Dear Reader, imagine you could weigh whatever you wanted. It would take some time to come true, at the rate of 2 pounds per week. During that time, you could only eat those foods which excited and pleased you. You wouldn’t be allowed to eat any diet foods or things that were just Good For You. The food would be available to you just at the moment you were starting to notice hunger, but well before you started suffering. You would live a life full of satisfaction and enjoyment. But you would have to keep a food journal. Would that be a worthy trade?
My food intake and calorie count
Breakfast – 2oz ham (100); Swiss cheese (90); toasted bread (160); sandwich with pickles and mustard and horseradish (negligible calories)
- 350 calories
Lunch – 13 ounces homemade beef stew
- 530 calories
Dinner – 6 ounces cooked spaghetti (300); 5 Costo meatballs (230)
- 530 calories
Snacking – tea with half and half (80); Kirkland euro cookies (210)
- 290 calories
Total for the day: 1730 calories (limit 1800)
Reboot #33
In France, when something has happened too many times, they say “for the thirty-third time!” Here in the US we say “for the millionth time!”. I haven’t had to reboot my weight loss system a million times. It has happened more than once, though. I might have a bad diet day, or several days, or I get sick, or have to do a lot of travel, or there is some other disruption to my routine that causes problems. That just happened this week! But my new lifestyle is like what I have described above. Who wouldn’t want to live that way? It’s very rich and fulfilling. And you lose weight, almost as a bonus….though not when things don’t go well. When that happens, though, you just have to let it go. You don’t get to live that over again. Tomorrow is a new day, and if this week was ruined or wasted and you don’t lose any weight, well, next week might go better. Never, ever punish yourself for a bad day. This system has worked so far.
If you think about it, gaining weight isn’t usually even. It usually happens in bursts, and you might have periods in your life when your weight is quite stable. Why should weight loss be any different? I am not a perfect man, so sometimes I will take two steps forward, and sometimes I will stand still. I am pleased, though, that I have not taken any steps backwards during the last ten months.
Fatigue! That is something I think about from time to time. I have been *on a diet* for ten months. Don’t I get tired of it? To which I say, re-read the first paragraph of today’s post. Who would get tired of that? I can have all my favorite foods in an infinite variety, served just when I would appreciate them the most. In exchange, I give up some spontaneity and I have to write everything down and pay a lot of attention. And I lose weight, too. This is a trade I am very willing to make, having lived it. No, I don’t get tired of this. But I do make mistakes. See yesterday’s post.
It occurs to me that I have lost about 9 pounds a month for the last nine months (October only one week in). I think the right attitude here is gratitude that I have found a system that works well and I have been able to transform myself this way. In the mirror, I am just another guy 40 pounds overweight. But I used to be 120 pounds over weight. Someday in the next few months I will be 30….20…..10 pounds over, and that will be very interesting. There is some impatience when you have lost 80 pounds and you are still not thin. But in this system, the goal has not been weight loss, but lifestyle improvement and increased quality of life, more refined tastes, and body consciousness. So I can ignore the feelings of impatience and fatigue, and just enjoy the gratitude. Don’t be too hard on yourself – you have lost 80 pounds. There’s more to come.
Keep yourself positive.
-The Doctor