Losing a part of me

Category: Treadmill

  • Day 1062

    After I wrote about it yesterday, I decided to hop onto the treadmill at lunch for a little bit. I knew that I only had a short time frame to do it in, but I hopped on and ran 3km at 4.5mph. My ankle was fine, and I know that I could have kept going, but I needed to shower up to get back to class in time. At least I got my steps up beyond 4,500… after Princess Sophie refused to walk in the morning. I also knew that I was 6,500 steps from extending my streak to seventeen days, but it was a good start… as well as a really good habit to try to get into! I sat back at my desk with a meal replacement shake to continue the class with thirty seconds to spare.

    My day did not go too well with regard to the eating (I hate that I am weak), but I did get my steps in, which means that my new steps-goal streak record is… seventeen! Yes, I did it. That is the good news. The bad news is that it will not be extended to eighteen. I noticed as I walked Princess Sophie this morning that my knee is quite tender, and while I will take whatever pills may help over the next couple of days, I do not think that the rush I would need to do in order to get my 11,1160 steps today (because of my course, and because of my evening plans) are worth injuring myself. I can proudly say now that I have met the goal that I set… and someday in the future I will probably set out to beat this streak too.

    Yesterday’s activities did not end with my lunchtime jog. After dinner I jogged another 3km (also at 4.5mph), and then walked Princess Sophie. I was able to extend my streak… but of course that will end today.

    It has been a long day of studying. I am now going to take Her Floofness for her walk, and then I’ll get ready for this evening’s festivities.

    Have a great day folks!

  • Day 1059

    It was a much earlier morning than I would usually experience on a Saturday. I got up to pee at 5:30am and could not fall back asleep. I had a couple of things on my mind, one of which was the welfare of a friend who is quite elderly who I usually get a response from pretty quickly but who failed to reply to my messages yesterday. When I finally decided that I was going to get out of bed, I found a message from him on my phone which was a relief. That did not change the fact that I was up and at ‘em much earlier than I necessarily needed to be. I took this as a sign that I should go down to the USA this morning to mail my stuff… and I am going to try to meet a couple of friends for breakfast in Grimsby.

    My steps-goal streak was extended to fourteen days yesterday. I hopped onto the treadmill mid-afternoon and jogged 3km then slowed to a brisk walk for another 3km. There were a few distractions I was facing – all in my head – that had me stop between kilometres, but never for more than 30 seconds or so. I would prefer to be able to go right through (as I did earlier in the week) but 6km with a few short breaks is better than nothing. After I came in to get ready for bed, I realized that I was still short about 1200 steps for the day, and so I got onto the treadmill and walked at a reasonable non-exercise pace and knocked off the last bit. With my strategic planning I knew I needed to hit 11,070 steps on the day. As I ended up getting up to check on something before I fell asleep, I ended the day with 11,132 steps. The goal for today is 11,090. When I get back from my daytrip I will get onto the treadmill and get as near to that goal as possible so that when I go out to the brewery this evening I will not be pressured.

    My sleep score was lower than it likely would have been had I fallen back asleep, but knowing that I only slept six hours I am pleased with the 76. My body battery was up to 93 this morning which is also quite a success. My weight, after two days up (a combined 1.6 lbs.), is down again this morning (by 1.2 lbs.) so I am still under the terrible mark, but I have to be vigilant to put more distance between me and that point before the Christmas dinners start. Of course, I do not know what is on the menu for this evening – whether it is finger foods or an actual meal – so I will plan for it by bringing a meal replacement bar… just in case whatever is served should be incompatible with either my weight loss or religious dietary needs.

    It is another very cold morning in Burlington, Ontario. While the temperature should rise briefly to 0° this afternoon, when I took Princess Sophie out this morning the mercury read -12°… not taking the dreaded windchill into account. Looking at the long-range forecast, today is the last bone-chillingly cold day for the week, with high temperatures ranging from 1° to 9° until it finally drops back below freezing next Saturday. Keeping in mind that it is mid-December in Canada, I am not going to complain!

    I guess I should hit the road so that I can get there and back in a reasonable timeframe. Have a great day folks!

  • Day 1057

    My weight rebounded a bit following a bit of a cheat day yesterday, but I am not terribly upset about it. I had a piece of veal for lunch with some eggrolls and salad. In the evening, I had another salad (even though I should not have). Despite running 4km on the treadmill (and walking one more kilometre) my weight was up by about a pound.

    My steps-goal streak is now at 12 days, and once again I strategically hit my goal yesterday and then STOPPED. Garmin had set my goal for the day at 11,030 and I ended the day with 11,100. Today’s goal is 11,050 steps, and I will work to reach that but to not surpass it by too much… again. The aim is to hit the goal without increasing tomorrow’s goal by too much. It is freezing cold out today (the windchill when I walked Princess Sophie this morning was -19° and the wind was cutting into the exposed skin of my face like glass shards. If only I could walk Her Floofness on the treadmill, life would be a little more comfortable the next few days. Alas, that is not an option… but that is where most of my steps will come from!

    Let’s see… my sleep score was 82, and when I woke up my body battery was 77. That is a good sign that what I have been doing is working. I will keep at it. I do want to lose more weight, but for the month of December (that most awful of months for those trying to lose weight) I am relieved that I have gotten below the 300 lbs. mark and will fight to stay below that horrible mark for the entire month. That means I will be turning down some invitations, and others I will accept but will not indulge. I believe I wrote the other day that I was going to eat pizza at Ryan’s but owing to the fact that the delivery took two hours I escaped without that particular cheat. There are some foods I can eat in moderation… pizza and wings are probably two that I should not even try.

    Have a great day folks!

  • Day 1056

    I did pretty well yesterday, not cheating at all. I had my regular breakfast, then a buddy from the Lodge came over for a cup of coffee. When he left I hit the treadmill, and while I did complete five kilometres, I only jogged the first three of them, slowing my pace for the last two clicks to a brisk walk.

    After I got off the treadmill and showered I had a meal replacement shake, and then I took Her Floofness out for her walk. I was about 2,000 steps shy of my steps goal for the day, and a good walk with her would finish that off. The flaw in that plan was that it was raining, and Princess Sophie does not enjoy walking in the rain. Yes, she did her business… but I was not able to coax her more than a hundred feet from the door we walked out of. The neighbour who lives right there came home as I was ‘arguing’ with the pup, and welcomed us to come into the building through her apartment (rather than having to walk all the way to the front of the building in the rain). Okay, that issue was solved… but I was still short nearly 1,500 steps! Solution: I got back onto the treadmill for a short walk. It was not strenuous exercise, I was not pushing myself, and while I did get a little warm, I did not break a sweat. With a steps-goal of 11,010, I went to bed with 11,092 steps on the tracker. That increased today’s goal to… 11,030. Don’t hold me to it, but I think I might be able to make it.

    I have to go shopping today… and not for the usual provisions. I decided a couple of months ago that I was going to make homemade doggie treats for Chanukah, and I bought the cookie cutter shapes back in September. As I am planning on driving down to the USA later this week to mail some things to my wife, I am going to make them today so that I can ship some to her for Duchess. We also agreed that while Duchess and Sophie would devour them, I found a recipe without peanut butter so that I could give some to Charlie (our next door neighdog) as well. He is the only dog I have ever met who does not eat peanut butter. There’s always one weirdo in the group, right?

    Knowing that I have very little planned for today, I will probably extend my treadmill workout to six kilometres. I want to make sure I extend my streak (currently at 11 days), but I do not want to overdo it and find out that tomorrow’s steps goal would be 12,500. I am thinking strategically to give myself the best chance to beat my current streak record of sixteen days. For the record, this streak is only accounting for the time since I switched from Fitbit to Garmin, so probably five years now.

    I fell asleep without much trouble last night… and then at 3:15am I woke up and could not get back to it. I finally picked up my phone and spent an hour watching TikTok and doing whatever else until my eyes were exhausted, and I dozed off again. My sleep score was 70, which considering the hour-long interruption is not too bad. My body battery was up to 79… also pretty good. My weight was down nearly two pounds from yesterday and is now the lowest it has been in a week; it is still 2 lbs. higher than my best weight eight days ago, but that is what falling off the wagon will do. Fortunately, I am mostly back on the wagon. I will probably eat today… but I will do so smartly (both with regard to portion and choices.

    Have a great day folks!

  • Day 1051

    The 5.5km treadmill workout I did yesterday put me over the top. I have officially completed the MapMyFitness.com ‘You vs. the Year 2024’ challenge. I am in the top 12.16% of participants (186,000 participants). Completing the challenge does not mean I am going to slow down. I am hoping to continue to make progress with my working out and losing weight for the rest of the year, and well into 2025.

    I cheated slightly yesterday but not terribly. I met some of my Lodge brothers at the pub before the official meeting, and I had to order something. I ordered the least cheating (while still within my religious dietary requirements) thing on the Happy Hour menu. Thinking about it, I could have ordered the six-piece chicken wings… but I know that wings are my Achilles heel, and I did not want to risk falling off the wagon because I had to order something.

    My weight did drop slightly this morning, but I would have preferred to see a more substantial drop after yesterday’s tremendous gain. No dice. I will continue to try to do as well as I can so that I can hopefully get back to where I was Wednesday. We’ll see. My sleep score was an amazing 89, and my body battery was up to 83 this morning. While my Body Battery was better yesterday, my sleep score had not been that high in nearly four weeks. I am glad that I got a good night sleep and will try to benefit from the body battery by hitting the treadmill for another good workout later today.

    I was put on the unpopular side of a discussion at our Lodge meeting last night and I felt bad that I was the only opposing voice. I realize that I was the one nay vote, but I am uncomfortable to have been placed in that position. I am going to try to discuss it with the Lodge’s leadership so that it does not happen again. If it is going to happen then I will have to walk away from the Lodge. I am in a very bad headspace over this.

    Have a great day folks!

  • Day 1050

    For a few months I was one of those people who had a piece of exercise equipment that was used mostly for hanging clothes on. I never wanted to be one of those people. When I first bought the treadmill (which I brought home January 1 of this year) I used it quite a bit… and then stopped. For part of the time that I was not using it I was walking outside because the weather was warmer, but for a lot of the time I was just not walking. While I do miss the warmer weather, I am glad that I am back on track with my treadmill. I will continue to walk until I feel that I am able to jog, and then I will continue to jog. I suspect that by that point the winter will be ebbing, but we shall see. It will be nice to be able to walk or even jog outside. I have currently logged about 145km on the treadmill and have found it to be a good way to stay on track when it would be so easy to fall off. Yes, I have plenty of ways to fall without the treadmill… I took advantage (sic!) of several of those ways yesterday.

    (By the way… welcome to Page 1000 of my journal! It took nearly three years to do, and I am not nearly at my goal… but I will keep at it until I am.)

    I am not sure what put the idea of canned salmon into my head, but I had it for a few days. I had told Leslie that while I might do it, I would rather do it for lunch so that I would have the opportunity to burn it off before bed. Yesterday I made the salmon salad that I had been craving. It was delicious, but I vowed that I would not eat anything else (except meal replacements) for the rest of the day. I then went to meet my friend and her girlfriend for dinner… and how much harm could a poke bowl do, right? Of course, while we are sitting to watch her show, I would never buy a bag of chips… but when the girlfriend offers me some of hers, well that’s not such a bad thing, right?

    Everything I did in that previous paragraph was wrong.

    I had done a very short treadmill walk yesterday. I did not have the energy, but I still did a 2km quick walk in the afternoon. I knew when I got home in the evening that I was still short of my steps-goal for the day. I had to take The Floof out for her walk, but that still left me about 1500 steps short of the daily goal. I had failed in so many other things yesterday, but I wanted to at least accomplish that. I got onto the treadmill at 10:00pm and walked the 1300 steps that I was still short… and then called it a night. My streak is up to 5 days. I will extend that today.

    Let’s take an inventory here. I hit my steps-goal, but in a pretty lackluster fashion. I ate horribly. I slept very well (my Sleep Score was 86, and my body battery actually hit 90 this morning). Some good, some bad. The number that matters – that on the bathroom scale – was very bad. I gained three pounds. Ouch. I have to do better today… and tomorrow, and the following day as well.

    As of this moment I am 1.7km short of reaching the 2024 goal for the MapMyFitness challenge. Had I logged my walk with Her Floofness this morning (as I usually do) then I would have surpassed that goal already. It was not really a decision to hit the goal with exercise as much as it was that I forgot to end the walk, which meant that by the time I realized it, the 1.5km walk was in its third hour. I decided to just discard it and will reach the goal on the treadmill this afternoon.

    Speaking of this afternoon… I will do at least 5km on the treadmill, and then after I am cleaned up, I have an appointment for a haircut. Once that is done, I am heading down to Grimsby where I will meet up with a buddy for a cigar. There is a Lodge meeting this evening, and a bunch of guys wanted to meet for dinner. I am not joining them because I really want to stick to my program… especially after the disaster that was yesterday.

    I fell. I am getting back up.

    Have a great day folks!

  • Day 1049

    I am always pleased when I see good numbers on the bathroom scale. It has dropped seven of the last eight days, for a total loss in that time of 11.8 lbs. Woohoo!

    There are times when numbers are important, and there are times when they can have a deceptive or misleading affect on us. Why is it that I see a difference of two or three points on my sleep score as being relevant? A few days ago I was disappointed that it was only a 79, yet this morning I was thrilled that it was 82. It does not make sense, but there we have it. It is not as if I am taking a test, and the difference between passing and failing is those three points. Yes, my sleep score was 82… and I woke up after eight hours of sleep… at 5:45am. I should mention that I did not change my routine last night, and I did not wake up with a headache. Maybe I am getting used to the new element.

    I got a lot done yesterday, and I still managed to get onto the treadmill for 5km… although I was dragging a bit and decided to slow my pace for the last kilometre. With that, and this morning’s walk with Her Floofness, I am under 4km from reaching the 1024kms goal of the fitness challenge. If I get on the treadmill today, then I will achieve it. If not, then it will be tomorrow morning. Either way, I am glad that I am approaching the finish line on that. I am hoping that I will be able to keep this habit going into the new year and beyond.

    I am meeting friends for dinner this evening and I am going to have to be careful, and possibly even deceitful. They are in from out of town, so I want to see them, but eating out is not a good idea. I am likely going to tell them that I am not feeling well so I will just have a drink as they eat. We’ll see.

    I am actually meeting someone else for coffee this morning, but he is local and that is a business meeting. Still and all, he is going to offer to buy me a muffin or doughnut. That is going to be easy to decline. He is a larger man and likely understands the challenges of taking it off and keeping it off. With him it will be easy to say ‘Sorry, I am on a diet… but you should enjoy one.’

    I realized last night that I had volunteered to make potato latkes for my Lodge’s holiday dinner (which is December 17th). When I discussed it with Leslie she agreed that it was a very bad idea… there is too much temptation for me to make such a dish while I am on a strict diet. I decided that I am going to let them know that I will not be able to deliver on that promise. It is bad enough that I will be eating the turkey dinner that night… deep-fried latkes would not be a smart addition to it.

    As I prepare to close out this article, I am looking at the bottom of the page in my Microsoft Word document. The page number is 999, which means that unless I am very short tomorrow, then I will cross that threshold on Day 1050. I know that over the last 1049 days I have had a lot of good days and too many bad ones, but I think it is this journal that has, more than anything, kept me from falling off the cliff completely. There were days when I was angry and just posted a word or two… and there were a number of days when I forgot to write but got back to it the next day. Each time I open this document I am reminded that I need to try to do better today than I did yesterday. That is my goal.

    Have a great day folks!

  • Day 864

    I was not impressed when I stepped onto the bathroom scale this morning to find that I had actually gained weight… and not just an ounce, but 1.2 lbs.! Grrr. This is going to happen sometimes, but I did not expect it to happen so early in my program. Had I fallen off track yesterday then I would have felt that it was at least warranted, but I did not. I did change the program a little, but not badly… and certainly not ‘gain over a pound in a day’ badly!

    Firstly, my change to the program: I had my morning and midday meal replacements at around the normal times. I came in from walking Her Royal Floofness at 9:30am and had Shake #1, and then at around 1:30pm I had Shake #2. Eduardo came over for a cigar at 2:00pm, and when he left, I went out for a jog/walk (at 3:30pm). When I came back, I had a shower and then instead of a shake, I had a protein bar. I was still very hungry, so I decided to go to the store to buy almonds. I bought 90g of unsalted almonds, and that was the extent of my cheat. I drank my final shake of the evening after a cigar – around 9:00pm.

    <Warning> The following paragraph contains a tasteless joke that may be considered offensive by some readers.

    Yes, I went over my 900 calories by about 500 calories, but I was still under 1500 calories on the day… and while there is a lot of (healthy) fat in those almonds, the 5g of carbs that I added to my day should not have accounted for this blip. Who knows, maybe it’s my time of the month?

    </Warning>

    I am now 100% convinced that the calibration of my treadmill and fitness watch (with respect to the Treadmill activity) are completely wrong. It was a beautiful day, and I decided to do my first outdoors run/walk. I jogged two kilometres and walked 8.5km. On the basis of what my treadmill measures, that would be roughly 18 minutes of jogging (with the pace set to 4.3mph) and 2 hours of walking (at 3.5mph) … yet I completed the jogging in 14m10s (about 5.25mph), and the walking in 1h16.5m (around 4mph). I did not feel like I was walking or jogging harder on the street than I do on the treadmill. I will have to remember this if I ever do decide to train for a marathon!

    Following my exercise, I took Floof for her walk. We walked our usual turn which took us through the park and the playground. Because we were out at a different time than our norm, where we encountered a different crowd of children with their mothers. There was a group of five mothers speaking Arabic with a Palestinian accent, three of whom were wearing pendants shaped like the entire State of Israel (including Judea, Samaria, and Gaza). It was only five years ago that I discovered that this pendant, in the shape of a map that I have been familiar with since grade school, is their symbol calling for ‘From the River to the Sea, Palestine will be free.’ Normally I would not warrant a second glance from any of them, but it so happens that I was wearing an IDF t-shirt (I was fresh from my exercise and had not yet changed when we went out), and so the group of them stopped talking, and glared at me with a hatred in their eyes that I seldom feel in Canada. We did not stop or even slow our pace. A few blocks out of the park, we encountered an SUV flying a large Palestinian flag. They were stopped at a stop sign, and we were stopped because Princess was sniffing around. They stopped for longer than they needed to, the eyes of the driver and passenger glaring at me. I smiled and pointed at the logo on my chest. I had never realized how many Palestinians live within a six-block radius of me. I will be paying closer attention. I will not stop wearing my t-shirts (when I jog) and my pins… but I will be more cognizant of those watching me. It is sad that in Canada I have to be aware of these things… but that has always been the lot of my people.

    I have been having trouble with the program I am on… as is demonstrated by the fact that I have had to supplement it with almonds almost every day of it. Combine that with my activity (which has been exceedingly high these last ten days) and I find my body completely out of energy in the afternoons and evenings. Because of this I told Leslie that I am thinking about transitioning back to what I used to call my partial program – breakfast and lunch, and then two shakes in the afternoon and evening. She recommended that I wait either until I hit the 270 lbs. mark (from which I am now more than a pound farther than I was yesterday), or until at least next Wednesday (when she picks up her son, and so goes off the program). I thanked her for her encouragement… without it, I would have gone shopping this morning. As it is, I am still thinking about it. It is 11:00am – I had my first meal replacement less than two hours ago, and I am already hungry and light-headed. I will not make any decisions yet… but if I am feeling this way still after my second meal replacement then I am seriously going to consider it. I have a very long week of teaching ahead of me, and I cannot afford to faint on camera.

    It has been rainy all morning, although that is set to abate by 1:00pm. I have not decided what I am going to do about exercising today… with my goal-streak at 13 days, and knowing there is no way to extend it beyond 14 days, I can either push myself to hit the 16,400 steps my watch is challenging me to hit today, or I can take it easy and rest my body (which I have overtaxed these last ten days). I have a number of decisions to make today. I will not rush into any of them.

    Have a great day folks!

  • Day 861

    Yesterday’s run was the best I have done in a while. I successfully jogged five kilometres at 4.3mph (which still is registering at between 8m56s and 9m12s per kilometre) and then a last kilometre walking at 3.5mph. All told it was 6km in 59m40s according to my fitness watch. I do not know if I will be able to beat that today, but my next workout goal is to be able to register 6km jogging.

    I still find myself relying on almonds to supplement my meal replacements. I have been way too informal about how I eat them and am going to start measuring them out. One ounce of almonds contains 170 calories, 5g of carbohydrates, 6g of protein, and 15g of fat. That is a reasonable portion. What I have been eating in a day is probably closer to four portions (having finally taken the time to do the calculations), and I am done with that. The problem is that I do not think I would consider one ounce of almonds to be a satisfying portion. What I will do instead, considering the mental side of things, is I will start eating up to a single protein bar when I need it, and hopefully not every day. The nutritional value of the bars that I have (and really like) are: 190 calories, 14g of carbohydrates, 15g of protein, and 8g of fat. While they are higher in carbs than I would like, I feel that they are quite satisfying as a single portion. They are also properly portioned, so I do not have to worry about that.

    One day I will have the mental fortitude and discipline to eat only what I am supposed to eat. When that day comes, I will be able to freely buy large bags of almonds and keep them in the house without fear of overindulging. At least I am self-aware enough to know that day is not here yet… and the packaged protein bars are what I am allowed to eat.

    I had a bit of a fight with the bathroom scale this morning. I stepped onto it and saw that my weight was up by .4 lb. Hmph. I then went to the washroom and tried to pee, but only a couple of drops came. Oh well. I then stepped back onto the bathroom scale and found that my weight was down .4 lb. from yesterday, or .8 lb. from thirty seconds and six drops of pee ago. I cleared the scale and stepped back onto the scale, and that same weight registered. Okay, I’ll take it. I would not have been terribly upset if, after seven straight days of weight loss (including a single day of no loss), my weight had gone up a little; after all, how many times have I written in this journal that success is not about individual plots on a graph, but rather on the overall downward trend?

    I am thrilled and grateful that I was actually able to order more shakes from the company. For whatever reason, they can only be purchased with a code from a doctor. That is one of the reasons I have been buying my shakes ‘on the black market’ so to speak. The person I bought shakes from last week stopped the program because she is pregnant, and she offered to share her code with me. I did not know if it would work but I decided to try it anyways. Lo and behold, I now have a month’s worth of shakes coming tomorrow! I am quite thrilled by that… yes, it is the little things that bring us joy.

    Okay, it is time to get my day going. I am going to chat with my wife for a while, and then I am going to get onto the treadmill. Later in the afternoon I have a buddy coming over for a chat.

    Have a great day folks!

  • Day 856

    While yesterday was Day 3 of my renewed program, it was the first day that I did not cheat. Okay, that is a harsh word… when dropping from over 2000 calories per day to 900 calories per day, a handful of almonds is not a cheat so much as it is an assist to get through the day. Think of it like training wheels for the first couple of days. However we might think of them, I did not have any yesterday, and so including the milk and sugar that I add to my coffee my total caloric intake yesterday was about 940. I was tired, but I made it through the day.

    Yesterday’s exercise was even better than the two previous days, even though I cannot completely account for it. At a certain point during the workout I must have smacked my fitness watch against the handrail of the treadmill and it stopped tracking. I lost about seven minutes of tracking before I noticed it. No harm, right? I know that I jogged the complete four kilometres (at 4mph, about 9m15s per kilometre) before pulling up and walking briskly for another twenty-three minutes. The total workout was one hour long, and it felt amazing. I am hoping that today or tomorrow I will be able to push that to a full hour of jogging, but I am not going to push myself too hard… I don’t want to strain anything! As it is, my back has been feeling the effects of the drastic increase in activity, and I am happy that my shower has a massage setting on it.

    Leslie may have been joking that I just have to look at a meal replacement to lose weight, but the first three days of my program have been no joke! My weight has dropped over 8 lbs. since Wednesday morning, and that is encouraging me to keep going and to keep doing better. That is one of the reasons I did not step out to buy a handful of almonds yesterday. I know that the first week’s rate of loss will not continue past that, but it is still amazing to be able to drop so much at the beginning of the program. I know that despite the current trend suggesting otherwise, I will not be dropping fifty pounds in a month… but if I could drop twenty-five pounds in the first month then I will be a very happy man! Fifty… it took me three months to lose that at the beginning of the program, and I had much more fat on me at the time. If I could get down to my best weight ever by September or October then I will be thrilled.

    It is a rainy day today, but I decided to sit outside to write anyways. I am not sure if Leslie and I will have a cigar date this morning, but if we don’t then most likely this afternoon or evening we will. I am taking my son the younger for lunch, and that will be my first real challenge of the program. I will tell him that my stomach has been bothering me and that’s why I am not eating. I do not like lying to him, but it is easier than explaining this crazy program.

    Okay, it looks like Leslie and I will be chatting so I’ll close here.

    Have a great day folks!