kingkeld's Journal, 31 July 2013

Good morning.

So, it’s back to writing journals in Word before copying them into FatSecret. Geez, I just hate when online systems don’t work as they’re supposed to.

Anyways…

There is no change since yesterday, not in weight, not in bodyfat%. It’s EXACTLY the same.

However, as I briefly mentioned yesterday, I did have the LARGEST DROP IN WEIGHT that I have ever had from one day to the next. I was down a whopping 10 lbs – 4½ kilos.

Obviously, it’s just water fluctuations, but it really is wild to see how much this can affect things.

I almost dug into the ice cream yesterday, but I avoided it. The "Don't eat stupid s**t"-rule kicked in, and I settled for a protein smoothie. Protein powder, skim milk and frozen strawberries. It was at least as delish as any ice cream. :)

…

Today started off kinda bad, I feel.

I skipped my breakfast as always, and went for my walk, which went with no trouble. I ended the walk at the gym, and had planned to go work out. However, even at the first machine I realized that this was NOT the time. I simply did not have the strength or energy to do it.

I chose to skip, and save my energy for the day. I will go this afternoon, so I am sure to get a workout today. I have to.

Looking at my calorie intake for the last two days, I see where the issue is. I’ve had a total of 1700 calories over the two days, and I have burned just about 6100. CLEARLY, I’m too low. It goes for fat intake, carb intake and in particular protein intake.

Today, I will change that. I will make sure to eat enough, but not TOO much.

Another way I could tell that things are a little off is that I actually felt hunger this morning. Again, I think my body is telling me to eat more. I fixed this at work with a protein recovery shake. It will cost me a whopping 400 calories, but it’s a good investment, as it also gives me 50g of protein. I need this for my afternoon workout.

In a way, I feel that I not only broke my fast early, but also that I fell into the "Don't eat stupid s**t" trap, as it was a lot of calories. Then again, 50g of protein doesn't come without calories, and I feel that I needed something to fill me up. It's a heck lot better than digging into the breakfast that is served in a few minutes here at work. This I will aviod - it's basically white bread, butter and cheese. Not thanks. :)

I know that lunch will be light just as yesterday – a salad with ham added for protein – so I should have plenty of calories available.

…

I was googling to find out mor einformation about maintaining weight, and I happened upon a forum discussion about this, which I found very interesting. I haven’t read deeply into yet, but it looked like it potentially had some great pointers about it.

From what I can gather from just skimming it, they’re talking a lot about forgetting the damn weight, and focus a lot more on looks and muscle. It makes sense, though I don’t think I am mentally ready to ditch the scale. I like the scale and I feel that it makes me focus.

Then again, why not? I know my numbers and I know that I am somewhat in the right place most of the time. Maybe it IS time to at least weigh in less. I’m not sure I’d be mentally comfortable with this though. Maybe the alternative is to know how to react to the numbers.

One of the things I see from the discussions thread is that many experience that the last few lbs won’t come off even when they eat less and work out harder. You simply can’t force the body to shed weight this far into the game. The alternative is instead to eat sufficiently and do muscle training.

I was happy to read this, as this is generally what I am doing.

They are talking a lot about ditching the cardio training and going for muscle training instead. This makes sense to me. We don’t necessarily NEED to burn any kind of calorie excess as long as our body is already burning a lot of calories, and we don’t over eat.

…

This makes me think about my walks. I wonder if I am doing them right, and if they are at all necessary. I like my walks from the mental point of things. I like having an hour every day where I am in my own head space. I can use it for thinking about things, listening to music, or listening to a book. At the same time I burn some calories, and this I have always thought of as being a good thing.

But on the other hand, I do stress my legs quite a bit when I walk. I walk 5 kilometers per day, 7 days a week. I like doing this, because it makes me reach my Fitbit goals easily.

However, I ”only” burn about 300 calories doing this. Most days, I have more then 300 calories left on my RDI, and it wouldn’t make much difference weight-loss-wise.

I feel how tired especially my thighs are on an (almost) daily basis these days. As I know that muscles need a rest day between the weight lifing days to recover and rebuild, I can’t help thinking that MAYBE daily walks on top of the workouts at the gym might be counter productive. Could it be that I am actually NOT progressing because I burn out from walking before I do weights?

It’s been quite a long time since I have NOT walked before hitting the gym, especially when I go in the mornings. Maybe I should try, lay off the walk for a week, just suck up that I won’t get as great numbers on the fitbit, and see where it takes me.

…

Of course, this is a dangerous time to experiment. I have 9 days until I meet with the surgeons. I sincerely doubt that walking or not walking will make much of a difference, but at the same time I am not very keen on risking anything. The walks HAVE helped me, or so I think. Of course, I have also changed my eating habits radically at the same time, so it could well have been this too.

…

I am really eager to get all this surgery-stuff done and over with. I want to finish this.

I am so ready to be moving on to a more steady phase of maintenance.

What I have read sounds really good:

Basically, I can keep my 8-hour-window way of eating, eat real food and not dumb stuff most of the time, and work out 3-4 times per week, as long as I generally stay active. My RDI will depend on how active I generally am on a daily basis, but I don’t really need to do focused cardio exercise such as my extensive walking, unless I feel like it.

This sounds like the perfect place to be for me, honestly. I can live like that forever.

…

One of the conditions to be doing this will have to make sure my nutrients are okay. I need to make sure to get my proteins, my carbs, my fat. I saw in the beforementioned thread that there were some pretty solid calculations to this. I can’t find them right now, but I have seen them, and I will find them again. One thing I do remember that is suggested thoroughly is about 1g of protein per lb of body weight. For me, that would be about 170g, which is way more than I normally consume. Most days I am less than 100. This could maybe explain why I haven’t seen much development at the gym. I keep working the same level, and have been for about three months. A few machines have gotten heavier, but nowhere near what it used to.

I think it’s time to look at these things.

Besides, as long as I don’t go over RDI still, it should all be good, and I don’t risk a weight gain right now.

…again, this is a scary time to start messing with things. 9 days until the surgeon meeting.

Maybe the smart move would simply be to keep doing what I’m doing, and start off on the new rules after the meeting at the hospital.

This way I would also have time to prepare properly, so I know what I need to be doing.

…

As much as I like that my meals are now easier to hand doing my new way of eating, I find it very annoying if I have to focus more on carbs/protein/fat balances. I know this will be necessary if I want to stay light on my feet AND good looking, but it is SO tedious. I don’t mind the calorie counting, but the other thing feels like such a chore for me. Maybe it’s simply because I don’t know enough about it just yet. Maybe I’m too lazy and it seems to complicated? I don’t know. I just like the looseness of ”only” counting calories. To me it’s easy and obvious.

...

EDIT:
I wanted to adress one more thing today. Something I started pondering on yesterday, and something that was somewhat an eye opener for me.

I'm a "luxury" kid. I always was. What I mean is that I always want the "one better" of things. I buy a new bass guitar. I don't buy the cheapie one. I always buy something a little better, nicer, more admirable. I always pay a little more from something that I can see will be better.

I think I have always had this mentality, and what is more is that I have realized that I do that when it comes to foods too. I want the bigger piece. I want the "better" one. And I think in my world, "bigger" became "better" at some point. Probably as a child, when everyone was carefully picking the larger piece of cake. I'd be making sure I got the BIGGEST one, because it was the better one.

I think it's pretty clear that this happens in MANY things I do. I want a faster computer/smart phone. I want to be doing the latest thing. You get the point.

In my past, I would always go for the biggest ice cream. The largest bag of candy. I would get two of things where one would be enough. I would get the largest pizza.

It's strange that I never really gave this much thought or even talked about here. It never really came to me until yesterday.

Fortunately, I now see that I am changing this. I am settling for the small ice cream, when I have one. And I have them less often. I also settle for sharing a pizza. I settle for less of many things. I think this is something that can really help me stay at my goal weight. Settle. Some is good enough. I don't need to have it all.

END OF EDIT.

…

I will spend some of my quiet day reading up on things.
…

Today, I’m thankful for:
- A nice walk with a new audiobook.
- Sunshine, again.
- A good talk with the owner of the gym, even if I didn't get to work out.
- Wife.

Happy Wednesday! Life is good!

180.8 lb Lost so far: 160.9 lb.    Still to go: 0 lb.    Diet followed 100%.