Oinkstop - Adventures in Weight Loss

Fashion Statement

2012-01-11T05:01:00.000-08:00

Last year, when I was working my way through the Couch to 5K and Bridge to 10K programs, I managed to chafe my way through, not one, not two, but three pairs of sweat pants.

Yeah.

Okay, so I'll admit it. I am fat, and my thighs rub together when I walk or run. I guess ordinary cotton sweat pants aren't up to the task, and in a relatively short amount of time, the fabric starts to pill. Then it wears away, and eventually I end up with a hole or two in the crotch of my sweats.

At first, it wasn't a huge problem. When I was working my way through C25K, the longest run was only 30 minutes. The chafing didn't seem to be so bothersome. Unfortunately (for me) as I started doing the longer runs that approach an hour in the B210K program, the rubbing started to become really annoying.

As I started to lose a little bit of weight, my sweat pants started slopping around. Once they started slopping around, they'd drag my underwear along for the ride, and I felt like every few steps I was having to pick cotton out of my copious ass. By the time I'd finished B210K, I'd worn big holes in my third pair of sweat pants (my that last run did feel drafty) and I ended up with stinging red patches on my thighs where the outermost layer of skin had been rubbed away.

It didn't feel so bad until I'd got into the shower. Then those little stingy spots made me yelp.

It dawned on me that it was time to buy some Proper Running Clothes.

Yeah, right.

I figured the chances of anything fitting me were going to be about zero.

Still, we found the name and address of a local running specialty store, and we paid them a visit. I felt awkward and embarrassed there, because everyone in the store (customers and staff alike) were clearly fit runners. There I was, the obese middle-aged slob, trying to buy a pair of shoes, because my old ones were just about dead.

I found shoes. Then it came time for the tights. I told the guy to bring me the biggest size they stocked, and I found one style that actually fit.

I couldn't believe it. These pants were supposed to be capris, but because I'm so darn short they reached to my ankles. They were the stretchiest damn things I'd ever seen, and without too much bouncing or wiggling, they pulled up over my copious ass.

Wow, something that fits. I bought three pairs of the running tights (all they had) since I knew I'd be running commando in them and I didn't want to double-wear nasty running tights after I'd run in them once.

Commando, for my UK and OZ friends, means that one is going without underwear.

Umm, yeah.

So I realize that I'm making a serious fashion faux pas here. I am old, fat, and my ass goes on forever, so I really don't have the body for running around in public wearing stretchy running pants that don't leave anything to the imagination.

But, those pants sure are comfortable. They are stretchy, yet they provide a little bit of compression so my fat doesn't feel like it's slopping all over the place when I run. Best of all, they are made out of extremely slippery nylon and spandex, which means that my thighs (and other parts down under) aren't chafing anymore.

Still, I'm not really keen on being seen in this get up. I've been running with a sports bra and a t-shirt, which I try to pull down over my copious ass. Unfortunately, as I run, the shirt tends to ride up and my butt hangs out for all the world to see.

So, to avoid being spotted by too many commuters on their way to work, I started running in the morning, early. That worked for a while, but pretty soon I started noticing that the industrial park I have to run through to get to my favorite jogging trail is often occupied by early-morning truck drivers. These guys are driving big semis, and are mostly young and macho.

It made me want to hide.

So every morning I'd try to sneak through the industrial complex, and about half the time I'd get caught. One morning it was because a driver wanted to turn left into the driveway I was crossing. I suppose it's a good thing that he saw me, as I otherwise would have been crushed flat by his semi. The worst part?

He waved at me!

Yeah, he waved at me. I couldn't very well ignore him, as he was being courteous, so I waved back. Lucky for me, I was already red-faced and sweaty, so he couldn't see that I was blushing because I was so embarrassed. I honestly wished that the ground would have opened up a hole and swallowed me right down.

So this carried on for several mornings. I'd run through the industrial area, and I'd get caught each morning by someone different. Sometimes, it would be the semi-drivers. Other times, it would be some random guy in a pick-up truck waving and giving me the thumbs-up gesture.

The worst, though, was the young (and gorgeous) African American guy who had parked his truck in the middle of the street. He got out of his truck and was walking to the office warehouse as I huffed and puffed my way down the sidewalk. I was on the return home, so I was especially hot, red-faced and sweaty. In short, I looked ugly, fat, and out-of-breath.

What he did next, totally surprised me.

He stopped dead in his tracks, turned around and started walking back towards me. He stopped, and started clapping and shouting encouragement at me. I don't remember what it was exactly that he said, other than something like, "You are doing good momma, keep doin' what you gotta do!"

I didn't know how to respond. Dropping dead of embarrassment was at the top of my list. Instead, I mustered up a smile and thanked him (breathlessly of course) as I ran by.

And now, I figure I just don't give a shit if anyone sees my fat ass. Too bad for them if they don't like it. They can always turn and look somewhere else.

Long Time No See

2012-01-10T10:28:00.000-08:00

So I realized, recently, that I haven't touched this blog in well over a year. I'd pretty much forgotten about it, because I was so busy dealing with other things. The other things mostly consisting of things like:

The Kid, who has been downright awful. (Think out-of-control teen on steroids)
The Job, which went thermo-nuclear busy last January and continued like that for most of the year.
The Wife, who I finally got to take a solo vacation with between the Christmas and New Year's holidays.

The Diet kind of took a back seat for a while, especially since I've been fooling around for close to two years with my thyroid medications. I think I'm finally in a halfway decent spot with that, and I feel mostly human.

I didn't finish Bridge to 10K that I was writing about back at the end of 2010. Shortly after I wrote that post, I got a horrible cold, which kept me away from running for a number of weeks, and then I started with a new thyroid medication that wasn't working out very well for me until we got the dosage right. I finally did get back to the Couch to 5K and Bridge to 10K programs this year, and finished them exactly a month ago.

I can can now run four and a half miles in a single stretch, though I'm still terribly slow. Since I finished B210K, I've been running three to four days a week at distances between three and four and a half miles. Yesterday, I ran a measly two and three-quarters miles, because I took The Kid with me and she pooped out early.

As for my weight, it's been up and down. I'm about 19 pounds heavier than I was at my low in 2010, but the weight is finally trending downward again now that I'm back to running. I'll update those statistics in my sidebar later. I'm a little discouraged that I got so close to just being overweight back in 2010, but just never quite made it.

Maybe this year will be better, though to be honest, I've really stopped trying to lose weight. At this point, I'm just doing my runs three or four days a week, and we'll see where that goes. Just the fact that I can do it at all is a good thing.

So Bad Me, But Good Me

2010-12-13T11:03:00.001-08:00

So this has been kind of a good news/bad news kind of post.

The bad news is that I've been busy and I haven't been posting much on my blog. I just looked this morning and realized that it's been nearly an entire month since I've written anything. Seriously, bad me.

In my defense, I spent more than a week caring for a relative who had surgery, so it hasn't been as though I've been twiddling my thumbs and doing absolutely nothing.

On the plus side, my weight is down a few pounds from where it was a month ago. This morning's weight, after running and going to the bathroom, was 220.4. That's down four pounds since last month.

Now most people would be pretty damn unhappy with losing only four measly pounds in a month. Normally, I would be too, except for one thing: my goal for the holiday season was simply to maintain my weight.

Now I know the holiday season for most people starts with Thanksgiving, but that's not how it works in this house. The holiday season starts around the middle of October. The Kid and The Wife both have birthdays, which of course are accompanied by dinners out (The Kid always wants to go out for Mexican food, which is the worst possible thing I could eat) followed by tons of birthday cake. Next comes Halloween, and the gluttonous amounts of candy that get brought in by The Kid, even when we don't buy candy to pass out, like we did this year in deference to my diet.

My birthday comes in November, and then we have Thanksgiving. Both tend to be gluttonous feeding frenzies, and then comes December with Hanukkah and Christmas. The entire month of December seems to be one giant excuse to eat nothing but crap, so the fact that I've lost a little bit of weight with all this terrible temptation everywhere pleases me to no end.

The other exciting bit is that I am now just two pounds from being obese. Now I know most people don't see obesity as something to celebrate, but if you are on the downward trend from morbid obesity, becoming obese is an accomplishment.

I'm happy about my weight loss, too, because my doctor has changed my script for thyroid medication twice, and each time it's changed I feel like I'm thrown for a loop. Every time the dose has been increased, I've felt better, but now my labs say I'm taking too much medication, so they are dropping my dosages. With each drop, I've felt more and more out of gas, so I'm not sure things are trending exactly in the right direction.

Blah.

I'm still working my way through the Bridge to 10K program, and this week is my 17th week of running. This week's run consists of three 15-minute runs, separated by a minute of walking. I have to say that this morning's run seemed a lot harder than last week's workout of four 10-minute runs.

I did make it his morning, so I'm happy about that.

So even though I've been naughty about blogging, I've been good with weight loss, so I guess that's all good. The fact that I've lost four pounds during a period when my goal was simply to maintain makes me pretty darn happy all the way around.

Back to Where I Left Off

2010-11-15T11:51:00.001-08:00

Over the summer, I was diagnosed as having a thyroid problem. I started taking thyroid medication, and in what seemed like an instant, I dropped about 20 pounds. I was super motivated, I was back on the diet and exercise bandwagon, and the weight seemed like it was falling off.

And then, just as quickly as it started, the weight loss stopped. I've been stuck on a plateau for about two months that just wouldn't seem to break. I tried reducing my calories, increasing my calories, doing more exercise, doing less exercise, but nothing seemed to help.

Then, just as mysteriously as it started, the plateau broke, and I'm losing weight again.

At the end of October, I completed Couch to 5K. I wasn't sure that I'd be able to finish, but I did, and now I'm working on the Ease into 10K program. Although there is a Bridge to 10K program designed for folks who completed Couch to 5K, I decided to go with the longer 10K program, simply because my running speeds are so slow I figured working on shorter runs and doing them at faster speeds might help.

On Saturday, I ran for about 34 minutes. I covered just under two miles, and my average speed was 17:50/mile. Slow. The first mile I ran 17:01, which was quite a bit better, but I just started to get tired and slowed way down.

I'm still working at it. The longest run I've made was 37 minutes at an average speed of 17:43. Hopefully, I will speed up at some point.

I had originally thought that I might be able to hit a 10-minute mile before the end of the year. Now, I'm simply hoping that I'll be able to make a 15-minute mile by then.

As for my weight, I was happy to see 224.4 show up on the scale this morning. That's the lowest I've been since April 2009. Once again, I am within a stone's throw of being merely obese instead of morbidly obese.

So now, I am back to where I left off of my diet, more than a year and a half ago. I hope I will be able to stick things out this time.

I Completed Couch to 5K

2010-10-30T12:57:00.000-07:00

Well, I did it.

On Friday, I went out and did my third run of week 9, thus finishing my final week of Couch to 5K. I was surprisingly nervous about the run, even though I absolutely knew I could do it. I'd done an extra run last Saturday and went for 34 minutes, plus I'd completed the 30-minute runs on Monday and Wednesday.

I guess I was worried something bad would happen and I wouldn't graduate.

But I did. I finished my 30-minute run and all was just fine.

Of course the truth is that I'm not sure I've really graduated the program since I'm not really anywhere near running 5K at this point. This morning, I went for an extra run, and I covered 1.95 miles in 34 minutes. That's a blinding average speed of 17:38 minutes per mile. (Can you hear the sarcasm?)

On Monday, I will start the 10-week Ease into 10K program. Although I could have jumped right into the 6-week Bridge to 10K program, I figured that going with the longer program will give me a few more weeks of short intervals so I can work on increasing my speed.

At this point, I have three goals I would like to achieve:

Complete Ease into 10K and be able to run for a full 60 minutes without stopping. Unless I get sick, injured or have to repeat a week, I expect to meet this goal on January 17.
Be able to run 5 miles without stopping. Given that I can't even cover two miles within 30 minutes, I have a feeling this goal will take much longer to achieve.
Be able to run a 10-minute mile. At this point, this goal seems really far off, but it's on my radar. Right now, I can't predict when I might be able to do this, but maybe I'll have a better idea in January.

Couch to 5K - Week 9

2010-10-27T17:39:00.000-07:00

Perhaps I am being a little premature in declaring victory here, but this morning I made my second of three 30-minute runs that are scheduled for this week. I wasn't worried about completing the run this week, because I already knew I could run for 30 minutes. Last week, I was running for 25 minutes, and on Saturday I went for a "just because I feel like it" run.

Okay, well maybe the word run is a little overstating things. I'm huffing and puffing along at roughly 3.25 MPH, which is a speed most fit people could out-walk.

But I digress. I went out on Saturday and I jogged for 34 minutes. I felt like I could have gone on even longer, but my left knee was hurting intermittently during the run, and I figured discretion was the better part of valor. I kept going until I was almost home, and then I walked the rest of the way.

Yay me.

So this week's 30-minute runs haven't seemed so bad. I am fully confident that I will make Friday's run without any problems, though the weather isn't supposed to be so wonderful. The forecast is for rain, likely starting early morning. I suppose I could get up really early and try to beat the wet weather, but I don't have any reflective clothing, and I don't want to get run over by a sleepy commuter on his way to work.

So, I'll run at sunrise and hope the storm front stays away until after I run.

Knowing my luck, fat chance. I'll run anyway, and perhaps I won't stink as much if the rain washes all the sweat away.

In other news I'm within about 3 lbs of my lowest recorded weight back in 2009. Even though my weight is just a bit higher, my percentage of body fat is lower than it was around the same time. Back then, it was 48.6%. This morning, it was 47.1% That is an improvement, I guess.

I'm still discouraged that I'm not seeing more progress.

Next week, I am going to start the Ease into 10K program. Even though I'm still not able to run 5K in 30 minutes, I figure the best thing I can do is increase my workout time. The 10K training program sets a goal of running for an hour without stopping.

My personal goal is that I would like to be able to run 5 miles without stopping.

Another Wednesday, Another Run

2010-10-13T09:40:00.000-07:00

I'm still on my C25K week 7 holding pattern, so I walked for about 5 minutes, ran for 25, and staggered home. By the time I made it back to the house, I was dripping with sweat. When I wiped my face, I left a huge wet spot on my shirt. It's amazing how sweaty I get during these workouts.

I've been doing a good job sticking to my diet (counting calories mostly, while trying to keep carbohydrates and fat under control) but I'm still not seeing the losses I'd like to see. I feel like I should increase my exercise again, but I'm just so tired most of the time I don't know what else I can do.

I'm running three days a week, and walking the other four. On the days I run, I cover about two miles. On the days I walk, I'm doing about two or three miles, depending on the day. Regardless of whether I walk or run, I come home red-faced and sweaty every time.

Everybody has told me that the running should be getting easier. This is now the eighth week I've been doing it, but honestly it doesn't seem easier at all. Every morning I'm glad for having done it, but I certainly don't enjoy exercise while I am doing it. I dread going out and am relieved when it's over.

Maybe this will become more fun after I lose some more weight.

I hope so!

Slogging Along

2010-10-12T10:44:00.000-07:00

This week, I feel like I'm slogging through mud. I've been extremely tired, and I've really felt like I've had to struggle through my workouts. I've been doing Couch to 5K with an Internet buddy, and because of various things going on in her life, she's gotten a bit behind on the runs.

I'm running a holding pattern (basically repeating week 7) while she's catching up. On Monday, I walked for 5 minutes, jogged for 25, and then walked the rest of the way home. Total workout time was about 39 minutes or so, and I really struggled. I wanted to give up every step of the way, but I didn't.

This morning, we walked for 2.29 miles, and it seemed like a real struggle. I came home all hot and sweaty, even though I only averaged 2.69 MPH.

Everything is just so darn difficult. My legs are so sore that I hobble around the house like a cripple in between workouts.

Why is this so hard?

In the weight loss department, I'm slowly losing. It just seems so frustrating, though. I feel like I have been dieting forever, and I haven't made all that much progress. The bulk of the weight I've lost so far was right after I started thyroid medication, and since the beginning of September my weight hasn't really changed all that much.

I'm trying to work up to walking three miles a day on my non-running days, but most mornings I don't really have that much energy. I'm tired all the time.

Oh, and get this: the doctor I saw last week said that fatigue is not a symptom of being hypothyroid. I call bullshit.

Couch to 5K - Week 7

2010-10-05T16:33:00.000-07:00

Well it's actually hard to believe, given my history with starting and stopping exercise and diet programs, but I'm still doing the Couch to 5K program. I've completed everything to Week 7, Day 1. This means that I'm now "running" for 25 minutes at a stretch.

I put the term "running" in quotes because I'm not going very fast. It happened Monday I decided to do my run on the treadmill, and after walking my warm-up time on the "warm up" setting of the treadmill, I couldn't even keep up with the slowest "fat burn" setting.

I suck. The truth is that I can't run a whole lot faster than I can walk. It's pretty pathetic, but at least I'm making an effort.

In other areas, I have some good news and bad news.

The Good News

The good news is that I've lost 20 lbs since my last doctor's visit.

The Bad News

I'm still trying to find the right dose of thyroid medication and I continue to feel like crap. This morning I went to see my Nurse Practitioner, and she informed me that I am now hyperthyroid. Since I'm still showing many of the hypothyroid symptoms, she referred me to an MD who works in the clinic. I'm really kind of irritated about this, because I'm tired of feeling crummy and I'm tired of having to hassle with this folks week after week in a futile attempt to get my medications right.

The question I want answered is, if I am now hyperthyroid and still dieting, why haven't I seen any incredible weight loss over the past few weeks? The truth is, the 20 lbs I lost happened within the first month. My weight loss as absolutely stalled since Labor Day, so it doesn't make any sense.

I'll go see the doctor (and miss some more work, which will make me insanely popular) and we'll see what happens.

But goodness, I'm getting VERY tired of this!

Couch to 5K - Week 1

2010-08-28T12:41:00.000-07:00

Yesterday The Wife, The Kid and I finished up week one of the Couch to 5K running program.

In a word, I suck at running.

Now I'm certainly doing it, but being so old, fat, and out of shape, I probably run more slowly than a fit person could walk. I know it's completely pathetic, but I'm at least doing it, even though I feel incredibly self-conscious.

Every time a car passes me while I'm running down the street, I hold my breath. I'm waiting for the driver to roll down his window and to shout something like "Fatty!" at me.

So far, it hasn't happened, but I'm afraid it will. Last week, before we officially started Couch to 5K, I decided to run down a hill. A couple of young guys were getting into their car. As they did so, they burst out laughing.

"Are they laughing at me?" I wondered. I tried not to feel bad and I tried not to think about it.

I hate having to exercise in public, even though we are doing it in the early morning hours, when there aren't a lot of people around. I feel like everyone is staring at me, the big overweight blob that's lumping down the sidewalk.

At least this is better than exercising at a gym, where everyone except me has a slim and perfect body.

Dieting Makes Me Anti-Social

2010-08-26T11:47:00.000-07:00

This weekend, The Wife and I are going to be getting together with a former co-worker. He recently got in touch with us after probably six years of no contact, so we invited him up for a visit.

Although I will be glad to see him, there's a part of my that doesn't want to visit.

Part of me doesn't want to see him because I'm embarrassed to let someone I've lost touch with see just how enormously obese I've become. Part of me doesn't want to see him because his visit will include eating, and even though I'm perpetually on a diet, I always feel like I am being judged by what goes into my mouth.

An old high school buddy recently found me online, and I've been reluctant to visit with her for the same reason.

Last night, my father called and wanted to go out for hamburgers. I split a cheeseburger with The Kid, and still felt like a fat pig. Even though I had half a burger, two onion rings and maybe five french fries, I still felt disgusting. I had counted calories, and I was well within my limits for the day, but I felt gross.

The cheeseburger, by the way, was delicious. I just felt like I should go walk on the treadmill for two hours to make up for it.

So every time someone says, "let's go out for coffee" or "let's go out to eat," I just want to run away, find a hole and die.

It's not that I don't like hanging out with people. It's just that being on a diet (again) makes me even more self-conscious about my weight. Being on a diet makes me feel anti-social, even though I like people and I like having friends.

Dreading the Doctor

2010-08-26T11:36:00.000-07:00

Right now, I'm not actually seeing a doctor, but instead a nurse practitioner, but I thought "Dreading the Doctor" was a much better title for today's post.

Tomorrow, I'm supposed to call my NP to let her know how I am doing with respect my thyroid medications.

I am really starting to despise these weekly calls because every week the call goes the same way. I say I still feel tired, beg for an increase in dosage, explain why I think it's necessary, listen to the NP's concerns about why she thinks the dose shouldn't be increased, counter her concerns, get another script for a week's worth of medication and go to the pharmacy to pick it up.

I am tired of having these weekly conversations where I have to explain myself. My NP works for me, not the other way around. Instead of coming across like a helping professional, I'm starting to feel like my NP is a gatekeeper.

No, that's not right. She doesn't feel like a gatekeeper. She feels like my drug dealer. Every week, when I'm out of dope, I have to go crawling back to beg for more.

I hate this feeling. I hate it almost as bad as being completely exhausted and not being able to lose weight.

It's not the greatest feeling to know that I've being diagnosed with a chronic metabolic problem for which I will require medication for the rest of my life. It's even worse to have to deal with medical providers who make me feel like I have to beg for medication that I should just be able to go buy. The medical professionals should listen to me, because I have to live in my own body, not make me beg for something that I know I need.

But tomorrow, I'll suck it up and beg anyway.

Where the Hell Have You Been?

2010-08-25T13:13:00.000-07:00

Yeah, I've been AWOL since February.

Why?

I got really, really, really frustrated. I've been dieting off and on for most of my adult life, and I've been intermittently blogging on this topic since 2007. My weight has been up and down, with a low that still gave me a BMI over 40.

I've lost weight, but only if I practically starved myself. I did Cambridge Diet shakes, I've tried intermittent fasting. None of it was really bringing the weight down like I thought it should, especially considering how little I was eating.

Around January of this year, we got a Wii, and I faithfully started working out every day. I started doing 30 minutes a day, then an hour, then 90 minutes. After three months, some days I was up to doing two hours of step aerobics a day. No, I wasn't doing all two hours at a single sitting -- I broke it up into three 40-minute stretches.

But guess what? Even after all that, my weight really didn't come down all that much. After a month of really making a concerted effort at weight loss, I'd only lost three pounds. My lack of amazing progress continued, despite my good efforts, until the end of March, and then I just gave up.

Fuck it, I thought. If I was going to work that hard and eat that little and see nothing for results, I might as well give up.

And so I did. I felt like crap and I looked like crap, but I just ate what I wanted and really didn't put on that much weight. By that point, my weight was hovering pretty close to the weight I was back when I started in 2007.

I figured I just had a crappy metabolism, and way too much stress on my plate. The Kid had been acting out in some pretty horrible, terrible ways and my stress levels were sky high. I wasn't sleeping well, I'd wake up in the middle of the night feeling as if someone had turned on the adrenaline valves.

So when I went in for my annual physical back in July, I complained to my nurse practitioner that I wasn't feeling well. I was tired, I was cold, I was trying to lose weight and the weight wasn't coming off, and I'd even gained weight during times when I was really limiting calories and increasing exercise.

She looked at my chart and noticed that my thyroid values (which had been taken a year before by another doctor) indicated that I was hypothyroid. She checked my chart, and we discovered that labs taken as early as 2006 were also hypothyroid.

I have been needlessly suffering for at least four years, and probably longer.

The nurse practitioner ordered new lab work, and once we got the results, she started me on thyroid medication.

And I feel better. I don't think my dosage is quite right yet because I still feel tired. Granted, I'm not exhausted to the point of paralysis like I was, and I've got the energy to exercise without feeling completely dead afterward.

This week, I even started the couch to 5k program. The Wife, The Kid and I have gone running twice this week.

So yeah, I'm still old, grossly overweight and out of shape, but I'm giving it a try.

And since I started the thyroid medication a month ago, I've lost a bit more than 20 lbs.

I'm embarrassed to admit how much I weigh right now, though. I'll update my sidebar when I'm less disgusted with myself.

But that's why I haven't blogged.

And now I'm back.

400 Calories an Hour

2010-02-05T17:45:00.000-08:00

When The Kid gets on the Wii Fit, she's so tiny she barely burns any calories at all. I've been doing a lot of exercise, and she's been duly impressed when she sees my daily calories burned averaging above 600 each day. I've had a couple of days where I've really worked hard, and I've managed to burn over 1,000.

It's a scary thought, but I'm so fat that I burn about 400 calories in an hour on the step game.

I'm glad that I can burn so many calories, but all the exercise doesn't seem to be making much of a difference.

Yesterday was an eating day, and I gained a pound and a half overnight. I was a little disappointed to see the scales jump that much, but I had lots of energy today and was able to put in just over two hours of exercise.

I just wish my butt and stomach would start to get smaller and my clothes fit better.

But so far, I'm hanging in there. Alternate day fasting seems to be working for me.

Met My First Goal of the Year

2010-02-02T14:26:00.000-08:00

On Sunday, I met my first goal of the year. It was to weigh-in and exercise daily with my Wii Fit. I hit my goal, which I was very pleased about.

I promised myself a reward for hitting it, but now I can't think of anything I want. I guess bragging rights that I exercised daily are good enough.

Of course last month's weight loss was not all that impressive. I think I lost all of about 5 lbs.

I have two goals for February:

Exercise and weigh-in every day.
Stick to alternate day fasting until the end of the month.

The alternate day fasting seems to be working. Most of the weight I lost last month was after I started ADF.

So far, it hasn't been too bad sticking to plan on the fasting days, though yesterday was really hard. It wasn't so hard because I was hungry, but because I'd finished my can of chocolate Cambridge mix and was back to the strawberry.

Yesterday morning, I drank less than half of my shake and I simply could not stomach one more mouthful of the stuff. It was so bad I told The Wife to throw the rest of it away. I'm going to stick to chocolate from now on.

I ended up finishing up the day not with shakes, but with a small amount of grilled chicken for lunch and some baked salmon for dinner. I'm pretty sure my calorie counts were under the limit, because my weight was down this morning.

The one thing I'm noticing, though, is that I'm rapidly losing my tolerance for food that falls short of excellent. I find myself frustrated and even angry when, on my eating days, something lands on my plate that doesn't taste absolutely delicious.

Take today's lunch, for example. The Wife made a stir fry with some chicken and veggies we had on hand. We were supposed to have a better lunch, as I'd made a trip to the store, but once I got there I discovered I couldn't pay because The Wife had borrowed my credit card for something and failed to put it back in my wallet. No wallet meant no groceries, so we made due with what we had on hand.

Before I started ADF, it wouldn't have occurred to me to complain. I would have scarfed up the lunch and not given it a second thought. But today, knowing that I won't be eating tomorrow, I was really pissed off. I had to bite my tongue so as not to berate my wife for serving me anything less than delicious.

I've only been doing ADF for a bit more than a week, but already I'm noticing that it's making my profoundly demanding in my expectations for food. I've never been a picky eater (probably one of the myriad reasons I'm morbidly obese) and historically I'd pretty much eat anything you put on my plate within reason. But now, I only want excellent food. When I don't get it, I feel shortchanged and angry.

Hmm, Maybe Not

2010-01-29T14:03:00.000-08:00

Well the first couple of days of alternate day fasting were looking pretty promising, but this morning, things weren't looking so great.

I expect on my non-fasting days to see my weight go up. What I didn't expect was to see it skyrocket overnight. When I weighed in this morning, I'd gained 2.5 lbs.

That's not so good. I was especially surprised at such a big gain because I'd exercised for more than two hours yesterday. My Wii Fit estimated that I'd burned 915 calories for the day, so that should have been more than enough to offset my eating.

I guess not. I think I'll have to do this a couple of weeks before I'll be able to determine whether the overall trend is in the downward direction or not.

On January 1, I set a goal of weighing in and exercising every single day for a month. Assuming that I exercise tomorrow and Sunday, I will have achieved that goal.

I was going to give myself a reward for meeting the goal, but I can't think of anything I want.

For February, I have two goals in mind:

Continue weighing-in and exercising daily.
Stick to the alternate-day fasting regimen for the entire month.

So Far, So Good

2010-01-28T12:49:00.000-08:00

So far, the Alternate Day Fasting seems to be working. Of course I've only been at it for a few days, but the initial results seem promising. On the days that I fast, I'm down about a pound and a half. On the days I eat, I've been up roughly half a pound.

The overall trend, at least, is downward.

We'll see how I feel about it after a couple of weeks on this program.

So far, the fast days haven't been super bad. I'll admit to being hungry -- very hungry -- but it's not as bad being on straight Cambridge because I know I won't have to be hungry tomorrow. The problem with the Cambridge shakes alone is that they don't taste very good, and if you are really sticking to the diet, you know that there's no break in sight.

Even when you switch to the plans that allow food, there are many things that are still forbidden, and you still go around being a little bit hungry all of the time.

I'll have to see if the trade off of being very hungry part of the time is better than being a little hungry all of the time.

But the initial results are promising, and it seems easier to stick to than the shakes alone.

A New Approach

2010-01-27T17:28:00.000-08:00

Since the exercise alone doesn't seem to be working, and I tend to gain back weight faster than I take it off with Cambridge, I'm trying a new approach. I've decided to try alternate day fasting for a few weeks.

Alternate day fasting is just like it sounds. You fast for one day and eat normally the next. A number of studies have suggested that it might be an effective weight loss tool, as well as offering some of the health benefits offered to those who practice calorie restriction.

I'm curious if it will work for me.

I've also bumped up my exercise again. I'm now doing three 36-minute periods of exercise per day -- one before breakfast, one before lunch and one before dinner. I know that it would probably be better to exercise after my meals, but given I'm so prone to exercise-induced urticaria, I don't want to take the risk of having food in my belly. Pretty much every time I've broken out in hives is when I've exerted myself some time after a meal, so I want my stomach as empty as possible.

So far this month, I haven't had a full-blown episode of hives caused by exercise. There have been a couple of times where my scalp has started to itch and I thought I was going to break out in welts, and even a time or two where I had one bump pop up, but so far (knock on wood) I haven't had a major outbreak that's covered me from head to toe.

Believe me, there is almost nothing as bad as being covered from head to toe in welty, itchy hives. Not only does it look terrible, it itches like nobody's business, and inevitably I get welts in places I can't reach or I shouldn't scratch in public. (Think my pal Oscar)

The only cure, of course, is to take an antihistamine tablet, which gets rid of the itchy hives, but in turn sends me off to an unavoidable four-hour nap. The nap is usually a blessing, as I generally fall asleep before the hives have disappeared, but it's a real killer when it comes to trying to do anything productive.

So, we'll see how it goes.

Since Monday, I've been alternating days of Cambridge shakes with regular food, and I've lost a little bit of weight. We'll see what the end result is this Friday, and if I'm happy with my results, perhaps I'll even update my sidebar, which I haven't done in nearly a year.

Yeah, I know... Bad piggy! Bad!

Very Little Progress

2010-01-26T11:45:00.000-08:00

This morning, when I stepped on my Wii balance board, I was told that today was my 41st day using the system. We got the unit in December, but I wasn't too consistent about using it until this year. I've consistently weighed in and exercised every single day since the first of the year.

On some days, I've exercised as little as 30 minutes. Most days, I'm doing more than an hour and a half. On some days, I've exercised as much as three hours, including time spent playing Wii Fit Plus and various flavors of Dance, Dance Revolution.

And how much weight have I lost since the first of the year?

A whopping three pounds.

It hardly seems worth it. Lots of sweating, turning down foods I want to eat, and trying to do the right thing for very little results.

At this rate, it will be close to three years before I get all the weight off.

I was doing Cambridge for a few days, but I got too tired and I went back to eating. I'd lost about six or seven pounds, and turned around and gained it all back within two days. Worse, I wasn't stuffing my face full of crap. I was trying to make good food choices and to exercise even more, but it just didn't seem to matter.

So now I'm trying something different: alternate day fasting.

The idea is that you consume less than 500 calories on your fast days, and try to eat normally on the days that you are not.

We'll see if this goes any better. I am just getting so completely frustrated.

Few Results

2010-01-18T15:26:00.001-08:00

I know it's only been a couple of weeks since I started seriously exercising, but I haven't seen any results.

I've been spending sometimes as much as three hours exercising per day, and still I haven't lost an ounce.

I'm frustrated.

I'm going back on Cambridge again.

Yech!

Trying Again

2010-01-13T15:54:00.000-08:00

As of the first of the year, I've been back on a diet again.

We got a Wii for the December holidays, so we've been spending a lot of time playing the exercise-style games.

I've seriously working out since January 4th. So far, it seems like a lot of effort, a lot of starving, and very little result.

I'll let you know how it goes.

Time Goes by So Slowly

2009-10-03T12:24:00.000-07:00

Since Monday, I've been doing a modified form of Cambridge. I've been having 2-3 shakes per day and doing my best to have a very small dinner. It seems to be working, and weight is starting to come off.

The bummer is that it seems like time is going by so slowly. I'm hungry in the morning, I have my shake, I'm hungry until lunch, and then I'm hungry again until dinner time. After dinner, I'm sill hungry. I keep trying to remind myself that hunger is my friend, but it doesn't make the day go by any more quickly.

Perhaps it would be easier if I really loved my job, and I were able to get super distracted by my work. Unfortunately that doesn't help and the day just drags on and on.

I keep reminding myself that I need to focus on today, not all the tomorrows that follow. If I think about all of those tomorrows, the idea of losing weight seems enormous.

I keep reminding myself that I am just choosing for today not to eat.

And time just marches on, so slowly.

Trying to Remember Hunger is my Friend

2009-10-01T20:14:00.000-07:00

I've been doing a modified version of Cambridge this past week.

Shake for breakfast, shake for lunch, sensible (and small) dinner. I'm trying to work up my courage to go back to Sole Sourcing, where I just have the shakes for three meals a day, but it's hard.

I'm hungry, and I really hate being hungry.

I know it's good for me. I know that being hungry is a sign that I'm losing weight. I've tried practically every diet out there, and the truth is that I don't lose weight if I don't spend a good part of my day with a rumbling gut.

So I'm just trying to remember that hunger is my friend.

Being Satisfied with Nothing

2009-09-28T16:37:00.000-07:00

Back on CD again... It's hard to be satisfied with nothing.

Ah, Meh!

2009-09-14T15:05:00.000-07:00

Meh.

I'm trying to get motivated and get back on the diet, but I'm having a really hard time. This weekend, The Neighbors held a birthday party, and we attended. There was Mexican food, cake, and plenty of alcohol for the adults.

I consumed more than my fair share of jello shots, though I don't feel particularly guilty about it, especially since it was my jello and my liquor that made them.

I had quite a few, but I didn't have as many as I could have. I never got particularly drunk (unlike some of the other party-goers) and didn't have a hangover in the morning.

Today, at least for breakfast and lunch, I was back to the Cambridge shakes. The Wife made my lunch seem especially unpleasant because she brought her meal (an Asian noodle bowl of some sort) into our office. She sat at her desk, slurping and smacking her noodles, while I stared at my already-empty shake cup.

And man I don't care what anybody says, those Cambridge shakes are not good. The strawberry ones are downright bad, while the vanilla and chocolate are tolerable.

I know I should go back on sole source. I know I should lose this weight because it's good for me. I'm just having a really hard time caring right now.

Trying to Get Back on Track

2009-09-11T11:45:00.000-07:00

I've been trying to get back on track with my diet, but so far I haven't seen any results. This week, I quit eating breakfast and lunch, replacing them with Cambridge shakes, but so far, no loss.

I guess I shouldn't expect much, as I've really come to the conclusion that to lose much in the way of weight I simply have to starve.

I'm trying to get motivated to go back on Sole Source, but the idea seems so depressing. The idea of nothing but shakes for breakfast, lunch and dinner seems really awful right now.

I think the bigger problem with my motivation is that things with The Kid have taken over everything in my life. Although we've had a good couple of weeks since her last tantrum, it's hard knowing that another is likely around the corner.

So I just keep on keeping on, but my discouraged mood is affecting everything. I'm tired of The Kid, I'm squabbling constantly with The Wife, and I dread every morning that I have to get up and work at The Job. I'm tempted to run away from home, but knowing that I'm the main breadwinner, that makes for a difficult proposition.

It's Hard to Care When...

2009-09-09T11:25:00.000-07:00

...everything in your life is rapidly going down the crapper.

For at least six months, we've been dealing with increasing drama on the part of The Kid. Although the past week has been really good, over the past few months we've had more bad days than good, more lousy weeks than bad. Things came to a head late Spring when The Kid decided that the way to cope with frustration was to physically assault her parents to the point of leaving bruises.

It's not a pretty situation. Two weeks ago, The Kid had an especially ugly outburst, where The Wife and I ended up locking ourselves in a back room while The Kid had her tantrum. The next morning, The Kid was at it again, and after two and a half hours of raging, threats, and a verbal assault that wouldn't quit, I finally walked across the room and slapped my kid right on the face.

Yeah, I slapped my own kid.

I don't generally agree that hitting children has any lasting benefit, so The Wife and I have made it a point not to use physical discipline. This was the first time I've ever hit The Kid. Though it didn't feel good to do it, I will admit that it put an abrupt end to the morning-long temper tantrum.

Now before my critics go off on me for not being strict enough, it's probably worth mentioning that The Wife and I haven't had the benefit of raising The Kid since infancy. She came to us, a few years ago, as an angry pre-teen. She was abused and neglected by her first family, so she didn't come with a clean slate. The Kid carries around a lot of baggage, and though she's been seeing a therapist off and on since she first came to our home, I don't think it's done a great deal of good.

In addition to things being in the toilet with The Kid, things with The Job aren't much better. I'm frustrated with the terms and conditions set by my current employer. I rarely get time off, when it do it's on short notice, and I'm often been called back from my days off to work. I get calls evenings, weekends, and holidays, and it's frustrating. Last year, The Wife and I finally got married, and my boss called me on my honeymoon and asked me to work. I was gone for two days and he called insisting I work on a project while I was out. Fortunately, I refused, because the "little task" he wanted done took an entire day to complete.

I want a life that exists outside of my job, but it seems that what I do to make a living doesn't lend itself to having a life.

So I'm tired, I'm frustrated, and even The Wife and I are squabbling. As a result, I have had a really hard time caring about my diet.

A lot of dieters will say that "nothing tastes as good as being skinny feels," but I'm having a hard time believing it. Although I've put on about 20 lbs since I quit dieting in April, I don't feel any different. When I lost the 20 lbs, I pleased my doctor, but I didn't really notice any difference myself. I didn't feel better, I didn't sleep better, my clothes weren't noticeably looser, and I didn't have any more energy.

Just like everyone, I read all the gloom and doom stuff about the dangers of obesity, so I know I should lose the weight. Even though I know this intellectually, I'm just having a hard time caring right now.

Frankly, a big fat steak or an ice cream bar tastes a lot better than how I felt 20 lbs lighter. And, if nothing else, that steak is a delicious distraction from the otherwise unbearable horror known as my life.

That being said, I've quit eating breakfast and lunch and I'm back to drinking the Cambridge shakes twice a day. If I can get a little more motivated, perhaps I'll go back to sole sourcing it for a while.

But it's been really hard to care about my diet when everything else is going so profoundly wrong.

More Dead Than Alive

2009-09-08T14:06:00.000-07:00

Well my diet progress came to a screeching halt back in April.

The Kid has been acting out in ways that are almost too incredible to believe. She's now just a month shy of her 14th birthday, and has decided that hitting, kicking and making threats of great bodily harm is an okay way to behave towards her parents.

Since we've been dealing with The Kid's increasing drama over the past six months or so, The Diet has definitely taken the back seat on my priority list.

This has been, without question, one of the worst summers of my life. We weren't able to take a vacation this year for a variety of reasons, including a lack of money, very little vacation time, and The Kid's absolutely horrible behavior. I feel like I'm watching my life turn into a never-ending soap opera of horrors.

At the moment, I'm going through the motions of my existence more dead than alive, but I am still here, and I'm going to try and get back the ground I lost over the past few months.

Day 79 - Swine Flu

2009-04-30T13:50:00.000-07:00

No, I do not have the swine flu.

Despite my rather creative name, Oinkstop, I do not have anything particularly porcine around my home. I do not collect pig memorabilia, nor do I raise them.

What I do seem to have is a case of gum flu.

I've been busy chomping away on a lot of chewing gum.

Well, by most people's standards, it's probably not much. I've only been using one serving per day, but I've been chewing and chewing and chewing. I chew until my jaw is tired and I have to stop.

But it's helping keep me out of temptation. By the time I give up one the gum for the day, my jaw is so tired that I don't really feel like eating anything.

But I guess it's helping. I've managed to stick to Cambridge shakes with nothing else since Monday.

Of course I found out today that I have to go to the neighbor's house for a birthday party on Saturday. I'm wondering how I'll manage to avoid the cake, the treats, and especially the beer. I've been told our host is planning Jello shooters, and I think that will be incredibly hard to resist.

We'll see how it goes. Maybe I'll just have to be honest with myself, since I know I probably won't be able to resist.

I keep telling myself even five or six good days out of seven isn't so bad. It's certainly better than seven out of seven days of bad eating.

Day 78 - Keep Going

2009-04-29T11:59:00.000-07:00

Today is the third day back on the Cambridge Diet after being off while my MIL was visiting. I imagine that my weight is dropping, but I've been avoiding the scale like the plague. I'm going to give things a couple of weeks before I dare step back on, only because I'm sure I've gained and I just don't want to know the damage.

I'd rather stick to the diet for a week or two, step on the scale and say, "nice, I'm the same weight I was before I went off!"

I know, I'm deluding myself, but what the hell.

I've learned, because I've taken several "diet vacations" along the way that I'm always in for a not-so-wonderful surprise on the third day back on Cambridge. It seems the third day is marked by repeated trips to the bathroom while my colon rebels against the change in diet.

Of course after I spend the day crapping my brains out, I feel much lighter.

So, onward day three!

Day 76 - Back on Track

2009-04-27T10:43:00.000-07:00

Well I never did make my goal before my MIL came, and we ate like pigs while she was here. The good news is that she didn't nag me about my weight, which was nice.

I'm avoiding the scales at the moment, because I just don't want to know the total damage I've done. I'm sure it's bad, because I've been hungry like crazy. So, I'm back on the shakes again, and I'll stick to it for a couple of weeks before I give myself the bad news.

Maybe it won't be that bad, but I don't want to know.

At any rate, I don't feel any difference in my clothing, but then I didn't notice much difference even when I was losing weight.

I'm going to have to really stick with the program, though, because I'm going to have to schedule my annual visit with my doctor, and I'm sure she will nag me about my weight.

Day 63 - Ow, ow, ow!

2009-04-14T07:56:00.000-07:00

So this morning I'm hobbling around my house like I've been crippled.

Over the weekend, The Wife and I decided to plant a vegetable garden, and it involved much digging, bending, and crawling around in the dirt. It also involved running to our local home improvement store to buy paving stones. We bought about 70 of them, and had to carry each one from the driveway into the back yard.

While other people were enjoying fancy Easter dinners, I was busy digging in the back yard.

We started just before 8:00 AM and didn't finish until at least 5:00 PM, and we didn't really stop for lunch. We took a few rest breaks, but basically we were on our feet for the entire day.

The scary part is that we only got about half the yard done. We'll have to go back to the store and buy more stones to finish.

I went off Cambridge for the weekend because I knew I'd need the extra energy. Even with all the extra exercise, it didn't help my weight at all. My weight popped up yet again, and now I'm about 10 lbs higher than my low weight from a week ago.

I'm sure most of it is water weight gain, and I'm back on the shakes as of yesterday morning.

But boy I am sore. Even my muscles have sore muscles!

Day 62 - Motivation for Loosing Weight

2009-04-13T07:40:00.000-07:00

Last weekend, The Kid has had a friend visiting for a sleep over. The Kid is 13, and The Friend is 12. On Saturday morning, the two of them went outside and started kicking a soccer ball around in the backyard.

Just watching them made me tired. Really tired.

So then I started thinking about all the reasons why I should lose weight.

Some of them, are pretty obvious, and really are less about my reasons for wanting the weight off. It's the stuff like better health, a longer life, and all the good stuff that the ubiquitous "they" have to say about why people should lose weight.

When I started thinking about the reasons that I want to lose the weight, I thought about a number of reasons, but then just as quickly realized that a lot of those reasons aren't important to me. Here's the list:

Reason to Lose Weight	My Response
I'll look better.	I don't care
I'll feel better.	Will I?
My clothes fit better.	I don't care about clothing, and I hate shopping
I'll be able to buy clothes at regular stores instead of buying fat clothes at a specialty shop.	It would be nice, but it's not a huge motivator, even though I'll probably save money.
People might find me more attractive.	So what? I'm already married.
I might live longer.	Maybe, maybe not.
I won't have to lift up my fat stomach to wash underneath.	Good reason.

I guess the real truth is that my motivation doesn't really come from any of the typical reasons people want to lose weight. Mostly, it's just I'm tired of being fat, and I'm sick of my fat being in my way. I don't like how it feels when I try to tie my shoes, or the fact that I have to pick up my breasts and my stomach to wash underneath.

At my heaviest, it was starting to get hard to twist around to wipe my ass.

I know, TMI, but that's the honest truth.

I really don't care so much about what people think of me, and I doubt once I've lost the weight that anybody will think I'm attractive. I don't even think I'll feel better about myself.

It's just the fat is getting in my way, and that's why it needs to go.

Day 61 - Comment from Anonymous

2009-04-12T08:13:00.000-07:00

On Thursday, I got an anonymous comment that's been weighing on my mind. It was written in response to my post Deciding Day by Day.

I'm going to post it here, in entirety, along with my response.

I don't have a blog so that's why I am anonymous. Nothing sinister.

Here's something I learned (and it was true) about losing weight.

Every time you drink a shake you are teaching your metabolism "Look, this is all you are getting today." And your metabolism says, "Well, I'm not happy about it so I'll dip into your fat cells and use some of those for energy."

In my experience, the only way I'm going to lose weight is to do exactly that. I've tried counting calories, Weight Watchers, you name it, and the only thing that I've found that works is to drastically reduce the number of calories I consume. I'm not sure that it's possible to eat a nutritionally balanced diet with real food if you are eating less than 1,000 calories per day, and that's exactly where I have to go in order to get any weight to come off.

Then, when you eat what you want to eat, your metabolism says, "Damn, man! You mean I don't have to work today and eat fat cells? Hot Dog! (pun intended)"

You have to either decide to be on Cambridge the rest of your life or learn how to eat what you KNOW you should be eating.

It may very well be that I'll have to use Cambridge products, or something similar, to keep the weight off. I fully expect, given my past experience with dieting and weight loss, that I'm going to have to work very, very hard to keep the weight off.

Otherwise, you are just shocking your metabolism on a regular basis and it just freaks out.

I agree I need to do a better job of sticking to my diet. I'm sure it will be easier once the MIL comes and goes. I expect that the rest of the summer will be mostly free of family gatherings, which are the biggest temptation when it comes to food.

It's not really the food that shows the pounds on the scale the next day ... because you know in your heart that if you eat a slice of pizza for dinner that it's impossible to show on the scale the next day.

The increase or decrease of poundage on the scale is only the result of what you ate 3-4 days earlier.

It is scientifically impossible to eat a piece of pizza for breakfast and show it as a true weight gain at lunch.

The only way this is true is that the pizza clearly has salt in it ... salt that you have removed from your diet. Salt has an immediate affect on the body's system, causing it to retain fluids.

If you ask any nutritionist, (as I did) you will discover that weight gain is not an immediate result of the [name food here] you ate for lunch.

I have been meaning to tell you this for a while.

I know this, and I don't believe that the fluctuations I'm seeing on the scale represent a "real" weight gain. I know it's scientifically impossible to put on 7 lbs of fat overnight, even if I did eat an entire box of cookies. I know about diet math, and the fact that 1 lb of fat is equal to 3,500 calories.

Bottom line ... I don't care if you use the Cambridge diet for 365 days with no cheating. The very second you go off it you are retraining your metabolism to stop working so hard to chew up those fat cells. And now you have to teach your metabolism to slow down. And you end up with hunger pains because you're giving it more food (instead of the drink) and it had been used to not having anything substantial for 365 days.

While I agree that going directly from Cambridge Diet to eating everything I want to eat would result in the described weight gain, I know of plenty of people who have not regained the weight. They don't quit the diet cold turkey, instead they gradually add in healthy foods while increasing their activity level as well.

It's a prescription for disaster. You will eventually gain it all back and then hate yourself even more.

I respectfully disagree. I don't think it's a prescription for disaster, and I don't believe that gaining it all back is inevitable.

And you're not being fair to yourself because you think you are trying to do the right thing with the Cambridge diet.

But you're freaking human. You gotta eat real food. You just have to work on your brain and tell yourself you can control food urges.

I've been reading your blog a long time. I think you are too hard on yourself

I don't think I'm being unfair to myself. I've come to realize that as hard as I've tried, I don't lose weight on conventional diets. It's easier to stick to a plan of less than 1,000 calories by doing the shakes than it is eating conventional foods.

Maybe I won't make it. But if I don't at least try, I haven't given myself the opportunity to fail.

I've decided that this is the last diet I'm ever doing. If it doesn't work out, then I'll just die fat.

And although that's an undesirable result, I'm not going to hate myself for it.

Day 60 - Inching Along

2009-04-11T08:15:00.000-07:00

Yesterday morning, I did my weekly weigh-in and I whipped out the good ol' tape measure.

The results were pretty discouraging, actually. My weight was up (still haven't lost all of the 7 lbs I gained overnight when I ate those cookies) from the week prior.

I've been dieting for two months now.

My body fat has gone from 50.0% to 48.6%. Statistically speaking, it's almost nothing.

What's even more discouraging is that even though my weight this week is down from where it was a month ago, some of my body measurements are actually bigger than they were a month ago.

Hips: Increased 0.5"
Waist: Decreased 1.0"
Bust: Increased 0.5"
Neck: Decreased 1.0"
Arm: Increased 0.75"
Thigh: Decreased 0.75"

Measurements are supposed to get smaller not larger!

Can I just go and scream now?

I've been taking pictures every month as well, and the truth is I can't see much difference between my "before" pictures, and the ones I shot this week. I'm still an enormous, lumbering elephant.

I'm gonna keep going, but I have to say I'm getting really darn discouraged!

Day 59 - Wondering What It Will Be Like

2009-04-10T08:00:00.000-07:00

For quite some time, I've been wondering what it will be like when I'm finally back down into a normal, healthy weight range. When I close my eyes and try to imagine what it might be like, I draw a big, black, fuzzy blank.

It's not because I'm being pessimistic. I know I'll get there eventually. It's just that I simply can't imagine what my body will feel like when it's thin.

For most of my life, I've been somewhat on the pudgy side. I was more or less in shape (mostly less) during my high school and college years, and ever since I've ballooned in weight. High school and college are now more than 20 years past, and I have a very hard time remembering what I felt like during those times.

I can remember, during the one time in college where I truly was thin. I remember being surprised that clothing fit, and finding that clothing that I picked off the rack was actually too large.

But I can't remember what it felt like to sit, or move around. I just can't recall that at all.

Now, I look at my body and everything sags, especially my stomach. I wonder if I'll ever have a tummy that doesn't have to be lifted out of the way to care for my undercarriage. I'd like to hope that, even if my stomach is saggy, I won't have to keep lifting it, but I don't know. I'd like to hope that my body will shrink back to a normal look and that I won't have to keep lifting saggy bits of skin out of the way to wash.

But maybe I won't shrink. Maybe I'll end up looking like a deflated balloon when it's all over.

I don't know. I guess for now I'll keep wondering what it will be like. One day, I guess, I'll find out.

Day 58 - Deciding Day by Day

2009-04-09T08:00:00.000-07:00

I have to admit that sticking to the Cambridge Diet is not always easy. Sometimes it is easy. I don't have to think about what I'm going to eat, ever. I just mix up a shake, chug it down, and it's over.

But sometimes, it's really hard, especially when The Wife or The Kid are eating something especially nice.

Last night, The Wife asked me if I wanted to join her and The Kid for dinner. She was serving Hamburger Helper and vegetables. They've been eating quite a lot of the stuff since I've been dieting, so I wasn't really tempted. Honestly, I don't like it all that much.

But last night, I was tempted. So allowed myself to consider the possibility of joining them. I imagined how the dinner would taste, how it would feel in my mouth, and the consequences of what I'd see on the scale in the morning.

Suddenly, it didn't seem all that worthwhile. I decided to have a shake instead.

What I've realized is that I decide what goes into my mouth, day by day. Sometimes, when things are hard, I have to make the decision hour by hour, or even minute by minute.

But really, I am the one that's in control here. I can decide to have a shake, or go out and have pizza if that's what I really want.

So I get to decide, at various points along the way, if I want to stick to the shakes or break the diet.

And that's okay, because I won't have to have these shakes forever, and I don't necessarily have to stick to it every single day in order to lose weight. The more days I stick, and the longer I do it, the more weight I'll lose, so there's certainly an incentive to keep going.

But deciding to give myself a break, as long as I'm on track more than I'm off, is okay. I'll get to the end eventually.

Day 57 - Note to Self

2009-04-08T10:31:00.000-07:00

Important Note to Self: When really craving for a single vanilla ice cream bar dipped in chocolate, just go out and buy the damn ice cream instead of eating an entire box of Girl Scout Samoas hoping that will satisfy the craving.

Yeah.

I gained seven pounds overnight from that little episode.

Well, I think this blows it as far as being able to get to my goal of being merely obese before my MIL arrives on April 17.

But that's okay. I'll get there, eventually.

And no for those who are asking, I don't feel guilty about it. The Samoas were pretty tasty. It's a good thing the Girl Scouts are getting stingy, though. There are fewer cookies in each box and the cookies seemed to be smaller this year. So, I guess they did me a favor, in a round-about way.

The stress around chez Oinkstop at the moment is pretty high. We have an influx of relatives flying in soon, and all of them are expecting to stay with us. Worse, none of them want to rent a car, so it means we'll have to be driving two cars and shuttling everyone everywhere. The Wife isn't working right now, so we've had to make a lot of cuts. The added expense of food and gas is making me worry.

Although I'll be glad to see the relatives, there's a part of me that wishes they weren't coming right now. They'll only be here for five days, but because of poor planning on their parts, we are going to have to make five trips to the airport (located ever-so-conveniently an hour away) because nobody is coming in or leaving on the same day.

Normally, I'd be mildly annoyed at the extra driving, but because The Wife isn't working and our income has been cut by half, I'm really scared.

Day 51 - The Weight Just Keeps on Droppin'

2009-04-02T10:07:00.000-07:00

This morning's scale-hopping adventure: 227.2 lbs

Woot!

I like that. Again, I know I shouldn't be getting on the scale every five minutes, but when the numbers are going so well, I like it.

When I know I'm doing well, I like the confirmation. When I know I'm not (like when I had pizza for dinner, or some other such rottenness) it's much easier not to step on the scale until enough time has passed until I know I've likely burned off the disasterous food.

I'm hoping that my super-fast weight loss will continue. Only 15 days until my MIL arrives.

Only 9.2 lbs until I'm merely obese. I wonder if I have any prayer of making it by the time my MIL shows up.

Day 50 - Breaking a Barrier

2009-04-01T09:24:00.000-07:00

I've been really trying to resist my habit of scale-hopping, but the truth is, I just can't help myself. The scale sits there on the bathroom floor, staring at me, and I just can't resist. Some days, I'll jump on it 3 or 4 times.

I know, bad me.

This morning, my scale hopping made me very happy. I've broken a new barrier, and I weighed 229.0 lbs this morning. Of course today isn't my official weigh-in day, but it makes me happy nonetheless to know that my diet holiday didn't ruin things too badly.

I can't remember when I last weighed in the 220's, so this is a good thing.

Now, all I have to so is lose 11 more lbs and then I'll just be obese instead of morbidly obese.

I've been doing a pretty good job of sticking to just shakes since the beginning of the week, and I know it's making a difference. It's difficult, but my motivation, at least for the moment, is high.

With the exception of my Deaf buddy, who knows I am on a diet, nobody has noticed I've lost any weight. Yesterday, a friend stopped by the house, and I expected she, of all people, would notice. This particular friend had a heart attack a few years ago, and has become very health-conscious. Anyway, I haven't seen her in a month or two, so I figured she would notice I'd lost a few pounds.

Not a word. Pretty discouraging when I realize I've lost 28 lbs from my highest weight.

Of course I guess if I am not noticing the weight loss, nobody else is likely to notice either.

Day 49 - What Should I Blog About Today?

2009-03-31T16:54:00.000-07:00

I considered not writing this morning because I really couldn't come up with anything diet-related that I wanted to talk about.

Sure, there's lots of stuff I could say, but mostly it would be repetitive griping. You know, the usual stuff like I'm tired, I feel grumpy, and I'm starting to get cold. Nothing positive there, so I feel like I should just shut up about it already.

Or, I could talk about stuff in the TMI (Too Much Information) category. I could share that during my diet vacation I became very constipated, but this morning I had an amazing case of the Atomic Butt Blasts and it wouldn't surprise me at all if I crapped out at least 10 lbs!

Well maybe not 10 lbs, but I'd definitely believe 3 lbs. It's happened before!

I suppose I could perseverate on the fact that my MIL is coming in for a visit in 17 days, and I'm hoping that I'll be able to get my weight down to 218 lbs by the time she arrives. If I can, I'll no longer be morbidly obese. Instead, I'll just be plain old obese, which is definitely better than being morbid.

Why is it they have to come up with such depressing names for fat people, anyway? Why don't they come up with nicer names that don't sound so terrible.

Here's the new names I propose:

Old Name	New Name
Overweight	Large
Obese	Mongo
Morbidly Obese	Pachydermal
Super Obese	Cetacean

I mean really, don't you think that it would sound just a bit nicer if someone said, "Hey check out that cetacean woman over there!" Doesn't that just sound nicer than "Hey, check out that super-obese woman over there!"

Well, maybe the truth is that none of it sounds nice, and that's why we should all lose weight.

Day 48 - Back on Track

2009-03-30T11:33:00.000-07:00

I haven't blogged in a bit more than a week because I got to the point where I was feeling so lousy that I just couldn't take it any more.

So, I went on a diet vacation for a week. Now I'm back on track and feeling better. I'm back to sticking to my Cambridge Diet shakes and nothing else for at least a week. We'll see how things go after that.

After a break from the shakes, they actually taste a bit better. For a while there, they were tasting so bad I would gag every time I tried to have one.

I think the break was just what I needed. I hope I can stick to it, because now I have a bit less than three weeks before my MIL comes to visit. I'm hoping by the time she gets here, I'll have lost enough weight that she'll notice.

I'm sure my diet vacation didn't help, but I think if I hadn't taken it, I'd have decided to quit, permanently, by now.

And no, I don't feel the slightest bit guilty, even though I'm sure I put on a few pounds. I'm not sure what the total damage is because my scale is giving me odd readings, so I'm not going to step on the scale again until Friday.

We'll see how it goes.

Day 40 - Tired of Being Tired

2009-03-22T10:46:00.000-07:00

Before I started Cambridge Diet, I seemed to have a big problem with being tired all of the time. I just never had any energy, and even my daily chores seemed like a big effort. I thought perhaps my problem was being too fat, and not getting enough exercise. I started to cut down on the food, and we started walking as a family, but that left me even more worn out.

So I started Cambridge. I've heard many people say that when they started to lose the weight, their energy started to pop.

Well guess what?

I still don't have any energy.

I suspect it's hard to have much in the way of energy, given that three shakes only amount to 420 calories. That's barely enough juice to keep the lights on, let alone have extra energy for exercise or anything else.

But I'm hanging in.

And although yesterday's post was pretty illiterate since I was so wiped out, I've realized that food and hunger really are my two biggest enemies. Food is my enemy because I want to eat it, and hunger is my enemy because it gives me the desire to eat food.

And food is also my enemy because when I eat it, I gain weight.

I ate dinner on Friday and some food on Saturday, and even though I did make an effort to keep portion sizes down, I still managed to gain two pounds since Friday morning.

I'm not terribly worried about, because I know a couple days of sole sourcing will get rid of it. It's still discouraging to see that weight pop back on so quickly, even when I try to make good food choices.

Even when I make bad food choices, I'm still eating far less than I used to, but that doesn't seem to make a difference, either.

There's no doubt that dieting is hard, and this diet is especially so. I'm just going to keep going for as long as I can. I still have about 2.5 months of shakes left, so I'm going to keep at it until they are gone.

After that, a lot will depend on our finances and whether or not The Wife has found a new job by then.

Day 39 - Food and Hunger are the Enemies

2009-03-21T10:17:00.000-07:00

As of yesterday, I'd done a pretty darn good job of sticking to just the shakes 100%. I not only knocked off the weight I'd gained on the bus trip, I lost a few more pounds, besides.

But I've realized that I just can't stick to a 100% shake diet for more than about five days at a time. By Friday afternoon, I was feeling sick. I was hungry and nauseated at the same time. Friday morning, I couldn't get down my entire shake. I had to put half of it in the fridge and try again several hours later. I was too queasy to drink my afternoon shake until about 3:00 PM.

I'd also been having diarrhea for several days, and my poor rear end was getting pretty sore form all the wiping. In fact, I'd wiped so much that I'd given myself a nastly toilet paper abrasion on my poor behind! (I know, too much information, but I'm just telling it like it is)

Anyway, there's nothing more depressing when you know you've wiped your rear so much that you are bleeding.

By dinner time, I felt terrible. I took a hot shower and felt so lightheaded that I thought I might pass out. I slipped into my pajamas, and had a rest on the best. My stomach gurgled and growled. I wasn't sure if I'd be sick to my stomach, or if I was going to have to spend some more time sitting on the commode.

Finally, The Wife came in to check on me. "You look terrible," she said. "You really should eat something."

She was right. I did feel terrible, and by that point I was just too hungry and nauseated to care. She went out and got KFC.

I ended up gobbling down three pieces of chicken. As soon as I did, I felt enormously better. I also had one biscuit (instead of my usual two), some mixed veggies (as prepared by the wife with no butter), only some of the mashed potatoes (instead of my usual double helping) and about three sporkfuls of macaroni salad. I stopped eating when I was full, and had two cookies for dessert.

The food tasted good, and I felt so much better afterwards. I went to bed, for the first time in what seemed like ages, with a full belly.

I don't feel in the slightest bit guilty, because I was honestly feeling quite ill. Weight is up this morning about 1.8 lbs from yesterday, though.

I think I'm going to have to start making a habit of adding regular food to my regimen of shakes. Too many days of shakes alone just leaves me feeling terrible.

Day 38 - Changing My Weigh-In Day

2009-03-20T07:52:00.000-07:00

Well, I've decided to do it. I'm changing my "official" weigh-in day from Wednesday to Friday, simply because I know I'll show better losses on Friday than I will on any other day of the week. I'm much better at sticking to the diet during the week than I am on the weekends.

So this morning's weigh-in put me at 230.2 lbs. That's down 3 lbs since Wednesday, and 4.2 lbs from the week before.

Just a tiny bit more, and I'll be in the 220s, which will be a nice little progress marker. As of this morning, I'm only 12.2 lbs away from being merely obese instead of morbidly obese.

Whoopee!

Last night I was really struggling with hunger. It seems to really hit me at bedtime. I find myself struggling to fall asleep because my stomach is busy growling and yelling that it would like some food. I know it might help to take my evening shake a little later, but by dinner time I'm starving too. Yesterday was just an all-around hungry day, but I didn't give in. I just stuck to the shakes.

I sure hope this gets easier, but if I keep going at the rate I'm going, I'll definitely be down into the obese range by the time my Mother-in-Law visits in April. I hope she notices all the weight loss.

Day 37 - Cheating the Scale

2009-03-19T13:23:00.000-07:00

I've been thinking about changing my weigh-in day from Wednesday to Friday, simply because my weight is always better on Friday.

I'll be honest, I'm not doing 100% Sole Source Cambridge Diet anyway, and on the weekends I tend to eat a bit more. Sometimes, my weight pops up over the weekend, and it doesn't always come off by my Wednesday weigh-in.

Not that it really matters, because I obsessively weigh myself several times a day.

I know you shouldn't do that, but I feel like it keeps me honest. If I go out and have Mexican food, I pretty much have instant feedback on the damage I've done and how much work I need to do to correct it.

So, I'm thinking of moving my weigh-in to Friday.

The Wife and I have had a fun morning. (Translation, not fun)

We found out that someone is out there frauding on our credit card, and so far they've run up almost $2000 in purchases. We've called the credit card company, we've reported the fraud, and they've sent us new credit cards. The worst is that they won't remove the charges until the statement cuts, so I'm worried the card will end up going over limit and we'll be hit with even more problems.

Of course the worst was when the credit card company didn't believe it was us calling. They actually made us go into our local bank and have the manager call and visually verify we were who we said we were.

Crazy.

Day 36 - Weigh In Blahs

2009-03-18T07:57:00.000-07:00

Well this week I didn't do quite as well as I've done in previous weeks. My weight this morning was 233.2 lbs, down only 1.2 lbs from last week.

It's not totally surprising, given that I went off the diet for the school bus trip, and I had trouble getting back on program the following day. I suspect my results would have been better had I not agreed to go out to lunch yesterday, but my mother was in town, and I still don't want her to know I'm dieting.

So, I guess I should be happy about the 1.2 lbs loss.

Right now, my overarching concern isn't really my diet at all. I'm very worried about our money situation now that The Wife's job is suddenly ending. We'll be okay, but it's pretty scary to think that our business' gross income will drop almost by half.

I still have a job, which is good, but I'm scared it could be me next!

Day 35 - More Stuff to Worry About

2009-03-17T15:39:00.001-07:00

Well, as if I didn't already have enough stuff to worry about...

The Wife just got word that she's losing her contract as of the end of the month.

I guess I'm glad I bought a three month supply of Cambridge Diet. At least that's covered.

Ah damn...

Day 34 - Sick of Shakes

2009-03-16T12:25:00.000-07:00

Since my last weigh-in, I've been really struggling with the diet because I've come to a point where I'm really sick of shakes. I know that's kind of stupid, since I just bought three cases (a three-month supply) of the stuff, and I know it's in my best interest to stick with it.

But just because something is in my best interest doesn't mean that it's easy to do.

Because, really, I'm just sick of shakes. I want real food, with a real taste, and I want it every day, not just on the designated food days I set out for myself.

I know this feeling will pass. I know that it will get easier. But right now, today, at this very moment, if I never saw another Cambridge shake, I wouldn't miss it.

Day 33 - Worried About the Future

2009-03-15T10:28:00.000-07:00

On Friday, The Wife and I spent about 13 hours chaperoning a school field trip for our daughter's school. It was a long day. We spent 3 hours on a bus, each way, plus 3 hours walking around a museum, and the rest of the time was spent at our two meal stops and loading/unloading the bus.

It wasn't a bad trip, but it was definitely a long trip.

I went off CD on Friday because I couldn't figure out a way to bring along the shakes and be able to mix them on the bus. Instead, I brought a sandwich and some healthy snacks. Dinner was an all-you-can eat buffet, but I made one trip through the buffet line and stuck mostly to salad.

Yesterday, I just couldn't get my head around having the shakes again, so I ate small amounts of normal food. I did give in and have a few cookies -- only four -- which is better than what I normally would have done. Normally, I would have eaten the entire box in one sitting.

But still the damage for two days of eating was pretty bad. Looks like I've gained about 3 lbs. Of course I won't know the official damage until Wednesday, when I have my weekly weigh in.

So this morning I'm back to the shakes again, and I had a very hard time choking down my strawberry shake. I found myself gagging as I tried to get it down. At one point, I nearly vomited.

ugh.

What I learned this weekend was that even moderate eating really sends my weight sky-high. Although there's no doubt I shouldn't have eaten the cookies, it's not like I had that many of them.

So I'm worried that I'll go to all this trouble to lose the weight, and I'll have to forever starve myself to keep it off.

Oh well, I'm trying not to think about it. Right now, I'm just trying to concentrate on getting the weight off in the first place.

Day 30 - The Root of Sabotage

2009-03-12T08:16:00.000-07:00

Well, I finally got to the bottom of why The Wife was trying to sabotage my diet at every turn.

It seems fear was her problem.

Fear? How's that work exactly?

Well, it seems that The Wife has been worrying that once I lose all this weight and become slim and attractive to other people, I'll just dump her and go looking for someone else.

I did my best to reassure her that was not the case. We've been together for a decade now, and I don't really want to end our relationship. That thought was so far from my mind that it was laughable, but I did my best to be kind, and not just laugh in her face at the sheer absurdity of it all.

I am not leaving The Wife when I lose weight. At least not unless she dumps me first.

At the moment I feel like I'm in the middle of a race between my stomach and the United Parcel Service truck. I ran out of Cambridge powder, so I'm hoping the truck gets here soon. Last night I ended up having a small dinner with the family, but it doesn't seem to have done much damage. I'll know better on my next weigh in, which is scheduled for next Wednesday.

I have to say that I'm struggling a bit with the big picture. Although I'm really happy about this week's 5 lb loss, I started feeling pretty discouraged when I realized I'm going to be at this for at least another 6-9 months. Even though I've lost 19 lbs since I started CD, and I've lost almost 23 from my high weight, I'm still not noticing a difference in my clothes.

Last night, I went through my closet to see what I had stashed away, and found pants as large as a size 20 and as small as a 14. I know I have even smaller clothes packed away in boxes in the garage, so I don't think I'll need to do much in the way of clothing shopping for a while. At the moment, I've got several pairs of extra-large sweat pants, and two pair of size 24 jeans. Oddly enough, the two pair of jeans are the same manufacturer, style and size, but they fit very differently. One is loose, while the other is tight. The difference? The two pair of jeans were sewn in different factories.

Tomorrow The Wife and I will be chaperoning a field trip for The Kid's school. Although I'm looking forward to the ultimate destination, I'm not looking forward to a three-hour bus ride each way. Fortunately, the school chartered a bus, so we'll have bathrooms on board. These days, I can't seem to go five minutes without ending up in the bathroom.

The joys of an all-liquid diet, plus trying to down 2 liters of water on top of it.

Day 29 - Weigh and Measure

2009-03-11T08:13:00.000-07:00

This morning, my weigh in was nothing short of excellent. I weighed 234.4 lbs, which is down a total of 5 lbs from last week. I've lost a total of 22.6 lbs from my high weight, and 18.2 lbs since I started the Cambridge Diet.

My percentage of body fat, according to my super-fancy scale, is now 47%. That's down from a high of 50%. Not too shabby.

Over the past four weeks, I've lost quite a few inches as well:

neck - 1/2"
bust - 1/2"
waist -2"
hips - 1"
upper arm - 2 1/4"
thigh - 1/4"

I guess I can't complain a whole lot, can I?

Yay me!

Day 28 - So Tired

2009-03-10T08:05:00.000-07:00

This morning, I'm feeling pretty darn tired. I had another frustrating day at work yesterday because my computer blew up and I had to re-install the entire operating system. Instead of actually getting some work done, The Wife and I spent the entire day trying to fix my stupid computer. I didn't get started on any actual work until almost 7:00 PM.

So I'm really tired this morning.

The weight dropped another .5 lb since yesterday, so I'm quite happy about that. Unfortunately, I still haven't noticed my clothes fitting any better. If I look in the mirror, it appears nothing has changed. My boobs and my rear end just go on forever!

Tomorrow will be my week 4 weigh-in, so I'll be taking pictures and measuring myself. I guess it's harder for the tape measure to lie than the scales!

I'm starting to run out of the Cambridge powder, so I hope my new shipment arrives on time. It's scheduled for Thursday, and I hope it makes it. If it doesn't, then I'll either have to choke down those dreadful SuperOats over the weekend or go without. Friday we won't be around because we are chaperoning a school field trip for The Kid, so nobody will be home to sign for the package.

Today is definitely a day I wish I wasn't self-employed. If I had a regular job, I'd definitely call in sick!

Day 27 - My Scale Must be Broken!

2009-03-09T08:30:00.001-07:00

After having cake on Saturday, I really expected the scales to jump up. Yesterday wasn't much better for staying on plan. I had a shake for a late breakfast (almost lunch) because I wasn't hungry, and then we went to a meeting at The Kid's school.

The meeting took much longer than we expected, and since they had snacks and I was starving, I decided to partake. I had some cheese and a few grapes.

I managed to avoid the crackers and cookies.

By the time dinner rolled around, I figured I'd already blown it for the day, so I had some broccoli and a 1/2 cup serving of hamburger helper with the family.

So imagine my shock when I stepped on the scale this morning and it claimed I weighed 235 lbs this morning. That's down 4.4 lbs since last Wednesday's weigh-in! I have another three days until my next official weigh-in, so this is just crazy!

There is no logic to dieting. It doesn't make sense that I wasn't really on plan and I get rewarded for it.

Well, no complaints from me! I'll take that gift horse without checking its mouth.

Day 26 - Having My Cake and Eating It Too

2009-03-08T12:45:00.000-07:00

Yesterday we went up to visit my mother for the day. When we arrived, I discovered that she'd made my favorite cake in the world.

So naturally, I had some. In fact, I had quite a bit. Probably way more than I should have had.

But the thing is, I'd given myself permission (for the first time since I went on the diet) to eat as much, and whatever, I wanted.

So I don't feel at all guilty.

Will it negatively affect this week's weight loss?

Probably.

Do I care?

No.

Now it's not as though I don't care about my diet. I absolutely do care about it. I also realize, though, that there's no way I'm going to be able to stick to a very strict diet for at least six to nine months without having a break once in a while.

So I had my cake, and I ate it too. Today, I go back to the diet as if nothing happened.

I figure if I spend more days on plan than off, I'm bound to lose weight in the long run.

Of course I didn't step on the scale this morning. I really didn't want to know what the damage was. I'll stick to plan and weigh-in again on Wednesday.

Day 24 - Will Our Marriage End?

2009-03-06T08:18:00.000-08:00

A little background for those who live outside California.

Last year, the California Supreme Court ruled "that the California legislative and initiative measures limiting marriage to opposite-sex couples violate the state constitutional rights of same-sex couples and may not be used to preclude same-sex couples from marrying."

Last Spring, The Wife and I got married.

This morning, the biggest thing on my mind is not my diet. I'm still reeling from watching the California Surpreme court hear oral arguments regarding Proposition 8. For those unfamiliar, Proposition 8 was a ballot initiative that changed the California State Constitution to read "Only marriage between a man and a woman is valid or recognized in California."

After watching the oral arguments, I left wondering if the State Supreme Court will void our marriage. It seemed to me that the judges were very hostile towards the idea of overturning Proposition 8, but were undecided on the fate of the 18,000 same-sex marriages that had been performed before the election.

The Wife and I have been together for a decade, but we've only been married for just over eight months. The court will issue their ruling within 90 days, and I feel like we are sitting on death row, waiting for our execution.

The most disturbing thing about the oral arguments was Ken Starr's opinion that the voters should be allowed to make whatever changes they wish to the constitution. Although he agreed that voters were not always wise, it is their sovereign right to make those changes.

It's a brave new world out there, folks.

Last November, the state voted to eliminate the rights of gays and lesbians to marry. Perhaps in two years, the state will vote to eliminate the right of gays and lesbians to adopt. What's next after that? Will they vote away protections for equal housing and employment?

Even more chilling, if they can vote away the rights of on unpopular minority, who will be next? Blacks? Hispanics? Asians? Perhaps they'll just go after Arabs in retaliation for 9/11.

If the court upholds Proposition 8, what they are really saying is that California's Equal Protection clause doesn't necessarily have to afford equal protection to everyone. It just affords equal protection to those in the majority, or those the majority deems fit to receive protection.

If that's the case, why do we even have a constitution in the first place?

Day 23 - In for a Dime, In for a Dollar

2009-03-05T14:19:00.000-08:00

Earlier this week, I promised The Kid that we'd go out for pizza as a family on Saturday. I found out that's not going to be possible, as my mother called and wanted to know if we could come and visit this weekend. Since not keeping a promise to The Kid is just short of a deadly sin, I decided we'd go out to pizza last night.

I ordered an individual pizza to keep my serving size down. Even so, I gained a pound. I'm not terribly worried about it, as I suspect the majority of the gain was the weight of my not-yet-pooped-out pizza remnants.

It's all good.

Today, of course, I'm back at it.

I'm starting to run low on supplies, so I went ahead and ordered a resupply. Since the nice folks at Cambridge Direct Sales gave me a 10% off my next order coupon, I went ahead and ordered three cases of shake mix. That's a three-month supply of powder.

So I guess I'm really making a commitment to stick with it.

I'm hoping my losses will remain high, since I'll be seeing my MIL on the third weekend of April. I hope I will have lost enough that she'll actually notice I'm smaller, though I'm not really holding my breath.

Of course one of my friends already noticed I've lost weight. He's my absolute best friend in the entire world, but he also knows I've been dieting. On the other hand, his noticing may actually be legitimate because he's Deaf, and almost nothing escapes his very observant eyes.

I'm not seeing much of a difference yet. My size 24W pants don't really feel any looser than when I bought them last Spring in time for my wedding.

Day 22 - Weigh In #3 & Responsibility for Other People's Happiness

2009-03-04T07:45:00.000-08:00

Despite my earlier grousing this week about my weight not budging, it seems something shook loose over the last couple of days. Today is my third weigh in.

Today's weight: 239.4 lbs, for a loss of 3.2 lbs for the week.

Not too shabby. Only 21.4 lbs to go until I'm merely obese. At this rate, of weight loss, I'll probably I'll be very close to obesity by the time the in-laws visit in April. Wouldn't it be nice for my MIL to notice I've lost weight?

Don't get me wrong. I adore my MIL. She does tend to nag me about my weight, though.

In other news, in pondering my Diet Saboteurs, I came to an important realization: I am not responsible for other people's happiness.

I know that sounds like a big duh, but when The Kid was giving me the big lecture about how bad my diet was making her feel, I was feeling really crummy. But then I realized something important -- how other people feel about my diet isn't my problem. It's their problem. So, when The Wife or The Kid start complaining how they feel so bad because I'm not eating, I'm going to let them own their own feelings.

I'm on this diet because I'm tired of being fat. I have more than 100 lbs to lose before I'll be at a weight considered healthy for my height, and I need to do something about it. So when family members whine, I'm going to have to remind myself that I'm not responsible for their unhappiness.

I'm responsible for my own happiness, not theirs.

Day 21 - Saboteurs

2009-03-03T07:41:00.000-08:00

I am getting really tired of the diet saboteurs, namely The Wife and The Kid, who live in my house.

It seems like just about every night either The Wife or The Kid is trying to convince me I should eat something I shouldn't. Last week, I tried eating small meals during dinner. It slowed my weight loss to a screeching halt, plus I had to listen to both The Wife and The Kid whining about how little I was eating.

I told The Wife no more, and then she decided we were going to go out to dinner on Friday, and we ended up going out again on Saturday because my father unexpectedly popped into town. Then, The Wife and The Kid wanted to pop out and get pizza Sunday night.

I told them no, and there was a certain amount of sulking about it.

Last night we had a big Family Talk about something related to The Kid, and because it was a good family talk, then The Wife and The Kid wanted to go out for pizza.

I said no.

The Kid drew me aside and proceeded to give me a big lecture of how my diet was making her feel bad, and that she felt like she should also be on Cambridge (even though she's not overweight in the slightest) because it "wasn't fair" that they were eating and I wasn't. Furthermore, she told me, she didn't like going out for pizza without me, because it made her lonely.

I listened, but couldn't help feeling pretty darn mad.

Later that evening, I gathered them both up and told them flat out that I didn't appreciate their attempts at sabotaging my diet. I told them I was trying to lose weight because I am more than 100 lbs (more than what my 13-year-old daughter weighs) over the maximum healthy weight for my height. I also said that I was just tired of being fat, and I was tired of my weight getting in the way of things I want to do.

I wasn't trying to be mean, but I reduced The Wife to tears. The Kid is usually pretty stoic, so she didn't cry, but I could tell I made her feel bad.

I have to say, though, I am done being nice about the diet sabotage. Although I'm willing to go out once in a while, and I'm willing to give myself a break from time to time, I'm not willing to put up with invites to eat out every night of the week.

I've said my piece nicely. Next time it comes up, I'm going to start yelling.

And really, with the recession nibbling at our doorstep, and The Wife's job now converted to a month-to-month arrangement instead of an annual contract, I think the money we were spending on eating out would be better placed in our savings account.

Day 20 - Is There a Bridge Anywhere?

2009-03-02T09:56:00.000-08:00

This morning I experimentally stepped on the scale, hoping to see a drop and I was greeted with a .2 lb loss.

Yep, that's right a 2/10ths of a pound drop.

Woo-effin-pee!

That means I've lost a whopping .2 lbs since last Wednesday. Wow, a whole 3.2 ounces. Oooh, I can tell that's going to make a big difference in the way my pants fit.

I am not a happy camper. Can you tell?

This weight loss thing is so frustrating, I find myself wondering if I'd be better off if I just threw myself off the nearest bridge.

No, you don't have to worry. I'm not really serious. It's just the thought does cross my mind when I'm so very frustrated.

Besides, knowing my luck, I wouldn't have the decency to die. I'd end up living the rest of my life as a very expensive vegetable, and be a huge emotional and financial burden to my family.

No bridges for me.

But really, why is it I can't even seem to lose weight on a VLCD past the second week?

Day 19 - Motivation Lacks When Things Go Wrong

2009-03-01T11:19:00.000-08:00

An Open Letter to The Kid:

Dear Daughter,

When you, in a fit of pique, decide to take a pair of scissors and chop off your hair, don't expect me to take you to the beauty salon to repair the damage. I'm especially disinclined to take you to the salon, as this is not the first time you've done this, and your excuse is especially pathetic. My refusal to allow you wear cosmetics at age 13 isn't sufficient reason to have a tantrum.

I love you dearly, but I'm not going to pay for any more salon cuts for you. If you need a trim, I have a lovely pair of scissors on my desk that will work just fine, and I'll be glad to help.

Love,

- Oinkstop

Raising kids is never easy, and it's especially difficult if the child you are raising hasn't lived with you for his or her entire life. In our case, The Kid has only lived with us for about 2.5 years. The first decade of her life was marred by poor parenting on the good days, and abuse and neglect on the bad, so we can't always expect her to behave in the same way a child born to us would behave.

Knowing that The Kid started out from a disadvantage doesn't make it any easier to deal with her behavior when things are going poorly. When things are going well, she's a great kid. When things aren't, The Kid can be very, very difficult.

I've found this week that it's been very difficult to stick to my diet entirely as planned, especially when it's been such a tough week. Not only have we had struggles with The Kid, The Job has been especially difficult, and I lost almost an entire day of work when my computer was infected with a virus.

So with all of this going on, it's been hard not to completely throw in the towel. I've managed to stick through the week, mostly according to plan, but last night I finally gave up. I went out to dinner, we had Mexican food, and I ate tortilla chips, a salad (loaded with dressing), two cheese enchiladas, rice and beans. I ate way more chips than I should have, but when I walked out of the restaurant, I wasn't completely stuffed.

But the truth was, I was hungry. When we got home, I had some buttered popcorn as we sat and watched a movie.

I don't feel particularly guilty, because I didn't gorge myself. The other reality is that I have to find a way to live with this diet. Starving myself forever isn't going to be productive, especially because I know it won't take long to reach my breaking point and just give up entirely.

So I'm still at it today. I had my breakfast shake and I'll have another for lunch, and I'll keep going, one day at a time.

But I have to admit, my motivation for sticking to the diet really lacks when things are going so wrong around chez Oinkstop.

Day 18 - Discouraged

2009-02-28T14:54:00.000-08:00

Today is Day 18, and it seems like the scales have been stuck where they've been since Day 15. For the past two weeks, I've noticed a slow and steady drop on the scales every morning, but for the past three days, it's hardly budged.

Maybe it's because I started adding food back into my diet. The Cambridge USA folks say you shouldn't do the Fast Start (Sole Source in the UK) program for more than two weeks unless you are medically supervised.

Although I'm not opposed, at least in theory, to medical supervision, I'm trying to figure out how to pay for such supervision. I recently wrote to the Cambridge USA folks for their medical supervision guidelines, and they recommend the following tests:

Complete Blood Count (CBC)
Blood Lipid Profile
Serum Sodium
Serum Potassium
Creatinine
Uric Acid
SGOT
Serum T4 (only if clinical hypothyroidism is suspected)
Urinalysis for proteinuria
Pregnancy Tests
Electrocardiogram

Sounds great if you are rich. They also recommend that some doctors might want to repeat the electrocardiogram every 30 lbs lost.

And how much is this going to cost?

I have no idea. The worst thing about the US healthcare system is that costs are not predictable. When you go to the doctor, you know how much the visit will cost, but there's no way to find out what the lab work is going to cost, and how much insurance will cover, until after you get the bill.

It doesn't make sense. It seems that if you are agreeing to purchase something, you should be able to find out the price first and then make the determination as to whether or not you can afford it.

So I've got three choices:

Suck it up, ruin our monthly budget (can you say hello credit cards?) and have all these expensive tests done.
Disregard Cambridge's recommendations for medical supervision and do the Fast Start program for an extended period of time anyway.
Use Cambridge's regular program, which means three shakes and some regular food, which promises a much slower weight loss.

I have no idea what I'm going to do. It's a damn shame that money doesn't grow on trees!

Day 15 - Weigh In

2009-02-25T07:31:00.000-08:00

Well this morning I had my second weigh-in since I started the Cambridge Diet. I weighed in at 242.6, which is down 3 lbs since last week. I guess that's a pretty good loss, considering my stupid metabolism never wants to let go of any fat.

Of course I would have been happier if I lost another 7 lbs like I did last week.

Maybe I should cut out the extra food at dinner time. It definitely helps me feel a bit more energetic, but I wonder if it really hampers my weight loss.

The vegetables have to stay, though. Otherwise, I spend way too much trouble running to the bathroom!

I live in a older home, and it's definitely in need of some work. One of my home's many problems is that the water heater doesn't stay hot. It's usually a good idea to run a load of laundry or the dishwasher to use some of the lukewarm water that's stored in the water heater, and then wait about 20 minutes until the burner kicks on. Then, the water coming out of the shower is nice and hot.

Last night, when I took my shower, nobody had run the hot water, so the water coming out of the shower head was just barely warm. I'm the type of person who likes my showers hot. If the water isn't coming out at a temperature warm enough to make my skin turn bright pink by the time I'm done, it doesn't feel particularly satisfying.

So I stood in the shower, water pouring over me, waiting for the water to get hotter.

It never did.

Now the water wasn't cold. It was quite comfortable, but not as hot as I wanted, so I kept standing in the shower, waiting to feel the particular satisfaction I feel when I've had a really hot shower.

It never came.

So I stood under the water, letting it run and run. It never got any hotter, and I finally gave up and got out. As I was drying off, I realized that my experience in the shower reminded me of the way I sometimes deal with food.

There are times when I'll sit down to have something to eat, and it doesn't really satisfy. Perhaps it doesn't taste all that good, or it's really not what I wanted. Whatever the reason, it's not satisfying, but rather than put it away, I'll sit there and keep eating it, hoping that eventually I'll be satisfied anyway.

Interesting parallel.

Day 14 - Anticipation

2009-02-24T17:20:00.000-08:00

So tomorrow is day 15, my next scheduled weigh-in.

I am having a dreadful case of scale anxiety.

I know my weight should be down. I've done a good job of sticking to the diet. Although I haven't completely Sole Sourced (or Fast Started as they call it in the US), I've been really careful about the food I've eaten. I haven't had much, and what I have consumed has been heavy on the protein and vegetable side, and low on the unrefined carbs.

When I went out for Japanese food, I had miso soup, some boiled soy beans (because I needed the fiber, if you know what I mean!) and some sashimi. Logic would dictate that I did okay, simply because all my shakes add up to a mere 420 calories. If I'm only having a regular day of so few calories, a few extras shouldn't put me to the point of not losing weight.

When I went out for Mexican food, I only ate a few tortilla chips and I skipped out on the tortillas. I had chicken fajitas, which is basically seasoned meat with veggies. Again, I was really careful, and I tasted the heck out of the food I did eat.

In both cases, I had my third shake for the day about 30 minutes before I went out, so I was already feeling pretty full. Going out to dinner with a full stomach is sort of a self-limiting thing, because there's only so much room in there, and I'm not really interested in gorging myself until I feel sick.

So I think I did okay.

But I'm really scared to step on that scale. What if I didn't lose? What if my planned bits of food just totally ruined my diet? What if? What if?

I guess what worries me most is that I've found with every other diet I've been on that I have to eat next to nothing in order to lose weight slowly. Now that I really am eating next to nothing, I'm scared that the scales won't budge and I'll be stuck in Fat Land forever.

If Cambridge doesn't work, then I guess I have two choices: stay fat forever, or consider getting my stomach stapled.

I really don't want to have my stomach stapled.

Day 14

2009-02-24T06:49:00.000-08:00

I've started adding very small portions of dinner with my evening shake, and I have to say that I'm feeling quite a bit better. Basically, I'm limiting myself to 1/2 cup of whatever the family is eating, plus as many veggies as I want.

I'm not eating much, because I take my shake 30 minutes before dinner, so I'm not usually feeling all that hungry by the time I sit down at the table.

I'm not sure how badly this will interfere with my weight loss. I guess I'll find out when I step on the scale tomorrow.

On bit of good news is that it seems to have dried up the extreme diarrhea I've been experiencing. Diarrhea isn't anything new around my house as I've had a problem with dumping syndrome since I had my gallbladder out nine years ago. It's nice things are at least a bit more under control, because it's not fun running to the bathroom 20 minutes after my shake!

Yuck.

Based on yesterday's comment, it looks like some of my dieting buddies from the UK have found their way to my site. Welcome friends! It's nice to know that someone's reading my blog besides me.

I feel especially tired this morning because I've been up since roughly 3:30 AM. I wasn't sleeping well to begin with, and a problem at work started weighing on my mind and I figured I'd better get up and see if I could make any headway with it. This is one of the problems of being self-employed -- it's hard to leave work at the office!

I'm still looking for (and not finding) changes in my body. My clothes fit the same, I look the same in the mirror, and my stomach still gets in my way. I keep hoping that one morning I'll wake up and notice a difference, but so far, no luck!

Day 13

2009-02-23T13:10:00.000-08:00

Well, I'm still hanging in there. I did go out and have fajitas with The Wife on Saturday and I still lost weight. I did have a few tortilla chips, and I skipped out on the tortillas with the fajitas. Actually, I wasn't very tempted because our server forgot to bring them and I didn't ask.

I split the plate with The Wife, and I didn't eat any of the rice or beans that came with.

I've experimented with eating a little bit and I'm not sure what to think about it. Last night, The Wife served Hamburger Helper and broccoli for dinner. A standard serving of the Hamburger Helper was about 300 calories, which I thought would be too much. I had a half serving and some broccoli, and felt completely stuffed afterward.

It was nice in one respect, though. I was so tired I went to bed early, and didn't wake up in the middle of the night with hunger pangs. Instead, I woke up at least three times because I had to go pee.

Oh well, it's not like I can have everything. The extra sleep was good, I shouldn't expect that I would have extra and uninterrupted sleep.

I found a UK support group for folks using the UK version of the Cambridge Diet, and I've noticed that a lot of the UK folks consume nothing but the meal replacement shakes for weeks or months at a time. The instructions that come with the US version say you shouldn't do that for more than two weeks at a stretch, unless you are under strict medical supervision.

I wonder if it's because the formulations are completely different, or if the good folks over at Dean Distributors (the people who sell the US version of Cambridge) are afraid of being sued. I've compared the nutritional information of the UK and US versions, and it seems the US version has slightly more calories, carbohydrates, protein and fat. It seems to me that if the UK people can safely consume nothing but shakes for extended periods of time, it's probably safe to do the same on the US version.

Still, I'd feel better following directions, so I'll see about discussing this with my doctor the next time I can afford to go in.

Overall, I'm feeling pretty happy about my weight loss (looks like I've dropped close to 10 lbs, though I won't officially weigh in until Wednesday) but I'm still feeling pretty darn tired. I've gotten used to the shakes, and don't find them nearly as odious as I did in the beginning. The only flavor I can't stand is the Super Oats (porridge). That stuff is nasty no matter what you do to it.

Bleah!

Day 11

2009-02-21T11:08:00.000-08:00

We have had a very tough week with The Kid this week. Even though she's 13 years old and should know better, she's been behaving much like a 2-year-old. Even though she simply didn't deserve it, we let her spend the night with a friend simply because we needed a break.

The Wife and I went out to dinner last night. I knew it was technically "cheating" but after such a tough week, we needed to blow off steam. I've also gotta live with this diet for the next however long, and I know if I starve forever without the possibility of ever having any food, it will just be impossible.

The Cambridge USA instructions say you shouldn't exclude food from your program for more than two weeks, anyway. Well, at least that's true if you aren't being medically supervised.

So, last night, we went out and had Japanese food. I tried to be really good. I ordered miso soup, some edemame (boiled soy beans) and some tuna and salmon sashimi.

The miso soup tasted really weird, everything else was good, but I couldn't eat much. I had a shake right before we left, so I was pretty full during dinner. Tonight, The Kid is going to be gone again, and The Wife wants to go out to dinner again.

I'm tempted, but worried this is going to lead me astray too quickly. On the other hand, I'm getting really tired of the shakes. The flavors are growing on me, and things don't taste as bad as they did in the beginning.

I suppose a little fajitas wouldn't hurt.

Day 10

2009-02-20T09:17:00.000-08:00

This morning I had to cancel my guitar lesson because I've got a case of the tummy rumbles and I don't want to be more than about 25 feet from the bathroom.

The good news is that I don't feel bad. The bad news is that I know very well not to leave the house right now, or I might end up with an incredible ass explosion that would definitely ruin my day.

What's worse is that these atomic butt blasts are starting to take on the colors of the shakes I've been consuming. The other day, after I'd had several strawberry shakes in a row, I noticed that my bowel movements were taking on a decidedly pinkish cast. At first, I even panicked a little thinking that I was bleeding from "down there."

I felt a lot better when I realized that the pinkish skid marks on my toilet paper were probably nothing more than FD&C Red #40 mixed with poo.

Such a comforting thing to know.

Day 9

2009-02-19T07:27:00.000-08:00

I'm feeling a little bit less tired than I have over the past few days, but I definitely don't feel like my usual self. Not that I'm all that energetic on most days, but I feel even less energetic than usual.

Last night I had one of the chocolate shakes and I mixed it with a 1/4 tsp of peppermint flavoring. The end result was actually pretty decent. I think I'm starting to get used to the shakes, because they don't seem to taste quite as blah as they did in the beginning.

I guess if you get hungry enough, anything will taste good.

I've started dreaming about what life might be like when I'm thin, and it's frustrating when I wake up surrounded by fat. I can't see any difference yet in the way my clothes fit or the way I look in the mirror, and that adds to my frustration.

Of course I keep reminding myself that I didn't get fat overnight, so I'm not going to get thin overnight, either. It didn't help that this morning the scale hadn't moved from yesterday. So far, I've seen a small, but consistent drop every single day, but this morning it didn't budge.

Maybe the gourmet orange I had at breakfast, or the peppermint flavoring did it.

Probably not. I have a hard time seeing how the 89 calories found in a large orange can ruin your diet, when you are only consuming a total of 420 per day.

I e-mailed the folks at Cambridge USA and asked them for the medical guidelines to give to my physician so she can monitor my progress. I won't be able to afford a doctor's appointment for at least another month, since it turns out we owe the IRS additional money for taxes this year.

I have to choose to pay the IRS before I can afford to go visit my doctor. It's a sad commentary on American life, isn't it?

Day 8 - The Good, Bad and Ugly

2009-02-18T07:57:00.000-08:00

Well today is day 8, which means I've completed a full week on the Cambridge Diet.

The Good - I lost 7 lbs the first week.

The Bad - I have a scale that measures your body composition through electrical impedance. So far my % of body fat hasn't budged.

The Ugly - I am really fighting fatigue. I haven't walked in a week because it's been raining gangbusters. Today was the first morning without rain, but I didn't walk this morning as I was just too tired.

I'm also noticing that it's way too easy to make me cry. Last night, The Wife decided to make dinner for herself and The Kid first. I went into the bathroom to take a shower, and as soon as I did, the heater kicked in and wafted the smell of their tamales throughout the house. Even though I only had to wait about 15 minutes for my shake, I found myself laying down on the bed having a good cry.

I managed to hide it pretty well from The Wife and The Kid, and I feel incredibly stupid. It shouldn't be this hard to stick to a dumb old diet.

Yesterday afternoon I was so fuzzy-brained that I gave in and had one of our gourmet oranges. It sure tasted good, and I felt better for a while. I was a little hungrier at dinner time, which may have contributed to the tears. Once again I woke up in the middle of the night absolutely starving. At least this time, I didn't dream about stuffing my face full of food while watched by an audience of super-obese folks.

So far, I've been averaging a loss of 1 lb per day. If this keeps up, only 127 more days to go!

Day 7

2009-02-17T08:26:00.000-08:00

It seems that the two hardest times of the day are evenings and the middle of the night. I'm finding it very difficult not to obsess on food after my work for the day is done and there's nothing to do but sit around and wait until bedtime. Normally, some of that time would be occupied by the making, eating, and cleaning up dinner. Now, my evenings consist of slurping down a shake and waiting for bedtime.

I've been taking my evening shower much earlier, and hitting the sack earlier, too. It's just not much fun watching other people eat.

The middle of the night seems to be the toughest part. For the past few nights, my empty stomach has started rumbling and I've found myself wide awake and really hungry. The "good" news, if I can call it that, is that it's just stomach hunger. I've found when I get really hungry, I'll start to get headachy and come down with muscle cramps. I haven't had any of that, but my stomach has made it a point to shriek me awake in the middle of the night.

Last night I woke up to my yelling stomach, and I resisted the temptation to get out of bed and eat. Instead, I lay quietly running my hands over my body trying to see if I could feel any difference. When I finally fell asleep again, I found myself dreaming that I was stuffing my face with KFC chicken. I was peeling the skin off, and eating mounds of the greasy chicken. All the while, I had a dream audience of super obese people. They stood around staring at me, while their stomachs flopped around their knees.

I guess you can tell what is on my mind!

Day 6

2009-02-16T10:03:00.000-08:00

Last night, The Kid came to me practically in tears. She wanted to start taking Carnation Instant Breakfast as a meal replacement, because she thought it "wasn't fair" that I was stuck consuming nothing but the Cambridge shakes. I told her that since she was slim, she didn't need to lose any weight.

"Although I don't mind if you have the Carnation Instant Breakfast once in a while because you like it," I told her, "it's not healthy for you to have it all the time. You aren't obese like I am, and you don't need to lose weight."

Then I lied to the kid. I told her I wasn't hungry, and I didn't feel at all bad about what I was doing.

"I'm doing this of my own free will," I said, "and nobody is forcing me to do this. I'm doing it because I'm very overweight, and I really need to lose a lot of weight to be healthy."

The Kid didn't seem very satisfied with my explanation, but at least it dried up her tears.

The truth is, I don't like Cambridge any more than The Kid does, but it has to be done. I've tried just about every diet out there, and it takes too long to get the weight off and eventually I get frustrated and give up because I'm not losing weight.

I know Cambridge works.

I realize it might not be the healthiest way of doing things, but I know that if I stick to the diet, I will lose the weight. Of course once I've lost it, I'll still have the huge challenge of keeping it off, but I guess I'll worry about that when I get there.

Day 5

2009-02-15T13:58:00.000-08:00

Friday the 13th turned out to be less-than-wonderful for my diet. We had an ugly explosion at our house. The Kid did something Really Bad, and I was so much at the end of my rope with her that I decided to leave The Wife in charge and I went to pay my mother an overnight visit. I did pack my shake mix, but when I got to my mother's house, I decided I didn't want to tell her I was on a diet.

It turned out my mom had eaten a late lunch and wasn't very hungry, we had a few olives, some carrots and a handful of peanuts. I was starving, but I lied and told my mother I too had a late lunch and wasn't hungry.

In the morning, my mother fixed oatmeal. I had one serving, and went really easy on the brown sugar.

"My you are being good," she noticed as she heaped her bowl with the sweet brown stuff.

We had a late lunch of green beans, chicken tender strips, and baked potato. I limited the amount of butter I put on my beans and potato, and stopped at three chicken strips. The baked potato was very small, not even the size of my fist, so I figured I'd be okay.

I was still hungry after lunch, even though I'd had heaping (and probably harmless) seconds on the green beans. I wanted to eat more chicken, but I figured that if my mother could be satisfied with two strips, I darn well should be satisfied with three. I came home hungry, but skipped dinner, figuring I'd done enough damage for one day.

I went to bed hungry.

This morning I weighed myself and discovered I had still lost weight. I thought it would be really hard to get back to my shakes this morning, but it wasn't as bad. So far, it looks like I've lost about 6.5 lbs since I started. I know it's probably all water and no fat, but it's gratifying to see the numbers go down, anyway.

Day 3

2009-02-13T08:01:00.001-08:00

Yesterday I tried one of the nutrition bars. They are much better than the shakes I've tried, but I then later read one isn't supposed to have them when they are working the Fast Start plan.

Oops.

I also had one of our gourmet oranges around lunch time. There's no way I'm going to let them go to waste, considering they are part of a very expensive fruit of the month club. The Wife and I have wanted to subscribe to the club for years, and this past year was the first time we could afford the luxury.

I am gonna eat my oranges, darn it! Considering that the shakes only add up to about 440 calories, I'm sure one measly orange isn't going to ruin my diet.

Other than feeling tired and cold, I seem to be holding my own. For the most part, I haven't felt particularly hungry. Last night was the exception, and I really thought my stomach was going to gnaw its way out of my abdomen. I think the problem was that had one of the nutrition bars for dinner when I shouldn't have, and we went out to see a play at a local theater. I was up way past my usual bedtime, and I think I ran out of gas because I was still awake long after I would usually be sleeping.

On the drive home my stomach was screaming. I was so hungry I felt a little nauseated.

When we arrived home, I took a hot shower and climbed into bed. I thought my stomach would keep me awake, but I was tired enough that I fell asleep pretty quickly. I felt much better this morning, and didn't feel hungry at all.

I'm having a little trouble getting my shake down this morning. As I've said before, the stuff doesn't taste bad, but I've gagged a couple of times as I've tried to choke down the strawberry. It seems the only way I can get it down is to alternate sips of the shake with gulps of water.

I just keep telling myself to put on my big girl panties and take my medicine.

I haven't noticed any change in my body yet, and I wonder how long it will be before I start noticing a difference. The scale is already claiming I'm losing weight, but I won't post my official progress until I've been on the diet a full week.

Before I got out of bed this morning, I found myself running my hands all over my body and wondering what it would feel like if I actually manage to lose the weight. It's been 20 years since I've been thin, and I can't remember what it was like. I've been overweight for most of my life, and the brief time I was thin in college was really an exception and not the rule.

It's an interesting question to ponder. I hope I get there.

Day 2

2009-02-12T10:09:00.000-08:00

I had another strawberry shake for dinner, and it wasn't much better or worse than the one I'd had for lunch. I didn't particularly feel at all hungry, and it wasn't particularly hard to resist eating, since I didn't join The Wife and The Kid at the table. Although they are certainly feeling a little unhappy that I'm not sitting down with them, I didn't see how I could possible sit at the table and watch them eat fried chicken while I had nothing but a strawberry shake.

Fortunately, a buddy of mine stopped by while they were eating. He'd already had dinner, so we sat on the sofa and chatted while The Wife and The Kid ate their meal. My friend was very much a welcome distraction, though if he had not stopped by, I probably would have sat down in front of my computer for a while.

As a side note, the instructions on the shake mix say mix it with cold water. Follow that advice. The shakes taste much better if they are ice cold.

This morning's breakfast was more Super Oats. They came out especially vile this morning because The Wife mixed them up for me. She knows that I usually like my oatmeal really thick, so she prepared them the same way as my regular oats. Regular oats taste good thick and chunky, but the Super Oats come out a consistency of glue. I ended up having to drink about a half liter of water along with my Super Oats glue to get them down. It didn't help that The Wife also sprinkled way too much cinnamon and nutmeg on them.

They weren't terrible, but they were definitely not delicious.

I'm still feeling cold this morning. The house is chilly because the outside temperatures are low enough that our aging heating system is having trouble keeping up. I started the day smarter than I did yesterday, making sure to put on my heavy jacket, socks and shoes before I felt really chilled. Yesterday, I spent most of the day shivering, and didn't fully warm up until I stood under the steaming hot shower for 20 minutes.

I've been making every effort to drink extra water, which is of course sending me running to the bathroom every 15 minutes. I didn't sleep very well last night because I had to make multiple trips, and then had trouble going back to sleep.

Other than feeling a little tired, I guess I'm doing okay. I don't feel particularly hungry.

Cambridge - Day One Lunch

2009-02-11T13:26:00.000-08:00

For today's lunch, I decided to try a shake. I chose the strawberry Food for Life formula, hoping it would be the tastiest. I tried the chocolate when I got some free samples a while back, and I remembered the original vanilla flavor from when I tried it in the 1980's, so I was hoping for some real strawberry action.

My opinion of the strawberry flavor can be expressed in one word: meh.

It's not bad, but I can't honestly say the stuff tickles my taste buds in any pleasurable way. The mix doesn't have a very intense strawberry flavor, nor is it very sweet-tasting. I was hoping for something that tasted like the strawberry instant breakfast, but it definitely misses the mark.

I've read reports from many Cambridge users that they are extremely hungry on the first day. I haven't found it to be true. I'm not particularly hungry. I don't feel at all different from yesterday, except for the fact that I have a bit of a headache and I'm freezing cold. I'm not sure that I can blame it on Cambridge, though. I didn't sleep well last night, which could explain the headache, and the reason I'm cold probably has more to do with the fact that our house is only a chilly 65 degrees right now. Our house is old and poorly insulated, and it's cold enough outside that the heater can't really keep up.

I hate winter.

Cambridge - Day One

2009-02-11T09:10:00.000-08:00

Yesterday afternoon, while I was gone on an outing, the Big Brown Truck made an appearance at my house and left behind a box. The box contained my first shipment of Cambridge Diet, which I'd been both anticipating and dreading.

I'd ordered the 30-day starter package. It contained six cans of their food replacements, a shaker, instruction books, a tape measure, an introductory audio CD, and some samples of their drink mix and nutrition bars. I'd ordered oats, vanilla, chocolate, cappuccino and two cans of strawberry. For some reason, I ended up with no cappuccino and three strawberry, which probably will be fine, since I'm not a big coffee drinker, anyway.

I'd originally planned to do two weeks of their Fast Start program, which limits you to three of their meal replacements per day. That plan was immediately tossed out the window when I learned we received a box of gourmet oranges in the mail. They'll spoil before the two weeks are finished, so I'm going to do a modified Fast Start program -- three shakes a day, plus one of the gourmet oranges.

This morning, I started with the Super Oats. I mixed it up plain, exactly as the instructions described. It came out the consistency of really thick oatmeal. Although I wouldn't describe the taste as bad, I wouldn't describe it as good, either. I sprinkled some cinnamon on top, after a couple of bites, hoping it would improve the flavor. It didn't help much. Instead of semi-flavorless glop, I ended up with a bowl of cinnamon-flavored, flavorless glop.

If I was going to rate the taste on a scale of one to ten, where one was unpalatable, and ten was the best thing I'd ever eaten, I'd probably rank this about a four or a five. It's not terrible, but it's definitely nowhere near delicious. If anybody tries to convince you that this stuff is delicious, they probably need a bonk upside the head with a clue-by-four. Nevertheless, at least this morning, the stuff was edible.

We'll see how lunch and dinner go.

Waiting for Doom

2009-02-07T14:29:00.000-08:00

On Tuesday, I finally did it. I ordered a month's supply of the Cambridge Diet. Now I feel much like a prisoner waiting for his execution date. I know that very soon a brown, box-shaped truck will deliver a package, and I'll be eating my last supper for a while.

I suspect I won't be eating meals with the family for a while. I think it's going to be too hard to stick to the diet while watching them stuff their faces with food. It will only be for a few weeks, though, so hopefully it won't be too unbearable.

If this lady could lose 125 lbs in six months on Cambridge, I'm sure I can achieve similar results.

If I stick to the diet.

And to be honest, I guess that really is a big if, considering that every other diet I've tried has been unsustainable over the long haul. Sure, I've lot weight. I've never been able to keep it off, though, because the amount of food I can allow myself to eat to maintain my weight is far less than I like. To stay thin, I have to be hungry, and it gets pretty tiresome after a while.

But maybe six months of this will at least get me to a more desirable weight, and then I can try and figure something out when I get there.

The Daily Walk

2009-02-07T14:23:00.000-08:00

Since the first of the year, The Wife and I have been attempting to walk every morning. We've been making the effort, but haven't made it every day because of a variety of reasons. The Wife caught a bad cold, and in combination with her asthma, she didn't feel well enough for walking. Then we had several days of pouring down rain. Since we live in an area that isn't all that rainy, nobody in the house owns a raincoat or umbrella, so wimped out in favor of staying dry.

The Kid has been pretty instrumental in foiling our plans for walking. In a nutshell, she Does Not Want To Walk. Several mornings, I've practically had to drag her out of bed, threatening to make her walk in her pajamas.

A few nights ago, she complained that she didn't think it was fair she had to walk, because she wasn't the one who was overweight. She quite thoroughly rubbed our parental noses in the fact that while we are both too fat, she's just fine, thank you very much.

So it gave me great pleasure when her pediatrician bawled her out and told her she needed to exercise more. Although the doctor agreed that The Kid was not overweight, she felt that The Kid was spending too much time in her room.

So now, The Kid has to go walk with us every morning. Doctor's orders.

Cambridge Diet

2009-02-03T13:04:00.000-08:00

Well, I've been thinking about this for a while, and I know I really need to do something to get my weight down. The December holidays were extremely unkind to me, and even though I've making a dedicated effort to walking 2.5 to 3 miles each day, my holiday weight gain hasn't budged at all.

The "lose weight slowly" idea isn't working. I feel like I'm riding a roller coaster -- at the end of a bumpy ride, I end up right back where I started.

So today I took the plunge, and I bought a 30-day supply of the Cambridge Diet. Yeah, I know it's probably not healthy, and yeah, I know I should probably do something else like counting calories, joining Weight Watchers, or just about anything else, but the idea of being on a diet for another year, and having nothing to show for it in the end is really discouraging.

I've been trying to lose weight since April 2007, and I've made virtually no progress. It sucks. I'm tired of being fat, and I'm tired of everything taking for [expletive deleted] ever.

This lady lost 125 pounds on Cambridge in six months. A very nice lady named Janet from Cambridge Direct Sales answered a bunch of questions I had about the product and sent me a few samples. I can't say the stuff tastes yummy, but it's at least edible.

So, why not?

To silence the worriers out there in cyberspace, I will mention what I'm doing when I see my doctor next. My next appointment will be sometime between now and May when one of my prescriptions runs out. I'm going to delay as long as possible so perhaps I'll be able to re-lose the weight I lost before my last doctor visit. If I don't, I know I'll end up setting myself up for a rash of nagging I really don't want to hear.

Yeah, I'm fat. I get it. Quit nagging.

Well my doctor isn't really that much of a nag. She's morbidly obese, too, but I think she went and had her stomach stapled a while back. The past few times I've had an appointment with her, she's appeared to be smaller, and she has mentioned that fateful question at least once. "Have you considered weight loss surgery?"

Um, yeah, I have considered it, and I have only one answer:

No thanks.

I've had more than my fair share of troubles with GI upset and diarrhea since I had my gallbladder out nine years ago. I'm not going to invite someone to cut me open and scramble my already-malfunctioning insides even further. Besides, my health insurance won't pay for anything they consider to be elective surgery.

Of course that doesn't make sense -- they are willing to absorb the high costs of treating heart disease, high blood pressure, heart disease and diabetes, but they aren't willing to cover a procedure that might help people not get those conditions in the first place.

But that's okay, because I wouldn't let someone perform that surgery on me, even if they paid me.

Back from Vacation

2008-08-13T17:58:00.001-07:00

Well, I got back from vacation and had a great time.

I ate too much, though. Oh well.

Fat Friday: Why We All Should Lose Weight

2008-08-08T08:00:00.000-07:00

This week's Fat Friday consists mostly of more stories about why we need to lose weight and get rid of fat. We've also got stories about a death row inmate who claims he's too heavy to be executed, the controversy over obese passengers on airlines, and a list of restaurants that may be making your kids fat.

It seems like the news media is really in a frenzy over the evils of being overweight, and I have to say that the continuing FUD (Fear, Uncertainty and Doubt) campaign doesn't do much to increase my motivation to lose weight. Now that I've reached the point of saturation with all this negative news, I find myself just not caring all that much.

Here's this week's round up:

Excess Fat Around Your Heart May Be Dangerous - Researchers are finding that excess fat around your heart may give you a higher risk for heart attack than having a high BMI. (AJC.com)
Death Row Inmate Argues He Is Too Fat to Be Executed - An Ohio man is arguing that because he is so fat, he is too heavy to be humanely executed. (AFP)
There Are Few Old Fat People - It seems there are fat people and there are old people, but there are few old fat people. (The Methuselah Foundation)
Flying Fat - Airlines do not have a standard policy as to whether or not obese passengers should have to pay for a second seat when flying. As a result, there is considerable controversy -- and lawsuits -- from both the overweight passengers, and the normal-weighted folks who sit next to them. (Wired Blog Network)
Which Restaurants Are Making Your Kids Fat? - It seems that some restaurants out there are putting together kids' meals upwards of 900 calories. This article offers a scary look at some of the worst offenders. (The Consumerist)
All Americans Will Be Fat By 2048 - According to a new study, if the trend of the past thirty years continues, every American adult will be overweight. (WOAI.com)

Weigh In - Week 68

2008-08-07T09:02:00.000-07:00

I am doing my weekly weigh-in a day early this week for two reasons: 1) I happened to notice good results on the scale this morning, and 2) I'm going camping this weekend and tomorrow I might be too busy packing to remember to weigh myself.

So this week's results are pretty good. I finally broke the 240's this morning, with my weight coming in at 239.2 lbs. That's down 2.2 lbs, which is I guess pretty good progress.

Of course, knowing I'm going camping this weekend, I probably won't be able to hold onto this loss for very long.

As far as my camping trip goes, I'm going to make an effort not to eat the entire world while I am there, but I'm also not going to deprive myself. Part of what goes into making weight loss permanent is realizing there will times where I'm going to eat more than others.

Hopefully, I'll get some extra exercise and the damage won't be too bad.

Crazy Days

2008-08-06T12:44:00.000-07:00

Well I haven't posted up in a few days because things have been crazy. A work crew has been digging up the back alley behind our house because of a plumbing problem. Yesterday, I had to take one of our pets on an emergency run to an exotic pet veterinarian almost an hour away.

Nothing that gets your adrenaline pumping like driving like a maniac to get a seriously sick pet to a vet in an emergency situation.

Yesterday, because of the veterinary emergency, I missed lunch. As a result, I had extra calories available and had two slices of pizza for dinner, and some popcorn afterwards.

The news on the scale was good, though. I'm just .2 lbs higher than my lowest recent weight, so it's all good.

Of course it will be all bad on Monday, because we are going camping with friends this weekend, and it is their daughter's birthday.

Fat Friday: Donuts on a Diet

2008-08-01T09:18:00.000-07:00

In this week's roundup, donuts are now on a diet, parents make their kids fat, while scientists are busy trying to invent new pills and hamburgers to make us healthy. We also learn about a new memoir of a woman's experiences as a fat teenager.

Dunkin' Donuts on a Diet - It seems the folks at Dunkin' Donuts are trying to put their menu on a diet. Starting next month, they are going to be rolling out some healthier options, including an egg-white flatbread sandwich that rolls in under 300 calories. (The Business Journal)

I don't know about everyone else, but the idea sounds really unappealing. If I want something healthy, a donut store is not the place I'm going to go. If I want a donut, then it's a different story. There are times, I think, when people don't want healthier choices.
Neglectful Parenting Makes Kids Fat - According to this writer, it's the parents who are at fault for their obese children. (The Dallas Morning News)
Should Trans Fats be Banned? - Now that California has banned trans fats in restaurant and bakery foods, the debate about extending the ban is moving to Oklahoma City. (NewsOK.com)
Pills Can Help Burn Off Fat - Scientists at the Howard Hughes Medical Institute have discovered two drugs that imitate the effects of exercise. Could it be that one day, instead of exercising, we'll be able to pop a pill? (Financial Times)
My Summers at Fat Camp - NPR interviews the author of Moose: A Memoir of Fat Camp, a memoir about one woman's life as a chubby teenager. (NPR)
Burger Alchemy - Scientists are working on cooking up a healthy hamburger by replacing the bad saturated fats in ground beef with heart-healthy unsaturated fats. (The Washington Post)

Shouldn't this be called a Frankenburger?

Weigh In - Week 67

2008-08-01T09:09:00.000-07:00

Last weekend, I exercised my brains out and thought that as a result I could eat a little more food. I didn't completely pig out; I was careful and I counted my calories. I made sure I ate less than what I burned off in exercise. Unfortunately, the exercise backfired, and instead of losing weight (or even staying steady) I gained almost three pounds over the weekend.

So the truth is, I haven't felt much like dieting or exercising this week. So much of the time I feel like my weight loss is completely out of my control. There doesn't seem to be a logical connection between what I eat, how much I exercise, and what ultimately shows up on the scale.

My weight is down from where I was on Monday, but up from last week's weigh in by one pound.

Today's weight: 241.4 lbs.

It Backfired

2008-07-30T13:18:00.000-07:00

My absence from blogging for the last couple of days was because it backfired. Truthfully, I felt so depressed and discouraged, I decided not to write because the world doesn't really need to hear my incessant whining.

Lesson learned: exercise might be good for my health, but it doesn't seem to have much effect on my weight loss efforts.

At chez Oinkstop, the only predictor of diet success is calorie consumption. No matter what the ubiquitous "they" might say about exercise burning off calories, it doesn't work for me. Eating 1,600 calories, even if I have done enough exercise to burn off 600 of those calories, will result in a big weight gain over the weekend.

It didn't matter that I did a lot of extra walking, and that I spent most of Friday and all of Sunday deep-cleaning my house. I can sit on my ass and do nothing and eat 1,200 calories, or I can exercise my brains out and eat 1,200 calories; there is no difference. If I eat more than 1,200 calories, I'm guaranteed to put on weight.

Calories are king. Lesson learned. We won't do that again. Time to move on.

Let's Hope Simple Diet Math Doesn't Backfire

2008-07-26T09:22:00.000-07:00

Figuring out how many calories you need to eat is supposed to be relatively simple math. What I've come to realize, though, is that dieting is more an art than science. If it were just straight science, one wouldn't be constantly trying to figure out unexplained weight gains.

Yesterday afternoon, The Wife convinced me to agree to lunch from the local Mexican carniceria. I stupidly agreed, and ordered a bean and cheese burrito. After lunch, I entered each ingredient into my calorie counter, and realized that I'd gobbled up a greedy 612 calories.

Well damn. That gave me almost no room for dinner. We were planning on grilling something, but try as I might, I couldn't figure out how I could squeeze a tasty dinner into the number of calories I'd had left. Sure, I had enough calories to eat something, so I wasn't going to go hungry, but it wasn't going to be much in the yum factor.

Then, to make matters worse, The Kid started in on how she wanted to watch a movie after dinner, and how she really wanted some homemade popcorn with butter.

I was sunk.

Now don't tell me how great popcorn is when you hot air pop it without butter and put some of that fake butter flavor or Parmesan cheese on it instead. I don't care what people say, I can't stand popcorn that way. No amount of salesmanship is going to convince my taste buds that the concoction tastes good. The only way to eat it is fresh out of the hot air popper with loads of butter and salt. Any other way, and it's not worth eating. (Well, except for movie popcorn, which is an entirely different animal.)

So I was faced with a choice, either blow my diet, or tell The Kid no popcorn. There was no way I was going to be able to stay in the room and watch a movie while The Kid munched away.

But then I remembered there is a way to change the rules, if I viewed my diet as simply a matter of science. More energy expended = a higher need for calories. Since it was Friday, and housecleaning day anyway, I set about my afternoon chores with extra vigor. After an hour and a half of serious work, I had worked up quite a sweat. After the chores were done, The Kid and I went for a brisk walk.

Bingo. I plugged all my exercise into my calorie counter, which subtracts the value of your exercise from the calories you've already consumed, and voila! I had extra calories available for dinner.

After considerable discussion with The Wife and The Kid, we ended up having steak and broccoli for dinner. The Kid changed her request for popcorn to ice cream, and we went out to the local ice cream shop for cones. I ordered a single scoop of vanilla bean in a waffle cone, and damn it tasted good. It had to be one of the best darn cones I've ever eaten.

At the end of the day, I carefully entered everything I had eaten. To my delight, the calorie counter reported the following:

You've recorded 1000 cals on this day (subtracting 657 cals burned from 1657 cals eaten.) Your target was 1200 cals.

On an average person, these figures would lead to a loss of 9.9 lb over the next month.

Let's hope that simple diet math doesn't backfire.

Fat Friday: Starting a New Trend

2008-07-25T14:08:00.000-07:00

Although I've been keeping this blog (albeit somewhat inconsistently) for more than a year, I've mostly written about what's been going on with me. In order to make the blog more interesting and to gather more readers, I'm going to start adding features that aren't restricted to only my weight loss story.

Starting today, I'm going to add a new feature called Fat Friday which will consist of a round-up of interesting articles and/or commentary about fat.

For this week's round-up:

Some Carbs Turn to Fat Faster - According to a study conducted by UT Southwestern Medical Center, certain types of carbohydrate metabolize into fat more quickly than others. Fructose, found in fruit and additives such as high fructose corn syrup, is metabolized the quickest, which means that not only the amount, but the type of carbohydrates consumed is important. Although fructose is metabolized more quickly, dieters should not be concerned about consuming it in the form of fruit. Rather, they should avoid the highly-processed forms instead. (WMAQ TV - Chicago)
California Bans Trans Fat - Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger signed the first statewide ban to eliminate trans fats from restaurant and bakery food. The ban for restaurants goes into effect on January 1, 2010, and bakeries will be expected to comply one year later. Establishments that violate the ban will be faced with fines ranging from $25 to $1,000. The ban does not apply to pre-packaged goods sold in stores. (Sacramento Bee)
Australia, the Fattest Nation? - According to a report by Australia's Baker Heart and Diabetes Institute released last month, Australia has become the fattest nation in the world, even surpassing the good old US of A. (Wall Street Journal)
Fat Friends Can Boost Your Weight - Having overweight friends can subconsciously affect your eating habits and make you fat as well. (BBC News)
One Reason to Celebrate Belly Fat - Although nobody likes pesky belly and thigh fat, there is one small reason to celebrate it. According to a study, researchers found that this type of fat is an excellent source of stem cells. (The Times of India)

Weigh In - Week 66

2008-07-25T07:40:00.000-07:00

This morning's weigh in was actually surprisingly good, as compared with last week's frustrating gain of 0.6 lbs.

This week, I did better. My weight this morning was 240.4, which represents a loss of 3.2 lbs for the week.

Good for me. My calorie averages worked out to be 1,273 per day, with 176 calories burned in exercise, for a net of 1,097 calories.

I think that one thing that really helped my weight loss this week was Monday's giant stomach upset, where I unloaded almost 3 lbs in the space of about seven or eight hours. Happily, the weight I unloaded during that episode has stayed gone.

Pounds is pounds, and right now I don't care where the numbers are coming from, I just want them to go down.

My total loss from my high weight is now 16.6 lbs, which represents about 6% of my original body weight. I can't say that I notice much difference. My clothes aren't really any looser, my underwear doesn't fit any better, and my friends aren't commenting.

But really, I don't expect that. It's taken me more than a year to lose this pathetic amount of weight, so I can't imagine that anyone would notice.

Jeans Mystery Solved

2008-07-24T11:50:00.001-07:00

The other day, I was grumbling about how my two supposedly-identical pairs of jeans didn't fit the same. The two jeans are supposed to be the same, as they are from the same manufacturer, the same style and the same size*. The only difference is that one pair is black, the other is blue.

Color shouldn't make a difference, right?

Well apparently it does, because one pair was made in Malaysia, and the other pair was made in Israel.

Of course it makes me wonder -- since the jeans look the same, shouldn't they have been made from the same pattern?

I just wish the U.S. clothing industry wouldn't outsource all the manufacturing to other countries. Back in the old days, I could buy a pair of jeans, the same size and style and they would be the same. It didn't matter if I bought them days, months, even years apart.

Now, I can't even buy two pairs of jeans on the same day from the same manufacturer without trying them both on.

Is that nuts or what?

---
* And since I know there is probably at least one person who is dying to know, I'll admit the size: the jeans are size 24W short.

Impending Doom

2008-07-24T09:05:00.000-07:00

In two weeks, we are going camping for a few days. This will be our last blast of the summer, and though we expect it to be fun, it will also be sad. Our closest friends, who are coming with us, will permanently move out of state shortly afterwards. It's going to be be a very bittersweet weekend.

Although I'm really looking forward to the break, I'm also very worried about what it's going to do to my weight. We've discussed the menu, and because it's our last time camping together, we are pulling out all the stops. There is nothing on the menu that I'd consider particularly diet friendly. We are going to be eating hamburgers, hot dogs, steaks, potato salad, and a very high-calorie breakfast sandwich called a "pudgy pie" that consists of scrambled eggs, cheese, turkey bacon, onions, mushrooms and whatever else you can think of, placed inside double-buttered bread and roasted in an sandwich maker over the fire. All wonderful, delicious food that I shouldn't eat because it's high in calories and fat, and low in good sense and nutrition.

If the food menu wasn't bad enough, I know us grown-ups will be drinking, so my calorie counts will be through the roof. Although I'm going to try to exercise some portion control, I doubt that I'll be very successful at it. The truth is, for this weekend, I don't think I care all that much. I'll try to be more active and go on a few hikes, but I doubt that the amount of activity I'll be able to engage in will offset the amount of food I'm likely to eat.

In the meantime, I'm just going to work on losing as much as I can beforehand, so that the overall trend still moves in the right direction.

This morning, I'm eating cottage cheese and a banana for breakfast and dreaming of pudgy pies.

These Boots (Sneakers, Really) Were Made for Walking

2008-07-23T19:48:00.001-07:00

I just got home from a brisk 30-minute walk, and I am so tired out I didn't have the energy to walk back to my office and sit down in front of my computer. Instead, I flopped down om the sofa, and started to write this blog entry from my cell phone.

Pathetic, huh?

The Wife (fat, like me), The Kid (not fat) and I have been making a concerted effort to exercise every day after dinner. We go for a brisk 30-minute walk around the neighborhood and then spend the rest of the evening quietly until it's time for bed.

Truthfully, I don't know if it is making much of a difference in my weight loss, but it at least assuages my guilt and makes me think I am at least making an effort. Certainly my heart and my leg muscles are noticing the effort.

Even if it doesn't seem to be doing much to forward my weight loss, there is one added benefit -- I get to see what is going on in the neighborhood. I can see that someone finally mowed the lawns of the two foreclosed homes on our block, the neighbor across the street is working on his car, and the demolition of the old bowling alley about a half mile from our house is almost complete. Our nightly walks give us a sense of what is going on around our home.

We have lived in our home for seven years and we barely know our neighbors. We don't speak to them, nor do they speak to us. Our neighborhood seems to consist of small suburban islands, each cut out of their respective portions of city block. The inhabitants of each island, even if they share a common language, simply don't have anything to say to each other.

Since there is virtually no neighborhood gossip, the only way we are going to find out if someone painted or put in a new deck is to see it for ourselves. Now that we are walking every day, we'll be sure to notice.

Don't You Just Hate That?

2008-07-23T08:23:00.000-07:00

Before my wedding, I bought two identical pairs of jeans. They were the same manufacturer, style and size. The only difference was color -- one was black, the other blue. When I bought them, I noticed that the black jeans seemed to fit a little better, but I really didn't give it a lot of thought. After all, they were the same, right?

Last night, during my walk, I noticed the black jeans were getting decidedly loose. I'd been wearing them for a couple of days, and I thought, "wow, maybe I'm actually losing weight!"

This morning, I put on the freshly-washed blue jeans, expecting them to be a little bit loose.

Nope, they were just as tight as ever. I guess the black ones just stretched from being worn two days in a row.

Damn. Don't you just hate that?

1,000 to 1,200 Calories

2008-07-22T09:46:00.000-07:00

I've had a number of readers opine that 1,000 to 1,200 calories is too low for a man, and that I really should up my calorie intake.

I should only be so lucky. Unfortunately, I am in the unlucky 50% of the population who lacks a penis, so I am forever relegated to the lower end of the calorie spectrum.

Now I suspect revealing that little detail has caused a few recent readers to spit their coffee all over their monitors.

"But what about your references to 'The Wife?'" I hear them all crying.

Well long-time readers of my blog will realize that I used to call "The Wife" by the name "The SO." I changed her title around the end of June, when California legalized same-gender marriage, and we went out and got married. We've been together for almost ten years, and The Kid is a child that's been living with for the past two years. She's 12, and we are trying to adopt her from the foster care system.

But the fact that I'm female hasn't really been a secret. I think my post Here Kitty, Kitty, Kitty will clear up any misunderstandings in that area.

Now I'm sure I'll end up offending a few folks out there, but my blog really isn't about the fact that I'm queer. It's about the fact that I'm ~~really overweight~~ morbidly obese and I'm trying to work my way back to a normal-sized butt.

But hey, while we are on the subject, I probably should ask my California readers to vote NO on Proposition 8.

I know that the idea of a same-sex couple doing the mattress mambo gives many people the willies. However, this initiative isn't about sex. If you think about your boss and his wife doing the nasty, or your parents doing the Wild Thang, it probably gives you a bit of the squigglies as well.

This initiative is about protecting families -- families that already exist. Whether or not you support queer folks getting together in the first place, it's already a done deal. Equal rights or no, our families already exist. Voting in favor of banning same-sex marriage isn't going to stop couples from pairing up and having (or adopting) kids.

The only thing this initiative will do, if it is passed, is to prevent us from having the same rights as other families. If I die, my partner will have to pay inheritance taxes on all the property we've bought together. My kid will suffer because our home would have to be sold to pay those taxes. If one of us gets sick, and hospital staff decides to be stubborn, we might not be able to visit each other.

Imagine how that would feel to be told, "you can't visit your spouse in the hospital because your marriage is illegal," or "you are going to have to sell your home so you can pay the inheritance tax because your partner died."

And the truth is, domestic partnerships don't confer the same rights. They aren't recognized by the Federal government, and they aren't even recognized by everyone locally. People know what "marriage" means. They don't necessarily get that a "domestic partnership" means the same thing. My partner and I once went into a gym to buy a membership. They offered memberships for married couples, and for singles. When we said we wanted the same price as the married couple, they wouldn't give it to us. "Domestic partnerships aren't the same," they told us.

As for folks who struggle with this on the religious side of things, I think it's worth pointing out that even among biblical scholars there's disagreement over what Leviticus 18:22 means. It bothers me that so many conservatives are willing to point to the bible to say that homosexuality is wrong, when there are a great many other things, such as having intercourse during a woman's menses, the eating of pork and shellfish, and the wearing of wool and linen together that are also mentioned as sinful.

And too, we have to remember that our country was founded on the principle of the separation between church and state. If we forget that, then I think our country sinks to the level of certain Arab countries where no other religions are allowed to exist.

Anyway, I'm sure you get the picture. But again, that's not what this blog is really supposed to be about. This blog is really about weight loss, and the fact that I'm queer is really incidental to my weight loss journey.

As for why I'm sticking to 1,000 to 1,200 calories as my daily goal, it boils down to one thing -- if I eat more, I don't lose weight. I'm a shorty (only 5'2") with a lousy metabolism, and eating more food means that I simply won't lose an ounce. Perhaps when I lose more weight and exercise becomes easier, I'll be able to exercise my way into a higher calorie intake. For now, though, I have to do what I have to do to get some of those pounds off.

Right now, if I tried to go jogging, the city government would likely sue me for the cost of road repairs. I'd most certainly end up jogging sink holes into the sidewalk.

Dumping Syndrome

2008-07-22T09:22:00.000-07:00

As much as it's easy to think otherwise, I think that yesterday's case of the atomic butt blasts were caused by nothing more than dumping syndrome. The Wife, The Kid, and our two visiting friends and their three children ate the same thing, and nobody else got sick.

Dumping syndrome is one of the unpleasant side-effects of having your gallbladder removed, which I had done about eight years ago. Immediately after the surgery, I had problems with diarrhea, and it's never cleared up completely. I'll go through times where things are better, and times where things are worse, and yesterday was definitely one of those worse moments.

My surgeon, of course, assured me the problem would clear up eventually. He told me that an unlucky 10-20% of patients continue to have problems, but not to worry. Had he told me that before the surgery, I would have insisted he only remove the stones and not the gallbladder itself, because I'm the type of person that if there's a 10% chance of something lousy happening, it's bound to happen to me.

All I can say is that if someone suggests removing your gallbladder, say no unless there are absolutely no other options. Have them break up the stones with ultrasound, or do surgery to remove the stones but not the gallbladder itself. Even if the stones keep coming back every few years or so, I would rather deal with that than having persistent diarrhea.

I've been told that avoiding certain foods can help with this problem, but I can't seem to figure out what foods to avoid. I've tried avoiding fats, carbohydrates, protein at different times, but it had no effect. I've tried eating more fiber, less fiber, no dairy, increasing dairy, and really nothing changes. I can eat the same thing for days on end and be fine or not be fine.

I've tried supplements, calcium, enzymes, and other stuff, but nothing works for very long. I've pretty much had to learn to live with the problem. Eight years later, I've come to realize that I'm never going to be the same as I was before the surgery. I've learned that if I'm going to travel, I'm well-served by not eating, because if there's nothing in the pipes, then there's nothing to poop out later.

Most of the time the problem doesn't take me out for an entire day. Usually I know if something is going to bother me within a few minutes of eating it. On most days, if I have a problem, I just wait around near a bathroom until things explode, and then I'm fine afterwards. I don't really have much explanation for yesterday, other than I'd been eating a lot of fiber, which had slowed stuff down, and then when breakfast didn't set well, a lot of stuff had to move out of the way so that breakfast could make a rushed exit.

On the plus side, all the hassles with my intestines do have one benefit. Since my tummy troubles can be somewhat unpredictable, I was able to get a note from my doctor to permanently get me out of jury duty.

Full of Shit -- Not Anymore!

2008-07-21T17:12:00.000-07:00

Today was a productive, yet unpleasant, dieting day.

I found out, exactly, how much the contents of my digestive tract weighs when it is full.

And how did I find that out?

If you are sensitive or easily grossed-out, you probably don't want to know. If you read further, don't tell me later that you weren't warned!

Let's just say that I had an upset stomach -- a really upset stomach. I'm not sure what I ate that disagreed with me, but when I woke up this morning, my belly felt kind of bloated and stuffed. I chalked it up to constipation, especially after a rather pathetic morning showing on the throne prior to my morning's weigh in.

When I stepped on the scale, I weighed 243.4. Down a pound from yesterday. Good.

I ate breakfast, which consisted of two large peaches and a cup of low-fat cottage cheese. I eat this pretty often for breakfast, and normally it's quite a happy little breakfast. This morning, though, it wasn't happy, and about 30 minutes after eating, I felt sick to my stomach. I called in sick at work, and spent most of the day alternating between laying in bed shivering and sitting on the throne unloading the contents of my intestines.

Early afternoon, I happened to notice that my cottage cheese breakfast passed through, largely undigested. By 4:00 PM, I was still visiting the throne regularly, but there was nothing solid left. I pooped out vast quantities of liquid.

Finally, after about seven hours of doing a strange version of ass worship on the porcelain goddess, I was finally done. I felt better, and I could feel that there was absolutely, positively, nothing more left to poop out.

I took off all my clothes and stepped on the scale. I weighed 240.6 lbs.

I crapped out 2.8 lbs of shit my friends. That's almost three pounds of poop.

I guess when my friends tell me, "Oinkstop, you really are full of shit," they are probably right.

Weekends Are Just Tough

2008-07-21T09:06:00.001-07:00

During the week, I mostly seem able to stick to my eating plan. Since The Wife and I both work, there is less temptation, especially since we have fewer social engagements. We plan what we are going to eat, count the calories, and log it in our food diaries. Easy peasy.

The weekends, though, are a different matter. It seems we always have something going on that involves eating out, having friends over, or going over to someone else's place for dinner. Inevitably, all of those events involve food.

Now I have to say that I have been making better choices -- I am still counting calories, and I make a point not to go back for seconds. Still, I am finding that I end up going way outside my calorie limits for the day, even when I make a point to eat less for breakfast and lunch.

No matter how you slice it 1,000 to 1,200 calories per day just ain't that much. Maybe someday I will get used to it, but right now it feels like not very much food at all.

I am not going to give up, but it seems like such a long road ahead.

Sea of Fat

2008-07-19T22:00:00.001-07:00

Today, I took The Wife, The Kid, and two of The Kid's friends on an outing. We went out to lunch (onion soup and salad), walked around the mall for an hour, headed over to the movies, and then went out for pizza. I'm sure I blew my diet, but I tried really hard to be reasonable with what I ate. Instead of eating a mountain of pizza, I only had two slices and one trip through the salad bar.

Of course my downfall was the movies. I just couldn't say no to a box of Reese's Pieces. On the plus side, I gave half the box away to the kids.

So maybe it wasn't so bad.

But I was struck by something today. I felt like I was swimming through a sea of fat people. Everywhere I looked, I saw almost no one of what would be considered a healthy weight. In the restaurants, at the mall, in the movie theater, nearly everyone was heavier than they should have been. There were people ranging from what I would call "chubby" to people even more obese than I. I remember one woman sitting on a bench near the bottom of one of the escalators who was so large, she reminded me of Jabba the Hut. I felt sorry for her, because she looked tired and sad. Age didn't seem to matter, either. Children, adolescents, adults -- they were all fat.

I've been surfing around weight loss web sites the past few days, and the story of this woman absolutely amazes me. She used to weigh 300 lbs, lost 180 lbs and is now a fitness trainer. She isn't just thin, she is buff.

I didn't see any people who looked like her eating out, at the theater or in the mall. All I saw was a sea of fat.

I Hate Kettle Corn

2008-07-18T16:02:00.000-07:00

The Wife is sitting across from me, munching on a bowl of kettle corn. Kettle corn, for the unfamiliar, is popcorn coated in a candy glaze made of sugar or honey. It's tasty, and not as sweet as caramel popcorn.

The Wife is munching, and I want to scream at her.

She bought said kettle corn at the local farmer's market this afternoon. We went there to buy some produce (the peaches this year are fabulous) and while we were there, she spotted the corn. She had to buy a bag, so she bought a $5 monstrosity that probably has 10,000 calories in a bag.

Okay, well not 10,000 calories. I'm guessing at least 500.

"Uh, do you have to buy that? We are supposed to be on a diet." I said.

"Well I want it."

Ugh. So now I have to contend with the sound and smell of her smacking away. I want to eat some, not because I like kettle corn all that much, because it smells so good. Instead, I'll have a couple of peaches.

But The Wife is still smacking away at that corn. I'm telling myself, I hate kettle corn.

No, I hate The Wife. Why did she have to bring that stupid kettle corn home in the first place?