The year in retrospect

Okay, so last week marked the first year anniversary of my return to proper eating and exercising in an attempt to lose weight and settle into a size i'm happy with. Well, it wasn't a return to proper eating per se since I never really ate properly at all....ever. Perhaps better to refer to it as beginning to eat properly and changing bad eating habits forever. As for the gym, it was a return to attending regularly and putting in a decent effort each time which i had gotten away from in recent years.

So when I began this odyssey, I was about 227lbs. After one year, I stand at 198lbs which was my official weight last Friday (I was 196 on Saturday but since that wasn't my official weigh in, I guess it doesn't count). To me, at first look, 29lbs doesn't seem like such a great achievement, not when its not that hard to drop 5-10lbs a month when you're really trying.

But consider this: I dropped quickly during last fall, in fact, by late November I was about 207lbs. But then the Christmas season hit and there were goodies everywhere for the better part of the month...very hard to deal with. It took a while to get used to eating right again, but not before I had gained another 10lbs which I had to lose again. Then factor in Easter. We ended up with more than a few goodies to munch on which led to another disaster, we'll say about 5lbs. There was the trip to Niagara Falls in late June which packed on another 5-7lbs not to mention all the stumbling I suffered with my diet over the year as I learned to deal with giving up or seriously cutting back on the things I love to eat. That was good for another few pounds that needed to be lost again.

And the learning was the hardest part. Even though I decided to do this on my own, no doctor told me to go on a diet for health reasons, Red didn't hassle me about my weight (in fact she loved me as i was even professing to not noticing my bloated belly, God bless her blind soul). In fact, nobody thought I even had a weight problem, or at least they never mentioned it, except me. I was noticing my clothes were getting snug, my belly was protruding, my face rounder and the scale was giving me not so subtle hints that i needed to start taking this seriously again. I made the decision and I stuck with it despite all my kicking and screaming.

One of the biggest changes i made was my movie theatre experience. I'm an avid movie goer and part of my experience is buying the large popcorn and drink combo with extra butter slathered on of course. But after researching the calorie count of this deadly combo, I realized that I simply couldn't do this anymore. One of those large popcorn buckets has about 2000 calories and that's before you add the liquid butter/grease. And the movie chains offer free refills on the large sizes so I was always saddling up to the concession stand for that making for a ridiculously high caloric event. Believe me, this was the biggest issue I had to deal with when I started this. Suddenly going to the movies wasn't as enjoyable as it had been, it felt like part of my experience was missing, and boy did I complain. In fact, I got downright miserable. I know it made Red uncomfortable as I pissed and moaned about not being able to have my popcorn, she even suggested buying a small and not getting the butter on top (how dare she!), but I was inconsolable. That's how strong the association was between the movies and popcorn. I changed things up with rice cakes, fruit, and even nothing at all, but it wasn't the same. I was a good couple of months before I accepted what was and what had to be.

As time went on, I did start to enjoy a pretzel, fries or maybe some M&Ms sometimes, in fact, I've only had popcorn once at the movies in the past year. Not that any of that other stuff is much better, but i don't do it a lot so i think I'm doing well overall considering. But the bitching ended and that's the most important thing as I suspect Red was plotting to smother me in the night if it kept up much longer.

I started to eat lots of fruits and veggies. Gone was the usual pizza on a weekend or other quick take out. In was Subway which is basically the least troublesome choice you can make if you want take out. We normally do this about twice a week, we love Subway. Out was potatoes, rice, bread for most part and heavily sauced meats. We try to keep things light and I think we do a good job of it. Sure, we indulge in a pizza here and there, or ice cream once in a while, but its part of learning moderation and its hard to learn when you've always been an all or nothing type of fatty.

Another big change was getting up at the crack of dawn to hit the gym before work. I'd always gone after work and overall, was pretty good at it. But the last couple of years, I'd gotten lazy and was missing too much. Going in the morning would ensure I'd get my workout in and it had a very practical side, it matched up Red and me's schedules since she works much earlier than I do. This way we'd be tired and ready for bed about the same time...perfect. It does gets hard sometimes when the sun's barely up or its still dark out, but it gives me a jump on the day and after my shower, I'm wide awake and ready to go. So overall, its a good thing.

So getting back to pounds lost, officially it was 29lbs. But unofficially, if you count all the holidays, vacations, and stumbles along the way, it was more like 50. And that makes me realize that despite the small gains here and there, despite those times when it seemed like the scale wasn't moving, I managed to make some real changes and lose a good chunk of weight. And its not just a diet, its a lifestyle change. This is the way I plan to eat the rest of my life. It isn't just some block of time where I'm going to deny myself food and then settle back into old habits once I've lost the desired weight. This is permanent weight loss and a strategy for never having to diet again. I'm still learning that i can have some of my favourite foods, just in moderation. It hasn't been an easy journey so far, but I'm coming along. I'm hoping to meet my goal of 185lbs by Christmas. After that, I'll see what else I think I need to do. But I think 185 is a good weight for me. And I will make it. You'll see.