Daily tracking

20201011 Daily report: Keeping on

It is all getting very real, now.  This summer I went from 240 pounds to 214 pounds.  It’s entirely possible I will weigh 200 pounds (or less) by the end of the year 2020.  Not bad for a fellow who started out at or near 325 pounds in January 2019.  My pants size has gone down as well.  I am regularly wearing and buying waist size 40s now.  When I weighed between 240 and 245 pounds, I was wearing size 46 and 44 waist pants.  I started all this in size 52 and 54 pants.  

So basically I have done a lot of work, achieved great things, and now none of my clothes fit.  On top of that, looking in the mirror I am still overweight!  The weight is most persistent around my middle (back, sides, and front), the tops of my arms and the tops of my legs.  Everywhere else, like my neck and face, have thinned out nicely.  What will happen as I concentrate on losing another 10 or 15 pounds?  Where will the extra weight persist the longest?

But the path forward is clear.  I intend to keep going.

Braciole and Sunday gravy with tagliatelle noodles

My food intake and calorie count

Breakfast – 8oz Steel cut oats (215); syrup (30); pizza (50);

  • 295 calories

Lunch – wheat wrap half (60); with steak (100); green beans and potatoes (40); 2x Ole wraps (50); with pork (100); sauerkraut (100); horseradish (50);

  • 550 calories 

Dinner – Braciole (200); 4oz noodles (200); salad (50); gravy (40);

  • 490 calories

Snacking – tea with half and half (80); 1 serving cookies (170)

  • 250 calories

Total for the day: 1585 calories (limit 1700)

Nothing is easy but some things are worth it

I recently acquired a Fitbit Charge 4 watch.  It has provided a lot of interesting data on my movements, heart rate, exercise patterns, and sleep.  Among other findings, my sleep quality is not very good.  I am amazed; I always thought my sleep was good quality because I am almost always able to go to sleep quickly and easily.  But getting up is always difficult.  Now I have a possible reason.  I am apparently spending a minimal time in deep sleep or REM sleep, and most of my time in light sleep.  I have talked before about the connection between getting enough sleep and overeating, and I am thinking about this issue of low quality sleep, a lot.

One point is that while I spend a lot of time in bed, part of it is spent reading and playing games before trying to sleep.  It has been suggested that I should use bed only for sleep and do my reading and game playing while sitting in a chair.  It’s worth trying.  I have always believed that you need good sleep to do a good job while awake.  Even if you aren’t getting a lot of sleep, I want it to be high quality.  So I will be paying more attention to this.  That part of my lifestyle is out of sync and not helping me towards my goals. 

If you are doing a hard thing, make it as easy as you can in all other ways.  

My goal of body control is worthwhile and will help me in other parts of my life.  I talked yesterday about responsibility.  If I take responsibility for my body’s weight, and find ways to make that work, then I can apply those lessons to any enterprise: find what works and keep at it until the goal is reached.  What will I do next?  After a while I will not have more weight to lose and will have to adjust to maintenance.  Sleep is also a worthwhile project.  How can I get the best sleep?  I’ll look into it!

Goodnight,

-The Doctor

20201009 Daily report: mind your matters

The goal is to be in control of my body’s weight.  So, every day, I write down exactly what I eat and how much.  Writing it all down is important, but I refuse to do it using an app or smart watch.  I use a spreadsheet I created myself.  It suits me. 

How do I manage to keep writing it all down?  I didn’t write much down for the first 40-odd years of my life, after all.  What changed?

I changed my mind.  I realized that the mindset I was using to experience the world resulted in uncontrolled weight gain.  I was eating for the wrong reasons.  I associated being full with comfort and happiness.  If I tried to diet, I was essentially withholding comfort and happiness from myself!  Who would want that?  I had to change my mind.  Comfort and happiness could come from positive achievements, accomplishment, a difficult job well done. 

Now, I treat food as a reward for achieving, not as a source of happiness.

My reward: pizza! The crust needs some work.

My food intake and calorie count

Breakfast – Cauliflower and potato curry (75); 4x Jaffa cakes (50); Canadian bacon (40);

  • 315 calories

Lunch – Pork tenderloin (130); sauerkraut (80); and whole wheat wrap (90)

  • 300 calories 

Dinner – pizza (800); 

  • 800 calories

Snacking – tea with half and half (80); M&Ms (70);

  • 150 calories

Total for the day: 1565 calories (limit 1700)

It has been working

Controlling my body’s weight has been going reasonably well.  It’s not 100% consistent, because I make mistakes, backslide, and fall back into my old habits from time to time.  I can’t say I haven’t gained any weight during the last two years.  But changing your mind is highly recommended.

If you don’t change your mind, but manage to lose some weight, you are in danger of gaining it back.  Underneath, you are still the same person who became out of control and gained weigh you didn’t want.  You can force yourself to behave – to follow a temporary diet.  But you can only force yourself for so long.  Your old self, your old thinking will re-emerge.  I believe that is why so many people experience cycles of weight gain and loss.  

Change your mind.  Change your thinking.  Change yourself – if you change what is important to you, change what you value, then when you live out your beliefs your behavior will change as well.  If your new values are rewarding and useful then you will thrive. 

Losing all your extra weight isn’t difficult in terms of willpower.  I have lost a lot of weight – and kept it off pretty well, just by changing my mind.  I changed what was important to me.  Suddenly, I could understand why thin people acted the way they did.  Their behavior was not a mystery any more, because now I understood their thinking.  I understood their motivations.  I changed myself into a person who weighs 216 pounds, last I checked.  I changed myself into a person who can wear size 40 pants – down from size 52.

Don’t do as I say, or as I do.  Change your thinking, then you will find a way to do it yourself. Then you can build the life you want to lead.

-The Doctor

20201008 Daily report: steak time

I skipped posting yesterday.  Altogether it was not a great day in many ways.

However in terms of food, it was great.  I had 1420 calories, which is well within the range I need to lose weight, assuming I have enough days like that.  I was so busy yesterday that I didn’t have time to have more than a bite for lunch.  I made up for it later, though.  

Today was a better day.  Food-wise, it wasn’t quite as low calorie as yesterday.  However, part of the lifestyle (that has been so successful in terms of losing weight) is to only eat foods you really like.  This was one of those days.  Each meal was better than the last.

That's 8 ounces of tenderloin of beef!

My food intake and calorie count

Breakfast – 8oz rice (250); leftover chicken stir-fry with snow peas (100);

  • 350 calories

Lunch – 4oz noodles (200); 6.5oz Carbonnade of beef (350)

  • 550 calories 

Dinner – 8.5oz tenderloin steak (500); Indian cauliflower with potatoes (gobi aloo) (200);

  • 700 calories

Snacking – no today (00)

  • 0 calories

Total for the day: 1600 calories (limit 1700)

Each better than the last

If you want to live a lifestyle where you are in control of your body, you must find a system that works.  That means finding food that you are willing to wait for.  It must be worth the wait.  I’ve had a lot of success, losing over 100 pounds, by sticking to mealtimes and eating measured portions of foods that I really like.  That comes with a How and a Why.

How do I lose 100 pounds?  I developed a set of behaviors that put me in control of my body.  In the past, I was using food for reasons other than fuel – for example, emotional reasons.  Using food as an emotional release is kind of an expedience trap.  It becomes the easy way out, a cheap way to feel better.  Once you are in that trap, you will start using food more and more for those purposes, and gain weight at every meal.  

Why do I do it?  There’s another problem with dieting.  People (such as myself) try to imitate the behavior of thin people: try eating less in various ways.  But none of those behaviors work for us,  because we are just changing behavior, not the person underneath.  The person you are has developed a mindset that allows overeating and weight gain.  Just forcing yourself to behave differently only lasts as long as your willpower.  You need to adopt a new set of values to live by.  You have to basically become a new person who thinks differently than the old one.  

The new person believes strongly in controlling their body’s weight, more than anything else.  That’s the kind of dedication it takes.  It doesn’t make you a good person, or a deep thinker.  But it does mean that your priorities are focused on your body and controlling your body, and your life.  

Hunger becomes your friend because it enhances your eating experience.  Food becomes a reward instead of a therapy.  Think about becoming a new person.

-The Doctor

20201006 Daily report: concentrate

The job is to control my body’s weight.  How do I do that?  Well, it’s one day at a time.  Every day, my job is to have a perfect food day.  

That starts with getting enough sleep.  Being tired is no good, there is a temptation to awaken yourself with food and comfort yourself with more food.  I find my stomach is the last part of me to wake up!

One day at a time is one meal at a time.  The rules are: 1. Only eat when you are hungry.  Have the food prepared that you really want to eat, and allow yourself to anticipate and grow hungry.  Don’t eat outside of your mealtimes.  2. Measure your portion.  That usually means: no seconds, but it truly means you have to control how much you are eating.  It also means if you eat too much, you won’t be hungry next time.  Hunger is your friend.  Allow it to build, then satisfy it.  Think of it as rewarding yourself for accomplishing the goal.  

Chicken and snow peas stir fry

My food intake and calorie count

Breakfast – 6oz red beans (200) 3oz rice (100)

  • 300 calories

Lunch – bread (140); 4oz ham (160)

  • 300 calories 

Dinner – 6oz rice (200); chicken and snow peas stir fry (200)

  • 400 calories

Snacking – tea with half and half (80); chicken pieces (100); crackers (100); Snickers ice cream bar (180);

  • 460 calories

Total for the day: 1460 calories (limit 1700)

Always victorious

Because my goal is weight control and it is lived by the day, I can have victories every day.  Not every day is a total victory, but each day is a new chance.  If your goal is to lose weight it is self-defeating.  (Think about it: if your goal is to lose weight, everything you eat is against the goal.)  Don’t think like that.  Your proper goal is control.  Once you are in control of your body, you can pick the weight you like and you will get there – slowly, but it will happen a pound at a time.  You can get addicted to the victories as they pile up.

I weigh myself every week.  It’s more dramatic that way.  But based on my daily food journal I have a pretty good idea if I will lose weight.  It’s a way of keeping score.

I have a busy day tomorrow and have to get to bed.  Remember the first thing I said on this post: start with the right amount of sleep.  

Goodnight,

-The Doctor

20201005 Daily report: steady now

I had a bad diet day yesterday.  And it’s something I have found to be true every time: if you have a bad diet day, don’t make it worse.  Don’t try to make up for it tomorrow, by skipping meals or eating less.  That will ruin both days.  Try to make tomorrow exactly right (eat exactly the calories you are supposed to).  Enough good days will make up for a bad day in the long run.  Weight control doesn’t come by punishing yourself, but by re-establishing control over the majority of the time, eventually the vast majority.  You want your weight control lifestyle to be attractive and nice as a place to live.  Then you will want to stay there.  The bad days will be fewer.

Manicotti with meat make Canelloni

My food intake and calorie count

Breakfast – tea (80)

  • 80 calories

Lunch – 6oz red beans (200); 3oz rice (100); crackers (120);

  • 420 calories 

Dinner – Canelloni (650); sausage (180);

  • 830 calories

Snacking – candy (200); 

  • 200 calories

Total for the day: 1530 calories (limit 1700)

FitBit walking and sleeping

One reason the weight control lifestyle is a nice place to live is the pattern of consistent fulfilling eating experiences.  It takes planning and work, but you can make each meal something to look forward to, both by preparing your body (letting yourself get hungry just in time for dinner) and preparing the food (preparing a meal you are really looking forward to).   Today, I was living out the aftermath of a bad diet day – eating over 2000 calories on Sunday, and over 1800 on Saturday.  It happens.  Now I have to deal with it.

There is still a link between sleep and weight control.  I happen to know I slept less than 5 hours last night – according to a FitBit watch.  I also have gone walking a couple of times with the new FitBit watch.  It’s fun because it acts like a watch and also does other stuff.  Anyway, part of my responsibility – if I am serious about establishing control over my body – is taking care of myself.  <5 hours of sleep per night is not good sense and won’t give me good results.  I am going to start tracking sleep – and going to bed on time.  I have noticed that if I don’t sleep it is harder to keep my mind on the job, in every sense.  

So, to bed.  Tomorrow is a chance to have a perfect day.

-The Doctor

20201004 Daily report: spoooky

I admit it, I went around the neighborhood looking at Halloween decorations today.  They weren’t scary but some were interesting, and a few were impressive.  The shops are a bit strange, as the Christmas decoration displays are already up (October 4!) and the Halloween stuff is a smaller display crammed next to the spaces filled with trees and reindeer.  There is probably just as much autumn/harvest stuff up at people’s houses as Halloween decorations.  Corn stalks, orange wreaths, stacks of gourds…

New Orleans Red Beans and rice

My food intake and calorie count

Breakfast – bread (110); ham (130); cobbler (100);

  • 340 calories

Lunch – 2 bratwurst (260); 1/2 wrap (45);

  • 565 calories 

Dinner – beef carbonnade (600); noodles (100); salad (30);

  • 730 calories

Snacking – tea with half and half (40); chocolate (300); chips (200);

  • 540 calories

Total for the day: 2175 calories (limit 1700)

The pattern continues

It’s a it distressing, but I have continued the pattern of the last several weeks: overeating during the weekends.  This is kind of counterproductive considering all the careful discipline I put into the food week.  It has nothing, or very little, to do with hunger.  I am not sure why I am turning to food, but this will really slow down my progress and gives the lie to weight “control”.  This feels a bit out of control.  

To be fair, I am still keeping track of the calorie count.  This is not a disaster, but it is not helping me either.  I need to think about this and channel my energies into a productive direction.  Imagine, being a person who has an urge to use food whenever something difficult or unpleasant happens to them.  No wonder my weight was out of control!

This is all a process of self-discovery, you know.  Once I learn my behaviors I can change them.  In that case, knowledge is better than ignorance.  I see I have this old, learned, behavior.  Trouble?  Feeling bad?  Eat something and feel better!

Only I don’t feel better. I feel worse, because I am setting myself back on my project to control my body and channel my mind into useful directions.  And I don’t like feeling full anymore.  It feels strange and wrong.  Anyway, what’s done is done and there are consequences to think about.  Tomorrow is a new day, and I will do better.  I wonder if the problem isn’t partly to do with structure.  My workdays are highly ordered and it’s easier to stay inside the lines.  On the weekend, what I am doing is less structured and there is more time to think and get worked up by all the problems.  Hmmmm.  I will keep thinking about that.  I have had many weekends that were weight loss successes.  Why has that changed the last few weeks?  A mystery! 

-The Doctor

20201002 Daily report: more daily report

In the beginning, was a man who weighed 325 pounds.  This weight he had gained a bit at a time over many years.  He had never been able to successfully lose weight.  But on a low carb diet, he did lose 20 pounds.  This was the first time ever he had lost weight.  Did the low carb food cause him to lose weight?  The weight loss stopped after about 20 pounds, though he didn’t change anything.  Was the low carb food responsible for the stoppage?

It was probably not.  Later, he learned that the kind of food he ate had little bearing on his weight loss (there are some people who find otherwise).  But there was an important clue in there.  The low carb diet was easy to follow because he liked the food, and it was easy to stay on the diet.  It was easy to avoid noodles, rice, cereal, pizza, chips, and bread, when you can have as much meat and cheese and nuts (and vegetables) as you like.  

I can have pizza so long as I portion

My food intake and calorie count

Breakfast – toast (220); ham (160); salami (80);

  • 460 calories

Lunch – Corned beef wraps (300); stuffed cabbage half (70); horseradish sauce (20);

  • 390 calories 

Dinner – pizza (900); 

  • 850 calories

Total for the day: 1700 calories (limit 1700)

That and responsibility makes weight control

This was one of the Doctor’s key insights: you will find it easy to stay on a diet that you really like.  You will fight to stay on it.  

But that was a bit of a false lead.  I was completely unregulated in terms of calories.  At that time, I ate as much low carb food as I wanted and didn’t measure or pay attention to how much or how many calories I was having. And since at the time my mindset was that: food = comfort, I would have just kept increasing the dose over time and would probably have started gaining weight again.  I had to break that mental link and make a new one: food = enjoyable fuel.  Comfort would have to come from fulfilling responsibilities and achieving my goals.  

That’s leaping a bit ahead of the story.  For now, I had had the important insight, that the diet had to be in alignment with your values and how you want to live your life.  It had to be your lifestyle and not a temporary diet.  Forcing yourself to lose weight is just too difficult.  You will be on a permanent diet and never make real progress.  

The next step on the Doctor’s journey was to figure out how to create the new link.  Food was to be enjoyed, as a reward and as well-earned experience.  It was not to be the source of comfort.  It could and should be a reward for work.  The harder the work, the greater the reward should be. 

-The Doctor 

20201001 Daily report some more

In the beginning, was a man who weighed 325 pounds.  This weight he had gained a bit at a time over many years.  He had never been able to successfully lose weight.  It was too difficult to do.  When he did try, there was no real system and he would always give up after a few weeks.  He tried a few popular diets that were meant to make it easier, but made only a little progress (low carb had the biggest effect).  Was low carb the secret to success?  No.  It wasn’t.  But it was an important clue.

Lunch: homemade chicken, hummus, tomato, and pickle wraps.

My food intake and calorie count

Breakfast – bagel (330); ham (130);

  • 460 calories

Lunch – leftover beef and broccoli stir-fry (150); wraps (90) with chicken (100); hummus (100); and tomatoes (10);

  • 450 calories 

Dinner – stuffed cabbage (320); cauliflower (40); sour cream (50);

  • 410 calories

Snacking – tea with half and half (80); pretzels (110)

  • 190 calories

Total for the day: 1530 calories (limit 1700)

How to begin: don't be stubborn

When you are overweight,  and know you are out of control, there is the feeling that you could lose the weight all by yourself, just by doing the things that lead to weight loss.  Eat less food and exercise.  How simple!  If you tell anybody you are thinking about starting a diet, they may try to give you advice but you don’t want to hear it.  You tell yourself, you have your own system.  The truth is, you are not mentally in the right place to take control of your body’s weight.  That takes an effort and some new thinking.

Admit it: the problem is in your head.  If your head was right you absolutely could control your weight.  The Doctor has lost over 100 pounds just by changing his thinking!  (Maybe there were some ripple effects of living out the implications of the new thinking.)  So just start by saying: I would like to control my body’s weight.  How could I do that?

Find some thin people and watch them.  The big mistake is to watch thin people’s behavior and try to copy it.  That won’t work.  They act that way because they think differently from you.  The thinking is what you need.  The behavior will follow.  Figure out how they are thinking about food and eating.  What are their priorities?  You can ask.  They won’t be shy about telling you about their successes, and keeping thin is a struggle for everyone who manages it.

The Doctor is a stubborn fellow and comes from a family of stubborns.  I couldn’t learn a thing from my family, even though my family has people who have stayed thin throughout their lives, and other people who have successfully lost weight.  Of course it also has people who have not been so successful that way, and a few of us who have gained, lost, gained, and lost again.

The Doctor’s realization was that a sustainable weight control system needed to be enjoyable and positive.  It needed to be a whole way of living and not just a diet.

-The Doctor

20200930 Daily report: farewell to September

Keep your mind right, and you will control your body’s weight.  Today, it was difficult.  My mind wanted the quick and easy solution.  I needed to feel completion, release, satisfaction.  I was telling myself that I could get all that – by eating!  

That would be quick and easy.  It is also a waste of my time.  That kind of completion, satisfaction, soothing, is not enough for me.  I tell myself that I would rather have achievement than food.  What do I achieve by eating food?  Nothing.  (What as your achievement today?  Eating food, eh?).  Achieving something is better.  Even if it’s a to-do list of all the things at work.  I tell myself I can do all those things and then feel better.  It’s certainly more productive.

My reward for achievement!

My food intake and calorie count

Breakfast – 6oz grilled pork burger (450); 1/2 whole wheat wrap wrap (45);

  • 495 calories

Lunch – bratwurst (260); 1/4 wrap (25); 4.5oz steak (300);

  • 585 calories 

Dinner – 5oz rice (160); beef and broccoli (300)

  • 460 calories

Snacking – tea with half and half (80); 

  • 80 calories

Total for the day: 1630 calories (limit 1700)

More walking, less eating

I haven’t walked at all this week.  Today, I did.  It was an achievement, if not a big one.  I got some of my to-do list done at work.  Again, an achievement.  Is it enough?  We shall see.  I can be a bit proud, maybe, of getting a few things done.  Add to that.  I did recognize when I wanted to break my discipline today and take the easy way out.  It counts, I think, that I resisted and won.  Today.

That’s a short term victory, though.  I can’t have this urge to eat every time I want to feel soothed and comforted and have completion.  It means I haven’t got my head right, my old habits are still part of me.  Indulging myself this way is how I gained weight in the first place.  

The old thinking must be reprogrammed away.  Satisfaction and release and comfort don’t come from food.  I was wrong to pretend that they did.  A substitute must be found.  Is it achievement?  Something else?  A combination of things?

For now, I will keep fighting.  It has been working, mostly.  The saying is that you should double down on anything in your life that is working.  

-The Doctor

20200929 Daily report: 1000 words

Alas, no pictures today.  I was forgetful.

Today is another day of weight control!  And today the Doctor controlled it mightily!  That is, it just so happened that I was busy at lunchtime and not very hungry and…skipped it.  I don’t recommend doing this often, but I really wasn’t hungry until near dinnertime because I had my mind on my work.  

This fits in with one of my values: if you’re not physically hungry, don’t eat.  Conversly, don’t try to skip a meal when you are hungry.  That is counterproductive.  The goal is to live a lifestyle that you like.  That way, you won’t have to force yourself to do it.

My food intake and calorie count

Breakfast – Beef and cheese enchilada (370) with sour cream (50);

  • 420 calories

Lunch – skipped! (00)

  • 0 calories 

Dinner – corned beef (150); potatoes (100); cabbage (50); carrots (30);

  • 330 calories

Snacking – coconut cake (300); crackers (110)

  • 410 calories

Total for the day: 1160 calories (limit 1700)

What gives with the skipping?

Skipping a meal was an accident, but it turned out well.  I even got to eat the last piece of coconut cake for dessert – oh no, that was another chance to take a picture, wasn’t it?  I was very distracted today.

Anyway, today was a success.  I focused on my work and ignored the clock and all the cues to when I should be hungry.  Since I didn’t realize I should be hungry, I had to listen honestly to my body.  If I had gotten very hungry, I would have had to eat something.  But I didn’t.  Sometimes you need a reset like that.

But today went well.  I was able to stick to my core principles: first, eat only when you are hungry; second: make sure that when you do eat, the food is worth all the trouble (why else get hungry?).  Homemade corned beef and cabbage, followed by coconut cake?  Fabulous.  And the corned beef was very, very good.  I didn’t even need my horseradish sauce….and it wouldn’t have worked on the coconut cake. 

When you set up your life using hunger and fulfillment, it’s very rewarding.  I feel very satisfied and don’t need to eat anything else today.  If I keep this up, I might start losing weight again.  It’s been a couple of weeks.  

This week I haven’t had any exercise.  That will have to change!  

-The Doctor

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