3 Pounds!

Weighed in tonight. 3 more lbs. I am keeping to the plan and exercising. It makes a huge difference. That brings my total lose now 32.8 lbs. I am at 367.2. I am not sure how long it has been since I was at 367 but I am pretty sure it has been at least 3 or more years ago. So here we are about 6 weeks into this journey and I am where I was at 3 years ago. I am more than happy. I have a long way to go but I am on the right path. Next week I will be moving to Tuesday evening meetings so look for an update on my weigh in that evening. I will try to give you an update over the weekend on what is going on. Till next time I wish anyone on the same journey the best. Keep up the good work!

Death by bagel

I love that people are generous. I used to like it when people would bring in doughnuts or bagels. Now I am a bit less appreciative. I came into work this morning and someone very near my office had brought in bagels. Panera Bagels. Then to top it all off there was a Cinnamon Crunch Bagel and Honey Walnut cream cheese. I did resist, but I also stared lustfully at said bagel. Then I thought to myself the I should put this in perspective. I had a delicious omelet for breakfast this morning the toped out at 7.5 pts. So I looked up the bagel and cream cheese. What I found was not all that shocking. The bagel weighs in with 410 Calories, 8 grams of fat and 2 grams dietary fiber for a lovely 8 pts. But wait there is more. The cream cheese. Don't forget the cream cheese. The Honey Walnut Cream Cheese is 160 Calories, 11 grams of fat and 1 gram dietary fiber for another 4 pts. Do the math. That is 12 points for a bagel and cream cheese as compared to my veggie omelet with cheese for 7.5. A bagel would not be bad from time to time but not when I have already had my breakfast. Small victory for me. Backing away from the Panera box now. See you all later tonight with a weigh in update. Not sure what is gonna happen I weighed in on Saturday so this is a shorter week. I have given up trying to predict. I will take whatever the scale says and move forward.

Cooking healthy

I know I was talking about cooking healthy last post so I thought I should pass along what I did for dinner tonight. Tonight I had a thought toward the end of the day that I wanted to do chicken and shrimp. I got the chicken and shrimp out of the freezer when I got home and started to prepare my menu in my head. I decided some whole wheat pasta would be good with what I as thinking. I began by sauteing some onions, green and red peppers along with some mushrooms in a tablespoon of olive oil. I cooked 3 ozs chicken breast and 2.5 ozs shrimp on the foreman grill. I combine the saute mixture with a can of stewed tomatoes. I then added that saute mixture and tomatoes to the cooked pasta (note: I cooked 4 oz of dry whole wheat penne pasta) and served it with the chicken and shrimp with cooked asparagus. Enough talk. It looked like this and was delicious at about 12.5 points.

note: I only served just over half the pasta so my point calculations were based on that.

A few thoughts

Something interesting came up in the meeting I went to on Sunday. The group leader said that you could not ask others to change for you. This was after many people were talking about hurdles they had encountered during their weight loss and in particular how hard it is to watch others enjoy all those foods that you have to either avoid or enjoy in moderation. That got me to thinking about last winter when I made a small push to get healthy. Well I figured out that I had asked my Mom to change for me when I was the one who needed to change and that was unfair. You see at the time I was living with my parents for a few months while the renters in my house finished their lease. I wanted to get healthy and loss weight. I asked my mom to stop cooking the way she cooked for 40 years or more. I did not see it until someone said it. I needed to make the changes, she didn't. So lesson learned you cannot ask people to change, or more importantly you have to do the work, you will not succeed if you ask others to do it for you. That I think is also true of fad diets. Nutrisystem for instance sends you boxes of food and you eat them and you lose weight. That's great but those boxes did the work for you and you learned nothing about nutrition and preparing your own food. This is the reason I like Weight Watchers is because you have to do the work. I have purchased a few WW items, but only the sweet stuff. I make my own food, some of it is good, some of it not so good but the thing is I am learning how to make things lighter.

Saving up for a big evening. I tried this all day Saturday. I ended up in a sour mood and did not use my allotted points anyway. The plan was light breakfast, light lunch, bigger dinner, and several beers. Well I ended up drink about 3 beers and was done. I had 2 small glasses of the Boulevard Brewing Company's Long Strange Triple but then had a couple of Miller Lite's at the comedy club which I regretted. If I am going to drink I would prefer to drink a good beer. Regardless of the beer the point is I am fine with saving points but make sure that you get in your protein cause it will stick with you through the day and hopefully you wont end up in the mood I was in.

I am finding out so many interesting things about myself during this journey. I am learning about my body and how it reacts to different things. I am learning more and more about nutrition all the time. I am learning to make healthier food and make sure my son as having it as well. I have learned that the thing that the doctor said for all those years is right. Diet and exercise. They cannot be exclusive of one another. They have to be combined for optimal results. Diet alone will allow some loss but by I think those losses would continue to be less and less. By combining the to you create the calorie deficiency needed for weight loss. These may have all been things that I knew in the back of my head but now they are at the forefront. By living my life this way I intend to make the changes I have made in the past six weeks permanent. I may have pizza and beer for dinner one night but it will be right back at it the next day. Right now my thought is if I can have 5 to 6 times as many healthy days as I do pizza and beer days then I am in the right place. I cannot deprive myself of those things. They just have to be more controlled and less often.

I will be back on my Thursday schedule this week and then be moving to Tuesdays in march as it will fit my schedule better. So you all then!

Excercise Exercise Exercise.

The biggest thing that has changed for this week compared to last is the time I spent on the stationary bike and doing some exercise. So what were the results? 5.4 lbs! That took me to exactly 15 weight watcher pounds and a total of 29.8 since the doctors appointment on 1-17-08. Needless to say I was ecstatic So I have come to this conclusion for people early in the stages of a change in dietary lifestyle. You might lose a pound one week and 5 the next week. I would guess that this will flatten out. And that is what I am expecting. I am pleased with the direction I am headed. If you would have told me on the day of my doctor appointment that I would be down almost 30 lbs 37 days later I would have told you that you were out of your mind. So I am going to leave it at that and I will see you all again on Monday when I post some thought about the entire process so far. Until then I want to thank everyone for their support, particularly my girlfriend Carrie, my parents and my brother. I also want to send a thought out to any of you who are on the same journey that I am on. Keep up the good fight and take it day by day, you can do it!

"They" say eating right before bed makes you fat

So last night I got done with dinner only to find I had 9 pts left for the day. That is just not great. So I need to try to get more breakfast and lunch points. I also had this thought that you really should not eat 2 hours or so before bed because it would contribute to weight gain. You know "They" say that you should not neat before bed as it will make you gain weight. As it turns out what "They" are saying is when we snack at night it is normally chips and ice cream. The results find the calories make you fat no matter when you eat them. So stick to your plan and if you don't get to dinner until 9pm, don't worry quite as much about it. You can check out this article here for more information. So with all that said it does mention on the WW site that you should wake up and be hungry within 30 minutes. Which suggests that if you lay off the chips and dip that would probably be the case. So my plan it to try to eat slightly larger meals and continue with the fruits and veggies and try harder to eat more breakfast. As i mentioned in an earlier post breakfast just give you energy for the day.

I will see you all tomorrow with the new weight. Same Matt Blog Same Matt Channel

And the number is (drumroll please)

I have no idea. The weight watchers office was closed yesterday due to the bad weather. Stay tuned. I will be going in on Saturday to weigh in.

I can eat a double cheeseburger and large french fry in a 7 minutes

Just quick observation.

We have all heard it a hundred times. We eat too fast. And I was KING of eating fast. My routine prior to 4 weeks ago was to run to McDonald's and grab a double cheeseburger value meal, large sized with a Coke. Come back to work and eat my lunch in my car while listening to sports radio. I know it sounds pathetic, but I like my sports. The point is I made the food run and ate my food in about 20 minutes and had 10 to spare during lunch. Now the drive and picking up food took about 13 minutes. You do the math. That is 7 minutes to eat that value meal.

Now we know that is bad for you. You should not eat too fast. But how do you avoid it. I tried to will myself to eat more slowly but I am not successful. Even now I still eat some meals far to quickly, but the change I made at work as eating in with my friends. I end up taking half an hour to eat a salad and an apple. The reason. I am talking with my friends. So my advice to my tens of readers. Chat with your friends while you eat. Unless you have no manners at all you will end talking as much time as you are eating. And to those of you who have no manners, well you cannot be helped.

More tonight after weigh in.

T minus 25 hours to weigh in

As I mentioned last week I was upset and angry and just flat out sad about my 2.6 lost last week. Well a week to think about it and I am fine with that. In fact I am fine with the numbers on the scale when they head in the right direction. I am following the plan and I feel better and I know I am eating right now. I read this article (Weight Loss Diets) and found it very interesting. 1-2 lbs a week. It could mean the difference between 2 and 4 years before I reach my goals but then again it took my 34 years to get here. I am riding the bike now and doing some other exercise so I am feeling pretty good about where I am at. If it takes 4 years then 4 years it is. I will not be on a diet for 4 years though. I am not on a diet right now. The people who try to go carb free. They are on a diet. I have made a change in the way I view food and what I choose to eat. A lifestyle change if you will. So bottom line is I am in this for life. Now that does not mean that once I get to my goal weight I am not gonna go to Stroud's and make my self sick on fried chicken and artery clogging gravy because you can join me on that day. But the day after I will be right back at it, eating right and staying healthy!

What a difference 15 % makes

Sunday evening I was over at my parents house for dinner. We had decided to do hamburgers on the grill. It had warmed up to 35 degrees and there was snow on the ground but there is no substitute for grilled burgers. Earlier in the day I had picked up some 95% lean ground beef. This was my first time cooking with such lean beef and I will tell you that it is drier and has less flavor. Next time I will be opting for a medium - medium rare burger. So I made up a hefty 6 oz (pre-cooked) burger for me and made burgers of about the same size for the rest of the family with 80% lean ground beef. I also made some delicious potato skins that came in at about 3 points each but were really good. Some corn on the cob with that and it was almost like summer.

So whats the difference in 15%? 6 points over 6 oz is what. I was shocked. My dad was shocked as well as he has been trying to do the WW the thing as well. His burger alone was 11.5 pts then ad on a 3 pt bun and that is some serious points on a burger. Next time we will know. My meal came in 18.5 or so. A big meal no doubt but I knew I was going to have a burger for dinner so I had a few less snacks during the day. Over all since last meeting I am doing well and staying on points. I have ridden the bike twice for 30 minutes at a time and have begun to work in the crunches I talked about. This is a slow process and I think I will need to continually remind myself of that. Spirits are high and I hope for another successful week this week.

How do you react?

Well I have to admit I was not pleased last night. I was angry and upset and was nearly ready to quit. I am not quitting though, this is far to important. So allow me to explain. I went in last night I was pretty excited. I felt like I had a pretty good week. I felt as if I was within the points without being to short and without going over by a lot. My lowest day by my calculations was 39 and my highest was 46. I felt like I was where I needed to be. I was expecting a 5lb or better loss. What I got was 2.6. Now things are still headed in the right direction so I guess I should not be that upset, but I was. It was kinda like that birthday present that you really wanted and asked for and dropped hints about but did not get. So last night I went home, made dinner, talked to a couple of people and then began to think. I looked back over my journal for the week and came up with only one solution. Exercise. You see in my 7lb loss week I hit the bike three times that week. Last week I didn't pedal for a minute. I am not sure that it would have posted me another 7 but it certainly would have helped. So I got on the bike last night and road for a half hour. The other thing I thought about was that according to the doctors scale I was at 400 before I walked into weight watchers. So in the two weeks prior I lost just over 14 lbs and in the first week at WW I lost 7 lbs. The point is that I my understanding is that I should not expect 7 lbs every week and should not expect 5 lbs.

So this week I am going to ride the bike for at least 30 minutes every day. I am also going to begin to throw in some modified crunches and biceps curls and triceps presses. I am going to continue to eat pretty much the way I do but I think I am going to be more aware of my protein. I am not sure I am getting what I need. (I have been counting the chicken on my salad as 4oz and it is more like 2.5 to 3. For this coming week and weeks going forward my goal will be a 2.5 lb loss. That would mean by the end of the year I should be down a cool hundred or better. Now when I look at it that way then that would make me happy. To be down that much by new years. Yes that would be something.

Till next time thanks for reading!

The importance of a good breakfast

Before all this started I was that guy. Diet coke for breakfast. At times I would add a candy bar or something if I was hungry. Well initially when this started I was eating oatmeal for breakfast because it was easy. Then I switched to the egg sandwich. After nearly a month at this I came to an interesting realization yesterday. Protein and some good calories in the morning does the body good! You see on Monday I had half a cantaloupe for breakfast, now that was alot of fruit, but mostly water for a total of 2 WW pts. I ate that sometime around 7 am and by 8:30 I was starving. I could not figure it out I was hungry all day but I had such a large breakfast, I just did not get it. Then the next day I went back to my egg sammy with a touch of cheese at 7 ww pts but more importantly packed with protein and good calories. I was not hungry until abut 10:30 when I normally have a piece or 2 of fruit. Now I did not notice a change in energy but my focus was on work, not on food. Kinda silly that here I am 34 years old and I am just now learning that lesson.

Tomorrow is weigh in day. I am pretty excited I told my brother that I was shooting for 5lbs. that would push me to a total lose of 26.8 I would be very very happy with that.

I will update you tomorrow night!

Update on moving down to 44 points

As I mentioned before I went messed up and should have been on 44 points all last week, but I think it was better for me anyway as I eased into cutbacks of calories more gradually. I am please to report that I am doing fine with the 44 points so far. I figured it up and I will have to be below 310 lbs before I drop to 43 points. Hopefully things continue to go positively for a good period of time. I am also going to keep you up to date on my exercise routine, not so much to give anyone advice on exercise but to keep myself honest. I am going to be trying to get in to exercise at least 3 - 5 times a week. I will let you know how that goes along with what happens Thursday on the scales.

Before and..... not just yet

I have been asked to post a before picture and i think that would be appropriate. So I thought long and hard about a picture that probably had me at my heaviest. Then I thought what picture I could use that was not flattering at all but at the same time very funny.

This is what I came up with.

2008 Cotton Bowl Parade - Snowman Moleste!

That is one happy snowman.

Chicken Boob Tacos w/ Mango Salsa

As promised here is a delicious recipe that was most recently used at my super bowl gathering.

Chicken Boob Tacos w/ Mango Salsa

Chicken Boobs-

3 boneless skinless chicken boobs
1 tsp Curry
1 tsp Cumin
1 tsp Ground red pepper
1 tsp Salt

In a small bowl mix the spices together and set aside. In a large skillet spray cooking spray or coat with olive oil and brown the chicken boob on both sides until the chicken is about half to 3/4 done. Remove chicken from pan and dice (the smaller the better) return diced chicken to pan and add spice mix. Squeeze in some lime juice to get the spices to coat evenly. Sauté chicken until done.

Mango Jalapeno Salsa Modified from recipe on Recipezaar located here

2 cups mangoes, peeled and cubed
1/2 cup sweet kernel corn
1 lime, juiced
1 lemon, juiced
1 Roma tomatoes Seeded and diced
2 teaspoons olive oil
1 Jalapeno pepper, seeded and finely chopped
1/4 cup chopped fresh cilantro
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon pepper

If preparing in advance mix all ingredients in advance except mango. Add mango just prior to serving. (this salsa tastes great if made right before the meal as well)

Construct you tacos with flour or whole wheat tortillas and enjoy.

Good news and still kinda good news.

So I went to my second meeting last night expecting grand results. I got excellent results, but we will get to that.

When I went in for the first meeting you calculate your points and then that is how you eat. Nothing dramatic about that. So when I calculated my points I came to 51 points. I was stunned. How was I going to consume all those points? Well I went back and looked at the page where you calculate your points. At the bottom in somewhat fine print (but in bold) it says that if you exceed 44 points your daily total is 44 points. DUH! So as I went through the week I was eating at a pace of 50 - 51 points per day. Um that was a mistake. So that is the kinda good news because....

I lost 7 lbs this week. I am so excited. This is working. I am learning to say no thanks to the things that will get me off track and eat more fruits and vegetables. So this leads me to a new level of excitement as I move forward. I lost a pound a day eating more than the recommended points value. So if I cut back by 7 points per day I would expect to see the same if not better results. I think that I will be at my first goal of 375 (which I set for 4-19-08 the Missouri Football Black and Gold Game) next week. I will have to consider a new goal for that date. 350 may be a bit of a stretch but I think it is doable. What the heck. Lets shot for 350 by the Black and Gold Game.

This is a very interesting process. I definitely feel like I have made the correct choice. I considered lap band and possibly even gastric bypass but really that would have limited me to greatly I think. I am happily on a course that will allow me to indulge for an evening but put my nose back to the grindstone the next day. I know there are a few out there looking at this blog and all I can tell you is that I am extremely happy to rid of the 21.8 sack of potatoes that I was carrying around. I already feel a ton better. Oh what is must be like to be 6'3 and 200 lbs. It must be like walking on air. Some day I will walk on air to!

Boost of confidence

I am very lucky to have such a supportive family and girlfriend. They are very supportive and do what they can to keep me on track. And while I would not trade them for anything and appreciate so much what they do for me it is sometimes the comment from someone who had no idea you were trying to lead a healthier lifestyle and lose weight that really resonates with you. Today a co-worker of mine asked me if I was loosing weight. This was a few minutes after he offered me a leftover Crab Rangoon that I turned down. My response was a sheepish “I am trying”, but on the inside I was doing back flips. I was so happy that someone noticed. I know I am early in this process but it still means a lot. The reason I am doing this is to get healthy but little boosts like that along the way always mean a lot. Thanks Jeffrey.

Super Bowl at my place

Did you see that catch? It was insane!

So my extraordinarily sexy girlfriend Carrie was in town and my friends Jay and Kelly came over for the super bowl. I kinda busted but still managed to so pretty good. We had a veggie tray, Jalapeño popper dip, baked shrimp and chicken tacos with mango salsa. The dip was the killer, still weight watchers recipe but a serving size of 2 Tsp not half a cup. Oh well I didn't eat fried chicken with gravy.

So with the day gone I offer this piece of advice. If you are planing around an event such as the Super Bowl so you best to be the host. If you host then you control what is sitting out to eat. Even though I blew it yesterday I was only over by a few points, had we been at somewhere else I may have been over by many many more points.

Victory

Lets chat about willpower shall we. Generally I have had none, but I am getting better. I went this morning to grab some stuff for breakfast and picked up some Doughnut holes for my son. Now I could have had a doughnut or at least a doughnut hole but I opted to not do that. Probably a first ever for me. So I am giving a big Borat High Five to myself.

Also a quick observation. I am not having a completely difficult time doing this. I am actually having some fun with it. I am starting to feel a bit better physically, however I do notice being a bit tired while my body adjusts to the lower caloric intake. I am anxious to get to my meeting next week and see where we are at for the second WW weigh in. I have no idea where I am at and I kinda like it that way. I concentrate solely on what I am eating and trying to get 30 minutes on the recumbent bike every other day.

Tonight is the Super Bowl. I have friends coming over. This could be a total bust for the day, but we will see. I will let you know how it goes.

Success or a starting point?

So I am not sure what to do or what to make of my results for my pre-weight watchers diet. I went in a weighed for the fist time and I ended up at 385.2. Now these were 2 different scales and I was in shoes in one and not in another etc etc etc. Ok that is all fine and good but there is no way that a doctors scale and a WW scale can be that far apart. I am going to say that between my shoes and the scale that I may have been 4 lbs heavier than what WW says. Even so that is 11 lbs! Kick Ass! No one at the meeting knew it but I had just lost 11 lbs in 2 weeks. All I had done was to eat right, stop drinking Diet Coke, and drink a ton of water.

So back to the meeting first I would like to tell you that there was one other guy there. So I was not the only guy but it was us and about 20 – 25 women. Some were quite and shy other we forth coming with good advice and support. The common sense stuff I eluded to earlier was quite simple. We were talking about the upcoming Super Bowl and the parties that go along with such events. Well I think we know that grazing on chips and dip is not good. But as people who ate our way to the point where we are at it takes a bit of reinforcing. So that was discussed and some congratulations we given to some that had reached milestones. My first milestone is 10lbs and then comes 10% which will be 38lbs. I will be successful. I have no choice.

All that said I cannot tell you how much happier I am today. I lost some weight and I feel better. Mostly mental, but there is a bounce in my step and I feel ready to take on the world.

At a minimum I will be posting every week to tell you how I have done and what went right or wrong. Till next time.