Every Saturday, I weigh myself in the morning, before breakfast. It is important to know how much you weigh. The lifestyle I am building is an information-based way of life. I count calories and keep a food journal and weigh myself. Even if you had a bad diet week, or a bad day Friday, you should still get on the scale because you need to know the effects of a bad week or a bad day. It’s taken me a while to figure that out. I have been too embarrassed or too ashamed to get on the scale before. But it’s just between you and the scale. Not everyone is putting the results up on the internet! Talking of which, I did weigh myself. How did that go?
I forget, how much weight have I lost since I started living the weight control lifestyle in January 2019? Oh yes, it was…
Hooray!
I have to admit I thought I would first get below 330 pounds and then a week or two later get to this level. This is amazing and a bit weird. Losing 5 pounds in one week? That can’t be real or healthy, right?
Ordinarily I would just say no, it’s not real. But I have data from my food journal and I have been walking a bit more, about three miles a day most days. According to my food journal this week I averaged 1444 calories per day. That’s pretty low. Under normal conditions I aim for 1850 per day and expect to lose 1-2 pounds, so in deficit between 3500-7000 calories. But this week I was in deficit a bit more. About 400 calories per day more! 2800 calories more is just about a pound. Maybe the walking made a difference? I won’t know until next week.
Interestingly weighing myself with clothes on put me up about 1.5 pounds. That’s good to know, too.
And from an online calculator I see that walking doesn’t burn that many calories. Maybe 110 per mile, so if I walked 10 miles we can estimate a further 1100 calories were burned. That’s just not enough to lose 5 pounds. So there is something unusual going on with my body. That’s ok, I will find oud out next week when I get on the scale again. That’s the beauty of the system – there is always more data.
As a reward, the Olive Garden is out, due to Corona Virus. What kind of reward should I have? Today’s dinner is a top candidate. I had home-grilled steak, potato, and salad. Nearly 900 calories just for dinner! I haven’t done that in forever.
Have a good week!
-The Doctor
Hi Doc! A couple of personal observations:
(1) when I start aerobic exercise, like walking, my first week or two my weight goes down. I attribute this to water weight – my body is getting used to the exercise, and I’m holding on to less water than normal. At some point… week 2, 3… I suddenly have a slowdown week or two with no explanation. Everything evens out. The opposite is true for anaerobic exercise. I immediately gain weight! It is like the strain on my muscles cause them to retain water. Then 2,3 weeks later (assuming I keep it up) suddenly large amounts of weight drop off and I’m back to where math (straight line) says I should be.
(2) I have found mathematically (using daily scale weights) counting calories burned from exercise does not work. As you may remember, I keep a comprehensive Excel spreadsheet of my journey. Mathematically I calculate calories consumed per meal, per day, calories burned (66+(6.2*current weight)+(12.7*height in inches)-(6.76*Age in years)). Like you said earlier, if I have created a caloric deficit, I lose weight. Step 2: If I take any calculation for exercise calories burned, my calculated weights diverge from my actual weights, and over time this gets worse – they do not align. What I have read, and what I have found accurate is more conceptual (and yes, a little strange). Exercise is not only an uplift when you do it. And what calories you burn during exercise (above normal expenditure) are a random guess. But, doing the exercise, and keeping the exercise consistent (150 minutes/week is a standard metric) your body becomes more efficient at burning calories at all times. You “increase your metabolism,” 24 hours a day, every day. To account for this there is a multiplier – you rate yourself based on criteria as Sedentary (.3), Lightly Active (.5), Moderately Active (.7), Very Active (1.1), Extremely Active (1.2) and there is no hyperactive. You multiply your resting metabolism (calculated) by 1+ your activity factor. I have found this formula to be VERY accurate at calculating and predicting results. An example paper online… http://krupp.wcc.hawaii.edu/BIOL100L/nutrition/energy.pdf is an article about this. The only disheartening (and tells you why the calorie assumptions for a single exercise are really off) is the amount of activity required to just move from sedentary to lightly active. I run 15 miles/week, Exercise bike 30 minutes 6 days a week, do core exercises and lift weights… that gets me to moderate exercise. Be prepared though, with increasing your activity level, your appetite will also dramatically move upwards!
BTW – congratulations on the positive movement! And, take a look back in time, your feet and toes have gotten skinny too!