Week 43 - RESULTS

A bit late this week, as I was away on the first leg of my holiday visits, but better late than never!

STARTING WEIGHT:   219.5 lbs

ENDING WEIGHT:  215.8 lbs

WEIGHT LOSS:    3.7 lbs

As I said before, even though I showed a gain last week, it did rather come out of the blue, and sure enough, those pounds disappeared quite rapidly at the start of the week.

I'm pleased with this loss. It doesn't quite equal out to my weekly target over the last fortnight, but at least its more reflective of the exercise and dieting I was doing.

I couldn't blog over the last few days, as I was visiting my folks. I'm off again on Christmas Eve for stage two of my visits, so for next Monday's weigh-in I'll be at my folk's home - they do have a scale, but its not an electronic one like I have in my room, so I don't know if I'll be able to a) do a weigh-in at all, or b) do an accurate one. We'll see. I haven't weighed at all yet this week, and my diet rather went out of the window during my visit home, so I'm slightly nervous about weighing in! Still, I can get a few good runs in before then, so if I HAVE fallen off the wagon, hopefully I can limit the damage.

Anyway, nothing much else to report! I'm off AGAIN for New Year, travelling up to Edinburgh to spend time with my friends, so that ALSO might impact my weight...dear oh dear! Anyway, I'm going to have fun, while keeping one eye on my diet etc, and we'll resume normal service in the New Year. Not sure when I'll be blogging next, but we'll see!

WEIGHT LOSS TO DATE: 

81.3 lbs

Week 42 So Far...

I hit my lowest weight ever this morning, coming in at 215.6 lbs. Was a great feeling!

Like I said on Monday, even though I showed a gain for last week, I didn't think it was really accurate. The weight suddenly piled on over the weekend despite (or maybe because of?) the exercise I was doing. Well, sure enough, that weight fell away quite quickly, and I'm now rocking a pretty decent loss on top of dropping the gain too. I'm not going to get too excited before tomorrow's weigh-in though, as I know how quickly everything can change!

Plus, I just got done with a massive sleep, so I know some of it will be dehydration. I can finally afford to catch up on my sleep, as Friday was my last day of term! Got a two week break now, and no exams in January either, so I can afford to relax a bit. Been a hectic couple of final weeks, hence not much posting, but I survived it, and my weight is still doing OK!

Also, I went out with a lovely young lady last night. I don't know if I would call it a date necessarily, as we've been friends for years, but it was a really big thing for me, for one particular reason. You see, it was the first time I'd actually asked someone out. I would never have had the confidence to do that before this weight loss program started, and the fact that I did had me beaming from ear to ear, even before I got a reply! Now I'm in the tail end of my weight loss, its time to start shedding old fears and constraints, as well as pounds...I don't have the excuse of my weight holding me back anymore, so if I STILL chicken out, its just straight-up cowardice!

I'm off doing the family rounds for the holiday season from tomorrow, which is going to make it a bit more difficult to both blog and exercise (and heck, even to weigh!). I'll do the best I can with all three, but in case I disappear for a few weeks after tomorrow's weigh in, may you all have a merry Christmas, and a happy new year! Let's make 2012 THE ONE, shall we?

Week 42 - RESULTS

OK, a day late, but that's better than never! Or is it?

STARTING WEIGHT:   216.7 lbs

ENDING WEIGHT:  219.5 lbs

WEIGHT GAIN:    2.8 lbs

You know, this was the weight I recorded on Monday. This morning, my weight was back down again, but I didn't want to start heading down that road, cherry-picking the days I weigh-in to get the best results. So, although this result is completely wrong as of this morning, it was accurate on Monday morning, so I HAVE to go with it!

It's completely ridiculous, too. Remember how my weight had inexplicably gone up Sunday morning? Well, I watched my food that day, then went for a run Sunday night too. More than enough to AT LEAST keep the same weight, right?

WRONG! Lol, a gain of this magnitude is complete nonsense. Which, in a strange way, is what makes it both annoying, and OK. Its annoying, because it bears absolutely no resemblance to the diet or exercise I did last week. However, for that very same reason its hard to get mad about it - I held up my end of the bargain, I dieted and exercised, so by rights I should have lost weight. If my body doesn't want to play ball...well, that's IT'S problem. As for me, I'm living a healthy, active lifestyle, the way I want to. So go me, and to Hell with the scales!

Just to be on the safe side, I'm keeping a food diary this week, just to see if there are calories sneaking in I'm not considering (but I'm sure there aren't). I'm having a really good week so far actually - this result hasn't got me down at all! I may divulge why I'm so merry in a later post...we shall see.

If nothing else, at least I kept myself out of the 220's! Sucks to drop out of the 80-lb-lost bracket though, I really enjoyed it there, but now I have something to aim for!

WEIGHT LOSS TO DATE: 

77.6 lbs

Frustration!

It doesn't matter how many times you tell yourself that they are inevitable, that they're a normal part of weight loss, that they will balance themselves out eventually...sometimes, those random blips can be a real pain in the wotsit!

I'd finally managed to get on top of my workload, and treated myself to some exercise this week. I went out for a run on Thursday night, and again on Friday night, and it felt really good to be active again. I was sleeping better too.

Best of all though, my weekly loss by Saturday morning was up at 5.4 lbs. Fantastic! 

I decided not to run yesterday evening, as my legs were quite sore from two nights in a row, and also because I usually like to leave a day in between sessions anyway. And besides, I'd already lost 5.4 lbs this week, so no sense in pushing it too hard, right?

Well, guess what? After one day without exercise, I step onto the scale this morning, and...oh yes...I have, overnight, gained 6lbs. That completely wipes out my losses for the week, and in fact puts me at a net gain of 0.6lbs, despite exercising!

Now, I know its a fluke, and I'm not too worried, but hell if that doesn't hit your enthusiasm, even after all this time! Worse still, tonight our landlord took us out for a meal, so I'm stuffed to the gills, but desperately want to get a run in before I go to bed! Will have to wait for my dinner to go down, but I think I'll be lucky to see any loss at all tomorrow, never mind reaching my target...ho hum!

The Winter of my Discontent...

You know, it doesn't actually surprise me that my weight loss attempt started in a spring month. Spring is always a time of new beginnings, fresh starts etc etc.

But its more than that. Part of the reason also has to be the way I am affected by winter.

And 'affected' seems to be the operative word. I always seem to have a slump in winter, both emotionally, and energetically, and motivationally. I don't know if I would ever diagnose myself with something like Seasonal Affective Disorder, but the pattern has certainly become apparent to me over the last few years.

When I think back to last winter...that was when I put on a lot of my weight. When I first came to Med School back in August 2010, I was already overweight, around 260 lbs or so. But between then and Christmas, I had gained almost 40lbs. That's 40 lbs in about 3-4 months. And I withdrew from my friends. I stopped going to classes. I would sleep all day, only getting up to go over the shop and pick up a kebab, or some fish and chips...

Jeez, I was a mess. I just couldn't muster the enthusiasm to care, about anything. That's why I say its no surprise to me that my weight loss began in spring. When I finally came out from under that winter funk...it was time to change my life!

I started to feel a bit of the old winter blues coming on again recently. It always starts slowly - first I can never seem to get enough sleep. Then deadlines and targets seem less important than they used to. Then I find myself becoming stressed, and frustrated, often for no real reason. And then, of course, I stopped blogging or weighing in for almost three weeks, and my weight-loss slowed right down...

Luckily I've noticed it this time around, and don't intend to let that grumpy old Jack Frost undo any of what I've achieved this year. I'm pleased to report that I just got in from a run, my first for about 3 weeks, but not the last this week, if things go to plan. I don't know if I'll be able to make my target weightloss for this week, but I can certainly do a little better than the 0.1lbs I got last week! Well, here's hoping, anyway!

Week 41 - RESULTS

OK - finally, I am up to date again!

STARTING WEIGHT:   216.8 lbs

ENDING WEIGHT:  216.7 lbs



WEIGHT LOSS:    0.1 lbs

I was actually showing a gain for most of this week, but managed to cut back on calories just enough over the weekend to push it into a loss.

The last three weeks have been a nightmare, but finally there is light at the end of the tunnel. I had a really good day academically on Friday (which also happened to be my 27th birthday!), and got a lot of necessaries signed off, which eased the burden on me. I have a long night ahead tonight, as I have a final presentation to prepare for tomorrow morning, but after that...well, I'm STILL not done, but the last deadline is a couple of weeks away, so I can afford to finally catch up on some sleep...and some freaking exercise!

Although I've only lost a grand total of 0.3lbs over the last three weeks, I'm actually OK with that, for the following reasons:

- I've wanted to run. It isn't that I just couldn't be bothered and put it from my mind. I literally had to make a decision between going for a run and then going to bed, or staying up all night to make sure my work got done on time. Its a hell of a choice, and I think I made the right one, but I was desperate to let off some steam and hit the pavement! I should be able to head out again this week, and I can't wait!

- No massive gain! The concern was, without running, that I would pile back on all the pounds I'd lost before the deadlines kicked in. Luckily, although I did see a gain one week, I'm at a net loss. I think this bodes well for my maintenance phase - I managed to go three weeks without exercising or watching my calories, and managed to keep my weight essentially the same! Phew!

- I'm still on track! The weekly target I've got at the moment is 1.8 lbs, which will see me hit my goal weight on the 1 year anniversary of my weight loss (which I like). Obviously I've not got that loss in the last three weeks, but fortunately, my losses in the weeks before that were so far ABOVE my weekly target, that I'm actually exactly on track as of today! So, no damage done to the long-term goal.


As I say, I plan on finally getting a run in before this week is out. I don't know if it will be enough to get me to my target loss for next week, but once I'm out from under this pile of work and exercising again, I trust in my previous form, and expect the pounds to shift eventually.



Finally, before I end this post and go back to my (final!) presentation, I just wanted write about something that I've been thinking about recently.

I am so proud of what I have achieved so far. Sometimes I don't let myself feel proud, either because I'm not there yet, or I'm afraid of being arrogant and letting it slip away, but more often, I look at what I have achieved so far, and I can't quite believe it. I set a goal, worked REALLY hard, and am now well on my way to realising it.

As I've said, Friday was my 27th birthday, and I found myself thinking about the fact that my weight wasn't the only thing I was dissatisfied with in the past. As such, I have decided to try and use the lessons I have learned from my weight loss in my everyday life, to see if I can achieve the same results. The first target for this is my academic work. For too long (literally, years), I've been living what I call a 'first draft' life - leaving things too late, then rushing them the night before, and then 'making do' with that, rather than really trying my hardest. Being the best I can be. Indeed, that's why these last three weeks have been so hectic - I could have sorted it all out weeks ago!

I'm not sure how I'm going to tackle it, and of course I have to pull an all-nighter tonight, in what I really hope is my last example of cutting it fine the day before. I might be posting more about this attempt in the coming weeks - I know its not strictly about weight loss, but then again, my weight loss attempt was also about so much more than just, you know, losing weight. So, we'll see...

WEIGHT LOSS TO DATE: 

80.4 lbs

Weeks 39 and 40 - RESULTS

Time doesn't just fly, it hurtles past faster than the speed of light!

STARTING WEIGHT:   217.0 lbs

WEEK 39 WEIGHT:  217.4 lbs



WEIGHT GAIN:    0.4 lbs

WEEK 40 WEIGHT:  216.8 lbs

 WEIGHT LOSS:    0.6 lbs

OK, first up yet more apologies for the HUGE gap of almost three weeks since my last post. I'm afraid its just a case of the real world catching up to me. I'm into my final few weeks of this term before the Christmas break, and deadlines that were always manageably far away suddenly loomed on the horizon, and required my immediate attention.

I haven't been running once in the last three weeks. I've been spending almost every hour available either working on projects or essays, labouring my way through PowerPoint, or giving presentations. Its not just been a case of not having time to run - after all, it only takes about an hour or so. But the sleep I need after a run, the hours of rest necessary after that exertion, was a luxury I just couldn't afford. I don't think I've averaged more than 4 hours a night for the last few weeks, and that's compounded into the minimal loss (or rather, a gain then a loss) that I saw in these two weeks. Had I run, I would have been so tired that I wouldn't have been able to manage these crazy hours...a poor excuse I know, but its the only one I have.

 

I've probably been eating more calories than usual too, again because of the long nights sat in front of the computer, with a steady stream of coffees, RedBulls or sweet treats to try and keep me going. It's frustrating, especially after getting so successfully back into my running regime, to have to let it fall by the wayside, but in this instance, its been unavoidable.

Finally, not running means I've not really been thinking about my weight loss, and when that happens, I tend not to post. I'm not one of those who can post everyday with a stream of consciousness detailing how I'm feeling about my weight etc - I can only ever seem to so it if I think I have something to say! And with my mind focussed elsewhere...I simply haven't had anything to say!

I'll do a separate post later for last week's results, and then I'll be bang up to date. I stuck these two together just as a catch up, and now I will do the results for Week 41 (which was last week), which brings up back onto schedule.

WEIGHT LOSS TO DATE: 

80.3 lbs