May 4, 218 Update

May the 4th be with you! It's time for another update on my progress. I know it's been a while but these have been extremely busy months for me so even the few minutes this takes to write are tough to come by. The good news is, I have continued to make progress towards my goals. In my last update I celebrated losing 100 pounds, which was quite the benchmark. As of my last weigh in, I am now down 111 pounds! So in three months I have lost 11 pounds, which doesn't sound like a lot, but I like steady progress. I'm not trying to set any records for weight loss. Slow and steady wins the race and all that. I began working out not long after my last post and not only stalled, but gained about 6 pounds as my muscles began retaining water to combat the change in lifestyle. It took about 4 weeks for the weight to come off and my body to adapt, but then I began losing again at a quicker pace.

My workouts have been varied but enjoyable. I started off with HIIT training which is basically cycling intervals of high intensity effort with intervals of rest. I started on the stationary bike with high intensity for 30 seconds, then resting, (not completely, just low intensity) for 30 seconds. I did ten intervals like that at first and really felt wobbly afterwards. I am now up to 25 intervals of high intensity for 30 seconds and resting only 15. With my warm up and cooldown that means I am on the bike around a half an hour and feel terrific when I am done. When I first started my heart rate spiked around 180 beats per minute (BPM) in the first 5 minutes. Now, I don't get up that high without sprinting right at the end of the 25 intervals. I am also doing core workouts with crunchies, sitting medicine ball twists and upper body lifting as well. In addition, I am playing racquetball twice a week for 2 hours as well. I love this routine! But unfortunately, my muscles and 48 year old body don't always love it. In the past month I have incurred the following injuries:inflamed shoulder, sore left knee, strained oblique, strained hamstring and the latest just Wednesday, a pulled calf muscle. I am very frustrated that I keep breaking down when I want to ramp it up and do even more. On the other hand, I don't want to be stupid, push through a strain and turn it into a significant tear or do damage, so I am trying to be smart. I have backed off the workouts to let myself heal as much as possible. I believe once I get a baseline of strength, I'll be able to handle more strenuous activity more often. In the meantime, I have to be patient. For anyone that knows me, you know just how hard that is.

My meals and food have grown more and more simple as I progress. I am finding I don't need elaborate meals and recipes like I used to. I love the simple, easy meals that fill me up, are easy to prepare, and don't take much effort. I do love my pizza and my fat bombs. I am also in love with Robin's mug cakes, although I don't have them near as often as I used to. Once I get to my desired weight I'll probably switch to a little more carbs per day, making sure I don't go above 50 per day. For now, I am fasting until noon most days, then having two meals and making sure to be done eating around 6 pm. So technically I am intermittent fasting for 18 hours and eating twice within a 6 hour window.

So here are the numbers:

Weight - 256 lbs, started 367 lbs

Chest - 46 Inches, started 60 inches

Stomach - 44.0 inches, started 64 inches

Waist - 39 inches, started 54 inches

Mid Thigh - 19 inches, started 25 inches

Total pounds lost - 111 lbs, Total inches lost - 40 inches

Goal weight - 195, 61 Pounds to go

One Hundred Pounds!

It finally happened! I am down 100 pounds! I can't stop using exclamation points! I have stalled for about 4 weeks since I hit 270. Then I decided to switch a few things up and lost 4 pounds in 3 days. I'll get to that in a minute. I started this blog a few days before I began this journey in June of 2016. I set goals then to get to 195 pounds and wanted to get there a lot sooner than I will, but more importantly, my trend continues in the right direction. Keto has become such a big portion of my life. I have to keep myself from talking about it with everyone I meet. I would imagine there are quite a few people sick of the subject. You know who you are. :) I'll just apologize now because this subject is my new obsession. I feel so much better than that big guy on the right of this post. I remember getting the sweats for no reason. Getting help to put my shoes on. Dreading a trip up the stairs to my room. Taking 3 or 4 hour naps after lunch and waking up more tired than when I laid down. More than anything I remember being scared as I lost control of myself and just gave up. I knew I had less than ten years to live at the rate I was going. Now, I know I am eating in a way that will give me the best chance to live a long life. Perhaps it won't happen, but I'll at least live on my terms, able to move and chase my kids around and run up and down a basketball court again. I wouldn't have dared try such a thing just 19 months ago.

So what did I do? I have been fasting for 16 hours from 6 pm to 10 AM and eating three meals during those 8 hours since October. I hadn't lost anything the past month even without cheating and cutting out keto treats for the most part. Wednesday I decided to try fasting for 18 hours and to eat only 2 meals and be done by 6 pm. I also played basketball for the first time Thursday night. I lost 1 and a 1/2 pounds the first day, 2 pounds on Friday morning's weigh in and then 1 more on Saturday to hit the 100 mark! I feel so good too. I am not missing that extra meal. Intermittent Fasting is such a gift! I do get a little hungry at times but my body is already adjusting. The other thing saving me is my shakes. I love my keto fat shakes and most days use one as one of my two meals. My only beef with my shakes is needing to keep 4 ingredients on hand to make them fit as Keto. That may be changing soon. I'm very excited about this development, but will save any announcements for later when it is closer.

Weight - 267 lbs, started 367 lbs

Chest - 47 Inches, started 60 inches

Stomach - 46.0 inches, started 64 inches

Waist - 39 inches, started 54 inches

Mid Thigh - 20 inches, started 25 inches

Total pounds lost - 100 lbs!, Total inches lost - 40 inches

Goal weight - 195, 72 Pounds to go

1/19/2018 Update

It's the first update of the year! I know! Slacker! The good news is, I haven't been slacking in losing and staying on the plan. I went off for Thanksgiving and again for Christmas Eve and Christmas Day. Boy did I suffer the consequences. I gained no weight after Thanksgiving. But I gained a whopping 8 pounds after my Christmas follies! I couldn't believe it. I figured it would all come off quickly, but it took the better part of three weeks to get all the weight off again. Since then I am down another 3 pounds. So in the end I am down to a new low of 270. I am through the holidays and the worst part of my year for work and now can concentrate on healthy eating and adding exercise.

I continue to use intermittent fasting as part of my regiment but now mix it up a bit more. Before I was pretty much on a schedule of 8 hours of eating and 16 hours of fasting most every day. Trying not to eat until 10 AM and finishing by 6 pm. Now I am adding in a longer fast on Sundays periodically and some days not fasting at all. I think it is good not to let your body get too comfortable in any one thing.

I continue to add new recipes to the mix, this month trying a new cheesy cauliflower recipe and brats in a blanket. We are still gathering recipes for our cookbook but we are getting closer to putting it together. I have also started exercising this week, finally. I have heard many good things about HIIT workouts so I decided to give them a try. It was tough, but really got my heart rate up. I think it will be exactly what I need. HIIT stands for "High Intensity Interval Training." The basic concept is to go as hard as you can for a short burst then rest then go again. I think once I get back into some kind of shape and can add in some resistance to it I will really see more results. For now it will be good for cardio. As usual, most likely due to water retention, I gained a pound the next morning.

Here are the happy numbers

Weight - 270 lbs, started 367 lbs

Chest - 47 Inches, started 60 inches

Stomach - 48.0 inches, started 64 inches

Waist - 40 inches, started 54 inches

Mid Thigh - 20 inches, started 25 inches

Total pounds lost - 97 lbs, Total inches lost - 37 inches

Goal weight - 195, 75 Pounds to go

Just 3 more pounds to go until I am down 100!