The Final Fifteen Pounds

  Last night, a funny thing happened... But first some background... 1) I don't eat corn due to inflammation issues. 2) Due to a winter storm, our power was out for 36 hours and counting. It's cold even with a fire going.  Last night, I was the first in the family to go to bed. I said goodnight to my three boys and wife. I opened up my iPad and got in some reading before going to sleep.  Just as I was about to turn over, I realized that I had a question for my wife. I walked out and was met with four pair of guilty eyes. I knew they were up to something, but I didn't know what. I looked and saw the large bowl of popcorn unsuccessfully covered in the middle of the four huddled ones. They felt bad.  I was overjoyed. One is this... they waited until I went to bed because they cared about my feelings. That's love. But also, I didn't have a craving for the popcorn. Popcorn has been the hardest thing for me to pass up this last year of intermittent fasting. The hardest....

  I'll tell you about the push up challenge in a minute, but first holiday eating... It wasn't pretty. Okay, the food was great. And I didn't go hog wild, really. But somehow I picked up about seven pounds in the month of December.  Back on the straight and narrow. Already lost three of it.  Now the push ups. I had an idea to do a push up challenge with my boys for a month. Six of us began the challenge. One dropped out the first day. It's not because it's too hard for him. He's already crazy fit. He builds pools for a living and much of that is him on the business end of a shovel.  Another one did it only once or twice. He too works a full day in construction.  The boys who still live at home all are doing it with me. We are just over half way through.  The challenge is this: Do 50 pushups a day for a month. Take Sundays off.  The eighteen year old, who practices karate and ballet, immediately decided to take on more than 50 each day.  The other ...

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...