Losing a part of me

Category: Progress

  • Day 281

    Yesterday was one of those days that had the potential for me to go off the rails on my program. I got some very disturbing news, and it really upset me. If it was not for the unwavering love and support of my wife, I do not know what would have happened. I am relieved that the only transgression from the program yesterday was a bag of popcorn… and it was the last bag that I had in the house, so that should not be happening again.

    The results of staying on track? My weight dropped 2.4lbs, which is exactly how much I gained two days ago from my post-vaccination cheat splurge. I am still .2lbs from my lowest weight (which I recorded Monday morning, before that splurge), but if I stay on course today, I will hopefully be back into the best-weight-ever territory either tomorrow or latest by Saturday.

    I did not join the gym yesterday as I said I might. That is still in the plans, but yesterday was not a good day… it was a day to sit on the balcony and smoke a cigar and to reflect on what happened. It was also a day to renew my Microsoft ‘Expert’ certification, which was set to expire November 8. My certifications are part of my professional credibility, and I do need to maintain them to stay relevant. The renewals are not nearly as difficult (nor as regimented) as the actual certifications are, and I was able to finish it in less than thirty minutes. It is the second renewal that I did this week – the other being for my ‘Associate’ certification, which would have expired October 30. Getting these out of the way took a bit of a load off my mind indeed. I expect that in the next week or two, I will probably try to earn a couple more certifications… but that will depend on a lot of factors.

    Charlie came over for a visit today, which means that I will not be going out until it is time to pick my cleaning lady up from the train station. The weather might or might not be conducive to a cigar on the balcony – we will see how I feel – but I do know from last night that it is time to start using the patio heater. I also invoked (for the second time in a week) my mantra that if I am not enjoying a cigar, I should not be smoking the cigar. I threw out the cigar I was smoking a little past the halfway point. I should have lit another one, but I decided to step inside to warm up. It was only then that Princess Sophie told me that she wanted to go out for another walk, and so we went… we would have spent longer outside, but we saw the massive skunk (it must be the same one from the other night… unless there is a family of gigantic skunks living around here) so we both decided to come inside.

    I really miss my wife. The other day I was sitting on the porch with Lyle, and he told me that he understands why… that when he drops Dorothy off at the train station in the morning, he misses her terribly, and that is knowing that she will be back in the evening. How much worse must it be, he asked, knowing that when Leslie and I part, we will be apart for a month every time. He is right, it is agony. I miss her, and she misses me. We can only hope that the US State Department does not take too long processing our visa application. The sooner we can be together, the better.

    I joined the American Association of Retired Persons (AARP) last night. I am far from retired of course, but my wife was making fun of my age (she is nearly a decade my junior), and I realized that if I joined, she would automatically become a member as well. There are discounts associated with the membership, so I figured ‘why not?’ It was just something to do… and I suppose it is just one more card that someone wants me to carry around in my wallet.

    I am not sure if today might be my last regularly scheduled meeting with my diet buddy before she goes for her surgery. We might have a couple more weeks, but I will have to ask her about that today. I am really hoping that things go well for her. I am also hoping that I do not fail yet again and find myself wanting to follow in her footsteps. I really want to lose all the weight I have to lose in a healthy manner, and a non-surgical one. I know that my prolonged obesity will have made lasting changes to my aging body, but I want that to be the extent of it; I do not want to make any surgical changes to my body. As I might have mentioned the other day, my ex-wife seems to have overtaken me in the number of scars, and I do not want to try to catch up again.

    It is time for me to get on with my day, so I will close here… have a great day folks!

  • Self Love

    Several months ago – either before or shortly after I started my weight loss program – I was speaking with my girlfriend (now my wife) and I told her that I hated myself. I told her that when I looked in the mirror, when I put on a 3XL shirt that was tight or did not even fit, when I could hardly walk my dog three blocks without needing to lie down when we got home, I was completely disgusted by myself. This upset her, and she told me that I needed to work on loving myself. It was obviously a much deeper conversation than that, but if I were to ask her if that was an accurate synopsis of the conversation, she would accept that it was.

    I started my weight loss program on January 20th. As I write this, it is 9:30pm on Sunday, October 23… two hundred and seventy-seven days later. I do not know for certain what I weighed that day because my bathroom scale is not accurate in that range, and the scale at my doctor’s office maxed out at 350lbs. I estimate I weighed 395lbs, and that is the number I am using for my progress benchmarks.

    Today, ten months and three days into the program, I look back on a lot of successes, and a lot of failures. I have had weeks when I was nearly perfect on my program, but I have had a lot more cheat meals and cheat days than I care to admit. I know that had I stuck to the program religiously, I would be a lot slimmer today than I am. I also know that had I given up on the program, I would be back to where I was. I never want to be there again.

    Leslie has done a tremendous job of encouraging me along the way. While she has told me that she would always love me (and I believe it), she also knows how important my weight loss is for me… and that if I did not (and do not continue to) lose weight, the long life we want to have together would be much shorter. When I write in my journal that I am having a bad time of the program, she asks if she needs to kick my ass. She is very encouraging of every new challenge, and every milestone I hit.

    The question came to mind earlier this evening: Do I love myself yet? I suppose the better question would be: am I still disgusted by what I see?

    Knowing all of my failures and cheats, let’s review my progress so far:

    • Lost ~85lbs
    • Down from a tight 3XL to a loose 2XL golf shirt
    • Able to out-walk my dog… and have in the last month been able to walk 15km in a day
    • Eating significantly less… and making better choices
    • Intimate performance has greatly improved
    • My belly does not hang out of any of my shirts
    • Jackets that I could not come close to closing at the beginning fit perfectly… and while I am not yet ready to wear my custom-tailored suits from five years ago, the jacket is now a tight but wearable fit

    I could list many more improvements, but I think the most telling is a story that happened just two weeks ago. Leslie and I went out for Mexican food on the penultimate night of my latest trip to Dallas. When I came back to the table from the washroom, I told her that I looked in the mirror and saw a much slimmer man than I was expecting… I was used to seeing a morbidly obese man looking back at me. Now? I’m still fat, but I am looking better.

    I still do not love my body. It is hard to explain, but despite how long it might take me to stop being fat, I suspect that psychologically it will take much longer to stop thinking that I am fat. I like myself better than I did ten months ago, but I have a long way to go before I love my body again… if I ever did. Long before I was actually fat, I was taught by my mother to hate my body. It did not matter that I played high school and college basketball; it did not matter that I served (with distinction) in the Army. I was taught that I needed to lose weight… which meant that I was fat.

    The psychology of weight loss is complex. I do not know if I will ever look at myself and be happy with my body. There is so much discussion of how women have been taught to be ashamed of their bodies, but with men it is much less out in the open. I think that at a certain point, I am going to realize that I cannot do it alone, and I will need to speak with someone. Leslie is wonderful but I think that anyone with a history like mine would need professional guidance to feeling good about myself.

    To be clear, I feel much better about myself today than I did a year ago, or even six months ago. Better is not Good. I need to learn to feel good about myself. When will that happen? I don’t know. It would be nice to fit into my Army uniform, but will that do it? I don’t know. I only know that I am on a journey, and it is a difficult one. I have come so far… but I have so far to go. That is not only around my waist, but in my head. I thank G-d daily that I have such a helpful partner. Now if only I could be a better me.

  • Day 269

    Yesterday went exactly as I expected that it would. I had a meal replacement shake for breakfast, leftover Mexican food for lunch, and Italian food for dinner. The only real cheat in there was the dessert that my wife and I shared… a decadent piece of cake with a canoli on top (which she insisted I have). It was only because of that I was concerned that when I got onto the scale this morning I might be disappointed… but I was not. In fact, I was pleasantly surprised. Wednesday I was in best-ever territory, before giving back a little over 1.5lbs over the next couple of days. I am back to within .2lbs of where I was, and that is a good feeling.

    As we were getting dressed for the event yesterday, I decided to try to put on one of the new belts that I bought last month, which did not come close to fitting then. It was tight, but I was able to wear it. I am calling that another huge non-scale victory. I doubt it will fit with every pair of pants that I own, but if it works with some then I am happy by the minor progress.

    Another victory, and it is partially connected to the scale, is that my Body Mass Index (BMI) is under 40. In fact, it has, over the past two weeks, registered under 40 on five days, not surprisingly the five days when my weight was at or under 311lbs. The best that it has ever been was 33.4 on September 27, 2020… my best day from my last weight loss journey. It is disheartening to realize that even with all of my progress this time around, I am still fifty pounds heavier that I was then, and that it might take me another five months to get there.

    I know that weight loss is a marathon and not a sprint, and there is no healthy (and non-surgical) way to lose weight quickly. I just wish I thought I could do the full program completely (meal replacements only, no food at all) for a couple of months and drop it all… but I do not think I would be able to do it. I am worried that I would, as I always have, fallen off the wagon… hard. No, slow and steady is my best course to long-term success. I know that, and I plan to follow that… I just don’t have to be happy about that.

    Our plans for today have changed. We were originally going to drive out to Cigars International again for the event, but after yesterday’s Davidoff event (which was a real bust), we decided to stay closer to home. I am a member of a cigar lounge that is a five-minute drive from the house, and we will have just as good a time on the patio there as we would on the patio of the lounge at CI, which is a bit of a schlep. The staff told us what we could expect from the Oliva event today, and frankly there is nothing that will tempt me. Had we gone out there, we would have had to buy a couple of boxes of cigars to make it worth our while, and truthfully, I don’t mind spending the day at Addison. It is just more of a homey feeling to it.

    My goal for today is to relax with a few cigars, and to eat reasonably smart. I had a meal replacement for breakfast; we might have salads for lunch, but that will be up to Leslie. Dinner tonight will be our last dinner together for this trip, which is sad… but at least we know that in just over a month, she will be coming to Canada for ten days. With that said, I am not looking forward to flying back to Canada tomorrow.

    Have a great day folks!

  • Day 265

    Yesterday went mostly well, and then I had a Wendy’s hamburger for dinner. I did not expect good results on the scale this morning, although I did expect that some of the water weight (from the excessive salt intake the previous day) would drop off. As I prepared to step onto the bathroom scale this morning, I was saying to myself ‘Please, just be under 315lbs.’ I stepped up, and when the numbers stabilized, I was actually just under 312lbs! I was happy with that indeed, and while I will not celebrate with a cheat meal, I am happy that my cheat last night did not affect me.

    For the record, I did eat the hamburger with only half the bun. I have never been big on open-faced sandwiches, especially burgers. However, in this case I decided to reduce my starch intake by half. I felt the burger itself was bad enough, and while some bread was bad, more bread was worse.

    Aside from the burger, yesterday went exactly as planned. I was very comfortable hanging at the cigar lounge, and I did pick up my salad from Salad to Go. I also had a couple meal replacement bars for eating throughout the day – I only ended up eating one of them – so the day was relaxing and satisfactory. I was not hungry, and I lost weight. Yes, I know… the weight that I lost was a combination of the travel weight and the salt weight. I am okay with that… I just wanted to lose any weight that I gained in California. I was 311lbs the morning I got onto the plane, and am now 311.8lbs. In another day or two I will be back to where I was, and that is a success. I have too many times gone on vacation and taken three weeks or longer (if ever) to lose the holiday weight.

    My plans for today are similar to yesterday in most facets except location. I will hang around the house while my wife works. I will go to Salad to Go to pick up lunch for us (I introduced her to them before we left for California, and she loved it), and will probably smoke cigars on the balcony while watching TV and reading. In the evening, we will have dinner with her son (likely tamales or chicken nuggets), but I do not think that will be a disaster for me. As I said, if I can lose that last .8lbs in a couple days, I’ll be satisfied. If I can get down to 309lbs before flying back to Canada in five days, well that would be an absolute home run! The day I came to Dallas, I weighed 319.4lbs. A ten-pound loss in just under a month would be excellent!

    My foot is still in pain. It is less pain, and hardly feels like gout. It is just like someone dropped a bowling ball on my foot a week ago… which to be clear, nobody did. I am starting to suspect it is muscle fatigue from a lot of driving on California freeways (and in California traffic) … although just three days ago, it felt like someone had taken a sledgehammer to it. It is improving every day… but there’s still a day or two to go before I fitness walk again.

    Have a great day folks!

  • Go The Distance!

    I wrote this morning that I would need to register two walks of thirteen kilometres each today and tomorrow to come close to achieving the September Step Month badge from Garmin, which did not seem at all reasonable, considering that my longest walk to date was 10.5km.

    I killed today’s walk, breaking records… not Dallas records, but actual since-I-started-walking records. I did achieve the 13km distance, with an average page under 10m00. Obviously, my step count was higher than ever, as was my calories burned. Even so, I am still 23,750 steps from earning the badge… but I was not thinking about the badge as I walked. I was thinking about going the distance. I was thinking about shattering my limitations, and not simply beating my old record by .25km. I wanted to get out there and shatter things.

    • Distance: 13.02km (9km)
    • Duration: 2:08:09 (1:27:49)
    • Average Pace (Min/km): 9:50 (9:44)
    • Best Split-Pace Kilometre: 9m40 (x2) (9m18s)
    • Steps: 16.3k (11.4k)
    • Calories burned: 1,571 (1,083)
    • Elevation gain: 66.6 (39.1)
    • Average cadence (steps per minute): 126 (130)

    Of course, the day is not nearly over (I should press the Publish button around 2:15pm), so it is still possible for me to end the day needing only 20,000 steps to earn the badge. It will not be hard for me to walk another 4,000 steps today – that will involve a trip to the recycling bin, maybe a couple of walks around the complex. I’ll take out the trash, maybe I will offer to do whatever shopping is needed (although I do not think there is any needed, as Leslie placed an order with Amazon Prime this morning). I don’t know… but if I wake up tomorrow needing only 20,000 steps, then I will try for the badge.

    The problem with that previous sentence is that I do not have too many days in the past year where I walked more than 18,000 steps… and I am not sure if I have broken the 20,000-step mark. I know that if I even want to think about that badge, I will have to hit 22,000 steps today, and then 20,000 tomorrow. Doable? Yes. Possible? Sure. Likely? That’s a whole other story.

    In the meantime, I signed up for some October challenges on Garmin. There is the Garmin Pink October, meant to support breast cancer awareness. It is 100,000 steps in 10 days… perfectly achievable. There is the Halloween Walking challenge, for which I will have to complete a 3-mile walk between the 28th and the 31st (no big deal). The big challenge though is the October Step Month, which is the continuation of the September challenge I am working toward. 300,000 steps in the month. If I do not get lazy as I did this month (My first recorded walk was only on September 5, and then from the 10th through the 23rd I only recorded three walks) then I should be able to knock that one out of the park.

    Something that I will have to start paying attention to when I get back to Canada mid-month is the weather. I have been spoiled, both in Canada and in Dallas, with the weather these last few months. The last half of October is when things in Canada really start to cool down, and more importantly start getting really wet. If I am going to be walking outdoors when I get back to Canada, I will have to start thinking about weather-appropriate clothing. I have a few baseball hats, and I have long-sleeved shirts and training pants. I also have my new Team Canada jackets which would probably be good outerwear. My biggest challenge will be remembering how important it is for me to get out and do it. Hopefully my beautiful wife will remind me if I do not get out for a couple of days. Hopefully I will not need prodding or reminding.

    The rest of the day is open for me. I have a few minor bits to take care of, but for the most part my day is over. Leslie is making dim sum for dinner (which we all love), and so far, I have only had two meal replacements. I will have another one around 3:00pm, and then the dim sum. Of course, I am drinking a lot of water… and yes, I stopped midway through my walk to pick up a Gatorade Zero. I think I am doing pretty well on my plan. My diet buddy texted me a few hours ago to let me know she is looking forward to talking this evening, and that she has a weight-loss announcement. I have no idea what that means, but I hope she accomplished something amazing. I am crossing my fingers for her.

    Have a great day folks!

  • Day 253

    As I had hoped, I was happy with the numbers on the scale again this morning. At just over 315lbs, I am hoping that I can have a few more good days before heading to California. Don’t get me wrong. I do not plan to indulge in California. I am just saying that I want to stay on track here. I will be taking meal replacements with me and will even be fasting for Yom Kippur.

    I was chatting with a friend that I will be connecting with when I am there, and he said I was looking good in a picture that I posted. I thought about it for a minute, and then looked it up. This morning I am 33lbs lighter than the day that I left California. I forget, when I remember back to what I weighed two years ago, that sixteen months ago I was hovering just below the 350lbs mark, never mind what I weighed 253 days ago. I remember around February when one of my California buddies was video chatting with me and said something like, ‘Mitch, what happened? You were doing so well!’ I felt horrible, even though I was back on the program, trying to get healthy again. I am glad that I am going back there looking… well, not as slim as I did two years ago, but still much slimmer than when I left there.

    The forecast for today is not as hot as it was yesterday. I have a meeting for an hour this morning, and then I will kit up for a walk. I do not know if I will be breaking records today, but with the slightly cooler temperatures, I should be able to have another epic day. Over the past nine days I have averaged over 11,000 steps per day… and that includes four days that were abysmal with regard to step count. If I had registered just one more good fitness walk this month, I would likely be ready to collect the September Step Month badge from Garmin Connect… which would mean 300,000 steps for the month (or at least 10,000 steps per day). With only today and tomorrow left in the month, I am 41,700 steps short of that goal. Two good days will leave me short by about 10,000 steps. I would have to make both today’s and tomorrow’s fitness walk 13km each for it to be on the table. That is not likely. I will, however, try to get the October Step Month badge!

    As we hoped, Leslie and I took her son for sushi last night. It was very good, and I indulged. I did not go over the top, but I did have a good healthy meal. I suspect that had I held back, I might have been .2lbs lighter this morning. In the balance, I think the indulgent meal was worth it.

    I am hoping to speak with my weight loss buddy today. I hope she is doing well, and we have a lot to discuss. I also realized that I should probably plan to order another case of meal replacements to be delivered when I am back in Dallas after California, so that I will be able to take them back to Canada with me. I will take inventory today and see what I have left, and then plan accordingly. I will also be taking meal replacements with me to California, and if I am going to do that, then I had better think about ordering a proper shaker bottle… while my buddy might have a blender, I will be out and about most of the time, and I cannot rely on that. Amazon, here I come.

    Have a great day folks!

  • Push It!

    I was thinking, as I approached the last quarter-kilometre of my fitness walk today, that it was less than three months ago that I passed the exact same spot where I was today, and said ‘Wow, I can’t believe that I was able to finish five kilometres in such good time, with a pace of 10m54s per kilometre. I remember thinking to myself ‘I had better put on the brakes right here, stop my timer, and just take a relaxed pace back to the apartment. I really pushed myself today!’

    If I were to register a pace of 10m54s per kilometre today, I would consider it a terrible fail.

    I did push myself today, although I am still not hitting 8km, which in Canada is my bare minimum. I do not know if it is the heat (which today was nowhere near as prohibitive as it has been) or the humidity, or simply the fact that I do not know the area as well, and the routes I take are safer, but shorter. I do know that I am still proud of what I achieved today, and only wish I was carrying more water. Yes, I am worried that if I run out of water on a stretch of road where there is nowhere to buy another bottle of it, then I will end up panting my way back home. I finished my bottle as I came into the apartment today, 7.5km into the walk.

    • Distance: 7.5km (7km)
    • Duration: 1:13:40 (1:11:22)
    • Average Pace (Min/km): 9:49 (10:11)
    • Best Split-Pace Kilometre: 9m28s (9m33s)
    • Steps: 9.2k (8.7k)
    • Calories burned: 941 (857)
    • Elevation gain: 34 (27)
    • Average cadence (steps per minute): 126 (120)

    Today’s was the first walk in Dallas on which I have a total average pace under ten minutes. I am happy about that, and remembered along the way of one walk in mid-July when I was just hoping to finish seven kilometres in under 1h15m. While there is still the occasional walk when I do not achieve that pace, today was not one of them. These days, I try to keep ahead of 10 minutes per kilometre pace, which means that I will always be under 1h10m on the seven. Today I did it in 1h8m19s… not my record, but certainly a very respectable pace for me!

    I am glad that I am keeping active, and hope that I will be able to stay on track with my weight loss regimen. The holiday aside, I can definitely get back on track starting tomorrow. If I keep up my walking, there is no reason I should not be able to get back down below 315lbs by the weekend!

  • Day 244

    I thought I did pretty well yesterday, although I did have some goldfish crackers – the last of them. Unless I go shopping for treats, I have no more temptations in the pantry that I can think of. I have no further need to shop – I went to the supermarket last night to pick up an onion and to collect my dry cleaning. I want to be able to wear those suits in a month; unless I stay on track, that is unlikely to happen. So, I will stay on track.

    Yesterday, I bought my ticket for Disneyland. There are not a lot of options for getting discounts, and rather than spending excessing time on this, I decided to just pay full boat. I am disappointed that my friend will be out of town – his wife works for the company, and they could have signed me in for free. I am really looking forward to it though – Leslie and her son are worth it!

    There is no rain in the forecast for today, and that means I will head out for a good walk. There are a few reasons for this, not the least of which are the consequences I mentioned a day or two ago. In truth, I am still trying to make fitness walking habitual. I am long past the stage when I worried if I was able to walk well, and most of the time when I embark on a fitness walk, I am going to try for a certain distance (almost always in excess of 8km). However, I have still not become addicted to it. I still have to say to myself on any given day, ‘Okay, I should go for a walk. This is what time I am going, and this is the route that I will take.’

    I really want fitness to be part of my nature that I just go. I want it to be an addiction. Of course, it will never be that simple… as it will never be as simple for me to lose and keep off all of my excess weight. I think, really I know that I will always have to work at these things. I have to admit that I was never a fitness junkie, which probably would have made a lot of things in my life much easier. If I had been, I likely never would have gotten to where I am. It is a sad realization maybe, but it is an honest one. Guys in my unit would wake up, roll out of their bunks, and be doing pushups before they even peed. I would always grumble something about coffee, even though I was in just as good shape as they were. I have never loved it… I just always knew it was good for me, and important to do. For far too many years, I ignored it. Wisdom comes with age, and at fifty years old I know that I can never ignore fitness, just like I will never be able to eat without thinking. That is a very certain recipe for failure, and I do not want that.

    Aside from my walking, I will likely stay pretty close to home today. If he were around, I might invite my son the elder for a drink; he is on the west coast with friends, so that’s a non-starter. I might reach out to a friend to see if they want to sit and chat, but I suspect that Lyle is busy preparing for his aunt’s visit. We’ll see.

    Speaking of my son (and his absence), I am going to have to get an Uber to take me to the airport on Thursday. That’s usually an opportunity to see my boy, but with his not being in town, I am deprived of that option.

    As it turns out, Lyle is free for a cigar. After my walk I’ll have lunch around 1:00pm, and then drive over there for a couple of hours. I do not plan to make it a late night – or even evening – because I am going to do laundry this evening, so that tomorrow afternoon everything that I want to take to Dallas (and of course to California) will be clean. I won’t pack tonight, but I will try to fold and organize everything.

    I was speaking with Leslie this week, and I told her that I am going to bring a lot of my summer clothes and just leave them there. After all, by the time I am back (October 16) it is a safe bet that the short-pants weather will be behind us for the season. When she asked if I won’t need them in the spring, my initial response was that I could bring them home in time for that. When I gave it some thought, I was happy to tell her that if all goes according to plan, all of the shorts that I am wearing now will be too big for me by the spring, and I will need new ones anyways. Despite the bumps along the road (like this past couple of weeks), my goal is to be down another fifty pounds by next spring… if not more. Leslie agrees that if I am able to accomplish that, it will be a pleasure to have to buy new shorts!

    I have procrastinated enough. It is time for me to hit the trails. I am not sure now steady my knees feel, so I am going to plan for an 8km walk, with the option to extend it if I am feeling up to it. I will walk through the park to Appleby Line, up to Dundas Street, then back down. If I am feeling ambitious at that point, I can continue down to Mainway for the extra couple of kilometres. We’ll see. For now, I am going to start by suiting up and heading out.

    Have a great day!

  • Support of Friends and Family

    There are differences between nagging and encouraging. Having been exposed to both, I am familiar with many of them.

    Encouraging someone comes from a place of love, caring, and concern. It is done when someone is open to your input, and when you try to convey it in a way that will be accepted and is meant to help.

    Nagging might also come from caring, but it is usually done in a way that will discourage the person. It is done with a tone that can be hurtful or belittling, it might even be accusatory. While it might be intended to help, it can beat the person down and discourage them, having the exact opposite effect.

    A couple of months ago, Leslie and I were speaking about my weight loss regimen, and she told me that she was sorry for several things that she had said. I did not understand why and told her so. She reminded me that within the last few days she had:

    · Called me when I told her I might be too tired to walk and told me ‘Get dressed and go for a walk, Mister!’

    · Encouraged me to not have an extra salad one evening, calling it a ‘gateway salad,’ essentially that if I thought that having the salad with just vegetables was okay, I would not only make it a habit, but would then start adding canned salmon and seeds to it.

    · Reminded me on a number of occasions that I was doing well, and to stay strong so that I could accomplish what I wanted to with this diet.

    Over the years, I have told several people – not only individually, but I went so far as to write articles on it – that I did not want their input on my weight loss. That was not only about unsolicited advice, but even comments about my progress. When it comes to weight loss, everyone seems to have opinions and advice. It is all meant to be encouraging, but so often has the opposite effect.

    I cannot tell you how many times people have said to me something like: ‘You are doing great on your diet! You should try…’ and then shared their advice with me. Folks, if I am doing well, then let me continue doing what I am doing. For that matter, if I falter then the best way for me to get back on track is with the familiar, not with something new.

    I have a friend who weighs more than I do and has also over the last few months lost a lot of weight. He is doing incremental fasting, and the results are incredible. We have discussed his methods several times… and he knows mine. What he has not done was told me that I have to try this.

    When you are losing weight, it could feel good to hear people tell you how great you look. That is not always the case though, and because of that, sometimes I just do not want to hear it. I like to think that I have a pretty thick skin, but when someone tells me that I am doing good on my diet it is a judgement, and oftentimes I do not want to be judged.

    The last few days, as I have written, I have faltered quite a bit. While I walked quite a bit while I was in Montreal, I ate badly. On my second day back from Montreal, I went on an amazing, longest-walk-ever. That was Monday. Since then, I have not exercised, nor have I stuck to my weight loss regimen.

    Yesterday evening, my wife asked me if she needed to show me tough love… knowing that I have not been doing well. I told her that I did, and so she told me that if I did not get out for at least two really good walks before coming to Dallas, she would not pick me up from the airport. It’s rather a longer walk than I am comfortable committing to, so I figured that I had better set out today for my first of at least two good walks before Thursday.

    • Distance: 9.35km (10.45km)
    • Duration: 1:31:03 (1:44:12)
    • Average Pace (Min/km): 9:44 (9:58)
    • Best Split-Pace Kilometre: 9m17 (9m36)
    • Steps: 11.2k (12.8k)
    • Calories burned: 1,147 (1,242)
    • Elevation gain: 46.2 (37)
    • Average cadence (steps per minute): 124 (122)

    Do I think that my wife would have left me stranded at the airport? Of course she would not. She knows me though, and she asked if I wanted her to be tough on me. She knows that she has leave to use the carrot and the stick. I actively seek her encouragement, support, and when warranted, her berating. While most of the people who try to give me advice and encouragement are equally well-meaning, their input is not welcome. Leslie’s is welcomed and actively sought. I do not expect her to lock me out of the house if I don’t walk X number of kilometres this week… but I also do not want her blowing sunshine and roses up my rear what I am having a bad time of it.

    I did not break records today, but I had a really good walk, and a really good sweat. I am going to take my shower, and then start preparing my lunch. After that, I will go shopping, and will try to pick up enough provisions to take me through my flight on Thursday. I am usually pretty good, but every single trip to the supermarket is another opportunity for me to falter. I will not! I will, however, buy milk for my coffee, a couple more packages of chicken, and lettuce. I will check, I might also need an onion. I do not think there is anything else that I need, and today’s can be my last trip to the supermarket until I am home from Texas in a month.

    Have a great day folks!

  • Day 230

    As I gushed with Leslie yesterday about the massive weight loss I achieved over the previous day, I did tell her that I was resigned to the fact that I knew that I would be giving some of that back today. Nonetheless, I ate well yesterday. I did not veer from my normal weight management program, enjoying three meal replacements and one meal throughout the day. I also went for a great record-breaking walk. All this to say that as I lay in bed last night, I was still holding out home in my secret heart that I might actually hold my weight. After stepping onto my scale this morning, I realized I had not held it. Indeed, I was down… nearly another full pound.

    Dropping below the 315 lbs threshold was an amazing way to start my day, but again I am not going to hold my breath that it will hold. Fortunately, I will not be weighing myself again until Monday, when I am back from Montreal. My hope is that I will maintain my current weight over the five-day trip; hoping to actually lose weight is more than I will hope for.

    I chatted for a few moments yesterday with one of the organizers of a party that I am going to on Saturday. I asked what foods would be served, mostly because I do not want to be at a party that only serves non-kosher foods, but also because I suspected there might not be any healthy options for me. I was okay on the first, but from what I can tell, there will not be a lot of diet-friendly foods available. I will do my best to stick to my meal replacements, but I also know that if I have a little bit of bad foods in moderation then it will not be the end of the world. It will give me incentive to try to be good the rest of the week… and even if I am, I cannot hope to succeed if I go overboard. My goal is to not go overboard.

    We are less than a month from the Yom Kippur holiday. It is a day when we spend the day in synagogue praying and asking G-d’s forgiveness. Last year, I attended services online. I just do not have a connection to the Jewish community where I live, whereas I have a very close one to the community in California, where I used to live. That is where I was two years ago, and that is where I will be for Yom Kippur this year. I was thinking this morning how nice it would be if I could attend services weighing 305 lbs. Two years ago, I weighed 260 lbs when I attended. I know that was a fateful and terrible day for my diet – it was the day that my steady weight loss came to an abrupt halt, and my fall into failure began. It started with a cookie and a shot of tequila. That will not happen this year.

    I doubt that I will be able to comfortably attend services wearing the same suit I wore then, but I do plan to wear that suit just a few weeks later. There is a picture of me from 2020, coincidentally at the synagogue, wearing that suit for the first time in three years. I remember clearly weighing 298 lbs and being thrilled that I was able to wear it. If all goes well, Leslie is coming to Canada for American Thanksgiving, and I would like to take her out to dinner wearing that suit. I love looking good for her, and I happen to know that she has a bit of a thing for a well-dressed man. For the first time in a couple of years I feel that I am within reach of being able to be that. I always did it for myself – I quite enjoy putting on a suit and tie – but this time I want to do it for her. She deserves me looking my absolute best.

    It is about time for me to pack up and drive to Montreal. I will be there several days, and again I have to remember that my fitness walking must be a regular part of my daily routine. I am packing several sets of workout clothes, and because it is September in Canada, I recognize that this will require several permutations, including shorts and long training pants, and long sleeve shirts as well as short sleeves. What a pain. At least the drive will be mostly relaxing… I have no deadlines to hit, so I can stop and smell the roses as it were. After an hour on the phone with the Quebec Ministry of Justice, I think I have submitted my request for my divorce certificate properly, but again, it is Quebec… so who knows? I am taking my passport and birth certificate, just in case I get a notice that I am missing a … I don’t know what.

    If all goes well with that, the next few days will be a lot more relaxing and enjoyable than I originally suspected they might be, and I will be able to just chill, walk, and enjoy the company of friends.

    Have a great day folks!