Week 195 Update

I woke up at 06:15 this morning, and I stepped up on Mr. Scale, to which he replied, "184.5 pounds!" J I was happily surprised! Why?

This was a strange week on the weight control scene. I watched my weight start on Saturday on the upper side of my target weight, and then go up even higher until it reached 189.0 on Tuesday, where it was scraping up against my personal goal of 190.

I specifically picked my target weight, and my target range, in such a way as to keep all of my daily weigh-ins at or below my personal goal weight. So, when I find myself close to going over that upper limit, I start taking things very seriously. In fact, starting on Monday where I weighed 188, and my weight first broke out of my target range, I have averaged eating 40.8 points per day. On Wednesday the 2nd, I was up to 48.0 points with no evening snacking. I was there before I realized it, and it was too late to lower it at that point, but I didn't add any more, and I was more careful the rest of the week, not going over 41 points. Thursday and Friday I held my points down in the 30s.

For the week I was never going outside what I would consider "normal eating," as far as points were concerned. On Saturday and Sunday I was a bit high, with 50.5 and 54.5 points respectively, but my running average for points for the previous 7 days, at each day of the week, was below 47 points, and at or below 45 points from Tuesday on. For this entire week number 195, my average points-per-day was 44.14. That is 2 points-per-day less than I ate in week 194. I don't think I could have been adding fat weight on, so it must have been something else. Let's see...

Saturday - I weighed in at 186.0 pounds. This was in keeping with the general trend that I had been seeing ever since January 8th, and my battle with the cheesecake. Before today, I have had only 2 daily weigh-ins below 185.0 since that weekend, and I have had 25 that have been at or above 185.0 pounds. During that time, seven of my daily weigh-ins have gone above the upper limit of my target range. It was as if that weekend's splurge moved my mean weight up a couple of pounds. My 7-day weight average at January 8 was 184.57. That is indeed 2.3 pounds lower than today's average, even though I ate over 50 points-per-day the week ending January 8th.

Well, I was clearly not too worried about where I weighed in, because I ate some real junk that day, without what I would call a normal meal, aside from breakfast. I did eat some high sodium food too, and by the end of the day I had eaten 50.5 points. I didn't walk at all either.

I spent my morning hours getting my update together, and then Dotti and I watched a remake of "Freaky Friday." I normally am completely put off by the things they do to movies when they remake them, and so my expectations were pretty low. It did rise a bit above my expectations, because the acting was excellent, but it will not be one of my favorites for future viewing. After that, we went shopping, and we ended up in Barnes and Noble.

I found a display case filled with packages of audio CDs with college lectures produced by Barnes and Noble. I picked one up called Vault of the Heavens, which featured James B. Kaler lecturing on "Exploring the Solar System's Place in the Heavens." It turned out to be worth every penny of its purchase price! During this week I nearly completed the entire 14-lecture series driving to and from work. It is an introductory course in astronomy, goes through all the planets and other bodies of the solar system and even sketchily discusses the entire universe. I will of course listen to the entire course again, and perhaps again. (It's too bad they don't have a continuation set of lectures on astronomy.) They did have a course on philosophy that I almost picked up, and I probably will now, since the astronomy one turned out so well.

I also picked up a book of quotations by members of a political group that shall remain unnamed, but which pretty much stands against everything I hold dear. I spent a couple of enjoyable hours going through the quotes, and noting in the margins what I consider to be the flaws in their reasoning. Before I knew it, it was time for bed.

Sunday - I weighed 186.5 pounds. Unfortunately, I seem to have developed the attitude that I can "get away with it" by eating more on the weekends than I do during the week. My food choices were much better on Sunday, with vegetables, a turkey sub at Subway and a lot less junk food. Still, I ate 54.5 points, which in looking back, was not a wise move. Also, my sodium was up again.

I started off the day with a long walk. I headed off in a different direction than I normally take, and when I looped around back home, I had gone about 3 miles. So, I turned right around and continued around my normal loop, and at the end I had walked 6.06 miles. Later on Dotti and I walked to a Subway (we actually have two within fairly easy walking distance) that is easily reached during our normal 3.05-mile route, with just a little detour. It ended up being 2.20 miles to get there, and it was 1.60 miles coming back, with the little detour adding 0.75 miles to our loop.

Other than the walking, I felt like I completely blew the day on Sunday, not accomplishing anything of note, but it was relaxing.

Monday - I weighed 188.0 pounds. Not good! I ate much better that day, and I only ended up eating 40.0 points total. However, I had some salty food, and I over indulged in some new cereal that we were trying out. It was very high in fiber, and that was supposed to lower the points, but I was left wondering about that when I stepped on the scale on Tuesday.

This week at work was much busier than normal. There was something going on nearly all of the time, and sometimes multiple problems were calling out for attention. The lectures on CD made the driving time far more enjoyable, but by the time I got home I was ready to relax.

Monday I arrived at work in time to do my 3.17-mile walk. It was overcast but dry. (In fact I didn't have to wear my raincoat at any time all week long during my walks.) The temperature was 45° and the conditions were nice. But I was feeling tired from the nearly 10 miles I had done on Sunday. At lunch things were too busy to take a walk, because I had to take a short lunch to get back in to work on the problem.

By the evening I was feeling too tired to consider walking.

Tuesday - I weighed 189.0 pounds. L I was scratching my head at this point. What was going on? I focused on keeping my eating totally within my normal frame of reference, with nothing that could surprise me, and I ended up eating 40.0 points for the day.

I really didn't feel like walking when I got to work. But I was there an hour early, so what else could I do? J It was a little foggy, and 41°. I set off on my walk, and actually considered turning around and heading back a couple of times the first half-mile. However, things finally started to settle down for me, and I was able to finish the loop.

At lunch things were still busy at work and I didn't have time for a walk, and I am not sure if I would have been up to taking one if it had slower.

In the evening I spent my time on a project that Dotti had requested me to do: scanning my entire baby book into the computer. It turned out to be a lot of fun. And when I scanned the old pictures that my Mom and Dad had taken with their "Brownie" camera, the small images gave up a lot more detail on the computer screen than I had ever noticed in the original pictures. This one, of my Mom holding me up, taken at Yosemite National Park in September 1953, is one of my favorites. (Click on thumbnail to see larger image.) You can see why I am so taken with waterfalls. With that old camera, with no f-stop or shutter settings, and naturally a slow film speed, I think Dad did a pretty good job on a tricky photographic shot. J I was a little pudgy even back then. I had just turned 2, and Mom was 22.

Wednesday - I weighed 188.0 pounds. It was a move in the right direction, but still was not good! Also, when I had totaled up my points at the end of dinner, I was already up to 48.0 points. Normally that would not be a big deal, but when I am trying to pull my weight back down it was not a good sign.

It was a bit better doing my walk in the morning. The temperature had fallen to 35° and there was a very heavy fog out. Great walking conditions! I did my 3.17 miles at a faster pace (4.23 mph) than the previous couple of days, and I felt quite a bit better.

I was too busy to walk at lunch again, and when I got home I was not feeling up to walking either. I had over 19 miles in for the week anyway and I didn't think I would have any problem reaching my 25-mile goal. In the evening I worked on fixing an old picture that I had scanned in, removing the blemishes cause by time.

Thursday - I weighed 186.0 pounds, and breathed a sigh of relief. I wasn't happy yet, but at least I was back in my target range. I didn't want to go skating right back up again, so I held my points to 39.0, and stayed away from anything that I had not tested in the past for being safe to eat without going up on the scale.

Dotti was not feeling well when I got up, and she remained in bed. She didn't even make it to bowling, and I always know that she is really feeling bad when she misses that!

I felt really good when I got to work, and I enjoyed my walk in the morning. It was foggy, 34°, and it felt great for walking. I kept up a pretty good pace all the way around.

I was busy in the morning at work, but things broke in such a way that I could get a walk in at lunch. I felt a little more tired at lunch, and the temperature had risen to 41° at the start of my walk, and so I did a slower pace. But I was happy to get my total miles up for the week over 25. That meant that any additional walking I did would be just gravy, since I had met my goal already.

When I got home Dotti was starting to perk up a bit and we had a nice quiet evening. I did some reading while she did her treadmill.

I have been really impressed with what Dotti has been doing this year. She doesn't have "x-off" days, or blowout days on her points. She eats below her upper limit everyday, and she gets her exercise in, meeting her weekly goals each week. Thursday she was not feeling her best, but she was up on that treadmill anyway. That is the same fire I saw burning in 1998, and I think that she is finally shaking off the effects of the smoking curse that grabbed her when she quit. The weight increase has halted and she is losing again. It may not be as fast as it was in 1998, because several things have changed physically since then, but this is not a race. The combination of exercise, and eating fewer calories than you burn, is unstoppable in the long run. (A body cannot forever hold on to fat if it isn't getting enough input calories to run the system.) I am really excited to see that determination fired up and running again.

Friday - I weighed 186.0 pounds again. I would have liked another drop, but at least it didn't go up. I kept my points low at 36.5, and although I had some food that I would normally eat with a fair amount of salt, I didn't use any salt, just to make sure that my weigh-in today would be in my target range.

So, I this morning I was expecting to see 186.0 or 185.5 pounds on the scale. But as always he has a mind of his own. This time, at least it was in the right direction.

I did walk on Friday morning. It was my fastest pace all week long: 4:08 per mile (4.24 mph). The temperature was 39° and it was foggy once more. I love walking in the fog. Things look so different, and you can't see what you are approaching until it is nearly on you. Fellow walkers suddenly approach out of the mist and trees move through it as you are advancing. The sun is rising earlier now, so I am not seeing the completely black sky any longer, even at the very beginning of my walks. It is dark but not black. If it is not foggy, I can see a long ways in the light that is available. Soon, I will be arriving and walking after the sun has already cleared the horizon, but I shouldn't have to deal with unpleasantly warm temperatures for a few more weeks yet anyway. (Next week things will be extremely cold, but that is because we'll be in Idaho.)

Things at work were actually fairly quite for me finally. My stress level was allowed to go down a bit, as I caught up on all my paperwork, and got things ready for someone else to take over for the week next week. I almost took a walk at lunch, but decided against it. Instead I just read and ate my lunch.

When I got home we visited for a while and then Dotti started playing a computer game with her twin sister over the Internet, and I started getting my numbers together for my update this morning.

Overall, I consider the week a success, even though it was a fight to get there. I got my water in, and I reached my goal for walking. I fought my weight back down to my target weight, and so another week comes to a close.

Next week we are going to Idaho. We were there the first of December and it was too snowy and icy to walk outside. In February, I can only assume that it will be even worse. I don't know if we can find a gym where we can walk or not, but we'll give it a try. If not, we will just have to work around it as best we can, and make up for any deficits on the other end—perhaps on the following week.

3 years, 270 days OP; a lifetime to follow.

-Al-

6 '3" 239.5/184.5/180±2/BMI:23.06/WK-195

GRAPHS:

Weight Loss Maintenance Year 1 Maintenance Year 2 Maintenance Year 3 Maintenance Year 4 2005 Walking 2005 Walking Data

2004 Walking Data