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On Goals and Milestones
I've been thinking about this for a while. While on a long journey such as losing weight, we tend to look for milestones along the way to give us a sense or progress.
I have no idea what my ideal weight is. I've never really been at that weight since adulthood, so it's difficult to say. From reading charts and other online advice, I suppose 160 is probably about right as a ballpark, but I won't know until I get there.
So I'd rather concentrate on shorter-term milestones.
What's a good way to measure such milestones on this journey? Plain old pounds are too small: a day's fluid fluctuation can give or take these seemingly at random.
Whole tens are better, and they are, for me at least, quite the psychological barrier. I've been hovering just over 190 for a while now, and did the same just over 200. I'm doing better at dealing with the frustrating lack of progress, however. Soldier on: it will drop in the end. In past efforts, I'd probably have given up by now.
We British can also use Stones, which are units of 14 pounds (along with the corresponding half stone at 7lb). So at 191 lb, I'm 13 st 9 lb. 182 lb would be the 13st milestone.
My current weight puts me about halfway to 160 from where I started. 50%. That's a useful gauge of overall progress, but doesn't really help from day to day.
A good guide, if not at all easy to quantify, is clothing. I had to get a new belt a few months back. I started on the 2nd notch of the new one, am currently on the third, and will need to move to the fourth before long.
Shirts are my favourite. Most of my shirts right now are 2XL, and many are frankly starting to look a little silly on me. But some still look fine, while many of my XL shirts feel way too tight still. I have a similar problem with shorts: I have two different pairs of 38 waist which feel completely different. One has been too big for a while now, while the other I wasn't able to fit in a few months back, and are only recently starting to feel too big. Belts are amazing.
So what milestones am I aiming at right now? I'm going to say these, in order of which I should get to first:
* Below 190
* Reach 185 (which is the first weight at which BMI calculators declare me to be "overweight", rather than "obese")
* Absolutely have to get some new shorts
One last thought: it's getting cold. I'm going to be wearing jeans soon, but I haven't worn any of them since last year. It will be interesting to see how they all fit now!
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