Losing a part of me

Category: Cheating

  • Day 315

    The last couple of days were very emotional for me, and with that came some emotional eating. Today is the day that I get back on track. Yes, I miss her… but I will be good. I am going to spend a good part of the day at Eduardo’s condo watching World Cup football. The morning games are less interesting to me than the afternoon when Argentina is playing Poland. I have always been an Argentina supporter, and while I was absolutely cheering for Canada this year, they are not going forward, so I will revert back to my long-time favourites.

    Can I stay true to my diet today? I am going to do my best. I will bring meal replacements with me so that I do not have to cheat while I am there. I know it is had, but I have to get back on track!

    Have a great day folks!

  • Day 303

    Up nearly a pound today. Yuck. Yes, the weather has had me down, and my bum knee has prevented any serious activity. Neither of those were reasons to cheat yesterday. I decided to buy popcorn for when Leslie is here… and I indulged in a bag. This, after munching on some peanuts and dried apricots on my way home from the grocery store. BAD MITCH.

    What matters more than anything is that Leslie arrives tonight! I am so excited! I am really looking forward to finally having her back in my arms, and not in the Rectangle Zone where we have spent the last month on video chats. In preparation, I did laundry – my bed sheets needed to be changed, and there was a load of laundry already sitting in the dryer that I took the opportunity to fold. I bought only the provisions required to make her breakfast tomorrow, as I know that we love grocery shopping together. I finally got around to wrapping the Channukah presents that she will take back to Texas with her, and I included with that pile a Chanukkiah (candelabra) so that she and her son (my stepson!) can light the candles with me from Dallas. I have to remember to point out that the best way that I have found to clean the leftover wax out from the previous evening is with a flathead screwdriver… and I did my best to clean it out for her. I am ready for my wife to arrive!

    I thought I was going to have to get up at a ridiculously early hour this morning, but late in the afternoon yesterday Eduardo called and cancelled. He had been worried that his smaller car would not be big enough to hold all of his estranged wife’s luggage for the drive to the airport, but his son was able to get all of it in without too much trouble. While I was happy to help (even though it would have made today a very long and difficult day for me), I was relieved when he told me I did not have to wake up at 3:30am to start my day. Not to confuse sleeping until 6:15am with sleeping in, I was nevertheless able to start my day at a reasonable (and pre-planned) hour to go through my morning routines, including taking Her Royal Floofness for a walk to the park. Well, for me it is still a stumble/limp to the park, but my knee is a bit better than it was yesterday, and my girl was able to play with some friends, romp in the fresh snow, and do all of her business. She will likely have a playdate with Charlie today, but Sue will confirm that in the next hour.

    With the returned normalcy to my day, I will go to Eduardo’s after class this evening (after lighting the Sabbath candles). We will smoke a couple of cigars, and we will commiserate. His original thought last week was that he would be celebrating his estranged wife’s departure, which effectively ends their marriage. I told him that as Jews we do not celebrate the death of an enemy in war, we take the time to think on what that other person (even our most hated enemies are people too) have given up. It should be the same with the ending of an unhappy marriage. While they may not have been happy together, they did once care about each other to get married. He agreed, and so tonight we will not celebrate, but we will look back… and look forward.

    From Eduardo’s I will drive to the airport! I will pick up my beautiful wife and for the first time in just over a month I will be able to hold her in my arms. I miss that so much, and it feels like much longer than a month since she dropped me off at the airport in Dallas. Our physical separations cause me physical pain, and I know she feels the same. Each separation – whether a few days or a few weeks – is harder and harder, but the reunifications are so sweet! The anticipation may well kill me though… I still have fifteen hours to wait before I get to see her.

    This evening, right after class, I will call her, and once again we will light the Sabbath candles. We will say the benedictions over the candles, the wine, and the challah. Once again, I will say my prayers sincerely asking G-d to deliver peace and joy to all of my loved ones. I think this week, more than many, my loved ones are in need of it. I think maybe I am too.

    Have a great day folks!

  • Day 299

    There are some days when you have no choice but to cheat on your weight loss program. Yesterday was such a day. I was picking Lyle and Dorothy up from the airport and driving them home. They were coming home from Italy, and I had joked with them to bring me a pizza. I could not believe it when they did! Rather than coming home from the drive and having a meal replacement, I had a slice of cheese pizza. It was a pretty big piece, but I did not think it would do too much damage.

    I was wrong of course. Over the past four days my weight has skyrocketed. Where I was hoping to stay below 305 lbs. a few days ago, I am now relieved to be just slightly below 310 lbs. and I am extremely upset about it… doubly so knowing that I am working all week and will not get to the gym at all. I will have to redouble my efforts to stay on track with my food intake. That is actually going to be easier this week than it was last week, as I will be teaching.

    The weeks when I teach during the day are the easiest ones to stay on track with. After my morning routine (which starts earlier because I set an alarm to wake up) I am at my desk by 8:00am (7:30am on Day 1 of the class). During our morning break, I will prepare my salad, and get the chicken ready to cook. About 30 minutes before the lunch break, I will walk into the kitchen (while still lecturing) and turn on the air fryer, so that by the time it is time to break for lunch, I can enjoy my meal in a relaxed fashion. While I might enjoy some mints or lozenges during the day, there is no other opportunity to eat.

    When the class is done, I will take Her Royal Floofness for her second walk of the day – that is, unless one of the neighbours asks to visit with her, at which point it might be the third or fourth walk. I will come back in after that and have another meal replacement. The rest of the evening is mine to relax. I suspect that I will need to go shopping this evening, as I think I am going to run out of lettuce with lunch. All I have to do when I go to the supermarket is remember that I am six pounds heavier than I was Friday morning. If I do that, my eyes will not be tempted by the myriad temptations available at the store. Oh, and I should check to see if I need milk.

    To continue the pattern of the last few nights, I did not sleep well. I fell asleep just fine, but once I wake up to pee, falling back into slumber eluded me for a long while. I have too many thoughts racing around in my head, and I cannot figure out how to put them aside. Try as I might, the second half of my nights have been much less restful than the first half. This has been going on for a few nights now, and I am paying the price for it during the day. I am tired… almost constantly. Fortunately, Leslie will be here in four and a half days. I always sleep better when she is next to me. For many reasons aside from sleep, I am literally counting down the hours! It is 110 hours as of right now, for those who might be curious. I cannot wait to have her back in my arms again.

    I should write a few words about the weather. Friday it was 21° and sunny. This morning for Princess Sophie’s walk I donned my ski jacket for the first time, as the temperature was hovering around 0°. I was even thankful that my leather gloves were in the pocket, else I would have had to keep my hands in the pockets the whole time. The calendar might say that winter arrives on December 21, but every Canadian will tell you that the accompanying weather comes much earlier than that. There were snow flurries yesterday, but only a couple. It would not do for the cold and the snow to come in one jarring moment, so I was grateful that at least the skies are clear today. Partly because I am teaching, but also partly because of the predicted (and actual) cold, I put on a t-shirt this morning… under a long sleeve button-down shirt. While I did not put on my winter boots, for the first time since April I wore my Blundstones for our walk. I know the insulated boots will be needed soon, but I will wait for real weather for that. The calendar be damned, winter has arrived in the Greater Toronto Hamilton Area.

    Have a great day folks!

  • Day 298

    Yesterday evening I indulged… and I paid the price this morning on the scale. Sorry, not sorry! I was hungry in the evening, and I decided to make myself a salad. I was going to put some canned salmon on top but when I opened the cabinet, I saw the packages of gourmet smoked salmon that Leslie bought me as a present. I should have portioned it out so that I had enough for a couple of meals, but no. The entire package went onto the salad. It was delicious! This morning’s weight gain was ridiculous, but that is partly because of the high salt content of salmon and should correct tomorrow. I just have to stay on track today.

    I should mention that mid-morning I had an extremely large bowel movement, and there is a very good chance that if I were to weigh myself after that, my weight would be more in line with what I was hoping for this morning. Nothing doing, I will wait until tomorrow morning.

    My plans for the day are simple. I am taking it easy until I hopefully drive out to Milton to spend a couple of hours smoking cigars with Eduardo and Sam. At 5:00pm I have to be at the airport to pick up Lyle and Dorothy, and then drive them back to Hamilton. I do not plan to spend a lot of time with them once there, for two reasons: 1) They will be tired and want to unpack after a long flight, and 2) I have to wake up early tomorrow for my class, which means that I should get a good night sleep tonight. Of course, I will also have my regular meal in a little while. After the scale shock this morning, I will do my absolute best to not stray far from the food plan!

    We are now five days away from Leslie’s upcoming visit, and I am really excited. I miss being with her, and while the video calls are nice, they are small consolation for not being able to hold my wife in my arms. As I told a friend yesterday: I married her because I do not want to spend another day not being married to her. The distance truly sucks.

    Have a great day folks!

  • Day 294

    I am frustrated by my weight-slide this morning, but more so because my floor seems to have gone back to being hinky. I wonder if that just means that the batteries in the scale are dying. I know that there was a 2.5 lbs. weight swing from one spot to another, just inches away. I decided, despite how frustrating it may be, to stick with the highest weight… which means I somehow gained three pounds from yesterday to this morning. I know that I was not able to poop, but three pounds? That is just not right.

    Today is Day 294. How nice would it be if by Day 300 (next Tuesday) I could weigh 300 lbs.? With the way my weight has been going, I don’t know if it is extremely realistic, or a pipe dream. I am going to give it my best to not cheat at all for the next few days, and hopefully get down to that milestone.

    I have prepared a shopping list for today because I know that I am going to forget something if I do not. I need milk, tomatoes, onions, coffee, and lettuce. I am going to the gym in the afternoon, and the shopping can wait until after that. I have just enough lettuce, onion, and tomato left for one salad, so I should be fine. Also, I have enough milk left for one more cup of coffee… if I decide to have one. It is rare that these needs all align so perfectly! Imagine if I also only had enough chicken left for one day? Nah, I could go through to the weekend without buying more if I had to.

    I asked my son the elder if he wants to go to Costco today, but I have not heard back from him. I assume that is a big NO, so Costco is not in the cards… nor is seeing my son the elder today.

    I am really feeling blasé this week and know that I need to head to the gym in order to try to kick myself out of that. I am not down or depressed… but I do feel that before I can sit on my balcony this afternoon with a cigar, I should go to the gym and try to accomplish… something. Lord knows, I have not gotten anything done this week. Who knows? If I stick with my program and have a good workout today (it will mostly be cardio, maybe an hour on the treadmill) then maybe tomorrow morning I will feel better about myself when I step off the scale.

    Have a great day folks!

  • Day 292

    I am back from the doctor’s office, where I was pleased to be down 1kg. Oddly, the same scale that converts from kilos to pounds had me down much more in the imperial system… oh well.

    My doctor is extremely pleased with my weight loss progress over the last 10 months and told me as much. He is also impressed by my blood pressure (97/67). I am at no risk of hypertension. He said that the last time we did a blood screen I was okay, so there is no need to do that again ahead of schedule… sometime early next year I would think.

    Something else the doctor discussed with me is a new medication that is a once per week injection that suppresses the appetite and helps with weight loss. He asked if I have medical benefits and I told him I do not. Aside from it being quite pricey, he agrees that I do not currently need it, and that when my progress abated then we can discuss it again. Maybe when I move to the US I could get it… but I am hoping that by then, I will no longer be obese.

    I cheated yesterday. I am embarrassed to say that I gorged on crackers, but I did. I have to do better today!

    Eduardo is feeling better, and will come over later in the afternoon for a cigar and a chat. I was worried about him, and am glad that he is better.

    I really miss my wife. I am counting the days until she comes to see me, which is now eleven days away. Will I meet my goal of weighing under 300 lbs. by then? The potential is there… as long as I do not continue to cheat on a regular basis! I want to put on a suit and take her out on the town all dolled up. That is my current goal!

    After the doctor, I had my winter tyres put onto my car, as well as an oil change. While oil changes will never go away, this should be my last season of winter tyres… unless the US State Department drags their feet. I am crossing my fingers that does not happen, and that a year from now I am living with Leslie. I miss her too much for this to drag on!

    The weather has not quite turned, but under the sunny skies, it is a much cooler day today than it was Saturday. Even yesterday was warmer, but the wind negated that. I can definitely feel the winter coming. In Canada, that means warm weather clothes, turning the heat on (at home and in the car), and switching out trainers for winter boots. Ahh, the joys of Canadian winters are plentiful…

    Have a great day folks!

  • Day 291

    While I did take small bits of snacks at Ryan’s place yesterday, it was not nearly on the same level as last weekend. I did, however, forget my meal replacement bars – or at least, I thought I did – which meant that I accepted the proffered dinner of a steak sandwich, which I shared with Princess Sophie. It turns out that the meal replacements were in the car, and I could have avoided all of it had I realized that. Sigh.

    My weight this morning is .2lbs up from yesterday, which is really within the margin of error. I am going to the doctor’s office tomorrow and am praying that I am at least 1kg down from two weeks ago, but if I cheat today, that is unlikely. We all know what that means of course… I cannot cheat today! I forgot that I finished the last of my chicken yesterday, which means that I have to go to the supermarket to pick some up today. While I am there, I also need onions and tomatoes. Lord knows, I have enough carrots and celery to sink a ship… owing to my miscalculation regarding the requirements for my chicken soup.

    Speaking of which, I did what I could to remove the schmaltz from the chicken soup, which is now in a jar in my fridge. All seven containers of chicken soup are now in the freezer, and I am somewhat reminded of my mother’s kitchen. Miriam z”l did not have a lot of fine qualities, but she did make fabulous chicken soup. Seldom could you open one of our freezers without finding frozen containers of chicken soup. I can assure you that her soup was much better than mine… and likely any other that I have ever tasted. Of course, those freezers (yes, there was always a second freezer in the house) were replete with everything you can imagine; the Tetris game that I play with my cigars in the humidors is amateur hour compared to how she would pack a freezer. Of course, anyone who disturbed her methods would feel her wrath, but then I did not ever have to work hard to feel that.

    I was speaking with Leslie about how much we miss one another last night. It really is hard to live separately. We are really looking forward to seeing each other in twelve days time, but we both truly long for the day when we can live together forever. Our generation was instilled with the mantra of ‘Good things come to those who wait.’ This is a concept chiefly foreign to the younger generation, who have been raised with the concept of immediate rewards. I know we both have to wait, and eventually the State Department will issue my visa… but the time predicted for that to happen seems so long to us both. At least we have the means and the ability to visit so that we can spend time together every month… but we both feel that each time we part it is harder and harder on us. I pray for a quick response and a positive outcome!

    My plan for the day: I have to go to the supermarket to pick up some chicken and veggies for lunch (for today and the next few days). After that, I am going to Georgetown to a herf with some of the boys up there. I have to be prepared to hear a lot of racist jokes and far-right opinions. I have not yet decided if I am going to keep my opinions to myself or not; this might be a good opportunity for me to practice my reasonable voice. We’ll see… sometimes it is just less stressful to hold my tongue. If there is food at the herf, I will abstain. That is one of the reasons my lunch is so important! I thought about defrosting a steak, but after having the steak sandwich yesterday, I think that would be ill-advised. My gout has not been bothering me since I started taking the preventative meds daily, but why tempt fate, right?

    Have a great day folks!

  • Day 289

    I predicted correctly after I came home and had a second meal – having already eaten a salmon salad sandwich with Lyle and Dorothy – that I would be gaining weight today. It was not the chicken and salad that I ate at home that hurt me though, it was the ridiculously large bun that Lyle served that sandwich on. It was tasty, but it was neither low-calorie nor low carbohydrates. As is always going to be the case, the bread did fill me up, but by the time I arrived home (nearly six hours later) I was famished.

    As a result of that, my weight peaked slightly above my best-since-meeting-Leslie weight, and I am disappointed by that… even if it is only .2lbs. Still, I was hoping that my weight would be dropping slightly, not rising. I have to be good this weekend, or else I am going to pay the price. What exactly is that price, you might ask? I don’t know… but I wanted to be under 300lbs for my weigh-in at the doctor’s office on Monday, and that is unlikely to happen now. I would like to be under 295lbs by the time Leslie comes in two weeks, and that is still possible… as long as I can get off this slide that I’ve been on. Yes, I am only up 1.6lbs from my best weight, but I wrote an article a couple of years ago called One Pound Lost is Three Pounds of Progress. The corollary to that is one pound gained is three pounds of regression. I have to get back on track.

    I had my check-in with my weight loss buddy last night. It will be our last check-in before her surgery, as she is flying to Mexico today for it. Next week, she will be flying home (so no meeting). I am keeping her in my thoughts and prayers, and hope that when we speak in two weeks time, I will be back on track.

    I have no plans for today, but I will go to the supermarket to buy challah for the prayers this evening. My hope is that the challah will be my only cheat of the day. I also hope that tomorrow morning I get on the scale and get a wonderful surprise. We’ll see.

    Have a great day folks!

  • Day 287

    I gained weight this morning, but it was not a significant amount. .2lbs is what I would call a ‘margin of error’ gain. With that said, I did cheat yesterday. I had peanuts (which is not a daily thing but is not unusual). I also had dried apricots, and a couple of ounces of sharp cheddar cheese. It is a misconception that fruits are good for you. While they are healthy, they are also filled with sugar. Dried fruits are much worse, because the sugar is concentrated. While you might eat two or three fresh apricots, it is not difficult to eat a handful of dried ones (as I did… probably eight or ten of them). In other words, I ate the equivalent of ten apricots worth of sugar. Yes, that was a slip. It will not be a common one, but once in a while, I do like to treat myself to something sweet.

    The cheese was a craving that came out of nowhere. I don’t know why, but while I was sitting with Lyle yesterday, I decided I was really in the mood for a piece. I bought the smallest block of aged cheddar I could find and ate two small strips of it… probably 2-3 ounces… after paying the cheese tax to Princess Sophie… and her house guest, Mr. Charlie.

    I do not think that any one of those cheats would have prevented me losing some weight, but the three together resulted in a slight gain. My bad, and I will do better today! Yes, I still have the cheddar in the fridge, but I will not be devouring it on a regular basis.

    This morning, while I was getting dressed, I grabbed the wrong pair of jeans from my armoire. They were tight… I did not remember them being that tight! Because of my damaged and bandaged middle finger, I was not able to button the top button, so I took them off… only to discover that they are a Size 40. I have two identical pair (Levis 501) in a Size 42 (which I wear on a regular basis), and apparently a Size 40 (which was on the ‘hopefully next month’ shelf). While they were tight, I suspect that if my finger was not bandaged, I would have been able to squeeze into the Size 40 jeans. I am not ready to call that a non-scale victory just yet… but it is a good sign of progress!

    I mentioned over the last few days that I had a few days of constipation, and that yesterday it finally passed. I realized as I was speaking with Leslie last night that I could draw a direct line between not drinking enough water to having a stool too hard to pass. Drinking a lot of water is something that I should be doing every day, but I confess that I am often remiss on that. Saturday and Sunday I did not drink enough, so Sunday and Monday I was constipated. Monday, I drank a lot more, so Tuesday I was finally able to poop.

    I have no real plans for the day, except that I am going to try to pick up a Lego set that I spotted on Facebook Marketplace, which Leslie might like. That would take me to Hamilton, so I reached out to Lyle to see if he would be free. As of now he says he is likely busy, but he will let me know if that changes. Who knows? We might have a cigar three days straight leading up to their trip to Italy.

    I will try to be good today. I will have my regular lunch, and aside from that I will do my best to not veer from the path. Despite having cheese in the fridge, I will refrain. If I am out for a while and end up having a handful of peanuts, then let that be the worst transgression… and let me keep the size of the handful small!

    Have a great day folks!

  • Day 285

    Based on my cheating yesterday at Ryan’s house (which proves, once again, that I have not yet broken my relationship with food) I suspected I would be writing a very different entry for today’s journal. Instead, here is what I have to say.

    In March 2021 my best weight was 305.6lbs. It was on March 1 that Leslie and I both started training on a team where we would work together… and fall in love. It was March 3 that I weighed my best. By the day that she confessed her feelings for me, some four months later, I had gained 40lbs. By January the next year, I would gain another fifty pounds. Leslie did not fall in love with me because of my body; I have never once doubted the sincerity of her love for who I am. While our relationship has also experienced some highs and lows over the past year, our love for one another has never been a question.

    Several weeks ago, I realized that at some point my weight would drop below what I weighed last March… and that going forward, every best-weight-ever recorded would also be the lowest weight at which my wife has ever known me. I know she loved me (and was attracted to me) at my heaviest weight, although she was as frustrated as I was by my limitations based on my enormous size. It was during her last visit to see me in 2021 when I decided that I was going to start my weight loss program again in January.clip_image002 It took a few weeks longer than I had hoped – I originally planned (as everyone does) to start January 1 – but I did eventually get going. Through the best of times and worst of them, Leslie has supported me, has encouraged me, has loved me. I have felt that every failure was not only me failing, but it was also me disappointing her. Maybe that is why after a bad fight in July, I decided to redouble my efforts to lose the weight.

    As you can see from the graph that I included, my weight loss has not been a straight downward line. Rather, it has a lot of peaks and valleys. It goes up a bit, it goes down a bit. The important thing, as Leslie consistently reminds me, is that the overall trend is significantly downward. What has no ups and downs is Leslie’s love for me. Yes, there have been times when she has been furious with me… she has never stopped loving me. That is one of the reasons I keep going… not only on my weight loss program, but in general.

    Today, for the first time since the week we met, I weigh less than I weighed that fateful week. I am officially the lowest weight I have ever been since the gorgeous woman who is my wife has known me. I see that as a huge milestone, possibly moreso than the upcoming milestone of dropping below 300lbs (for the first time since February 2021). I have been looking forward to this more than that for the simple reason that the 300lbs milestone is just a number; it is a meaningful one to be sure, but it is only that to me. The weight I was when I met Leslie is a shared comparative milestone which symbolizes my willingness to continue improving myself for her, because her love is worth it.

    —

    I spent yesterday at Ryan’s house watching football and smoking cigars. That was expected. I cheated on my weight management program; I cheated way too much. I had peanuts (which are not the worst thing in the world, although these were salted). I also had some bar nuts (which were coated in some sugary something), as well as some pretzels that had peanut butter in them. I was ashamed of myself, and I remember thinking that eating like this will destroy any progress I have made. What I should have been thinking about was my suit. Leslie reminded me yesterday before I went to Ryan’s that I want to fit into my suits… so that I can impress her. Yes, that is what I should have been thinking. I have to get past the not thinking when I put food into my mouth. I have to remember why it is that I am trying to lose weight. I also have to remember how hard it has been to lose this weight… now 90lbs. I never want to have to go through this again, so I cannot slide back into my old ways.

    Some might think that there is a subliminal connection between my punishing myself for cheating and the trip to the emergency room I had to take last night after I sliced open my finger. In truth, that is unlikely. I was distracted by something for a moment while cutting vegetable for my salad and ended up needing five stitches in the middle finger of my right hand. I was not punishing myself but there is no doubt I reminded myself to focus while wielding sharp knives. The upside of the whole debacle is that I did not end up eating my meal (I asked my neighbour, who was also looking after Her Royal Floofness, to take the chicken from the air fryer, as well as the vegetables on my counter, and put them in the fridge). I got home from the hospital around 11:30pm, and I was not going to eat a whole meal that late at night. Instead, I made sure everything was put away properly, and I had a meal replacement bar. Had I eaten the meal, I would not have achieved the two milestones I did this morning (I also dropped below 305lbs).

    My plans for today are to visit with Lyle for a couple of hours. We will have a cigar on the patio, and he wants help moving something to the kerb. When I agreed to help, I had all ten fingers, but I suspect I should still be able to manage with nine and a half. I love my friends, and anything I can do to help is usually my pleasure to do.

    I do not know if my weight will jump tomorrow, but I suspect it will. I do not know if it will go above 305lbs, but I really hope it does not peak above the 305.6lbs mark, which is the Leslie-mark. I know that she won’t be upset about… but I would be. In other words: I have to stay on track today!

    Next stop: the 300-pounds milestone!

    Have a great day folks!