Regardless of exactly how much fat I’ve lost, I know it isn’t even remotely near what I lost the first nine months or so of my program. Something has definitely changed in the last 8-10 months. If I get really strict on a reduced-calorie diet I lose very little weight, at least relative to what I used to lose. I also find that as soon as I cut the calories I get tired much quicker during a workout and have a hard time making it to the end. After a few weeks of that I start getting stressed, start thinking about food all the time, and the tiredness progresses beyond just workouts and starts affecting me all the time. Before long I can’t continue like that and I give up on the diet, just to feel “normal” again. According to all the research I’ve done, however, this isn’t something significantly out-of-the-ordinary for someone in my position. For the better part of the last year and a half I’ve been following a pretty strict diet and have lost in the neighborhood of 100 lbs of fat. That takes its toll on the body and can have a variety of unintended consequences (i.e. lower metabolism, out-of-whack body chemistry, and the like).

So where do I go from here apart from just continuing my four days of training per week? Clearly low calories isn’t working for me any more…it is just causing me to yo-yo up and down like I used to. I keep setting goals and missing them because I can’t sustain the diet for more that a few weeks at a time, with very little weight loss even while I’m on it. What do I try now? What have I decided?

First of all, I’ve increased my cardio after each weight-training session. I work out with the trainer about 45 minutes and then do an additional 45-60 minutes of cardio. I typically burn from 900-1000 calories per workout. Secondly, I’m done with low calories. Done. Finished. It’s over. I can’t handle that any more. I’m tired of being tired and tired of the stress. For now I’m going to try modifying my diet to something close to what I’d do if I were finished with weight loss, except the calories will be slightly reduced. I’ll be eating the same sorts of food that I eat now (i.e. lean meats, good carbs, egg whites, and the like), but much more of it. I’ll still be counting calories but increase them to around 2800-3000/day. My hope is that I’ll be able to lose at least a half a pound per week, or possibly a bit more. Even if that means it takes me another year or more to lose the rest of the weight, that would be better than the last year, and without all the stress and tiredness. I’m also considering doing another body composition test at the Cooper Clinic to see exactly where I stand now—how does my lean body mass now compare to where it was over a year ago? While I’m at it, I’m thinking that it would probably be wise to get a blood workup as well, to make sure there isn’t something else going on that’s contributing to my problem.

In any case, I’m still at it, working out as hard as ever, and not giving up.

I ate somewhere around 49 lbs of taffy and 63 boxes of Pop Tarts on the vacation, so I have no doubt I’ve I gained some weight, but no worries. The trips are over, the house is pretty much in order (although we are still waiting on new flooring due to the water damage), and I’m just about ready to start hitting the diet fairly hard again. As of this afternoon I was able to get back in the gym with Tim and get the normal routine going again. It was a painful and exhausting workout, but that was expected after a three week break.

I’ll end this post with a couple of photos I’ve been intending on posting since Mother’s Day. The last several years we have made it a Mother’s Day tradition to go out to eat at P.F. Chang’s for dinner. I was amazed when I saw the picture we took this year and compared it to the ones from last year and the year before. It’s easy for me to forget how far I’ve come until I see a comparison picture like this. It helps encourage me and keeps me motivated.

I’d also like to leave everyone with this bit of encouragement. If you are in a state similar to me when I started all this–150 lbs overweight, sedentary life, tired all the time, and so on–then you CAN get where I am now. You can. It has taken me exactly a year to get where I am and it will take me a few more months to get where I want to be, but that won’t be the end. There is no “end” to it. For the rest of my life I’ll be exercising, eating differently, and living better. You can do it too, but you have to change your lifestyle.

I’ll finish this post with something I’ve said on multiple occasions, “If you want to lose weight and keep it off, stop living like a fat person on a diet and start living like a fit, athletic person in training. It takes a lifestyle change, so change your lifestyle.“

Yesterday I went through my closet full of clothes and did my first Great Clothes Purge of 2011. I tried on almost all of my clothes, tossing aside things that were too big, worn out, or I just didn’t like any longer. I also sorted things that fit me again, will fit me very soon, and are still way too small.  Today I’m going to go through my dresser and do the same thing.

I was amazed at how many things fit now. Several months ago about 90% of my clothes didn’t fit. When I started my fitness program about a year ago I was wearing XXXL shirts and 42-inch waist jeans.  Yesterday I discovered that lots of my XL shirts now fit…at least half of them. I also had to toss out all of my 3X shirts (some of them looked like clown shirts on me). I wear XL and some XXL shirts, and I can now wear two of the three pairs of 36-inch waist jeans I have. One fits good, one is a little tight, and one is still WAY too tight. My latest belt is now also on the last hole and I’ll have to get a new one. I expect within the next couple of months all the XXL will finally have to go and all of the XL will fit. Who knows, maybe I’ll even be able to squeeze into my 34-inch jeans by then, too.

One side note: as of this morning I’m at 253.8 lbs. That’s 4 pounds to go to break 250 before the China trip. I’ve got one week left, and I believe I can do it. I’m being crazy strict on my diet and I’ve switched my workouts back to endurance-type routines rather than strength building, to help fat-loss. I also got a Kindle a couple of weeks ago and now use it to read while I’m doing the elliptical after my 45 minutes of weight-training. That distraction has enabled me to do 30 minutes on the elliptical every time without any trouble. Those changes have pushed me up to burning 700-900 calories per workout. It’s good to see the weight steadily coming off at a good pace again, after it slowing down for so long.

Thanksgiving was last week, and now I wonder if I should celebrate Thanksgiving every week, because I ate a lot of sweets last weekend…a LOT…and yet dropped weight like crazy this week. I’ve lost 4.2 lbs since Thanksgiving morning. Okay, okay, maybe I shouldn’t eat that stuff every weekend…but wouldn’t it be grand?

I don’t know for sure what’s wrong (pushing down my metabolism, over training, whatever), but regardless of the actual causes and effects, I need a break from the diet and major cardio/endurance workouts−I need some time to rest and recover. Even the thought of another low-calorie diet day and endurance workout stresses me out. I am burned out, burned out, burned out. I’m sick of the diet, sick of feeling exhausted after my workouts, and sick of seeing the scale inch down by about one pound per week for my trouble. Did I say that I’m burned out and need a break? Well, I do. ::insert primal scream here::

I talked to Tim about it, and starting today I did a complete change in everything. No weightloss diet and no crazy cardio/endurance workouts. I’m upping my calories to about 3000-3500 per day and switching to a muscle-building regimen. For the next month or so (at least) I’m going to work on building muscle and not concern myself one whit with losing weight. So, today we did chest and triceps, higher weight and lower reps. I benched 205 lbs, and for now we will work toward a tentative starting goal of me eventually being able to lift my own body weight. And you know what? I had FUN today. Wow, what a novel idea! I actually had fun…at the GYM. I left the gym today feeling good and with a smile on my face…and I’m actually looking forward to my next workout. I don’t know if I’ve ever said that since I started this back in February. I’ll still be doing a modest cardio workout a few times a week, but I’m leaving the other stuff behind me for awhile.

Maybe in a month or two, if things are going well and I feel ready and recovered, I’ll switch back and hopefully get a “reboot” and see good losses again. But right now even the thought of switching back makes me feel like finding a padded cell and drinking a lithium smoothy…so I won’t be thinking about that for a bit. For now I’m going to enjoy…hmm, yes, “enjoy”…going to the gym and doing something that I like for a change.

I anticipated at least a few hours of misery again this time, but was amazed at how easy it all went. It took me two hours, including looking everything over at the beginning and taking a 30 minute break in the middle for some water and to cool off. It was really no big deal at all. When I finished I felt like I could have done it all over again and still wouldn’t be tired from it. No exhaustion, no soreness, nothing. I couldn’t believe how different the experience could be between the two similar projects. Clearly, working out with a trainer for four months has had a much more significant effect on my strength and endurance than I realized. That’s very encouraging and motivates me all the more.

If you want to see the result of the project, Louanne put a post up about it on our family blog.

Having a small cheat wasn’t a significant problem. It just means that I have to be that much more on my guard for a few days so that I don’t make a habit of it…because doing something once means it is significantly easier to do it a second time, and then before you know it you’re off the wagon (or eating it, as I said in my last post). I’m changing my lifestyle, so for now I have to be extra careful so that I don’t fall back into my old ways.

“How to Stay on the Wagon without Eating It”

 
-“I’m Mike and I’m a fatoholic.”

-“Hi, Mike!”

Maybe that’s the way many of us should introduce ourselves, because it just might increase the likelyhood that we could lose weight and finally keep it off. In my research about weight loss I’ve come across a staggering statistic multiple times. For those of us who need to lose weight, around 95-98% will not keep the weight off if we lose it. That means for every 100 of us tubbies out there, only about 2-5 will keep it off. If that’s true then why bother? Shouldn’t we then just cry “Doom!”, give up and go have a large double-chocolate shake instead? Maybe not. I think the key is figuring out how we can ensure that we end up being one of those 2-5 who succeed.

With those kinds of numbers against us I believe the solution is a radical change in one’s life. A completely different attitude about weight, nutrition, and exercise needs to be adopted. I’m dubbing the problem “fatoholism.” We need to approach our weight problem just like the alchoholic approaches his drinking problem. The recovering alchoholic quickly learns that he can’t drink in moderation, he must avoid bars, he must be careful about social gatherings where people drink, and so on. Eventually, after a long term of avoidance, he may begin to reintroduce some of those “risky” environmental temptations, but in any case he must still remain on his guard. And it is unlikely he will ever be able to drink in moderation for the rest of his life, because the chance of eventually falling back into excess is just too great. He must radically change his lifestyle and view of drinking, because if he doesn’t then he will almost certainly fall off the wagon. Similarly, if we don’t do the same we will end up eating that wagon, whether the alchoholics get off it or not. So they better get off it or watch their fingers and toes if they want to keep them.

We fatoholics must approach life like the recovering alchoholics if we want to be in the Two-to-five-percenters Club. Much like the drunk living in denial who says, “I need to cut back” or “I’ll only drink on special occasions” and quickly finds that he’s drinking more than ever, we fatties tell ourselves all kinds of similar things that never work. We say various things like we’ll eat less, skip desert, give up Cokes, use Splenda, eat low carbs, use Stevia, eat high carbs, give up processed foods, go to the gym, take acai berry, buy a bicycle, eat organic foods, and on and on and on. While many of those things may or may not have certain health or nutritional benefits, none of them are going to cause you to lose weight and keep it off. The facts of losing weight and maintaining that loss are simple; it isn’t a complex subject. You must eat less and exercise more…for the rest of your life. Regardless of how difficult this may be in practice, it is true nonetheless. It is an immutable fact that eating more calories than you burn causes you to gain weight and eating less calories than you burn causes you to lose it. That’s it. You don’t need 1000 diet books to explain that. You must admit you are a fatoholic and change…your…lifestyle. Nothing else will work.

Also like the alchoholic who has a physical addiction and cravings when he quits drinking, we have all kinds of physiological things that happen to us when we begin to lose weight. Normal processes kick in and our body tries to keep us at whatever weight we were at. We have to deal with lowering metababolism, hunger, cravings, and so on. These things add to the difficulty (thus the 95% who don’t succeed), but they aren’t insurmountable. We can succeed.

How? How can we succeed? Again, there is no magic forumula, super-food, or diet that will do it. None of those things will keep the weight off. You have to change your lifestyle, for the rest of your life. You have to find the thing that will help you do that. For me it is hiring a personal trainer to train me three times per week. I have determined that I will workout multiple times per week, every week, for the rest of my life. Even if that means I have to hire a personal trainer for the rest of my life to stick to that, that’s what I’ll do. For you it may be that, or Weight-watchers, or finding a motivated friend, running marathons, or something else you come up with on your own. But whatever it is, you must change your life. A “diet” implies a goal that can be reached and then the diet will end, in which case the weight gain then starts all over. Change your lifestyle. That is how the cycle ends.

You can do it.