Marcus: The Weight Loss Chronicles

uyis11

uyis11

New member
So, I decided to start a diary. To get the basics down, I'm a 23-year old male graduate student and I realized earlier this year I had become horribly out of shape and unhealthy due to about five years of neglect and bad habits.

I've made a lot of changes that have been successful so far (37.5lbs lost as of this week), but I still have a ways to go if I want these changes to last.

--How much weight do I want to lose? I don't really know. I put an arbitrary number in my ticker, but I'm really basing how far I want to go with this on how I look in the mirror.

--What is the time frame for reaching my target weight? My rate of weight loss so far has been a steady 2.5lbs/week, but I expect that to slow as I have less weight to lose. By August 2008 I want to look good naked and be overall a healthy person. That's the end goal.

--How do I want to accomplish my goals? To start, I need to keep up with not smoking. I need to stay with my diet that seems to be working great and stay with my exercise regimen. I need to consistently push the envelope each week as far as working out. I cannot stagnate.

--What is my biggest obstacle to achieving my goals? DRINKING. I have to get this under control or I am going to have more problems than a beer gut.

--Why have I had a weight problem for so long? Simple. My eating habits have been out of control- portion control didn't exist. I'm still learning how to eat the right portions of food. Not exercising ever was the other obvious problem.
 
Hello Marcus
I'm glad you decided to change your eating habits. It's great that you are changing your life for good, and for the better =)
And great job 37.5lbs gone! just remember not to drink too much. Instead of beer, go for water it'll do you good.
 
Dude, you lost 37+ lbs while quitting? Bravo. When I quit I ended up 20 lbs fluffier. I'm working on that now. Congrats on what you've accomplished so far and good luck with the rest of it!
 
Hey I am your female counterpart: 23, graduate student, bad eating habits during college years and no exercise and now 40plus pounds too many hanging off me!! Well only 25 now!

Welcome, I find it very helpful to have this diary, not just because of the great motivation people give, but because I feel a bit more controlled, which I think is the trap we college students fall into. Nobody is there to control what and how much we eat so we eat a lot of crap!
I write down everything I eat on here and it makes me less tempted to have something bad for me, because I don't want to have to write that down!

What kind of exercise are you doing? I do elliptical, swimming and stretches and sit ups, but I have just decided to run a marathon (a small one, just 5 k) in july so midmay I am starting to train for that. I found a great running plan (designed by reebok apparently) and that will hopefully get me to the shape I want to be.
What do you study? I do a master in medicine to complement my medical degree.

Crealy you have weightloss pretty much down, so I just wish you to stay the way you are doing it, seems to be working great!
Camy
 
Camy- Thanks for the encouragement. It sounds like you are making good progress as well. Keep it up! I'm working on my master of accountancy right now. It's so boring! I've only got one week of finals left for this semester, then I'm going to hit the books for the CPA exam coming up at the end of May (at least the first part of it). Then...summer school. After summer school, more CPA exams, then I'm done forever! I can't imagine how it will feel after being in a class room every fall for the past 18 years.

Last August I actually said to myself, "I'm not even going to bother worrying about my health or diet, I'm just going to have tunnel vision until I finish school." That attitude was so stupid. It really is possible to stay healthy while studying your ass off. There doesn't have to be a trade off. (I'm directing that comment to myself).

This week has been ok. Somehow, I hit my goal for this week and dropped another 2lbs. However, this is the first week that I've lost less than 2.5lbs. I've been concerned that I've been losing so fast, so it doesn't bother me at all that this week was a little less. I've actually tried to eat more healthy snacks between meals to get my calorie intake a little higher.

My workout today was awesome. 40 minutes on the elliptical with heart rate around 160 the whole time, then about 40 minutes of lifting. I finally got someone to show me how to do squats. I've got all this upper body strength and then basically no muscle or fat on my lower body. I can already feel my legs starting to get sore.

My main goal for this week (Thursday is the first day of my week) is to control my drinking this weekend. It's so hard for me to know when to stop. It seems like after 1 beer, if I don't have 10 more I feel like I'm missing out on something. I know you are thinking that sounds like the words of an alcoholic, but honestly I haven't had trouble with my drinking habits until the past few months (when I stopped drinking like 4-6 beers each day, instead now its like 10-12 beers once or twice a week). I know I have it in me to gain control over this habit. I need to drink a lot slower and call it quits after 6 or 7.
 
Dear god, my legs are so sore from yesterday from doing squats. I can barely walk. It's not like a "bad" sore feeling, but nonetheless, still ridiculous. I'm not even sure if I will be able to do cardio today.
 
Ok, today was measurements. Honestly, I weigh myself almost every day, but only Thursday morning's number "counts." I understand the insignificance of the number on the scale, but it's the only quantitative metric I have and I am a totally analytical number-phile! ["If you can't measure it, it doesn't exist."]

So, I finally went out and bought a measuring tape. Does that tell you how lazy I am? The only reason I haven't taken measurements for 4 months was because I didn't own a 2 dollar measuring tape. It sucks that I have nothing to compare to, but I'm certain my measurements have gone down a lot over the weight loss just in how my clothes fit. It's funny that people think I have bought a whole new wardrobe when really I'm just now wearing clothes that I bought in the past that never fit me.

One thing I realized from these measurements- waist sizes at stores are bullshit! All of my pants that say 34 waist are huge now and fall off my ass. I'm wearing 31 waist right now and they aren't even that tight. Oh, and I don't really know how to take measurements, so I just took ones that I thought should be significant. Anyway, along with the meat:

Gut (around belly-button): 33.75"
Gut- widest part: 35"
Where my pants sit: 34.5"
Thigh: 22"
Chest (around nips): 40.5"
Bicep-unflexed 13"
Bicep-flexed 14.5"
Neck 15.5"

My comments:
1) I thought there would be more variance over the measurements I took around my abdominal range. I basically expected the measurements to reflect more of a bulge.
2) My thighs seem ridiculously thin. I barely seem to have any fat on my thighs. The first place I seemed to lose weight was my thighs- go figure? Why couldn't my gut-fat have been the first to go?
3) 40.5" over the chest. Damn. That seems large. I've always considered myself to be one that suffers from "man boobs," however, I don't believe there is that much excess fat on my chest. More than there should be, but not enough to qualify as "man boobs" (anymore!). My pectoral muscles are quite large, when flexed I can't "grab" that much excess fat on top of them. I guess that's a good sign- just shows how lopsided I am though.
4) Bicep- I don't really know what to compare that to, but I took the measurement for egocentric reasons. My arms are my best feature.

It seems very non-manly with all this talk of measurements, but I need to get over that. This is the only viable statistic I need to be paying attention to. I do plan on getting a body composition test done this week at my university. Bastards are charging $20 for an air displacement test and $50 for the water floating dealy. I think I'll go with the air displacement test, I read some research that said there is not much margin of error between the two methods. I will re-measure at the end of May and do another body fat composition at the end of June. I will post body composition stats after I do the test this week. I'm really anxious to see what the results will be.

Bleh, I'm going to study the rest of the day and hit up the gym later tonight. I may have to forgo the squats though, I still feel really sore. So much for the weekend.
 
Whew. Great workout this morning. I've been using fitday for the past 3 days and have been keeping calories at around 1700-1800 which seems like its a bit more than I have been (which means I may have been undereating for a while). I doubt I'm going to reveal any significant loss through the scale tomorrow morning, which will be the first time in 4 months without a loss. Not because I've done poorly this week, but I think last week's weigh-in was off (too low) for whatever reason and this week will reveal that I'm entering my first plateau.

Plateau...the dirty word for this forum. My schedule is about to drastically change, so I'm hoping that might mix things up for my body and quickly get me out of this plateau. I might change up my foods a little bit and see how that works. Who knows, though. I may not be on a plateau. My weight fluctuates so damn much during the week that the scale is almost useless. I gotta get to studying. I'll update ticker tomorrow for probably a gain. Peace
 
I fear I might be hitting my first plateau, too. The scale has been 'funny' this week. At least you're getting good workouts in and feeling good about it. That's the main thing. Plateaus happen and plateaus are busted. It gives us a challenge! Good luck tomorrow!
 
Hi Marcus,

How tall are you? Did I miss that somewhere along my reading? And good luck with your exams. What's your Graduate degree in?

What do your workouts consist of? And congrats congrats on the 37+ lbs lost.

Tasha
 
Tasha, I'm 6'0. You might be thinking "wait, you're not fat," and I don't really think I am anymore, but I feel like since I've come this far, I can finally get my body fat % down to a level where I won't be embarrassed to take off my shirt (which I've never been able to do). Not just for vanity's sake either, I'm really trying to get and stay healthy. I had smoked for 4 years off and on and struggled with substance abuse in my late teens that probably did no-telling-what to my heart. I had high blood pressure last time I was at the doc. When I was 16, I tested for high triglycerides and cholesterol. So, a lot of risk factors going against me that I'm trying to mitigate.

Oh yea, and my degree will be Master of Accountancy with a concentration in auditing and controls. Only one more exam and 1 month of summer school to go!

My workouts have evolved over the course of this process as I've learned more (primarily from this forum), but I think I'm getting them down to where they probably won't change too much in the future.

35-40 minutes of elliptical @ 150-165 HR 6x week
Resistance training (3x a week)- 2 sets of each with high weight/low rep:
Squats
Flat dumbbell press
standing military press
lats/traps machine
calf raises
concentration curls
ab machine (sometimes, I despise ab workouts)

Marcus
 
uyis11 said:
Tasha, I'm 6'0. You might be thinking "wait, you're not fat," and I don't really think I am anymore, but I feel like since I've come this far, I can finally get my body fat % down to a level where I won't be embarrassed to take off my shirt (which I've never been able to do). Not just for vanity's sake either, I'm really trying to get and stay healthy. I had smoked for 4 years off and on and struggled with substance abuse in my late teens that probably did no-telling-what to my heart. I had high blood pressure last time I was at the doc. When I was 16, I tested for high triglycerides and cholesterol. So, a lot of risk factors going against me that I'm trying to mitigate.

Oh yea, and my degree will be Master of Accountancy with a concentration in auditing and controls. Only one more exam and 1 month of summer school to go!

My workouts have evolved over the course of this process as I've learned more (primarily from this forum), but I think I'm getting them down to where they probably won't change too much in the future.

35-40 minutes of elliptical @ 150-165 HR 6x week
Resistance training (3x a week)- 2 sets of each with high weight/low rep:
Squats
Flat dumbbell press
standing military press
lats/traps machine
calf raises
concentration curls
ab machine (sometimes, I despise ab workouts)

Marcus
Click to expand...

You and my hubby are almost identical. He's 6'0 and right around 168-170 lbs. I think he's trying to get to 165 and hopefully he'll stop (his body fat was just at 11% when he had it checked in Feb and he weighed about 5 lbs more then).

I know what you mean about abs, I hate hate hate working my abs. But I've been doing this P90X workout that incorporates 12 different exercises which also target the core, so it sucks.

Do you ever do deadlifts?
 
Congrats on the stopping smoking and the 37.5 pounds, and good luck with the rest of the way!

Ab workouts aren't my favorite either, but at least I know something's working when I do them. That's how I think of it, at least.
 
hay well done on losing the weight so far and giving up smoking! well done you!

woah a master of accountancy! thats some achievement my cousin wanted to do accountancy and gave up at the first herdle as i think she thought it was just to difficult for her not for the number side as she loved numbers!

Good luck with the workouts :) Good luck with your goals!
 
Do you ever do deadlifts?
Click to expand...
No, I've never even tried a deadlift. It's one of those exercises I'm afraid of doing. My lower back is prone to spinal irritation that can immobilize me for a few days, so that's my excuse. The paradox is that if I actually did deadlifts with the correct form it would probably cause me to build up enough back strength where I might not have any lower back problems in the future. I've read stuff around this forum on form for deadlifts, but its one of those things I'm going to have to have someone watch me in the gym to make sure I don't really botch it. It's on my to-do list.

Your husband probably has a lot better fat % than me. I'm guessing I may be around 15% or so. I finally made an appointment to have a body composition test done this Friday, so I'll know for sure then. Is the P90x workout something you do at the gym or is it a training video series? I couldn't tell from some of the websites I found.

Kotki, Thanks for saying hi. You know, I often find people have a misconception about what most accounting work consists of. The math involved is actually very minimal and simple; it's interpreting the damn accounting standards and applying them correctly that is so confusing! The other misconception is people think I study taxes. Only a small part of the accounting industry deals with tax planning or tax return preparation. I could rant forever about this!
 
uyis11 said:
No, I've never even tried a deadlift. It's one of those exercises I'm afraid of doing. My lower back is prone to spinal irritation that can immobilize me for a few days, so that's my excuse. The paradox is that if I actually did deadlifts with the correct form it would probably cause me to build up enough back strength where I might not have any lower back problems in the future. I've read stuff around this forum on form for deadlifts, but its one of those things I'm going to have to have someone watch me in the gym to make sure I don't really botch it. It's on my to-do list.

Your husband probably has a lot better fat % than me. I'm guessing I may be around 15% or so. I finally made an appointment to have a body composition test done this Friday, so I'll know for sure then. Is the P90x workout something you do at the gym or is it a training video series? I couldn't tell from some of the websites I found.
Click to expand...


The P90X is a series of workouts you can watch on DVD and do at home, but we memorized their ab routine and do them at home, on the road or at the gym. I hate hate hate it! Works your hip flexors A LOT and right now, I'm having a problem with my left one since running on Monday. :(

I am using deadlifts to strengthen my lower back as well, back problems run all through my family, and they have helped me some. Good luck finding the right person to watch your form!
 
I hate waking up at 4am. I've got a lot of material to cover today and a lot of ass-sitting to do, but thankfully the end is in sight. On to the meat, Thursday morning means weekly weigh-in.

Weight lost this week: 0lbs

I saw this coming. My weight moved around a lot this week, but settled on the same number. I always try to offer comfort when other people are going through this, but I must say that it is a lot easier said than done to just "get over it." Scale fluctuations are a bitch and what happens in the body isn't best described by the scale, but actually dealing with it is harder than I thought. It's hard because I know I am doing everything right and my only viable qualitative metric shows 0 progress. I'm not sure whether to try to change things up so soon or just continue what I've been doing. I'm thinking I will just continue with my normal routine, but really pay attention to alcohol consumption this weekend. I need to be doing that anyway. Then, if another week goes by of no loss, I'll have to re-think things.

The reason this could have happened (the overly-optimistic reason) is that it was due to some muscle gain. How? Well, over this past week I did finally get my protein intake way up and got my lower body weight lifting routine right. I had been probably wasting my time with some isolation machines and started doing squats near the end of last week and really have been feeling the soreness. I suppose it's unlikely, but if my leg muscles have never really been getting a workout, it could be possible the extra protein (and slightly extra calories) allowed for some muscle gain that offset some fat loss this week.

Another thought- I'm fast approaching the lowest weight of my adult life. That was 167.5lbs at age 19. I remember my jaw dropped when I got on the scale and saw that number. I weighed so little that time for a different reason, though. All my food money had been going towards cocaine. I'm glad this is under better circumstances. Maybe my body is resisting going under this level of body fat because it's unknown territory. Anyways, onward with the battle of the first plateau. And a message to my body- it's going to take a helluva lot more than that to make me give up. This motherf'er ain't going down without a fight.
 
Took a quick break from studying & found this info very interesting and thought I should post for anyone else troubled by the scale:

1 Liter of water weighs 1 kilogram or 2.2lbs. A typical bottled water is 0.5L. For those of us that consume 2-3L of water a day like myself, that's a potential fluctuation due to water weight of 4.4-6.6lbs per day!!! Obviously water is expelled, but the rate that we consume water and the rate it is expelled does not always exactly offset. Makes that scale number seem even less useful.
 
Good for you for getting over the coke habit. I know people who have fought that and it's not easy.

And you're right, the scale can be very misleading. Even when you measure weekly it can be misleading. If you lose 2 lbs in a week and just happen to be retaining a bit more water the day of your weigh-in that's a very frustrating thing to look down at.

So don't worry about that 0 lb loss. It's not a gain and it's only 1 week. Keep up the good work, man.
 
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