Less of Me These Days

Not around this blog, at least not lately. I've been chatty lately. :)

I talked in the summer about how I've been exercising. Mostly jogging. And I've mentioned a couple times about how I've been eating healthier.

Well, guess what?

I've also been losing weight.

Yea me!

It started back in March. I mean, not really. I've been overweight for the better part of the last 14 years. I did lose a bunch of weight back in 2006. But generally, I've been around a certain weight for much of that time.

So I had been ignoring the scale and just assuming that I weighed the same as always. But I noticed that my clothes were getting tighter and that I was get winded by doing simple things. So I got on the scale.

And quickly got off.

Something must be wrong with scale. I must have leaning wrong or something. I tried again.

Nope. I weighed about 30 pounds more than my "usual." And my "usual" wasn't great either.

So I spent the weekend thinking about what I should do. I knew that I didn't want to do a crash diet. I also knew that whatever I did, it was going to take awhile to lose the weight. Probably at least a year.

So I decided that I would start walking 5 days a week, and eventually work up to jogging. I didn't want to rush into it and get injured, but I also wanted to make exercise become part of my (mostly) daily routine.

I decided that I would eat mostly fruits and vegetables and small portions of meat and bread. I would try to limit my sweets to a couple of bites. By just taking a couple of bites, I'd get the taste but wouldn't consume enough to derail the whole day. I would try to eat as little processed food as possible. I'd mostly do what I referred to the "Eater's Manifesto" diet - Eat Real Food. Not Too Much. Mostly Plants. But no foods are really "off limits." I just try and really watch my portion sizes.

And when I didn't feel like exercising, I'd tell myself to just do it anyway. (Unless I was injured.) Most of the time, if I could just get out the door, that would be enough to get me motivated to exercise that day.

I started eating healthier and exercising at the end of March. The weight hasn't always come off as quickly as I had hoped, but it has mostly consistently gone down. And by the end of September, 6 months in, I've now lost 55 pounds. I'm running at least 3 miles a day. Which is great. It is. However, it is only half of what I need to lose just to get to a healthy BMI for my height. (I'm uh, NOT tall. 5'3" on a good day.) And the definition of a pear shaped body? Well, they had my body in mind, that's for sure.

But yes, I've lost half of my excess weight. I'm proud of myself.

But mostly, it has been a little anti-climatic, but in a good way. I really have adopted a healthy lifestyle. It is just the way that I eat now. The way that I exercise. And generally, if I exercise and eat like this, I lose weight.

The other thing is that if I don't eat like this, I get sick. Like my stomach is killing me and my muscles hurt and it is all I can think is the pain in my gut for two days kind of sick. It makes it so it isn't all that tempting to overeat.

I'm hopeful that come April 1st, 2011, I will be at goal weight and that I'll be running at least 6-8 miles a day.

And I'll be proud of myself.

But I won't be celebrating by eating a huge slice of cake or going out for a huge meal. I'll eat the same way that day that I always do. I'll exercise. And I do the same the next day, and the next day.

Come back here tomorrow and I'll list some before and mid-point pictures.