Losing a part of me

Category: Personal Best

  • Day 636

    I mentioned a couple of days back (and not for the first time) that it is uncomfortable to discuss certain bodily functions such as bowel movements. I have thought it important to discuss these last few weeks because of the difficulties I have had, often for days on end, and then the pain resulting from my hard (and mostly minor) successes in that domain. This is why I am so excited to write that yesterday I had not one or two but three extremely successful (and not painful bowel movements. I literally felt like my bowels had been hoarding for weeks and finally decided to let go of everything. It was such a relief that I cannot begin to put it into words.

    I ran out to run a few errands yesterday and ended up picking up some farm-fresh eggs. I was so excited that I made an omelette for dinner, in addition to making one for breakfast this morning. I really can tell the difference between these, and the store bought eggs that I am used to. The result was absolutely delicious!

    I did not exercise yesterday. I did not even walk to the supermarket (as I mentioned I might). My legs were still feeling a bit wobbly from the previous day’s walk so I decided to take the day off. I might go this afternoon, but there are a number of factors that might interfere with that. We will see.

    With regard to the bathroom scale: I am back on track! Yes, this morning’s reading on the bathroom scale confirmed a new best weight ever. While I am only .2 lb. lighter than I was Sunday morning before my cheat day, I am a full three pounds lighter than I was the following morning. I’ll take that and run… and work hard to continue on track today.

    I am now the lowest weight I’ve ever been… and I am not sure if I have had a meal replacement in the past 4-5 days. I am thrilled that I continue to lose weight without any product. I am going to ride this without making any changes for a little while to see if I can continue to lose the weight doing what I have been doing, and if I can then I am going to put an end to the meal replacements. I have eleven boxes left which I know I would have no trouble selling should I want to do so. I am not ready just yet… let me see if I can continue eating two meals per day (plus cutting out all food after 7:00pm) and still lose weight. If so, then sometime next month I will sell off most of my remaining shakes. Leslie would be disappointed if I did not follow that up with ‘Do you know how many cigars that money could buy?’

    I have an appointment with a tailor today to see if she can alter my sports jackets and vests before I go to Dallas on the weekend. It feels amazing knowing that I need to do that in order for them to continue to fit well! I am not going to try to get my shirts altered, but the jackets and the vests would be nice… and she promised that I would have them back in time for me to take to Texas which is important because Leslie and I are going to a couple of events that will require a jacket and tie. Worst case scenario, I still have other jackets… but I would love to wear these.

    Okay, it is time for me to get a move on. Have a great day folks!

  • Day 619

    Yesterday was a very frustrating day with regard to technology. I am not going to go into the details but suffice it to say that what I had hoped to have three days to accomplish I have to try to start from scratch again today and only have two days to go. Wait… while I was walking Her Floofness this morning I thought of one more thing that I wanted to try before giving up and starting over. I’ll be right back. (Three minutes later) OH MY G-D IT WORKED! I did not waste an entire day yesterday and I might be able to get everything done what I need done before Tuesday morning! Woohoo!

    Because of that frustration (and the causes of it) I had time to go for a walk/jog. I did two stints jogging (the first 500m and the 4th) at a faster pace than I think I have run since I was in the Army. I was never a fast runner, but my pace was at or under 5m50s for the two running stints. It felt great, and I will try to push myself to go a little farther at that pace on my next outing.

    I am not sure what prompted it but near the end of my walk I stopped at Fortinos. Instead of just buying water or Gatorade I bought a handful of peanuts. I do not know why I did it, but I walked out of the store with $1 worth of Virginia peanuts. I got home, showered, and prepared my second meal replacement shake. I sat down at the computer to fight with my tech problem. When I finished my meal replacement I moved on to the peanut portion of the meal. Hey Mitch! What part of MEAL REPLACEMENT was unclear to you? You are not meant to have the meal replacement… and desert! Fortunately I was sated to the point where I did not need my final meal replacement of the day, so the peanuts were in fact just that.

    I have this habit of stepping onto the bathroom scale before I get into bed at night. Sometimes I even step onto it when I come in from a long exercise outing. Whatever numbers I may see are not accurate for my tracking, but the pre-bedtime number is usually a good indication of what my weight will be the following morning. Most mornings I will weigh 1-2 lbs. less than I did before bed, although this is not a scientific guarantee, and it has often been as low as .5 lb. and as much as 4.5 lbs. difference.

    When I stepped onto the scale after my exercise yesterday, I was happy to see that I weighed .2 lb. less than my best weight ever… but that is a meaningless number as I have said before. You cannot walk and jog 10km and immediately step onto the scale expecting it to be in line with your daily morning weigh-ins, right? Before I got into bed, I was pleased to see that the number was lower than it had been that morning. I know, I did not have my evening meal replacement so it was probably skewed because of that; nevertheless, I was optimistic that I would see a big drop the next morning. I went to sleep disappointed by my peanuts but glad that I had used them as a meal replacement rather than as an additional snack.

    I have of late stopped wasting my time by sitting on the potty in the mornings in hope that my previous regularity might somehow return, so my morning bathroom ritual is much shorter than it was… especially on days after a long walk/jog which means I would have showered in the afternoon. I walked to the bedroom (where my ‘bathroom’ scale has been for over a year) without any of these thoughts on my mind, only hoping that the numbers would be at least slightly down from yesterday.

    “Mr. Garvis? Yes, your table is ready. Welcome back to Best Weight Ever. Please relax and try to not rest on your laurels.”

    The day-over-day drop was not insubstantial. Not only was my weight lower than yesterday, but it was also a full pound lower than what it was the morning that I flew to California… the day when I dropped below 245 lbs. and for the first time could honestly say I had lost one hundred and fifty pounds! It was an amazing feeling. It would be another hour before I would walk to my fridge to cross off the next number on my countdown chart, but once Her Floofness was walked and fed that is exactly what I did. In the nearly two months since Leslie and I made our little wager to urge each other’s success I have lost just under 20 lbs., and that includes a week in California which did not help my progress at all.

    My original plan for the day (and tomorrow) was to sequester myself at the computer working on my labs, and indeed I do intend to do a lot of work on them today. However, knowing now that I do not have to start from scratch (as I thought until that break in the first paragraph of this journal entry) I will not deprive myself. I will still work most of the day, but I will do so on the balcony with a cigar. It is a beautiful day outside with forecast high temperatures of 25° and sunny. Knowing now that the problem I was up against was caused by Microsoft and not by my not paying close attention because of my cigar I am more comfortable that I can continue to work outside. Depending on how far I get into my labs I might go out for another walk/jog this afternoon… but that will depend on the progress I make.

    Have a great day folks!

  • Day 488

    It looks like yesterday I was focusing on other things, and so I did not post an article. I wrote it, I completed it… I just never put it on my blog. Oh well. Here’s what I wrote, without a single word change, on Tuesday May 23, 2023. -MDG

    My eyes popped open this morning at 5:45am, which is ten minutes earlier than they would have had I not changed my alarm. Realizing I was not going to get back to sleep, I got out of bed and got my day started early. As I went about my bathroom routine I thought about a 5km walk after bringing Princess Sophie in from her morning outing, and I even dressed for it; had any of my neighbours been out that early they would have likely not thought twice about me wearing track pants. Nevertheless, when we got home I decided to get dressed properly, and then go to the lab early and wait in line. That turned out to be the right decision, because as it turns out, the lab closer to home opens at 7:30am and not 8:00am, as does the one in the same building as my doctor. When I walked into the building there was already a line, and by the time I got near the front of it that line was three times longer than it had been when I showed up. I probably saved an hour with that snap decision and was home from the vampires by 8:30am. I was by then more than ready for my morning coffee and meal replacement, owing to not being allowed to eat or drink before the bloodwork was drawn.

    This morning marked the ninth straight day of weight loss. With a day-over day drop of one pound I have now dropped a full 15.4 lbs. since putting the brakes on my slide. I am happy with that, but I also have to give a lot of thought to how to interpret my progress, my feelings, and my plans going forward. As I mentioned in yesterday’s entry, on Sunday I was feeling extremely weak, and I needed to break from the program. I know that I was jogging on the full-fast program before, but on Saturday and especially Sunday I was extremely weak and fatigued the rest of the day. I doubt that had I jogged yesterday morning if I would have been able to make it through my class. In the next few days I am going to discuss my options with Leslie and see which one we feel will be the smartest going forward. In the meantime, I made it through the day yesterday with four meal replacements and two cups of Japanese milk tea… in addition to my regular coffee consumption.

    Every day that my weight drops takes me to a new best weight ever; Saturday morning I was tied with my previous best, but the last three days have each set a new record low. While I have no recollection of it, as I have written in these pages before I was weighed in 2005 at 255 lbs., at the end of my Weight Watchers success (that was abruptly halted by the end of my first marriage). I have been wracking my brain to try to remember another weigh-in lower than that, and the only one that comes to mind is from a year before my enlistment in the Army. I have no recollection of weighing myself between autumn of 1993 and the winter of 2005, although I am sure I did step onto the scale for Army doctors and other check-ups… there is just no record of it. Because of that I feel I am in uncharted territory and find myself at a loss for what to say. I know there are people who have yearned for the day they would see me at a loss for words.

    My plan for the day is to stay the course. Of course, it does not hurt that I start teaching in 30 minutes, and I go straight through until 9:15pm. Would it be possible for me to cheat if I wanted to? Sure. Would it be simple or convenient? It would not be. I am also hoping that I will not be tempted to, because if I had to I know I could pop open a can of salmon or tuna. I do not think I will have to resort to that today, unless I am really struggling. I am hoping that today will be my second straight day of complete success on the program, and that tomorrow morning will mark my tenth straight day of weight drop… and fourth straight day of setting new best-weight-ever records for myself.

    That last note, incidentally, is something that my wife reminds me constantly to be careful of. The scale giveth, the scale taketh away. There will be days when I do everything right, and the scale will either show no loss, or worse a slight gain. I have to remember that these things are going to happen, and that it is not a sign of failure, nor is it a reason to get discouraged. I know that one day in the next few I will see that happen, and I have to remember that weight loss is not going to be a straight and unbroken line down without the occasional blip… even if I do everything right. The most important thing is for me to stay focused and stay on track. As long as the downs are more than the ups then I am still on the right track.

    My plan for today is to stay focused and mindful, and to not veer from the program. As I wrote, it is possible that I will be changing my program over the next few days, but most likely that would not happen until the weekend. Unless I find that I do not have the ability to concentrate and stay awake, I will stay on the full-fast this week, and on the weekend, when I resume my jogging, I will reevaluate that plan. Yes, I have decided that this week I will not be getting up at the crack of dawn to jog before class. Until I know how it will affect my mind and body throughout the extremely long day, I am going to hold off. Next week, when I am teaching in the morning then again at night, I will be happy to jog after my morning class. That way, if I am really drained, I can still take a nap in the afternoon before my evening class. This week, teaching twelve hours straight through Thursday, I will not have that option.

    As long as I do not fall off track, sometime in the next few days I will hit a monster milestone. I am less than two pounds from hitting 250 lbs., which I have no memory of ever weighing after joining the Army. I need to stay on track so that I can celebrate that one soon.

    Have a great day folks!

  • Day 380

    Holy crap kids, it was real. In fact, not only was the extreme weight drop over the past three days real, but despite dropping seven pounds in the previous four days, I actually dropped another .6 lb. this morning. I am in absolute shock and amazement. When I stepped off the scale, moved it to another section of the floor, and got the same reading. Three weeks ago, I finally snapped a two-month plateau and dropped below the 300 lbs. mark; today I am 285.2 lbs. and dropping. I love being in best-weight-yet territory, and I am excited that I am within sight of my next huge milestones. More on that in a few minutes.

    With all of the writing that I did over the last few days, I neglected to mention something that I felt a couple of days ago. While lying in bed I realized that my arm was lying on something strange… it was my hip. It has spent the last what… two years shielded by layers of fat that I am once again shedding. It felt weird… and is another sign that I am making progress.

    Sitting in the airport terminal yesterday, I wrote my article from the food court, while nursing a large cup of coffee from Dunkin Donuts. I also had some emails that I needed to respond to, mostly because my flight delays were going to cause me to miss meetings, so I needed to reschedule them. Other than that, I was using the computer sparingly, knowing that if the battery died, I did not have a charger. Yes, I traveled to Dallas without a charger, but no it was not a mistake. Leslie has the same brand of laptop as I do, and I knew when I packed that I could just use her spare charger. What I did not know when I packed was that it would take me twenty-six hours to get home. I was so focused on what I needed to get done before my battery died that I forgot to eat the protein bar that was sitting next to my coffee cup the whole time. In fact, the airplane was in the air and the flight attendant was serving drinks by the time I realized it was 10:00am, and I had not eaten anything yet. This is something that would not have happened even a few months ago… I have always been able to wake up and do my morning routine, and even take HRF Princess Sophie for her walk before eating, but to wake up at 6:10am and not eat anything until four hours later, and not be hungry? That is new.

    I mentioned earlier that I am back in best-weight-yet territory, and that my next major milestones are in sight. That is not to say that they are within easy reach, but I know where they are, and I can look at my history and predict how long it will take me to get there… if I stay on track. The bathroom scale that I have is a smart one that not only connects to my phone, but it also keeps track of data for me. While it is not the same scale that I bought in June 2020 (which never made the trip from California to Canada), it is the same model, as is the one I bought for Leslie. As such, they all report into my same cloud account, and at the touch of a button, it exports all of my historical weigh-in data dating to June 21, 2020… the day that I stepped onto it for the first time. I downloaded that historical data this morning and see that on July 21, 2020, I weighed exactly what I weigh today. It took me sixty-eight days to drop to the lowest weight I would see: 260.4 lbs. on September 27. It was not a straight downward drop, but in just over two months I lost the 24.8 lbs. that would take me to my best. If I can follow that same trend, then on April 12 I will be back there. Looking at the Hebrew calendar, Monday next week is Tu Bishvat (the New Year for Trees). April 12 is the second to last day of Passover. I could actually be at my lowest weight ever by the end of Passover… if I stay mindful and on track, and do not fall off the program. That is very exciting!

    I had to reset my fitness watch this morning. It was completely crashed, and I had to reset it, break the connection to my phone, and then re-sync everything. I do not think that it is dead, and I hope it can give me a few more months before I have to replace it. It also dawned on me that nearly four years ago, I asked my Facebook community for recommendations on new ones because after using Fitbit for nearly a decade, I was not going to buy another. This Garmin watch has lasted me longer than any two (or possibly even three) Fitbit devices had. I am glad that the reset fixed everything, and unless I notice any other weird behaviour from it, I will continue to wear it as I lose even more weight!

    Today is a good day to stay inside. While it is sunny, the wind chill this morning registered at -30° Celsius, and the high is forecast at -13° (but still windy). Tomorrow’s forecast is much warmer, and by Sunday the forecast high is 6°. I took HRF Princess Sophie out for her walk this morning, which she agreed should be a short one. Even wearing her fancy coat, she was not impressed by the cold. There will be another brief walk later in the day, but she and I both agreed that today is a good day to hibernate. We can go out for a longer walk when it warms up. It does not have to be a lot warmer… tomorrow’s -3° will be fine and Sunday will be better… but today is a good day to stay inside. As I am still exhausted from the last few days, I have no problem with that. My plan is to stay on track with my full-fast meal replacement program, and to drink coffee to keep me somewhat warm… and somewhat awake. When she does need to go out, I will once again dress in layers and bundle up. Every Canadian knows that is the secret to extreme cold. That, and also minimizing the time you spend outside.

    Have a great day folks!

  • You Are Kidding Me, Right?

    There are many days on the weight loss program when I look at the numbers on the bathroom scale and say that. ‘You’re kidding me, right?’ More often than not, those are bad days… the days when I have followed the program religiously, but either lost no weight or worse… actually gained weight. There are also days (like yesterday morning) when I look at the scale in shock, seeing a number so low as to astound me. Yes, I had been good on the program… but to see a drop of two pounds day-over day, after the previous day’s drop of 2.6 lbs., is pretty surprising. Don’t get me wrong, I did not complain; I was simply expecting this morning’s numbers to correct that somewhat.

    After a sleepless night in a hotel in Queens, followed by a relatively uneventful flight, I was in my apartment in Burlington, Ontario (about a 40-minute drive from the airport) by about 12:20pm. I unpacked and then walked down the hallway to my neighbour’s apartment to pick up HRF Princess Sophie, and to chat for a few minutes. It was thirty minutes from walking in the front door until I got undressed and stepped onto the scale. I knew before I did that I should not have much faith in whatever number the bathroom scale showed me because of all of the travel and disorientation, not to mention that it was nearly five hours later in the day than I usually weigh myself. Whatever the number would be, I would take it at face value.

    It is difficult to accept that after two straight days of huge day-over-day drops that for a third straight day the scale registered a drop of over two pounds. You really have to be kidding me. I know I was mostly good for the week in Dallas, and considering everything that happened over the past thirty-six hours (mostly resulting from an ice storm in Dallas that threw my well-planned travel plans into a cross-shredder) I know I was really good yesterday and this morning… but I cannot believe for a minute that I not only weigh less than I did the last couple of days, but I am also a full five pounds lighter than I was the morning I left for Dallas. It simply makes no sense, especially knowing that Friday morning – two days after that last Canadian weigh-in – I had gained 2.2 lbs. Certainly not with the knowledge that Friday evening Leslie and I went out to a Chinese restaurant, or that Sunday I ate meatless burgers with bread and sweet potato fries. Absolutely not possible, knowing that Monday morning (four days ago) I weighed a full seven pounds more than I do right now. It is simply not believable.

    I stepped off the scale and made a beeline for the kitchen, where I prepared my first Canadian meal replacement shake since last Wednesday; when it was ready, I brought it over to my workstation, fired it up, and started trying to make sense of that which just does not make sense. I know that tomorrow morning, after a good night sleep, at the right time of the morning, and with eighteen hours separating me from my last airplane ride, the number will be real and true.

    I have to assume that tomorrow morning I will weigh at least slightly more than I did at 12:45pm today, but in truth I do not know what it will be. All I know is that right now, at 1:15pm on Thursday, February 2, 2023, I weigh less than I have since January 27, 2021 – almost two years to the day – when I was on that slippery slope. At the time, I was only 25 lbs. heavier than my best weight ever… but it would only keep getting worse until just about one year later when I was 135 lbs. heavier than my best weight. Just like it took me nearly a full year to gain the rest of that weight back, it has taken me slightly more than a year to get back down to it.

    This time I am not getting off the ride. It will be hard work to stay on it, but my goal is to keep losing weight until I am slim, and then work my tail off every single day to stay there.

  • Further and Further!

    I set out on my walk today to see if I could come close to Thursday’s record-breaking walk. I have been happy that I have been able to not only crack the 7km ceiling that I seem to have had in Dallas, but do it a few times, and with gusto. In fact, breaking my distance record Thursday was a real milestone for me. Would I be able to match it?

    • Distance: 15.56km (13.02km)
    • Duration: 2:40:02 (2:08:09)
    • Average Pace (Min/km): 10:17 (9:50)
    • Best Split-Pace Kilometre: 9m34 (9m40)
    • Steps: 19.3k (16.3k)
    • Calories burned: 1,871 (1,571)
    • Elevation gain: 76.5 (66.6)
    • Average cadence (steps per minute): 120 (126)

    I certainly was not breaking any speed records today, but I shattered all my previous distance-related marks. I was only able to break the 10m00s mark for three separate kilometres, which was disappointing. For the first couple of 10+ minute kilometres I made the excuse that because there was no sidewalk, I was walking on grass. Leslie has a better theory though, that I am essentially starving my body, and she is probably right.

    We had lunch at Panera Bread Company, and I had a salad with chicken. I also ate the roll that they gave me with it, which I probably should not have done, but which also probably fueled the last five kilometres of my walk. For dinner, Leslie and the boy are preparing a pasta salad, which Leslie knows is not on my diet, but it is something that he helps to prepare, and he is excited to ‘cook’ for me. I am not depriving him of that. No, I should not be eating pasta, but I should also not be disappointing a seven-year-old boy who wants to show off for his new step-father. I expect that the near-1900 calories I burned during the walk will more than make up for whatever I eat this evening.

    Once again, I know it doesn’t count… but I got onto the bathroom scale after my shower, and was down more than two pounds from this morning. It was nice to see 310.8lbs on the scale… even though I never count weigh-ins at 6:00pm! Hopefully tomorrow morning the scale will be equally nice… but it is a lot to expect a weight loss of two pounds in a day… even with the monster walks!

    I will not be walking tomorrow, for several reasons… not the least of which is that I need a day or two to recover from today. Monday I am flying to California, so while I started October with a bang, I do not expect the next three days to be nearly as impressive.

  • My Perfect Ten

    When I set out on this evening’s walk, I did not expect to be breaking any records. By the time I arrived home, I had broken every one of my records.

    Despite my resetting all of my apps, it was still reporting my progress every 620 metres or so, which was throwing me off… but what was worse, the first report told me that I was clocking nearly eleven minutes per kilometre, which made no sense to me.

    I decided to pick up the pace. After two kilometres (and then again after three), it was reporting split-pace times well under 9m50s. Remember, prior to today, my best per-kilometre time was ten minutes even. I know I had kicked it into gear, but I was surprised that I was so far ahead of my previous best. I kept going, deciding I was going to leave it all out on the trail, as we say. Looking at the following table, I am proud to say that every measure is in bold, because every single one is a personal best.

    • Distance: 10 km (8 km)
    • Duration: 1:41:27 (1:27 minutes)
    • Average Pace (Min/km): 10:08 (10:52)
    • Best Split-Pace Kilometre: 9m37s
    • Steps: 12.4k (10.1k)
    • Calories burned: 582 (460)
    • Elevation gain: 39.6m (36m)
    • Average cadence (steps per minute): 122 (116)

    While I was aware of my blisters, neither they nor anything else was causing me pain. By the end of eight kilometres, I suspected my times were dropping… but nowhere near the kind of decline I have experienced near the end of my previous walks.

    I will not be walking ten kilometres every night; I will also not be pushing myself to even approach any of these records any time soon. I am thrilled to have achieved them though… and tomorrow is another day.

    Have a great evening folks!