Tag: exercise

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Lesamy Week 42 – A Pause

I’ve been thinking about this for a while. Even before the recent “plateau-ing” of my weight-loss (which is really an indication of my ambivalence about going further). As the reality of “loose skin” becomes more and more apparent – i.e. visible – I get more and more nervous about ending up with lots of it. The answer I think is to slow down, to give my body time to adjust to being 85lbs lighter than it was. Give the skin time to firm up and shrink back.

So I’ve being toying with the idea of a “pause” – stopping losing weight but maintaining what I’ve got for a while, probably several months. I was going to post a long discussion of the pros and cons but then I weighed myself and discovered that I’ve put weight on again, due probably to a fairly calorie-full weekend, itself due to mixed feelings over the whole loose skin issue.

So I’ve decided to do it. Or to plan to do it. And here’s the plan.

It’s week 42 and I weigh 16st 7lb. In 10 weeks it’ll be 1 year since I started and I should be under 16st by then. That seems to me a good point to start maintaining at. From then on I’ll aim to keep my weight under 16st but not really reduce it. How long? Well at least until Christmas and after that maybe a bit longer too.

In case anyone thinks this is the easy way out “pausing” is not giving up. Not when the whole point is to try to firm up what’s there. I’ll need to keep the exercise going – especially the sit-ups and so on – and I’ll need to still be watching what I eat. I’ll be allowed a little more but I won’t just be able to not care at all what and how much I eat. And I’ll need to do all that without the satisfaction of seeing those numbers steadily fall. I’ll also have to cope with people thinking I’ve quit when they won’t know the real reason.

But I think I can do that. I want to do that. As this weekend has reminded me I actually don’t really enjoy eating loads and loads any more, I get full and feel uncomfortable. And I’d much rather be a fit, but “fat” guy than a “slim” one covering up folds and folds of loose skin.

Weekly loss: -0.5kg (-1.1lb)
Total loss: 39.3kg (86.6lb or 6st 2lb)
To target: 28.6kg (63lb or 4st 7lb)
Current weight: 104.8kg (231lb or 16st 7lb)


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lesamy

“And I Would Walk…”

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZeuNxMY_5Uo]

Passed another milestone last night, almost literally a milestone. I’ve now walked 500 miles in exercise since I started Lesamy.

I discovered on looking back over my spreadsheet that it took 300 miles to lose a stone in weight!

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Lesamy Week 25 – Big Breakfast

When we moved offices at work back at the end of January it had an effect on my eating habits. It became easier to make and take my own sandwiches. Which meant that I was eating slightly more calories for lunch than I had been. Which in turn meant that I compensated by having a smaller breakfast. Probably over-compensated because I found I regularly had 400+ calories spare at the end of the day so my usual one treat had become three.

Which would be fine – as long as it’s in the budget – except I was feeling quite hungry toward the end of the day. Plus I was also struggling a bit with my morning sit-ups. If you recall the reason I started having breakfast at all was so as to have something inside me before I attempted these. I guess I forgot that, or thought that a 100 calorie yoghurt was somehow helping with that.

So now I’m back on my 361 breakfast of cereal. It’s made a huge difference to my feeling less hungry in the afternoons and has, I think, helped my mood. I wish I could say it has made the sit-ups easy, but I definitely think it has made them easier.

So anyway here’s some figures:

Weekly loss: 1.4kg (3.1lb)
Total loss: 33.1kg (73lb or 5st 3lb)
To target: 34.8kg (77lb or 5st 7lb)
Current weight: 111kg (244lb or 17st 6lb)

So I’m now over 5 stone down!


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Lesamy Week 24 – No Tipping Point

You know I’ve been doing this for quite a long time now – more than 20 weeks in fact – so you think I’d be used to it by now. The ups and downs, the uneven nature of the loss, how hard it can be, not physically but psychologically.

But I guess I’m not.

It’s been another tough week. I’ve struggled with motivation and wanted to give up. I keep coming back to that Fat Aceeptance thing and wondering why I’m doing this. If it was for general fitness then I’ve achieved that. All that’s really left is that I must simply want to look better. That I believe being 12 stone will make me better in some ways that being 18.

So why do I keep going? Well for one I realised that if I was to do the HAES thing properly then it’d look a lot like what I’m doing already. In terms of the things that are most effort – having to think about what I’m eating, and making time to take exercise – they’d still apply even if I’d be letting myself eat more and being all self-accepting. So what “giving up” would really be like, real giving up, would not be HAES, it would be back to slob-dom and ever-increasing weight and unfitness. As long as I’m not damaging my health – and I really believe I’m not – then why not try to keep going?

That was one thing. The other was the idea, oft-repeated but never really tried by me, that things that are worthwhile take effort. Well guess what this is the effort. What did you think “not being easy” would feel like?

And then there’s always plain old stubbornness.

So, I grit my teeth and I make myself doing situps when all I want to do is stay in bed. I push myself to go for a walk when I know it doesn’t really add much to the weight-loss. I stick to my calorie limit when I really really fancy a whole bar of chocolate. Or some wine. And I make it through another week knowing that it’s just one week amongst many many to come – cos we’re motorway driving, but I’m really tired and want to just get there…

Anyway.

I guess I always thought there’d be a ‘tipping poing’. A point where it really was ‘all downhill from here’. Where the fact that I weighed less would mean that I was pushing, pulling, lifting, dragging less weight around and so the exercise thing would be easier which would mean I could do more, which would accelerate the weight-loss…

But there’s no tipping point. I may have lost nearly 5 stone but I still have this huge belly that makes my morning pushups a struggle. I still have far too much wobbly bits to think about running rather than walking just yet. And I still look like a fat bloke.

And that’s really the issue. It’s not even that I care how I look, not really. It’s that I’ve done this huge thing. I’ve worked hard at something, consistently over months, exhibited a level of discipline and self-control I didn’t know I was capable of and if I stopped now no-one – no-one I hadn’t actually told – would know. I’d get no credit for it. That’s what I want. It’s not how I’d look, it’s that it’d be obvious I’d done something impressive.

Yes I am that shallow.

Weekly loss: 1.4kg (3.1lb)
Total loss: 31.7kg (69.9lb or 4st 13lb)
Current weight: 112.4kg (247lb or 17st 9lb)


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Lesamy Week 21 – Not Giving Up (yet)

TV Program + Blog = Thoughtful

This has been an interesting week. This week I watched a TV program called “Why Thin People Aren’t Fat?” and I read a blog on something called ‘Fat Acceptance’.

This has made me think, which is almost never a good thing.

OK in order to write about this I need to try to sum up what I got from these sources of ideas, otherwise I’ll be here all night. Here goes:

Dieting is bad

OK no, that’s not it. Or it’s only a small part of it. Let me try again.

First the TV program. This was a Horizon program from the BBC. For those that don’t know this means it’s a fairly serious, if populist, science program. They repeated a little-know experiment which showed that some thin people almost literally can’t get fat. What I got from this show was:

  • your body has a kind of built-in notion of how heavy it thinks you should be
  • it (your body) tries to maintain this weight
  • so if you’re “meant” to be fat you probably will be
  • and you’ll struggle to lose weight and put it back on easily
  • which doesn’t mean you shouldn’t try but be realistic:

What may be depressing for many people who are overweight [is] to know that a large amount of weight-loss is very difficult to maintain in the long term. However we know that small amounts of weight-loss will make you healthier and actually is much easier to maintain.

Dr Carel le Roux, Imperial College London.

There was lots more than that but that’s the gist of what I got from it.

Now the blog. This is more political. I only read a few recent posts and some with intriguing titles. But what I gained from this was:

  • dieting really is bad
  • because it sets unrealistic expectations
  • and because it rarely works, certainly not long-term
  • i.e. 95% of dieters don’t keep off the weight
  • of the 5% remaining the majority end up working in fitness, gyms, personal training etc
  • i.e. it becomes a full time job keeping the weight off
  • we should rebel against unrealistic images and expectations
  • in particular BMI is a load of rubbish
  • you can be healthy without being thin
  • in fact it’s probably healthier than dieting
  • in case I forgot to mention it dieting is bad

Now all this very interesting and some of it is new to me so it certainly made me question what I’m doing. And that made me a little sad.

Why? Because regardless of whether it’s doing me any good or not the sense of achievement, the satisfaction I’ve gained from actually sticking to something and seeing results has been great. But now there’s reason to believe that I’ll probably find it impossible to maintain and if I do it’ll be like a fulltime job and I’ll constantly feel hungry (one study showed that obese people on a “maintenance diet” still felt hungry all the time).

So am I right to worry or is this typical Shuggie paranoia?

What’s Good About What I’m Doing

Well the good news is that I am already doing some good things. The essence of HAES is eating well, taking exercise and self-acceptance. Well I certainly eat better than I did and I do lots of exercise. More than I did and more than I need simply to lose weight (see below). As for self-acceptance well yes and no. But that’s a bigger issue than just my weight, though I have got sucked into thinking how nice it would be to be “thin” again.

So…

Reasons Not to Quit Lesamy

The first is this “natural weight” thing. How do you know what it is? In the program they said most adults gain only around 20-30lbs across their entire adult lives. At 18 I was 10 1/2 stone, a few months ago (41) I was 22 1/2. That’s a little more than 30lbs. In other words I wasn’t maintaining some natural weight I was getting bigger and that’s not good.

So maybe I do have a natural weight, and maybe it’ll still be fat by everyday standards. But if I’m doing exercise and not eating crap and generally being reasonably healthy then I’ll be ok with that. I’ll have to give up the dream of being thin but I’ve been fat my whole adult life, I think I’ll cope.

I Haven’t Stopped Yo-ing Yet

One thing all this reminded me which I pretty much have known for years is that yo-yo dieting is worse for you than not dieting at all. But I’m not yo-yoing yet. I’m still on the way down. Maybe I will be one of the 95% but maybe not. If I’d had to predict it I would have say that I would never have got this far. I would have said that I would have lost a few pounds , maybe even a stone or more, but put most of it back on again, and so on, a few times by now. So maybe, just maybe, I’m capable of keeping at least some of this off.

And you know what? If not. If I go back up then I’ll just keep up the exercise and healthy eating and call it a win.

Maintenance

But I honestly think I can maintain it.

Why? Because I haven’t been hungry all the time. Despite surviving on 1800 calories a day I’ve felt ok most of the time. If I had to live on this regime the rest of my life, I could. I’d rather have a few more treats every now and then, but it’s not like I’m even missing those completely. Plus that’s a diet based on losing weight. My plan to maintain it will allow me a few more calories and at least one “day off” per week.

Conclusion

So to conclude. I’ve had a lot to think about but that’s actually good. It’s made me really think about what I’m doing and look at my motives and confirm what’s good about it. There’s a lot in these sources I agree with, specifically,

  • need to be realistic, I may always be “fat”
  • remember healthy != thin and fat != unhealthy
  • BMI is dubious at best
  • acceptance is a good thing, self-acceptance particularly

However I don’t think that I’m actually endangering my health right now and the benefits in terms of self-esteem, accomplishment and yes, feeling fitter are real.

So I’m carrying on.

So Many Words – What About a Few Numbers?

OK so you’re bored rigid by now by my meandering thought processes (so why you reading my blog?), what about this week’s stats? Before I post them, a quick word about exercise.

End of last week I developed a large blister on my foot. Right between my big toe and the next one. It wasn’t painful but it made walking, even using the stepper, awkward. So on Tuesday I abandoned exercise for the week. I thought it would be a good experiment. Ever since I got my pedometer I’ve been aware that exercise doesn’t account for very much of my weight-loss, how much would I lose even without it? Here’s the answer:

Weekly loss: 2kg (4.4lb)
Total loss: 29.5kg (65lb or 4st 9lb)
Current weight: 114.6kg (252lb or 18st)

This is a number of milestones. I’m under 115kg, I’m 18stone even and I’ve now lost just over 20% of my original body weight.

So yes it’s mainly the diet and not the exercise that’s causing the weight-loss. Which in a weird way just re-inforces that I need to keep up the exercise because it’s that that’s doing me more good and it’s that that will keep me healthy if I do eventually yo back up.

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Lesamy Week 20 – A Little Bit Down

…as in my weight and my mood.

Weekly loss: 0.3kg (0.7lb)
Total loss: 27.5kg (60.6lb or 4st 4lb)
Current weight: 116.6kg (257lb or 18st 5lb)

*sigh*

I’m not quite sure what went wrong. OK so I have still lost weight and it’s not a tiny amount but it’s still fairly small. Meanwhile I’ve had a week where I’ve not only stuck to the rules but had a lot of exercise. I’ve worked hard this week and unlike some weeks it’s felt like it.

I’ve been hovering around this general weight for the last three weeks. Is this me finally hitting the “plateau”? Makes you think about targets and goals. I once said that,

“As long as my general health and fitness was ok I didn’t feel inclined to go chasing a particular body image.”

But I have haven’t I? I mean I’m fit enough now to not worry about falling over if I have to run for a bus. So the fact I’ve kept going, kept losing weight must mean I want to look slimmer right?

I do. I admit it. I not only want to be healthier, I want to be thinner. But I’m not there yet and it’s taking so bloody long.

Don’t worry I’m not giving up. I’m just having a whinge. It’s my blog and I’ll… (well you know the rest)


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Lesamy Week 19

Weekly loss: -0.1kg (-0.2lb)
Total loss: 27.2kg (60lb or 4st 3lb)
Current weight: 116.9kg (257lb or 18st 5lb)

It’s been another week where I put on weight slightly. Although given that it’s only 100g (that’s a small glass of water) I’m seeing it as maintaining last week’s weight. Which I’m quite happy with because I had quite a big week from Tue-Fri. We were moving offices at work and I was helping out. This meant lots of extra hours, lots of lifting and carrying, but also ordering pizzas and a couple of pub lunches.  It also meant that I over-compensated because I knew I was doing lots more exercise (I could feel that as I flopped into bed exhausted). I had a bit of a pig-out on Thursday.

So all in all the fact that I managed to pull it back at the weekend means I’m not unhappy.


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Lesamy Week 16 – Back on Track or Broken Scales?

Weekly loss: 3kg (6.6lb)
Total loss: 25.5kg 56.2lb or 4st)
Current weight: 118.6.9kg (261lb or 18st 9lb)

Wow! 3kg is big. It’s more than I’ve lost since week two. It’s big enough to make me suspicious. As you’ll recall I did have some problems with my scales before Christmas, giving me silly low numbers, but I replaced the battery and it seemed to be ok again. Also I’ve checked it with smaller items against the kitchen scales and it seems to be accurate.

Actually I suppose I have stepped up the exercise slightly and this is the first week in quite a while when I haven’t had a meal out or a pub lunch or something. Anyway I’m choosing to go with it on the basis that if it’s wrong it’s a bit like an estimated reading on the gas bill – it all works out correctly in the end.

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Lesamy Week 13 – My Bony Ass

Since this week is not a SlingInk deadline week and in order to get ahead of the curve I thought I’d do a brief get-it-out-there blog post.

It’s traditional at this point to add some blather about the process of dieting/exercise itself before the big ‘reveal’ of the numbers. Well I don’t have a lot to blather about but just to add to my ‘shocking wrist fat loss’ theme of yesterday, I would just like to whinge say that I find it odd where my body decides to go for its missing calories. i.e. where it chooses to burn fat. My wrists I mentioned and I think my face (though is that just a decent haircut and a shave making me look tidier rather than thinner in the face?)

But one other, um, area, where I think I’ve noticed a change in my behind. Ok, now before you think that I literally must be disappearing up my own rear-end to have noticed this let me explain that the evidence is secondary and I’d quite happily be wrong. Thing is I’ve noticed lately that after sitting down (at work or at my desk at home, like now) for a while I start to feel like my bum is a little sore. It feels like the bones of my whatever-you-call (not the cocyx the other bits) are digging into the chair seat. Now I never noticed this before and my sitting habits haven’t changed all that much, so I conclude that whilst I’m still relatively heavy, but have lost some weight, if I’d lost some on my backside it would explain why my bony parts are pinning me to my chair.

Or it could just be lack of visible progress frustration mixed with my normal paranoia and hypochrondria.

Oh well, here’s the stats.

Weekly loss: 0.6kg (1.3lb)
Total loss: 21.8kg (48.1lb or 3st 6lb)
Current weight: 122.3kg (269lb or 19st 3lb)

I was expecting this to be honest. Last time I had a whole weekend off the clock the effects were carried over into the next week so I was partly expecting that this time. Also I had a lunchtime at the pub on Friday which was also off the clock. (I had virtually no evening meal to compensate but still, alcohol’s nearly pure calories you know.)

I’m not gutted, it’s still going down. The challenge is to make it through the next two weeks (Christmas work do this week and Christmas itself the next) without going up.

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Lesamy Week 12

Well once again the impact of a story due in for SlingInk meant that I didn’t update my blog.

It’s almost week 13 and it’s been a tough two weeks. I’ve had a few days when I went “off the clock” as far as calorie counting went. These were semi-deliberate and I did do something to pull it back – more exercise mostly – but it left me feeling that I’m vulnerable to temptation. My confident feelings that I can keep this up indefinitely have been shaken a little.

I’d still like to see more visible progress. I know, I know it’s there if you look for it, but you really have to look and most people don’t. And if you never met me before well, then I still look like a fat bloke. One weird, vaguely frustrating thing is that I’ve gone done a notch on my watch strap. Yes, I still have a big old belly but I’m losing that all important wrist fat!

Weekly loss: 1kg (2.2lb)
Total loss: 21.2kg (46.7lb or 3st 4lb)
Current weight: 122.9kg (270lb or 19st 4lb)