Gained 6 pounds but not worried

  I went to see Dorothy Mason the nurse practioner, and I got weighed in the process.   Now I haven't weighed myself since I stopped trying so hard to diet.   I came in at 205 pounds.

   So I have gained some weight back, but I knew that was coming.   So far I'm sticking to the plan of eating more frequently and a lot more, but keeping exercise up to a reasonable but not crazy level.

  Instead of 20,000 or 30,000 I'm doing more like 12,000.      The plan is to get my metabolism out of starvation mode so my quality of life can rise a bit.     I would like my rest metabolism to get back to a wasteful state and hopefully I won't be gaining all that fat back, but getting some back is inevitable.

  To help increase the burning I'm trying the Steve technique of munching on stuff here and there all day.    The body responds to eating with a 'thermic' effect, which raises the metabolism in order to run the digestion process.    

  The greatest thermic effect is gained by eating protein.   I would love to munch on turkey or chicken because the calories are so low.  The problem is that lunch meat is expensive.    A package that would last me two days costs $2 to $3.   I'm not going to spend $3 on a snack for every day and then plunk down $6 for my wegmans salad on top of that.

  The one thing I don't want to do is eat fat, because the energy content is so high that I'm sure I would be shooting myself in the foot.   The body finds it extremely easy to make body fat out of fat intake.    So protein would be my first choice,  carbs would be my second...

  I'm wondering if I can find a soy snack that is low cal high protein for me to snack on that isn't so expensive?

Switching Modes

   Having weighed myself on Friday, 10 Apr 2009,  and come in at 199.5 lbs, I have decided to change to a hopefully less arduous plan.

  I think that by limiting my intake I had slowed my metabolism quite a bit, which was ok because I was burning so many with lots of exercise.

  But I think what I will do now is to up the calories to something closer to my calculated daily rest energy, which is about 2000 calories.  But at the same time, I want to walk 5 to 10 miles per day to keep the weight loss going.

Home Stretch

Now I'm in the home stretch.   Having gotten down to 204.4 last weigh in, and thus becoming normal weight, I did not want to get on the scale the next day and hear that sad music tone before it tells you that you're overweight.

  So I took a few days off the weigh-ins and worked super hard at walking.   So I did running on Wednesday morning and also did 100 min of treadmill every night, and tried to keep very vigilant on the number of calories I was consuming.

  The result:    4.4 pounds lighter than last time.   I am exactly 200 pounds!

  Molly has been a great help there.   She's stopped putting a big plate of meat next to me at dinner, and is always making a salad for me to fill up on.   I think her efforts to help me plus the 100 min of treadmill is what really did it.

  So my new goal is 195 pounds.     I will officially end my diet there.   That would be 25 pounds lighter than when I started this blog.     Unfortunately I will still have a lot of body fat, and I won't have my 6 pack at 195 pounds, but I'm tired of having my whole life focused around weightloss.

   I will go on for a while trying to keep under 200 as I get back to a more normal life.    Maybe this summer I will try for lower, like 180.  It would be easier then because of all the opportunities for running and biking in the outdoors.

  So...   5 pounds.   I'll bet I could do it in two weeks if I keep with the extreme effort.   Salads and walking to Wegmans and 100 min treadmill every night.   2 weeks then I'm done.   That seems doable.

Finally!

Yesterday I was so bummed out that a week of intense effort had yielded nothing.   But I concluded that I should not give up or change strategy, because it had to work.

Well, I guess it did.  This morning my weight had dropped 2.4 lbs.

  And for the first time, my BMI is now in the Normal range!   The picture shows my current BMI in the normal range, and my previous BMI in the dreaded overweight range.

   The weight was 204.4 lbs.   As a final goal, I think that 195 lbs would be a good target.   Then I can let my weight drift back up to 200 when I finally relax.

  But already I think I can ease up a little bit.    If I can strive for 1.5 lb per week for April and May, then I would be at my goal for June.

So assuming I have a base metabolism rate of 1200 Calories per day, and I can exercise an average of 700 Calories per day that means I need to eat less than 1900 Calories.

700 Calories would be walking/running 6 miles.    My Dennis walk is usually 2 miles, and my Wegmans walk is usually 3 miles,  and 60 min on the treadmill is about 3 miles.   Doing all of those would get me 8 miles or 944 Calories.

Then I can go running twice a week, too.

To lose 1.5 lbs per week requires a daily deficit of 750 Calories, so I need to keep my intake below 1250 Calories.

That means limiting my dressing on my salads, so they are closer to 250 insteat of 400.   And no snacking on nuts, because they are really high in calories.

Keeping dinner time down to 1000 calories is the tough part for me.   Keeping the calories down that low for 2 months is probably totally impossible for me.   I can make myself exercise, and I can only get a salad when I go to Wegmans, but I cannot sit at the dinner table and not eat any more when I pass the 1000 Calorie mark.   Oh well.

Goal = 195 lbs in 8 weeks.

207 Still

  So last week I walked/ran about 10 to 13.5 miles per day.  At 118 Calories per mile, that should be 1180 to 1593 Calories per day.

  Everyday I have had no breakfast and a 210 Calories salad with 180 calories of dressing.  That's 390 calories.   

  So the big question is, how many calories do I eat at dinner time?    Assume that I'm using 1500 Calories per day for normal body operations,  then an average of 1386 Calories of exercise on top of that, then I should be burning  2886.5 calories per day.

 So if I am not losing any weight, then how much must I be eating for dinner?

2886.5 - 390 = 2500

I think I'm probably eating closer to 1200 calories at dinner time.   So I should be losing about 1300 Calories worth of fat every day, or  1300/3500 = .37 lbs of fat every day, or 2.5 lbs per week.

But I'm not so what is going on?

I probably am not buring 1500 Calories per day for operating expenses.

I probably am eating more than 1200 Calories at dinner time.

Even still,  I don't know how much you can modify these numbers to make the zero-weight loss make sense.

OK, so I just went to the following website to calculate my resting metabolism rate:

http://www.bmi-calculator.net/bmr-calculator/

ha ha ha, guess what it says my daily Calorie use would be if I stayed in bed all day?

2008 Calories per day!

http://www.hussmanfitness.org/bmrcalc.htm

  Ok, so there are two completely different sites which list my BMR as 2000 Calories a day.

So even if I did NOTHING, then I could eat 400 for lunch and 1600 calories for dinner to keep the same weight.

The 118 Calories per mile of walking seems like a very stingy estimate.   Walking 30 miles to burn a pound of fat is daunting.  So I don't think that is wrong either.   And the math for how much I'm exercising is based on a speed of 3mph * #hours walking, and that isn't going to be off by much either.

So a McDonald's Quarter Pounder is 535 calories.  So if I'm eating 1600 calories per dinner, that would be like eating 3 Quarter Pounders.  So let's go with that.   I am eating 1600 calories for dinner.   I am eating 400 Calories for lunch.   And I'm exerciseing 1300 calories per day.  And my BMR is very low, let's cut it in half, or 1000 Calories per day.

Input  2000 Cal/Day

Output   1000 + 1300   (BMR + Exercise) = 2300

So if my BMR is 1/2 what is should be, and I pig out every day at dinner time.  I should still be losing a pound of fat every  11.6 days.

Is there any question that I have this virus?

http://www.webmd.com/diet/news/20070820/obesity-virus-more-bigger-fat-cells

ok, well I think the best thing to do is stick to the plan.   The numbers say this simply must work.  There is a lower limit to the BMR no matter how much the body tries to conserve.   I can't see myself eating less lunch or dinner, because I simply will not be able to stick to it.   So, for another week I will stay the course, and hope for the best.

Failure

  I gained tons of weight this weekend.  I'm at 209.2,  almost back up to 210 pounds.

  I should have just layed around and eaten doughnuts and pizza.   What was I thinking with my ten miles of hiking and 17 miles of biking, and eating bags of carrots when I was hungry?

  ok, I did eat eat some Cheeto-like things, and there were some m&m's set out in a bowl that I was unable to ignore.  And I ate some chips.    But those were all limited little munchings, not a whole-bag binge kind of thing that I felt guilty about.

  But the facts are the facts.   Despite an average exercise level which is more than ANYBODY I KNOW, it is simply not enough to keep up with my endless hunger, despite a pretty good effort at diet control.

  I was tempted to take a picture of all the snack foods in the kitchen and dining room this weekend.   3 bags of chips, peanut butter cookies, chocolate chip cookies,  M&M candies,  zinger-like things,  cupcakes,  cashews,   yogurt covered raisins, and several pizzas.   I *love* all those foods.    I'll admit my annoyance at the sight of it. 

   I don't particularly covet celery and spinach and raw carrots.      

   So, I failed.   Trying to eat just a little of this, and little of that, and little bit of bad stuff added up to a giant step backwards on my quest for normal weight.   Trying to not eat that stuff when I'm hungry just doesn't work for me.   Atkins worked for me because I could eat foods I liked when I was hungry, I just couldn't eat things with carbs.

   What I'm going to do now?  I strayed from Atkins and tried the exercise approach because I found that Atkins is not a good way to go if you want to build some muscle.   But perhaps Atkins is the only way I can lose.

206.8 must be patient

   I went to the community center last night and used their rowing machine and their arm pain machine.     I planned to bring my pad to sit on, but forgot it.   I was trying to be very careful not to hurt my tailbone this time (last time I wore right through the skin), but this morning I found that I was not careful enough.  Ouch.

  Besides that, the rowing was good exercise.   I can burn calories at over 1000 per hour, but then I could only 20 min because my backside hurt so much.   But I did manage to burn over 300.  Then I did the arm machine which was almost pure torture for 8 out of the 10 minutes.    I used a whopping 60 calories!  Enough for 1/2 a coors light.

  The treadmill is a much better deal as far as calories used verses unpleasantness.    But I knew I'd be running in the morning and didn't want to tire my legs out the night before.

  And I did run this morning.   I almost didn't, since I stayed up until almost 1am working on a new City of Heroes story arc.  It was way fun, but that meant only 4 hours or so of sleep.    My rationalization for not going was that my heart palpitations seem more frequent when I get less sleep, so I'd better not run today!   But that would mean running on Friday morning, which may make me extra tired Friday night, I got up and went anyway.    No heart pain or strangeness of any kind happend.

  I did 4 min warm up at about 6mph, then 18 min at high intensity, which is probably between 8 and 9 mph.  Then 11 more min at 6mph again.   We will count that as 4 miles.   I'm hoping to do twelve miles today as it will be a weight-loss day.    My body has to refill leg, back and arm glycogen today, and I'm going to let fat do that.    Hopefully I will be saying goodbye to another 1/2 pound.   Going to have to avoid pigging out at dinner.

207.2 Less than 2 lbs to normal weight

  I gained .7 pounds from yesterday, but that's ok, because the drop the day before was a whopping 2.8 pounds.   I really really did not want to do treadmill last night, but I was a pig at dinner and I knew I must do something to avoid disappointment the next day.

  So I did 100 minutes at 2.7mph at maximum incline.   The low speed / max incline is good because I was noticing last night how little impact there is when I step.   This is probably so much easier on my knees than walking on the paved pathway.   Also I sweat plenty even with no shirt on and the fan going, so my energy use is probably higher too.

  So yesterday was  1/2 walking with Dennis,  1 hour to wegmans and back for lunch, and then 1 hour 40 minutes on the treadmill.   Thats 3.17 hours which works out to about 9 miles.   

So how many calories is that?

http://www.bodyfatguide.com/PoundADay.htm

Your weight. The more you weigh the more calories you burn walking per mile; the less you weigh the fewer calories you burn per mile. The amount of calories you burn per mile is equal to double your weight in pounds divided by 3.5. For example, if you weigh 175 pounds, you burn 2 x 175 = 350 / 3.5 = 100 calories per mile. Since there are 3500 calories in 1 lb. of body fat, a 175-pound person needs to walk 35 miles. A 125-pound person burns about 71 calories per mile, and would need to walk 49 miles.

(207 * 2)/3.5 = 118 cal/mile.   So I need to travel  3500/118 = 29 miles to lose a pound of fat.

So I should be losing about a pound every 3 or 4 days if I keep this up

Gah!  That stinks.  I want to lose a pound a day.

Finally!

208.6  !!!!!

I've been doing treadmill every night, at least 100 minutes.    Last night I did 156 minutes.   That was 7 miles of walking uphill at 2.7 mph.    So I had already walked about 4 miles that day.  So 11 miles of walking.

  I wore out the skin where my thighs rub together.  Ouch.

  My feet are kind of generally unhappy, but no ankle pain or anything.   I hope they hold together long enough to get me under 200!

  But anyway now I'm psyched to try to stay under 210.   It was so hard to get here.

Finally lost a little

  Weighed in at 210.5 pounds.

  In desperation to come in at a lower weight I did not drink any water this morning before weighing in.   And yay I lost 1.3 pounds!   Of course immediately after weighing, I drank 1.1 pounds of green tea.    

   Yesterday I ran for 4 miles on the track, walked outside for 4.5 miles, and did uphill treadmill for 4.5 miles.   A total of 13 miles.   That should have been good for about 1/2 pound of fat.

   I also didn't pull the comforter over myself last night either, in the hopes that being cold would burn more.   This is getting tough.   Oh how I long for the beginning of the diet, when the pounds would just drop almost automatically.

Ran outside for the first time this spring

   I gained another .7 pounds today so I was 210.8 this morning.  The Wii  whined that I was going to miss my goal, which is pretty odd since I've lost 10 pounds in the last two weeks, and I have less than 10 pounds to go, and 96 days to do it in.

   But today will be a day of weight loss.   I'm going to do my walk with Dennis and the walk to Wegmans and I won't eat anything but the salad.  Then tonight if I did another 60 on the treadmill I'd have a chance of losing another pound by tomorrow.   It sounds excessive but I think the three day cycle is a good one.   One day of draining, and two days of medium activity.  I want to lose the weight and be done with it.

   It was over 50 degrees this morning so instead of going to the track for a 25 min run, I just ran out of the house and down to the towpath.   I tried to do intense running to Fairport, and then took it easier on the way home but not that easy, because I was worried I wouldn't be home in time to get the donuts I promised to buy at Clawson's on the way home from the community center.

 So I got to the canal after 6 min 47 seconds of easy warmup running.   Then I ran at a faster pace until 24 min 40 seconds.     So that means I was on the canal for 17 min 53 second.    7/8 inch = 2000.    

 

2000 * 5.5 * 8 / 7 / 5280 =   2.38 miles

17 min 53 second is about .298 hours   so I was going about .1252 hours/mile = 7.98 mph = 7.51 min miles.

1 5/8 inch = 1.625 inch   2000 * 1.625 * 8 / 7 /5280 = .703 miles

So total distance traveled = 2 * (2.38 + .703) = 6.17 miles

in 51 minutes= 7.25 mph Average

Not great but not awful.

I felt like I could run forever at 7mph.  But 8mph is a whole different thing.   9 mph would be really pushing it for me.

   Yesterday I went up 1.1 pounds, but today I went down 2.6 pounds.   Now I am 210.1 pounds.   That is ten pounds lighter since we got back from Florida.   So that really does the trick.

Run in the morning to deplete glycogen.   This will keep blood glucose levels down,  since after the exercise the body increases glucose uptake by the muscles that need to replenish their glycogen storage.   That also means more glucogen (the body's anti-insulin).   Glucogen increases the rate of fat burning and decreases the conversion of glucose into body fat.    This is of course what you want to happen.

 So to follow up on the strategy - run in the morning to deplete glycogen.  Then walk at 10:30 with Dennis to actually burn body fat.   At that point almost 100% of the energy is going to be coming from fat burning.    Then walk another hour at lunch time.  More fat.  Then after dinner do another hour on the treadmill.    

3 miles running,   3 miles with Dennis,  3 miles to wegmans, and 3 miles on the treadmill.   That's 12 miles, which is somewhere around 1/2 pound of fat.

  I was really tired after that.   I think it would not work to try to do that every day.   But doing every three days is my plan.    To burn 1/2 pound of fat every three days.   And hopefully I can burn some off on the other days too, I just don't think I should run every day while on the low carb diet.

Colder than a Witches .... hand out there today

  So I was up .7 pounds this morning which is a pretty good considering I was down 4.2 pounds the day before.  So I'm at 211.7 now.

  Having started out at 220 pounds, then 8.3 pounds in the first week is pretty good.  Of course, Dennis is probably right that taking an average for the week and the comparing that average number is the way to go.   I am not going to be able to do 8.3 pounds every week even though that would be sweet!    I would love to be sub-200 by the end of march.  That would mean an average of 3 pounds per week for four weeks.   I don't think I can do that without a Stickk contact.

   It was so cold that it was unpleasant this morning on my walk with Dennis.    I'm not sure I am willing to walk to wegman's in this weather.  It is 13 degrees with wind.   Weather Underground says the windchill is 2 degrees farenheit.   

  The alternative would be to drive home and eat quick and do a little treadmill.   But that really would be less time for fat-burning walking.   Plus I think walking in the cold increases the fat burning.  I think it would be difficult to read my book with it that cold and windy.

  If I drive home that would be 35 minutes driving.  15 min eating,  which means I coudl do 35 min on the treadmill.  Plus I get to drive the pony.   I think I will try that.  I'll bring my book to read on the treadmill and if that is too hard I can play COH.

  Yesterday I ran in the morning but had to stop due to the blister.   Later I wanted to get some exercise in but didn't want to do it on the treadmill, because I thought using the same sneakers that gave me the blister would be a bad idea, and if I don't use the gel inserts, my ankles will hurt.

So I decided to take a hike to the landfill.    It was great fun.   They had a big tall fence with barbed wire, no less!   When they built it they must have thought people would be really determined to get in there.   However, I just followed along the fence for a short bit before I found a 16 foot wide opening where they had just removed a gate and thrown it to the side.

So that was about two hours of walking.   And it was cold, too, which probably added a great deal to the fat burning.   Molly and the boys went to robotics dinner, so I basically didn't have any dinner.   Just some nuts and some Michelob Ultra Light.

Anyway, I weighed in this morning at 211 pounds,  4.2 pounds lighter than the day before!

So that's around 9 pounds lost in the first week.   Now I know that most of that is not fat, but still it makes me happy.  I've made real progress towards getting off the overweight section of the BMI chart.   Now I'm in the lowest 1/4 of it instead of being smack-dab in the middle of it.

Gained another .7 lbs

  Today on Saturday I have gained another .7 lbs,  and deservedly so.

  I went running but wore my older running shoes with the Dr Shoals supports in them.  My plan was to run at intense speeds ( about 9 mph ) for 20 min.  This uses glycogen at the maximum rate.  At the 20 min mark, glycogen use starts to taper off as the body tries to keep you from using it all up and then having none left for emergencies.    I can notice the drastic increase in the amount of air I need at that point, because my body is starting to use less glycogen and more of the sources which need oxygen, ie   fatty acids, and glucose.

   Anyway, after 20 minutes, I slow down to moderate, with the idea that moderate still uses glycogen, but less.   WHat is remarkable is that when I slow down I need hardly any air.  I'm running around passing people at my reduced rate and breathing at a low rate which you'd think woudl be more typical of a walking person.

   My theory as to what is going on:  During the intense run, the body configured the muscles to draw from the glycogen stores.   Then I slow down, and it takes time to readjust.   My energy use is much lower,  but we are still using quite a bit of glycogen for energy, and therefore I don't need much oxygen.   So for maximum glycogen without going into muscle-eating mode, I think the ideal running work out is 20 min of intense followed by 20 min of moderate.

   Then you will get really hungry for the rest of the day, since the body will be using blood glucose to refill your leg muscles with glycogen.   But if you can resist the urge to pig out, you will lose weight nicely.   When your blood sugar is lower, the body produces much less insulin (the hormonal message to build fat from blood glucose), and instead starts producing more glucogen, the hormone which tells the body to start burning more fat.

  Unfortunately, the blister on the bottom of the arch of my right foot prevented me from finishing my 20 minutes of moderate.   I had to stop after about 5 min of moderate following the intense part.     The blister is about the size of a nickel, and is already raised like it is going to fill with fluid and burst.  Ouch.  I have a bandaid on it now.

  I'll want to get more exercise in today, but I'm worried about this blister.

On Thursday I lost another 1.1 lbs, bringing the total lost to 5.5 lbs, I think.

Because I was happy with my success,  I did lots of walking on thursday.

1 hour with Dennis     300 cal

1 Hour to Wegmans   300 cal

1.5 hour on Treadmill at maximum incline.  600 cal

So this should have totaled 1200 calories, about 1/2 lb of fat.

But on Friday, I gained the 1.1 back

At night I was doing ok until we got to the mexican restaurant, and I ate 1/2 basket of the nacho chips on the table.  Then I went home and ate goldfish, popcorn, and a 100 cal pack of cookies.

I probably consumed 1600 extra calories and tons of Atkins-destroying carbs. 

Oh well.  I always have done way better during the week than on the weekend.   Without the STickk.com threat hanging over my head, I lack the will power to avoid the really tasty things when I'm starving hungry.

   

ha ha ha 5 lbs

I weighed in this morning at 214.5,  which is 5.5 pounds less than Monday morning.  Ha ha this is so not real.    This morning's weight loss was because I went running, and sweated out a bunch of water.

   As usual, around the 15 minute mark at 9 mph, I needed a ton more breath.   Then I slowed down to about 6 mph and then felt like I was running for free, hardly needing a breath at all.  So I ran for about 17 minutes at an intense rate, and about 13 at a  moderate pace.

Oh and I ate a packet of oatmeal this morning.   Probably enough calories in that to power the run, but it is good to keep my leg muscles from shrinking since I'm not running every day any more.

Looking forward to the warmer weather.   Wore my sneakers today instead of the boots.

Ok, I didn't do treadmill last night, and I ate a box of chocolates after dinner.

Some great beginning for a new diet, huh?

But when I weighed myself this morning I was 217.8 pounds. Go figure.

So my weight will probably go back up again tomorrow. I'm under no illusions that I lost 2.2 pounds of body fat yesterday.

No more chocolate or carbs for me.

I was tempted to go running this morning, but I didn't. It is too cold, and I know that running my glycogen stores down would make me starving hungry all day.

Ok, I'm going to try again.   I just got back from vacation, where I gained 4 lbs.   

I was 220 lbs.   Not terrible, but 4 pounds of fat = 8000 calories.   2000 calories is enough energy to run a 26 mile marathon.    So I have to run about 100 miles to burn this back down.

Here is the new plan.

1.) Weigh myself every morning as part of my daily routine.   The Wii will graph it for me and remember it all.

2.)  Go totally Atkins.

3.) Do lots of low impact exercise every day.   That includes a  1/2 hour walk with Dennis every day, a 1 round-trip walk to wegmans and back,  and 1 to 1.5 hours on the treadmill playing COH every night.   That should be 2.5 - 3 hours a day at 3mph,  or about 9 miles per day.

   The body will not use any glycogen for walking, it burns primarily fat.  I will not get as hungry, since I think it is when replacing depleted glycogen that makes you so hungry you can't stand it.

  I should only do high intensity exercise once or twice a week.  Without carbs, the ability of the body to replace glycogen will be limited.   If you do high intensity exercise with no glycogen, you  are going to be catabolizing your own muscles for fuel and not burning much fat at all.   Bad plan.

So if I can walk 7 to 9 miles per day, that is about 600 to 750 calories per day, or a pound of fat every three days.    So 20 lbs * 3 days = 60 days, so I should be under 200 lbs by May if I can pull this off.

Then I go back to running and a more balanced diet.   Hopefully this will also help my left foot recover too.

One week later

I'm now 214.125 lbs.

That's 8 lbs in one week. Not bad!

Maybe next Saturday I will be under 210 lbs. Then if I have four more weeks to get under 200, I should be able to do that.

First Day

  The first day of my new diet.   

  I got on the wii and it said I weighed 220.25 lbs.    So I would like to lose 20 lbs by 14 Feb.

The Plan:

Rule 1:  NO CARBS!!!

Rule 2:  Eat a no-carb breakfast

Rule 3: No Caffiene in the morning

Rule 4:  Exercise 5 out of 7 days. 30 min running or 1.5 hours walking

Rule 5:  Salad for Lunch - nothing else

Rule 6:  Eat no more than Molly for dinner

Rule 7:  No nuts!

Rule 8:  No lo-carb diet food like lo-carb cookies