I hoped for, but never clearly enumerated.

This morning I did have a successful, but still difficult, bowel movement. I am going to increase my fibre intake to two tablespoons twice daily for the foreseeable future. I suspect that when I am in Dallas it will not be as much on an issue, as I will be eating plenty of salads. For now, the idea of sitting on the toilet being an exercise in pain and difficulty is not an appealing one, so I will do what I can to try to mitigate that.

The reasons my weight loss is slightly slower than it was are many, but one is clear when looking at the numbers. As I have mentioned so many times before, I love examining the numbers on my weight loss spreadsheets and using the data to explain patterns. For example, on my comparative spreadsheet from 2020 I see that my gain over the pace from my last weight loss attempt was tremendous this morning, and I am now back to 6.4 lbs. ahead of my pace to my best weight from 2020, a two-pound jump over yesterday. That could have been caused by a sharped weight loss, but of course it was not. It was caused by the cheating and subsequent consequences of same from the 2020 attempt. Reading my journal from that week is interesting – aside from the cheating, I also found this paragraph from that journal’s Day 364 that talks about my ex-girlfriend using me as an emotional punching bag, a topic that I discussed with Leslie just the other day. I also discuss the failures of the previous day, which included a couple of meat sticks from a convenience store, as well as a bag of almonds. I am glad that I am not turning to things like those anymore because the sodium content must have been through the roof! No, the numbers that I was actually referring to at the beginning of this paragraph are in the BMR (Basal Metabolic Rate) column of my body fat scale spreadsheet. There is a huge drop in that from when I started my journey – over 750 calories per day – which simply put means that my body at rest does not burn as many calories as it did a year ago. On a day like yesterday when I hardly moved from my desk chair, I would not have been burning as many calories as I would have not been moving a year ago, which means that the weight loss would be less pronounced. I know that I need to be moving to lose weight, and this weekend – as well as all of next week – I am going to get my butt in gear. I know that I will not get to 265 lbs. by next Thursday… but under 269 lbs. is definitely achievable if I stay on track and move my tuchus!

Going back to my comparative spreadsheet for a moment, I am going to set a timed goal… something that does not always work well for me. Today my comparative weight to 2020 is ahead by 6.4 lbs. March 20 (the first time I will weigh myself back in Canada after my trip) correlates to September 4, 2020, when I weighed 270.6 lbs. If I were to lose an average of .5 lb. per day between now and then, that comparative weight will be up to 7.8 lbs. ahead. If we adjust that rate down to a very reasonable .4 lb. per day, then I will still be ahead by 6 lbs. That will be my goal… to be at least 6 lbs. ahead in the comparative chart on my first day back in Canada. That will allow me to have my cheat meals but will also encourage me to be as mindful as possible so that I do stay on track. It should help that the weather in Dallas will be much more consistently amenable to jogging than is the weather in Canada this month!

Incidentally, if I do keep up that .4 lb. per day loss, I will achieve my best weight from 2020 by March 31, and my best post-Army weight on April 13. At my current rate (since February 1) of over .5 lb. per day, those predictions move up by a week, to March 25 and April 5 respectively. I could weigh less than I can ever remember weighing in the first week of April. I am floored by that. I am truly astounded to know that by either of those rates, my true best-weight-ever is a short-term goal of less than 45 days. Mind. Blown.

I will get through the day with my carful mindfulness, not veering from the program at all. After class I will drive into Hamilton for my appointment with the tailor, which is truly exciting. With all of these predictions and forecasts from the previous paragraphs, I cannot think that I would be tempted to indulge in any cheats along the way. Whether my best weight ever comes on April 5 or 15 or 30, I am not going to fall off my program and lose the amazing momentum that I have built up. Despite the aches in my hip that are reminding me how long it had been since I jogged, I am disappointed that I will not be able to get out for another run until the weekend. I will get through my day today on my usual 950 calories, and I will come home with pictures of fabrics that will be my new wardrobe in 6-8 weeks.

Have a great day folks!