Weight loss and perseverance

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Well, it’s now the middle of the Month and my weight is all over the place. I have been very active doing yard work, tree trimming, planting and mulching. My muscles are all sore and I’m sure I am holding some water weight because of it. Since my weight hasn’t really changed, that must mean I am still making progress.

While the scale isn't changing, my body still is still apparently shrinking because today I finally fit into those size 40” waist pants that have been hanging in my closet!

Woohoo!

I have now lost 16” off my waist since I started!

Only 6” left to go...ok, maybe 8”...LOL!
 
Last day of the month and last weigh-in of May. My weight is now 237 lbs putting me at 78 lbs lost!

The weight loss is really showing more and more now. This is a photo comparing me wearing the same shirt yesterday to last Summer at about the same time.

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Yep...


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I seem to be off to a great start this month. Only 8 days in and I have lost 2 lbs so far. My weight has been steady at 235 lbs for the past 3 days. I guess the extra activity level is making a difference.

I am now at 80 lbs lost!

Only 50 lbs left to go to reach my ultimate goal. My loss rate has stayed rock steady at 2.5 lbs per month average since I started down this path 32 months ago. That means I should hit my ultimate goal in just 20 months from now at this rate. :)

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And with a beautiful R^2 value! Keep it up!
Thanks! Today I started wearing my new belt. Ran out of holes in the last one and even punched two more. This new one will be good down to a 34” waist so it’s probably going to be the last one I shrink out of before I get to my final goal of a 32” waist size...24” smaller than where I started.
 
Thanks! Today I started wearing my new belt. Ran out of holes in the last one and even punched two more. This new one will be good down to a 34” waist so it’s probably going to be the last one I shrink out of before I get to my final goal of a 32” waist size...24” smaller than where I started.

What are some of the unmeasureables? Can you describe the way you feel now, etc.?
 
What are some of the unmeasureables? Can you describe the way you feel now, etc.?
Sure, the biggest feeling is of being way lighter and stronger than I can remember. Almost like I am walking around on a planet with far less gravity. Walking around the yard feels like I’m an astronaut bounding around on the moon!

Here are a few more in no particular order...

I can touch my toes with my knees locked.
I can scratch the middle of my back just by reaching.
I can walk around the back of my car in the garage without turning sideways and sucking in my gut.
I can stand up from the sofa without having to push off from the arm.
I can go up the stairs without using a hand on the rail to help pull me along.
I can squat down to the ground and stand right back up again without needing a support to brace on.
I can breath normally while walking instead of huffing and puffing like a steam locomotive.
I can drop something and not dread having to bend down to try to get it.
I can sit on a piece of furniture without first thinking about whether it can hold up to my weight.
Going up a step ladder doesn’t feel like climbing Mt Everest anymore.
The distance between my gut and the steering wheel feels like a mile apart.
I can lay in bed to sleep without feeling like a beached whale.
Rolling over in the middle of the night is no longer an engineering challenge.
I can bend down and tie my shoes instead of pulling my foot up and across my opposite knee.
Looking in a mirror doesn’t make me sigh at what I see.
I can run again.

Most of all, I feel like I have reclaimed my life and can be proud of myself...and actually like the skin I’m in.
 
I’m down about 34 lbs since Christmas. Down to 216 need to lose another 20. Working out and feeling good for an old guy.
 
Oh yeah congrats DDaddy. 78 lbs is an amazing accomplishment. Now go pick up 75lbs and carry it around all day.
 
Oh yeah, and the feeling of age.

I started just after I turned 54 and I felt like I was 84. Now I am 56 and feel like I’m 36.

By the time I reach my goal, I’m hoping to feel like I’m 26. :)
 
My brother picked up a 50lb bag of catfish food and was complaining how heavy it was. I said that’s what you are carrying around. He has lost 40lbs.
 
Oh yeah congrats DDaddy. 78 lbs is an amazing accomplishment. Now go pick up 75lbs and carry it around all day.
Congrats on your progress too!

I picked up an 80 lb bag of concrete the other day and carried it from the garage out and around to the back of the house. After I set it down I said to my wife “No way in hell I will ever let myself go back to having that extra weight on my body constantly.”
 
I’ll be hitting 64 this year. I’ve always been active. I got to my heaviest weight this past year at 250. Crappp.
 
I am glad I decided to take photos regularly during this journey. It lets me look back and never forget the path and progress.

I just put this group together. On the left is from the Summer a few months before I started and the rest are from each Summer since. It almost seems surreal to me looking back on it like this.

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And seeing this, it is even more firmly burned into my mind that there will be two more Summer photos added to this by the time I get to my goal...and I want to see them!
 
Middle of the month and it has been very interesting so far. My daily weigh graph looks very different this month. Usually I see ups and downs over the course of the month while it all goes slowly down on average. This month it is a step pattern of drop, hold, drop. No ups since the beginning of the month. In the 32 months I have been doing this plan, I have never seen it do that before.

Also, I’m down 2.6 lbs at mid-month. If it stays on this trajectory, I will be down 5 lbs by the end of the month. That has never happened before either. 4 lbs was the most before and that only happed 3 times.

It must be all the extra physical activity this month. I have been constantly doing yard projects and other stuff all month. Moved over a ton of 100 lb rocks yesterday by hand (just a few 100 lb rocks moved several times).


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Great job! Your weight loss has inspired me and I have lost 16 pounds so far I started out at 324 and am now down to 308 since January I can't wait to get below 300 again!
 
The science:

Yes, I know. But if you read this thread you would realize that. Nothing new there for me, it’s what I have been saying all along. Eat less than you burn and you WILL lose weight.
 
I am calling today my last official weigh-in of the month...a day early.

Why? Because today is exactly 1000 days since I started this journey.

It has been a big Month. I have lost 6 lbs and my new weight is 231 lbs. That makes it now 84 lbs lost.

The numbers are bigger because I increased my activity, decreased intake by 150 calories per day and started controlling my sodium intake to around 2200 mg per day. It was around 3400 mg before and I figure about a lb of the weight loss is because of it. It also reduced my daily Blood Pressure variation and now it is nice and tight around 120/80 and a pulse rate of 62 all day, no matter what I am doing.

1000 days
84 lbs lost
294,000 calories removed...one less bite at a time in every meal.

46 lbs to go to get to my ultimate goal and now solidly on track to having lost 100 lbs (my original goal) by Christmas...maybe even by Thanksgiving. :)

Last time I weighed 231 lbs was over 25 years ago when I was 30 years old.

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I forgot to post the daily weight graph. Like I said, very unusual compared to past months, pretty much a straight progression. I figure that’s because controlling my sodium to a tight range also controlled the water weight fluctuations.

My average daily calorie intake was 2250 with a range of 2100 to 2400 on any given day. Like always, I just ate what I felt like I wanted each day while keeping my goals in mind.

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