My D-Day

Tomorrow is the Big Day. The weigh in. Having already established that I plan on giving the money to some charity, I really no longer care about that - just victory. Victory over myself, the people that kept up the refrain “if you don’t eat you wont lose any weight,” the people that didn’t think I could control by impulses and, most importantly myself.

I have been taking laxities for a few days now and just POOPING my guts out. I also haven’t had anything to eat all day and won’t be eating until after the weigh in. I’m also going to stop drinking fluids in about 30 minutes. 40 hours without food and 16 hours without water… I’m also planning on doing a 58 minute workout just before the weigh in.

Victory or Death.

I anticipate seeing Jesus. Or at least going slightly crazy. Permanent damage is possible. I’m already noticing. Yesterday I had a salad, which I promptly shat out with the power of Ex-Lax. I mean… what happens when you deny yourself these things for so long? I don’t think I ever have even tried something like this. Not drinking anything AND working out. It doesn’t really seem safe, to be honest… but I KNOW it’s possible and I WILL win. There’s no alternative.

You shall see me home on the shoulders of my men with the heat of victory pounding in their hearts or you shall see them cary me in a box to lay me down in the Earth. I’ve come to understand defeat only by reputation and we will never become acquainted, I can assure you that. I shall know Victory or I shall know Death. There can be no other way.

Normal weight

This week was better than anticipated. The scale indicated that, for the first time in a long time, I am neither overweight nor obese by my BMI. In less than 3 months I have shed 37 pounds and am now considered “normal weight.” The mirror still looks bad. I have skin hanging off me that pinches grotesquely, but the effects are obvious. I’ve “ungrown” my belt, all my pants and my shirts look like bags that hang off me. I’m 182 pounds now and, though I don’t feel it, I’m certainly a lot smaller than I used to be.

30 pounds GONE.

I’ve lost 30 pounds.  Hellz yeah.  I stepped on the scale today and I thought something was wrong with it.  After almost three weeks of plateauing, I’ve lost 10 pounds in 10 days.  My new plan, which I’ve simply referred to as Victory or Death is working… for the better.  Which is nice.  Since I didn’t really want to die.  So, when my ass stepped on the scale and it was all like “Oh hai!  U way 189 pounds lol.” I was like “OMGWTFRTOFLWWJDKTHXBAI!”  This means that, I’m fairly confident, I will win this competition because my secret is something no normal human being would do.  It’s so horrible and painful and disgusting, that I just don’t see how one could possibly even WANT to do it.  Doing Atkins while taking Alli is torture but unbelievably effective.

Do I have regrets?  Well… I’ve lost some underwear along the way.  My skin is always burning and I can’t wake up in the morning.  Every day I feel horribly hungry but!  BUT!  This is a victory over another group of people I find HORRIBLY OBNOXIOUS.  The people that say this line… i want to punch them in the face.  Even though they’re my friends and I love them dearly, I still want to punch them in the face:

“If you don’t eat, your metabolism slows down and you don’t loose weight.”

*PUNCH*  GODDAMN IT.  If you don’t eat, you loose weight.  PERIOD.  We don’t have magic fairy metabolisms where if you’re starving you just convert the world’s happiness into cute belly fat.  Yes, your metabolism slows down but it doesn’t STOP.  Do you know what happens when your metabolism stops?  You die.  But you can’t argue with these people.  They’re relentless.  OMG YOURE ONLY EATING 800 CALORIES A DAY?!  YOU CANT LOOSE WEIGHT DOING THAT.

I just lost 30 pounds doing it.

Not eating is the greatest diet ever.  Not that I don’t eat.  I do.  I eat less than most people, but I don’t eat over 1000 calories a day.  What isn’t a good idea is to think that not eating will some how keep you from loosing weight.  That’s a diet of stupidity.  Not eating will help you loose weight.  Unless you haver magic fairy metabolism.   Let me give you my general run down on how to loose weight:

1.  Stop eating so much.

That’s it!  With the magic fairy metabolism myth dispelled there’s nothing else to do but follow step 1.  If it isn’t working, see step 1 and consider following it.  If you’re still having problems loosing weight.  You should really stop eating because you’re obviously not following step one.  Seriously.  The fat doesn’t sneak in your thighs while you’re not looking.  You may actually only need to eat 1000 calories day if you’re a 5’ tall woman.  Humans aren’t really that large of animals.  You know, we’re about the size of deer and they get food from eating leaves off bushes.  Not deep fried leaves over duck confit, covered in brown sugar with a side of mashed potatoes and butter.  Deer don’t eat that.  And they’re not fat.  So be like Bamby.  Or better yet, be like Bamby’s mom.  And die.  Here is another step that will HELP you, though it’s not wholly necessary:

2.  Get off your ass and walk.

I’ll admit, it’s hard work getting off your ass.  I love sitting on my ass.  It’s great fun.  But that does nothing.  Getting off your ass and doing work is another way to burn calories and keep your metabolism up (Honestly, what slows your metabolism down more?  Not eating or not doing anything? — The correct answer is B) Seeing as how metabolism is directly associated with the NEED to expend energy which trumps its availability — and if you’re fat, then you have plenty of it, thanks Krebb’s cycle!)

Breaking through the plateau

Each day I doubt it could get any harder and then, the next day, it is indeed harder.  I broke through the “plateau” and lost 4 pounds this week.  I cut carbs down to around 20g a day and my swimming+running/elliptical regiment has really drained me.  Not eating carbs has had the unintended consequence of limiting my dietary consumption so much that I’m under 800 cals a day.  I’m finding myself confused and disoriented a lot now.  It’s no longer a grumpy-hungry feeling but a sort of brain damaged feeling.  Though, I’m quite certain, no brain damage has occurred (so keep your worries to a minimum.)

Plateau

This post was supposed to celebrate the loss of my 20th pound, but it isn’t. Instead it’s about not losing my 20th pound. It was supposed to be psychologically significant because this is the halfway point of my weight loss.

Allow me to essplain:

I’m in a competition, you see, with 7 other people who all chipped in $50 to loose weight. Whoever loses the most weight as per a percentage of weight loss wins $200 (second and third also get money back.) I started out with a BMI that stated I was obese - I weighed about 219 pounds. My objective, in addition to win the contest, is to also end with a BMI that is “normal” or around 183 pounds. That means that by April 1st I need to lose 36 pounds, collect $200 and have completed a total loss of 16.4% of my body weight. I have 52 days left to loose 13 pounds. In the last 46 days I’ve lost 19. Good news, right?
WRONG.  HORRIBLE NEWS.

That image there tells you the horrible story of my weight loss.  As you can see, I must be below the red line AT ALL TIMES to be victorious - but I’m approaching it slowly every day because I’m losing weight slower and slower.  I’ve upped my cardio and maintained my calories but the line…. it’s just… GOING TO KILL ME.

nevermind that.  I’ll be victorious.  Rest assured.  I’d rather be dead than lose.

Angery

SLAM. Down another 3 pounds. It may be 2.5 pounds, but the doctor’s-office-like scale in the locker room wasn’t being too clear. I’ll take the 3, thanks. That means I’m down 18 pounds in 4 weeks and 5 days. Not bad, not bad.

Guess what else. I’m pissed off a lot. I dunno why. It’s driving me insane. The lack of focus is hard. Losing this much weight is difficult. Losing it this fast is… difficulter… uh.

13 pounds down

Well, I’ve managed to loose now 13 pounds since January 4th and let me tell you, I feel like CRAP. The math-o-matics work out to something on the order of 800-1000 calories every day or, to put it into perspective, 4.465 bowls of breakfast cereal with 1% milk. Plus a regimented workout plan created by my very own father, which I’ve decided is too confusing to follow and will be asking for a newer, simplified plan that doesn’t involve bizarre 4 minute bursts of running interspersed between walking and interpretive dance.

It’s not that I miss eating copious amounts of food, mind you. I got over that after about the second week, I just find myself bored and hungry - time I would have otherwise enjoyed being bored and eating, or bored and cooking something in a kiddie pool of butter. But I’ve found new flavors in the foods I eat, that don’t involve deep frying or extensive introduction of exogenous fat. For instance, the difference in flavor between adding 5 tablespoons of butter to a chicken breast and adding none is remarkably small.

But we shall see. My ’small goal’ is 30 pounds by April 1st, to put me at a pleasant 189 pounds. My sinsiter ‘almost killing myself’ goal is only 40 pounds more to put me at a comfy 179 pounds, which I haven’t been at since I started graduate life.

This diet thing

I’m doing this diet thing right now.  It’s horribly painful.  Let me tell you about it:

I weighed 219 pounds at the beginning of this year after returning from the all-you-can-eat-and-drink resort in Mexico.  I get back and hear of this contest in the department about loosing as much weight as possible and winning lots of money, so I entered it.  10 days later I’ve lost 9 pounds and I think I’m still dropping… but it’s killing me.

Like, I have small bouts of Retrograde amnesia where I can’t remember peoples’ names (like my wife’s) or if I zone out while I’m driving I suddenly can’t remember where I’m going.  You know, inconvenient things like that.  It finally culminated in being forced to go home because I couldn’t hold my head up long enough to do chemistry.  I did the maths and found my caloric intake was somewhere around 400 Cal a day plus the aerobics I was doing.

Whoops.

Now I track what I eat and try to keep it around 1200 Cal a day.

No wonder anorexics are flakes.

Chapter 1: The Biggest Loser

Here begins the blog. At the beginning I weighed 219 pounds. I must lose most of that weight to get to a BMI which is more respectable. My goal is to lose 40 pounds by the end of March.

I have entered into a competition with 7 other people. We all pitched in $50 and the 1st place winner takes home $200. Thanks to generous benefactors, by actual take home will be $1000 with matching rewards, which will go toward PAYING DOWN MY HUGE STUDENT LOANS. Which will be nice.