DCarr10760's Weight loss diary

DCarr10760

DCarr10760

New member
Hi Everybody!

In reading through the forum I saw lots of references to diaries, so decided to start one. If I am doing something wrong, let me know, but it seems to be that you start a thread and keep posting to the thread, right?

So...

I mentioned in my Newbie bio that I am 46, Male, a Father and have struggled with my weight since the age of 6, so 40 years. I have, in my adult life, been as low as 184 lbs and as high as 305 lbs. As I've gotten older and less active, I spend more time at the upper end of the range than the lower.

It seems that I am always on a diet, or feeling guilty that I am not on one. The crazy thing is that I lose weight very quickly, when I put my heart into it. My body responds to exercise and sensible eating very quickly. But when I am not focused on my health, I fall back into bad habits and put all of the weight I lost back on. I know I am an emotional eater and have blurred the line between feeding my body and feeding my heart or soul or pain...

So I have YoYoed up and down in weight for all this time. Last year I went to a new Doctor and he looked at my history and bloodwork and said you are incredibly healthy, considering how overweight you have been, imagine how healthy you would be if you just lost weight. So I tried again.

Last Fall I went down from 285 to 240 and then back up to 266, where I am now. So my point is not how do I lose weight, but rather how can I lose all the weight I want to, become healthy and engaged in life and then KEEP IT OFF forever. That's what I came here to learn, how do you change your attitude to food and health long-term so that you can stay healthy?

BTW- I'm 5-foot-11 and am currently 266 lbs and would like to be under 200 lbs. I am happy to be here and happy to hear from you all!

David C
 
Thanks!

I haven't really gotten the hang of the place yet (I keep losing the diary, lol) but I'll find my way, sooner or later.

Certainly joining up and starting the journal have focused my thoughts.

Thanks for the Welcome!

David C.
 
Hello David! Welcome to the forum! My name is Michelle and we are really glad to have you here! I know exactly how you feel with the "yo yo" dieting, I've done it more times than I care to admit myself. I am 17 years old, going on in my senior year of high school and I have been yoyo dieting since my freshman year. I would always loose alot of weight, then put it back on even quicker because I would go through periods where I would starve myself then binge eat myself into a frenzy (I would mostly binge on sugary stuff like chocolate, cookies, ice cream, candy cause I was/am a sugar addict lol) the lowest weight I got to was 119 pounds(which still looked a little chunky on my 5'2 frame), and that was back in November! I am now back up to 158 pounds because of constant binging. Now I am concentrating on eating in a way that I can eat for the rest of my life (meaning eating healthy foods like fruits, veggies, lean meats, whole grains, etc) but also not depriving myself on the foods that I love, but aren't so good for me. I eat alot of the good stuff, but I keep the bad foods in moderation. I know I will never yo yo diet again because this is a lifestyle that I can keep up and be happy about. I know you will do the same thing! We can and will get this weight off! :). Well I hope you have a wonderful rest of the day and feel free to swing by my journal (I'm back!) (For Good This Time!)
 
Hi David,

Welcome to WLF. Keeping the weight off once you have it off is really difficult. I've yo-yo'd up and down over and over again. I hope this forum can help you find the perfect way to have a lifestyle where you can lose and then maintain the weight you'd like.

Have a good night
~Jenna
 
Thanks!

It's been a long time since high school for me...

It's good to hear you getting a handle on it at a young age. It's harder, I think, when you get older and set in your ways a bit and especially when you are on your own. Fast food/junk food is so accessible and easy. Eating healthfully requies a real time commitment, planning meals, shopping, and food prep all take time and organization. The younger you start, the easier it will be, I think.

Binge eating is a hard one, it seems it is always a cry for help, something you need and are not getting, so you turn to food, it's always there and soothing, for the moment.

But you lose the connection between eating for health and eating for emotional support, the hunger we feel when we are sad/lonely/scared is not easily sated by food, but eating salves the hurt for awhile. But it's not the answer. Finding what's missing is the answer. But it's not easy, I've been trying to understand why I overeat for my whole life.

As you heap on the years, the original reasons for your weight gain are obscured by the pain of living as a fat person. It's a quagmire. Unraveling it is hard and I'm not sure is absolutely necessary to become fit and whole, just the understanding that we eat when we should be crying, or grieving or standing up for ourselves can help. We can see the idiocy in harming ourselves to sooth ourselves.

I'm trying to understand why I'm fat, why I stay fat. But it not easy (that's why I'm here :)

David C
 
David, It seems to me you have a very good understanding of why you have been unable to keep the weight off. I think if you want it that you can have it. Glad you are here.
 
Thanks for all of the Welcomes!

Well, I got on the scale this morning and I was down to 260! 259 if I rocked all the way back on my heels (I know ALL the tricks-Lol).

So 6 pounds since Sunday! All water, no doubt, still, it's reassuring that things are working out of the blocks. I do lose weight quickly when I live right.

Yesterday I had:

Breakfast:

Coffee
1 cup cereal with 1/2 cup milk and a cut up banana

Lunch:

4 oz of pork cubed
1/2 cup brown rice and assorted vegetables
1 cup V8 juice
1 pear

Dinner:

1 pork rib (about 8 oz)
small green salad with Oil & Vinegar
1/2 cup of potato salad
1 small brownie: eek:

About 2200 calories total

I also walked at lunch, fast pace about 40 minutes
I mowed my In-laws lawn for an hour, again at a fast pace
I did shoulder (military style) lifts, three sets 12 reps each with 30 lbs of live weight (my 2-year old son who wished I'd sone several more sets :) )

So while a bit more food than I should eat to reduce, I exercised more too. So it worked out.

My goal is to lose 2 pounds a week on average. To do this I will keep under 2000 calories a day and walk or do some exercise every day. I try not to weigh myself more than once a week but I always fail :rolleyes:

David C
 
Today so far...

Today got all screwed up...

Breakfast went fine, I missed my lunchtime walk because it was pouring rain outside :mad:

I was rushing around the house this AM and walked out without my lunch:boxing:

So I went to McDonalds (I know, I know...:rolleyes: ) but instead of my two double cheeseburgers and medium vanilla shake that the fat me usually gets, the thin me ordered one double cheeseburger and a small coffee.

So my caloric intake was about the same as my packed lunch, just too much fat and not enough nutrition.

When I get home and after the Baby's asleep I'll do some stationary cycling to rescue the day.

This is progress for me! In the past I would've been so angry at myself for forgetting lunch that I would skip it entirely and come home ravenous and overeat, or I would buy and eat way too much food at lunch and blow the diet and that might be the end of it, or the start of a full-fledged binge.

So today was a little victory, I feel better that I maintained control, not perfection, just control.

I'll be better tomorrow!

Thanks for listening...

David C
 
Great job taking control of the situation! It was definitly a victory. Your taking steps in the right direction... one step at a time
 
Avoiding that stuff is always good but at least you didn't go crazy. You will probably be fine. Way to keep control. I think everytime I control myself it gets easier.
 
Yesterday all in all wasn't bad, the weather was lousy so I didn't get in a walk :(

Food choices weren't great but portion control saved the day and I stayed at 2000 calories.

Today will be better. I have been trying to motivate myself out of bed at 5:00 am to walk for an hour while it's still cool. So far I haven't succeeded until today, er...well 5:15...

I did my old route, which I enjoy, it's about three miles, relatively flat and at 5 - 6 in the morning there's not much traffic. I had to huff an puff my way through I'm in much worse shape than before the Baby (now 2 years old) was born. It took exactly an hour, so it was a brisk pace. I looked like a pail of water was dumped over my head when I got home...Lol.

It feels good to get out and exercise first thing, now, no matter what the day brings, I got out and pushed a bit. A good feeling.

David C
 
A new idea (for me)

I was perusing the diaries and posts and was thinking about how much food was an appropriate amount to maintain weight and how much you needed to reduce this by in order to lose weight at a safe rate of speed.

I saw some of the calculators and punched in my numbers and then I got an idea for what seems to me like a sensible number of calories to eat to slowly lose weight.

If you eat the appropriate number of calories required to maintain the body weight you want to achieve, then you should lose weight until you reach your goal? Does this make sense?

So for me, I am 5-foot 11-inches tall and currently 260 lbs. According to a recently posted Home Body Fat Test, I am currently at 31.1% fat and I have 179.1 lean body mass.

So if I want to get to 10% body fat, assuming my lean weight stays constant, my ideal weight be about 200lbs (seems high since I've been lower than that, but for the sake of argument it's okay).

So if I eat the appropriate number of calories for a 200lb male getting light exercise I would need about 2500 calories a day. If I eat only that many now, it stands to reason that I would slowly lose weight until I got to the goal. At 260 lbs. my caloric requirements for maintaining are a good bit higher nearly 3000 calories a day. So using these numbers I would only have a deficit of 500 calories a day, so there would be little danger of going into starvation mode. It's a pound a week of fat loss. To pump up the loss I can always exercise more.

The benefit as I see it is that I only need to adjust my diet and lifestyle this one time, because I will already be eating at the level that yields a body weight that I want. I can stay at the ideal weight forever by eating the same as while I'm reducing, and maintaining the same level of activity.

Most of the time in the past, I went on very strict, very low calorie diets, much different from the way I ate before, and when I neared or reached my goals I drifted back to the old eating habits and put the weight drifted right back on.

This seems very reasonable to me, so I will try it and report my progress.

David C
 
That looks like a plan that should do the trick. I don't think 2500 is anywhere near starvation mode. Like you said though, you will likely steadily lose weight.
 
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Day 4, or is it 5? Already I've lost track.

I posted an avatar, that's me and my son Davy taken last December while we were looking for a Christmas tree. I was probably 275 around then so I'm a bit thinner now.

Haven't sat down to figure out the weightloss ticker thingy, if I have a few spare moments this weekend I'll Git 'r done.

No real news, I was home with the baby (almost 2 now) who had a wierd rash all over, Doc said it was a Viral rash, not dangerous but the virus made him feel out of sorts. Deb (wife) had an important meeting so I stayed home.

I was curious to see how I'd do home alone. The distractions of work keep my mind off of food when I am working pretty well. But I did okay! I ate according to plan with the exception of the better part of a pound of cherries that Deb brought home so we would have healthier snack choices.

The indiscretion came with it's own punishment retribution as my stomach and points South were grumbly and bubbly all evening. So I ate lightly at dinner. My calorie total for the day was 2200, a bit below the 2500 I intended, but I wasn't hungry.

I stepped up my walking to a full hour in the morning, I have to wake up at 5:00 AM to do this, but it's quiet and peaceful then and I enjoy it. I've carved out a route that's about three miles, a few small hills and goes by the river. In the Autumn the sun will rise about the time I am over the bridge and it will be beautiful.

Getting the walk in first thing in the morning makes me feel better all day!

David C
 
At lunchtime I was thinking (a dangerous pastime) about the stark difference between how I eat when I am focused on my health and how I eat when I am not.

I jotted down my recollection of an average day and I was bowled over by how many calories I was eating. Depending on the day anywhere from 3500 to 5000 calories! On average. Remarkable.

This accounts for about 5-10 lbs of weight gain per month. My last "diet" took me down to 240. In the past three months I shot up to 266, so all that cipherin' is about right!

Along with the weight gain came depression, lethargy and low(er) self-esteem. Today, my Wife came downstairs while I was feeding the baby, Iwas humming to myself. I made her coffee and when I handed it to her, she said,

"You're so much happier when you take care of yourself!" It's true, I am! How do I lose that? That's the question I am asking myself over and over.

I hope this journal gives me some insight.

David C
 
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