My Diary and how I will pay myself to exercise

[Fade Away]

Okay, so here we go, this will be my diary of how I hope to pay myself to lose weight. Firstly for others reading my diary a little bit about myself and how (and why) I intended to pay myself.

It is New Years Day here, but this is not a New Years resolution, this is an idea that has been going around in my head for about a week now. I am 51 year old female, and this morning I picked up the courage to weigh myself. I have not stepped on the scales for two years as I have been burying my head in the sand. I now weigh 99.6kg (219 lbs) Wow, even as I type it I realise how huge that is, and as I am only 5'3", I know I look like a little christmas pudding.


So how did I end up this size. Well, I have always thought of myself as fat, even when I wasn't. I use to be a tiny little thing, and could eat what ever I wanted without gaining weight. Problem is that as I grew older and my body stopped letting me get away with that, I kept eating. At age 20 I was 60kgs (or less) at around 30 I was around 70kg or less. At 40 I had got to around 80kg, but vanity had kicked in and I was yo-yoing. For around 5 years I was actively exercising and taking control of my weight when it got out of control. I had done so well during this time, that 7 years ago when we went on an overseas holiday for our 20th wedding anniversary I weighed 70kgs. I was going the the gym and yoga; heck I could even ride my bike for 30ks. I looked really good, and was so healthy.

My biggest weight gain has been in the last 3 years. I would think that I would have put on 20kgs in this time. The strangest part of all of this is that I am also the happiest and most confident I have ever been. I have a job I adore, and never feel like I am working while I am there. This job has been a big part of the problem, because food is provided by work. When I say food, I mean lots of it. I have unlimited access. Morning and afternoon tea is provided. So is lunch. Lunch is either a traditional 2 course home cooked meal or we eat out. There is also a lolly jar. I then come home and eat another full meal for dinner plus snacks. Nobody twists my arm to eat this food, and I know I can refuse it or monitor myself a lot better than I do. So why don't I!!!! It is like someone has turned off the "off switch" in my head, and I just keep eating. I have absolutely no motovation or conscience to do anything about diet or exercise, in fact other than walking the dogs, I do NOTHING!! So I think I need an incentive. So here is the plan, I am going to pay myself set amount to excercise and loose weight. I have a time frame and a goal. The goal is not a specific weight, instead it is a prize. The time frame is October. I have around 290 days before I need the money and I hope to raise somewhere between $600 -$800 (more is even better).

I live in Australia. In October my (Australian) husband and I are going home to visit New Zealand. We are meeting my brother and his wife in Auckland and travelling down through the country to Wellington for my mothers 80th birthday. We will be travelling through spectactular countryside. My brother and I are both interested in photography, so if I stick to my plan I will have a new lense for my (DSLR) camera. Having the lense is something that I can't really justify (but would very much like), so I will have to earn it. How good a lense I get is up to me.

Sibling rivally will also play a part in my plan. My brother had a huge health scare last year. He ended up having a triple bypass, fortunately for him, he did not have the heart attack, but he came close. He realises how lucky he was, and is now very proactive in looking after himself. Like myself, my other siblings are overweight. My older brother is now giving them what-for about this. The thought of spending four days on the road with him going on about my weight is awful, especially when I won't be able to keep up with him physcially when we go out with our cameras.

Another part of my plan that I need to share with you, is I have booked an appointment for some Hypnotherapy sessions. I don't know if they will help or not, but I suspect that they won't hurt. What I hope to achieve with the hypnosis is to help turn that eating switch off in my head. Because of my previous lifestyle I know right from wrong when it comes to diet and exercise and what is balance, but as I have said I don't really care, so I also don't want to spend the next 10 months focused on "dieting"

Here are the rules of my payment scheme.
1). Every day I will pay myself a set amount for certain excercise. I can only pay myself for the best excersie of the day. If I choose to do more than one type of activity that is good, but I will not pay myself extra.
2). I intend to pay per kilo's lost.
3). I will also charge myself for a bad behaviours.
4). I must keep an honest tally.

These are my payments and charges to myself
$1 = Walk around the block (1.5ks)
$2 = Walk 4km around a planned route in my neighbourhood (with the dogs)
$5 = Walk on my own . This payment is only payable if I have also walked the dogs. This walk must be 3ks or more
$5 = Walk to town to collect mail $5 - this can be paid if walked with or without dogs. Can purchase a drink only if required (approx 6kms)
$2 = Walk to town to collect mail if I stop to have coffee and toasted sandwich at the general store. $2, payable only if no other lunch is eaten
No payment will be paid for walk to town if cake is had with lunch.

Time spent on the excersise bike - btw the exercise bike has stood gathering dust for years
1-5 mins = 10 cents per minute
5-10 mins = 20 cents per minute
10-15 mins = $2 plus 20 cents per minute
15 mins plus = $5 plus 50 cents per minute

Payment for weight loss.
$5 per kilo. I think I need an incentive to get on the scales and to ensure that I do actually loose weight. I also think this will be the hardest payment to acheive.


Deductions for unwanted behaviours
-$2 for buying chocolate to eat in the car
-$10 for binge eating.

I can not repay myself for a deduction by extra excercise.


I felt it was important to put this down in writing somewhere and be accountable somewhere. I think I like the anonymity and support of a forum.

K

 

[Fade Away]

Small start for New Years Day. Have just put $2 in the jar. Took the dogs on the longer walk. Also stopped myself from buying a chocolate bar.

 

[Solomon76]

Let me start out by saying good luck and I hope that you achieve your goals. I could see how the deduction part of your plan could probably work for me because I hate losing money. But I don't think that paying myself would work that well for me because I'd feel that when it is all said and done, it was my money in the first place.

 

[Fade Away]

Let me start out by saying good luck and I hope that you achieve your goals. I could see how the deduction part of your plan could probably work for me because I hate losing money. But I don't think that paying myself would work that well for me because I'd feel that when it is all said and done, it was my money in the first place.

Thanks for the welcome and good wishes Solomon. While the money thing may not work for you, it will for me Solomon. This is just my incentive down in writing to make myself accountable in public (so to speak). It is the first bit of motivation I have shown in a long time

BTW Solomon the reason I chose the lense as a reward is because for me it is a real reward and one that I probably wouldn't get.

 

[Omega]

Let me help you ensure that other experienced people do not trouble to offer you further advice.

As you say in your own signature - you are what you eat.

Welcome to the forum.

I notice from your plan (as it is outlined in your three postings to date) is based almost solely on additional walking and not having food as certain treats while walking.

Firm control of nutrition tends to play a much bigger part in successful weight control which is maintained...

I suggest that you get a free account from and log your profile information, food eaten and exercise. You will thus be able to see how the calories that you burn balances out against those that you eat. The sad fact is that as we get older we burn less calories as we do the same amount of exercise. This is sad as I am 50 years old and 5ft3 myself...

Fitday is not just a calorie counter - but also gives a full breakdown of the nutritional content of your food. Many people firmly believe that they eat a well balanced diet until they check this out. If you study the nutrition content of this forum (and other forums where I am involved) you will be able to set targets for yourself regarding such nutrients as protein, calcium, fibre, healthy fats, sodium etc in order to benefit from both optimum health and optimum weight loss. Most people find that they have to work hard for a while to get the balance right.

Omega thanks for the welcome. I am sorry you didn't stop at the welcome though. While I accept that your intentions are well meaning and that this is a public forum, so I am open to everyones opinion, (as you are in return open to mine). I have clearly outlined in my diary how I got to this point in my life, so yes my plan is based on walking and limiting treats. For me this will work because I recognise that they have become my biggest problem; and I need to motivate myself to do something about them. It is a pity that as I have been a member less than 24 hours you have not given me any opportunity to have any success or failure before you came in offering advice on trying methods I had stated I was not interested in at this point in time.

Sorry if this puts me off to a bad start as a newbie.

I am out of here.

 

[Solomon76]

Thanks for the welcome and good wishes Solomon. While the money thing may not work for you, it will for me Solomon. This is just my incentive down in writing to make myself accountable in public (so to speak). It is the first bit of motivation I have shown in a long time

BTW Solomon the reason I chose the lense as a reward is because for me it is a real reward and one that I probably wouldn't get.

As I said before, good luck and I wish you much success. I wasn't knocking your idea and I honestly hope that it works for you. I hope that I didn't come off as being negative before. I'll be checking in on your progress in the future to see how you're doing.

 

[Fade Away]

As I said before, good luck and I wish you much success. I wasn't knocking your idea and I honestly hope that it works for you. I hope that I didn't come off as being negative before. I'll be checking in on your progress in the future to see how you're doing.

Thanks Solomon, I hope you do drop by, it will help to keep me honest with myself:

 

[Trusylver]

I will also check in on you from time to time, often the most simple and small changes can make the biggest difference eg. you limiting your treats like you have planned and added walking. counting calories is not for everybody.

 

[Veronica2]

We are a lot alike. Same height, almost same weight... so I can feel your pain. I also have a side bet with my husband going on in regards to monetary rewards for this adventure. For every pound I lose, he will put $10 into an account and at the end of my journey (hopefully 100 lbs) I will have accumulated $1000 for whatever my heart desires.

Now the negative part. I have a large wardrobe, so much so that it takes up the entire guest bedroom. Aisles of vintage threads, thrift store treasures, and dresses I have designed and made with my own bare hands. The problem is that all these clothes are a size 6 from before my accident so I cannot even fit a leg into the pants. My agreement is to hit certain weight loss goals by certain dates or else I lose 10 items of clothing for every pound I am off. I gave him complete and total discretion on deciding which items can stay or go which kills me because I LOVE my clothes more than anything. I joke that this is my only vice. I don't drink. I don't smoke. But I do love to shop and design clothing. So I figured if he was going to reward me with money for a shopping spree, I would have to suck it up and offer up something I cherished for this to push me.

The point to this rant is that I understand. Good Luck!

 

[Fade Away]

We are a lot alike. Same height, almost same weight... so I can feel your pain. I also have a side bet with my husband going on in regards to monetary rewards for this adventure. For every pound I lose, he will put $10 into an account and at the end of my journey (hopefully 100 lbs) I will have accumulated $1000 for whatever my heart desires.

Now the negative part. I have a large wardrobe, so much so that it takes up the entire guest bedroom. Aisles of vintage threads, thrift store treasures, and dresses I have designed and made with my own bare hands. The problem is that all these clothes are a size 6 from before my accident so I cannot even fit a leg into the pants. My agreement is to hit certain weight loss goals by certain dates or else I lose 10 items of clothing for every pound I am off. I gave him complete and total discretion on deciding which items can stay or go which kills me because I LOVE my clothes more than anything. I joke that this is my only vice. I don't drink. I don't smoke. But I do love to shop and design clothing. So I figured if he was going to reward me with money for a shopping spree, I would have to suck it up and offer up something I cherished for this to push me.

The point to this rant is that I understand. Good Luck!

Veronica you have made me laugh. I also get the wardrobe thing. My wardrobe is huge, but it is mostly full of clothes that don't fit me anymore. This includes clothes from this time last year. I did take a little pile into give to a favorite work colleague. She is a single mum, so spending money on herself is not always in her budget. Anyway, we have only worked together in the last 18months. She was stunned when she saw how many sizes I have gone up. The clothes were size 12-14 and I am now in 18's have a couple of size 16's that I am kidding myself with, and a size 20 that horrifies me.

Good luck with you race towards your new wardrobe. Our plans for rewards are not disimilar (just the reward itself) so I will keep an eye on your progress.

K

 

[Fade Away]

I will also check in on you from time to time, often the most simple and small changes can make the biggest difference eg. you limiting your treats like you have planned and added walking. counting calories is not for everybody.

Thank Trusylver, would love to see you drop by. Have got of to a small start today, only small but it is still a start, and it did make me refrain.

 

[Fade Away]

Okay, so it is the end of my second day since I committed myself in writing to this plan. I have had a busy day, and have been reasonably good. I am still on holidays. Most of my break so far has revolved around a little rescue dog we have staying with us for the moment. Today I gave her her first bath, and then took her into town to have her stitches removed from her desexing op. After that we had a couple of errands to do before we went to visit a fellow rescue team member and his wife. Joe and I had saved this little dog from being put to sleep a couple of days before Christmas. She is an absolute sweety. Holly will be going to her new family on Monday, so I wanted Joe to see how well she has done in the last 10 days. Sitting at Joe's I resisted the overwhelming temptation to eat any of the tasty looking homemade biscuits Margaret had put out for us. Normally I would have had at least two (and secretly wanted more). Because of the distance between my errands/visits I was away from home from around 10am to 2.30pm. I stopped in at the general store to get milk and bread on my way home. Normally I would probably just bought a bag of chips and a chocolate bar for lunch, but again I walked away, and had a sandwich when I got home.

After years of sitting in the bedroom unused I spent 15 minutes on the exercise bike. I also walked two of the dogs on the longer 4k walk. My knee has been clicking and banging like mad and I am limping. I started having a sugar drop on the last leg of the walk home. Have had this happen before, and I have walked in the house and just gorged myself, and then had tea. Instead what I did tonight was I came in and just got tea started. We were having pasta carbornara, fattening I know (don't care), but I did make a couple of changes that I would not have done if not for my conscience. I kept the recipe the same expect that I cooked less than I would normally cook so we couldn't go back for seconds. Also I tricked myself with the bowls I used. Instead of the big pasta bowls we normally use, we had them in the smaller bowls and then I went back and had a little bit more. I still felt like I had seconds, but I had actually eaten less than normal.

So today for the 15 minutes on the bike and walking the dogs, I earnt $5. Funny thing was when I was riding the bike I couldn't remember what I was paying myself, so I thought I had earnt $2.

Note to myself, review prices on the bike payments on 1st March. I may need to increase the timelimits.

 

[Fade Away]

While out walking I was trying to decide how I keep track of my payments, without making it too complicated. What I decided to do was to run a reply to myself for each week, and edit it as I go along. This week being the first week I will run it a couple of days longer to catch up the extra couple of days. After that it will run Sunday to Saturday.

I have made myself a little money box. Everytime I have saved $50 I will purchase a prepaid visa card so that I don't go raiding my money box for milk money. I have also decided to make myself up some little deduction slips so that should I have to fine myself I will have a reminder of my naughty moments.

So here is Week One

$2 - Day 1 (Friday 1st Jan) $2 for walking dogs on 4k route
$5 - Day 2 - Rode exercise bike for 15 minutes and walked dogs 4ks to golf course
$5 - Day 3 - 15 minutes on the bike.
$2 - Day 4 - walked all three dogs on the 4k route
$2 - Day 5 - took one dog only on a 5k walk.
$2 - Day 6 - 15 minutes on the bike and walked all three dogs on 4k route
$2 - Day 7 - Walked one of the dogs into town had lunch. Other two dogs to be walked this evening
$1 - Day 8 - Walked dogs around block twice am and pm. once with OH - very nice
$1 - Day 9 - Walked dogs around block twice am and pm
$5 for kilo lost. According to the scales I lost 3.5kg in first week, but as I am unsure of start weight being correct I have decieded to only pay myself for 1kg
---------
$27 Total

 

[Trusylver]

looks like a good day, well done

 

[Fade Away]

It's Sunday, and feels like on of those day's that seems to have gone on forever. OH is home today which is nice but unusal for a Sunday. There was a Michael Jackson video clip special on the tv for about an hour this morning. If OH hadn't been home, I probably would have spent the whole hour dancing around the house with myself. OH hates MJ. Instead I hopped on the bike in front of the telly and ejoyed it that way. Should have spent longer. We just pottered around home together. Did some serious vacuming, burned up quite a bit of energy while cleaning all the nooks and cranny's.

I had to go grocery shopping (boring). What to buy is never the problem. I have never been one to go down the lolly isle and I am too mean to pay the big bucks for items from the freezer. My trap is always the chocolate bar at the check out. Resisted the urge and bought apricots instead. Resisted the urge to buy chocolate when filling up with petrol as well. So am pleased with myself. May not have done masses of excersise but have not snacked my way through the day.

OH wanted roast lamb for tea, so I just bought a small piece of lamb. I ate more of the veges than the lamb. Nice meal, and didn't go back for a pick at the left over meat.
Spent quite a bit of time outside playing with the dogs. Holly goes of to her new home in the morning. I was trying to take Holly and the pup out for a walk but ended up talking so long to the neighbour that I ran out of time, and could only manage a walk around the block with the pup.

Back to work tomorrow. Thats when the real work begins.

 

[Fade Away]

About work and why it is part of the problem. Until about 3 years ago, I had worked 9-5, 5 days a week, mostly conventional office admin type jobs in the textile industry. Very boring, but definitely a set routine. The other girls always use to laugh at me for my large glass of water on my desk. I had a 500ml glass. It was fantastic. All I had to do during my working day was to drink 4 glasses of water.

Three years ago I had a massive job change. I retrained and now have a career. These day's I work with people with dementia. Our facility is unique and a very special place to be a part of. We do provide respite, but no one actually lives there. Everyone lives in their own homes, and comes in for our day programs. Our main foucs is to help people retain their skills and connections to society and the communitity. We work out of a beautiful old house, and a key part of what we do is to create a home like atmosphere. We have more of a family relationship than a staff client one. When I say we have a lot of food around, I mean lots of homecooking, morning and afternoon teas, (outings for) picnics, bbq's and stopping for ice-creams. There is always something nice coming out of that kitchen. It is really hard not to join in. Obviously some staff do better than others, judging by their size, so it is not impossible.

Because I don't sit at a desk like I use to, I don't have a tendency to drink the water I use to.

So lets see how I do tomorrow

 

[Fade Away]

Am happy with my effort for my first couple of days back at work. I haven't had any of the morning teas, and wasn't even tempted by the lynns amazing homemade savory scones dripping in butter. Have been out for lunch both Monday and Tuesday, and kept my choices simple. A ham salad yesterday, and a small roast meal today. I have been making a better effort to drink more water during the day, and have been having water with lunch instead of softdrink (like everyone else).
OH not home for tea last night, so I only had a sandwich, and tonight we had salad and a small serve of lasagna. Dogs have had big walks both nights. But I haven't been near the bike, must try to get in some time on the bike tomorrow.

 

[Fade Away]

It's Thursday and my first week is coming to a close. I worked afternoon shift yesterday. I was happy with myself yesterday. No snacking during the day, and only ate my evening meal at work. A reasonably small slice of pastie and salad, followed by peaches and a scoop of ice cream.
No work today, and have been really good. It could have something to do with the fact that there was no bread in the house though. I walked one of the dogs down into town to collect the mail and buy bread. I had a ham,cheese and tomato sandwich, and a cuppacino for lunch down at the general store/cafe. Sat outside and did the suduko while having lunch. Very relaxing.
I think I got myself a bit of a bargin on ebay today. I bought a Wii with wii sport, wii fit plus and the board for $225 (NIB) I have been looking for a while and the price sounds to good to be true, so I can't wait to see if what I think I bought is what actually turns up. Hope so.
I weighed myself this morning and am confused. The scales say 97kg. I weighed myself 3 times to make sure it was right. I don't believe that I could have possibly lost 2.6kg in a week, so will concede the possibility that my first weigh in is incorrect.
All in all I am pretty happy with the way the week has gone. I have tucked away a little bit of spending money for our holiday and I haven't struggled with temptation.
Am off to see the hypnotherapist tomorrow, so it will be interesting to see if that helps me stay motivated longer.

 

[Trusylver]

Well done, even if your not sure about the exact amount, it is still a very nice loss.

 

[Fade Away]

I think I got myself a bit of a bargin on ebay today. I bought a Wii with wii sport, wii fit plus and the board for $225 (NIB) I have been looking for a while and the price sounds to good to be true, so I can't wait to see if what I think I bought is what actually turns up. Hope so.

Not such a bargin after all. Something funny going on with the seller and unathourised activity on their account, have been dealing with ebay, and now paypal. Looks like it is a scam. Bugger. I know I will get my money back so not such a big problem. Thought it was too good to be true.
Knew the price was too good to be true.