And this is why it's bad to lose weight through diet alone

This is traditionally the point at which I'd become frustrated in diets past. And once again, I'm frustrated. I'm at 217. Still. After about a month of being at or near 217. This is what is technically known as a Weight Loss Plateau.

See...I theorized early on in my diet that I should have a diet plan that closely matches my current lifestyle so that I could maintain it for the rest of my life. I made some modest changes to my physical activity. But most of my changes were dietary. I ate fewer calories, ate more vegetables.

Here's the problem with that, though. When you lose weight through reduced calories, you lose muscle --> and when you lose muscle your metabolism slows --> and when your metabolism slows, you need fewer calories to get by.

And when you need fewer calories to get by....suddenly you find that a reduced calorie diet isn't causing weight loss anymore. Oops.

Here's what the Mayo Clinic has to say:

A plateau occurs because your metabolism — the process of burning calories for energy — slows as you lose muscle. You burn fewer calories than you did at your heavier weight even doing the same activities. Your weight-loss efforts result in a new equilibrium with your now slower metabolism.

At this new equilibrium, calories eaten equals calories expended. This means that to lose more weight, you need to increase activity or decrease the calories you eat. Using the same approach that worked initially may maintain your weight loss, but it won't lead to more weight loss.

So I've been getting up in the morning and taking long walks. Lifting weights in the basement while watching Scrubs on my Laptop via Netflix. Also...a nasty flu has given me a healthy headwind. Though we're back to the muscle loss thing.

The moral of the story: An effective weightloss regimen needs some form of muscle building or muscle maintaining exercise.

Dieatary change alone is going to lead to a hard core plateau as your body constantly slows its metabolism.

Here's some suggestions from the Mayo Clinic:

• Reassess your habits. Look back at your food and activity records. Make sure you haven't loosened the rules, letting yourself get by with larger portions or less exercise.


• Cut more calories. Reduce your daily calorie intake by 200 calories — provided this doesn't put you below 1,200 calories. Fewer than 1,200 calories a day may not be enough to keep you from feeling hungry all of the time, which increases your risk of overeating. In addition, this reduced calorie intake should be sustainable. If not, you'll regain the weight you've lost and more.


• Rev up your workout. Increase the amount of time you exercise by an additional 15 to 30 minutes. You might also try increasing the intensity of your exercise, if you feel that's possible. Additional exercise will cause you to burn more calories. Consider adding resistance or muscle-building exercises. Increasing your muscle mass will help you burn more calories.


• Pack more activity into your day. Think outside the gym. Increase your general physical activity throughout the day by walking more and using your car less, or try doing more yardwork or vigorous spring cleaning.
  

The next challenge is, what type of exercise would I incorporate that I'd be willing to do for the rest of my life?

El Weightloss Photo Update

It's that time again. Time to update my picture and compare with the original pic. I've lost about 30 pounds, now.

Old Picture:




And this is today's picture:



One thing you may notice right off the bat is that the angle of the photo has changed. I no longer have to obscure my jowl and neck and all the jowlish-neckishness that used to go with it. Though there's still much work to be done.

And as promised, a full body pic, fully clothed so as to protect the innocent and the guilty. This one is the first in the series, taken by my 7 year old son. He did a pretty good job. I have quite a bit more work to do on that belly of mine. Belly belly belly. But I'm more than halfway to my goal of 50 pounds of fatlessness.



And that's...the way it is.

My Two Week Odyssey of Stress and Restaurant Food

Blarg.....so a couple weeks ago my parents went to Florida for two weeks to visit family who are having health issues, and my wife went out of town for a week to a vendor show for her store. The confluence of these events left me alone with my two boys for a week, and without much in the way of child care during my daily work schledule for two weeks.....

...hence my long term blogging absence, by the way.

While the lady was gone, I got it in my mind that a good way to keep my boys from missing their mother and grandparents was to live it up in the evenings which usually meant going out to eat in the evenings: hamburgers, hot dogs, pizza....whatever food suited them. And let me tell you...such a lifestyle is NOT diet friendly. I'm lucky I made it out of the past two weeks in a state of stasis. I did not lose weight. On the bright side...I also did not GAIN weight.

I think there are three morals of the story:

1. Eating out is not diet friendly. Ya gotta really know what you're eating. Even the salads aren't safe.

2. Fish is amazingly low calorie compared to beef. I think what saved me is my love of lake perch. Even FRIED lake perch is better than ground beef in a patty on a bun. I'm a huuge Lake Perch fiend and if it's on the menu, like it is in most local West Michigan restaurants...if it's on the menu, it's as good as ordered and in my mouth. I love fried lake perch.

and

3. Stress and a change in routine is also terrible for the diet. A person really has to look out for that. When you're stressed your will power is severely compromised. There's like a gagillion research findings to support this. Avoid stress.

So that's what I learned earlier this month.

Now if I can just lose 6 more pounds I'll weigh less than I have in over five years.

AVAST! My old nemesis...water weight! Curse you for ruining my weightloss goals!

Well, here we are. February 1st. And I'm sad, but not TOO sad, to say that I did not reach my 10 pound weight loss goal for January. I did, however, lose 9 pounds. And that's fantastic.

I started January at 233 pounds and ended January at 224 pounds. For whatever reason, though, that very last 2/3 of a pound I needed to shed in the last few days just wouldn't go away no matter my calorie deficit or the exercise. From a very simple standpoint of 3500 calories being 1 pound of fat, I should have lost at leat a pound over ht past few days. But I didn't. In fact, my weight went a little bit up or stayed the same from day to day. Frustrating...which leads me to my weighloss topic du jour:

That freain' water weight, again, and inherant problem of weighing yourself every single day.

As it turns out, we're not just looking at a simple equation of fat loss = weight loss. Alas, we have so much other Stuff in our bodies that happens to have its own weight. The biggest one, of course, is water. 1 pint of water up of water is 1 pound, and you can easily down a pint of water. Just two cups. Cup of coffee from McDonalds, BAM... about 1 pound.

And if you've had more salt than usual, your body is going to hold onto that water. Another thing that holds onto the water...glycogen. There are two basic types of energy storage in your body: fat and glycogen. The glycogen is your body's rapid response energy boost. It's the first energy store your body taps when you're running low on energy. And holy smokes does it hold onto the water. So your day to day glycogen stores are going to fluctuate the amount of water your body is holding.

So, basically...just as part of the body's normal routine of, like, LIVING...it's going to see weight gain and weight loss from day to day. I just need to remind myself that it's normal and not get disouraged.