The Final Fifteen Pounds

If you are new to this blog, you won't know that I've lost over 55 pounds this year. Still losing.  I'll keep this short and simple today. I've figured out how to make it through the holidays and keep losing. 1. Keep my eating window short. What I do is sometimes called time restricted eating . I do this every day. Not just during the holidays. It looks like this: eat during a six hour window of time. The other eighteen hours, don't eat. Depending on your needs, expand or reduce that window some. Many people do well on using an eight hour window.  2. Turn down the carbs. No added sugar. This is usually easy at holiday meals. Eat turkey but not starchy offerings. Add butter, not gravy (unless the gravy has no grains in it). Eat salads and cooked veggies, not grains, not bread. Eat (some) nuts and cheese, not desserts.  3. Drink water. Don't drink anything that has sugar or even artificial sweeteners. Artificial sweeteners have been proven to turn on the insulin r...

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I don't know about you, but I gained weight on Thanksgiving. Am I disappointed? No. Here's why. I expected it. I knew I was eating more than I normally would, and I knew I was eating more carbs.  I do time restricted eating otherwise known as intermittent fasting. But on Thanksgiving, I extended my eating window.  I think it's actually good for my body to have a feast day. I don't know how long it will take to shed those 2 extra pounds, but I'm not worried. If life plays is normal for the next few days, it is likely to take three days to lose it, maybe five.  How do I know? I write my weight down every day on a spreadsheet. I can see how my body behaves. If I keep my eating window short and carbs low, I lose weight.  It's that simple for me. It might look different for you. If you track your weight, you can figure it out. Here's the thing though, you have to have an agreement with yourself that you will look at the numbers as data you can use. If you get dep...

My weight loss has slowed down over the last six weeks, plateaued in the last two or three weeks. I know because I record my weight daily.  Maybe it's the salt.  This is me 11-21-20. This is me 11-19. Weight-loss researchers write about the value of recording your weight. Some have said that making that one change leads to weight-loss for many . Not all. (I wonder if there is any one thing that leads to weight-loss for all over the long term?) Since I've tracked my weight, I can explain to myself why I've gained or lost weight. (It's nobody else's business unless I decide to make it theirs.) There are two weight levers I pull to make weight loss changes in one or two days. One is to cut carbs. The other is to close my feeding window. I don't count carbs. For me, that's too much work. I do educate myself on what foods are high carb vs low carb.  I've been battling with peanuts. That's right. I want them. Really, really want them. I've decided to g...

Back in January, when I was 218 pounds, I was submitting answers in a weight loss app. I had to pick a goal weight, and 168 looked good.  But here I am at 266.8 as of this morning, and I still have a belly. Not big like it used to be, but it's still noticeable. I want it to look like a flat beach, not rolling dunes! But make no mistake about it, I'm happy with the weight loss.  The cool thing is that it's coming off faster than ever.  Here's my weight loss from the last 10 days...  173.2 172.2 172.2 169.8 170.2 169.8 170.0 169.1 167.8 166.9 But the way I'm getting that to happen, I wouldn't recommend. I'm eating meat. I've been gradually moving from a high fat/low carb diet to a meat diet: carnivore. I don't intend to stay there for long, maybe a month or two. I'm trying to calm down some inflammation in my joints.  But I don't like eating meat only. I don't like the slower digestion. I hope it speeds up. I've heard that when people s...

When you lose weight, there a trickster like an evil Bugs Bunny that plays around with you. It wants to knock you off course just for laughs.  That's why you can't take the scale too seriously. It's a tool. But it can do some funny things.  Every morning after I step on my smart scale, I put the number on a spreadsheet to calculate my 3 day averages and my 7 day averages. I think those numbers are much more important than my weight on a particular day.  I've had days when my weight jumped up a pound and a half and I really didn't know why (but I usually figure it out). Other times, I have lost over 2 pounds overnight.  I lost over two pounds last night, so today is the first time since I was in high school to see 160 something on a scale. I'm celebrating with a Snoopy dance.  But I'm not taking it too seriously yet. I large drop is often followed with a bounce back up.  My best guess is that my body is doing something with water. I am experimenting with my...

I do. I call it Finger Pointer. One day, I’ll come up with something more elegant but for now, Finger Pointer. Mr. F.P. is having a grand old time right now because I’m closing in on a weight goal. My BMI is almost down to 25. My goal is for it to be underneath 25. And this week I’ve been at 25.1 and 25.2.  At 175.something, for my BMI to drop to 25, I need to get down to 174.4.  I’m so close, that I can hear it breathing. I feel like a hunter, stalking a cornered beast. It’s not going down easily, but IT IS GOING DOWN! Now, I don’t know what your weight loss is like, but mine is like this, I get down to a new goal for 2 minutes and pop back up. Weight fluctuates. In fact, yesterday I got down to 175.4. Today it bounced up to 175.8. And even though my “smart” scale says that weight gain is not fat, there is part of me that is not happy. That is my FP friend who will find any reason to be negative. My answer to FP is my IC. Inner coach. There is an important mental difference b...