Just Start your Diet, Will Ya?!? – Day 1

I said in my last post I’d see ya at 250 when I was about 260 – then gained 12 or 13 pounds.

I guess holding my posts hostage as a means to lose weight doesn’t work.

So maybe instead I *should* post and clutter up the Internet unnecessarily? I’ve posted and lost weight – and posted and GAINED weight. I’ve posted and stayed the same.

Does my posting matter?

How about this? Let’s pretend: yeah – posting has some magical influence on my weight and posting sheds pounds.

And maybe I shouldn’t worry too much about cluttering up my little backwater on the Internet. How much virtual ink has been spilled on Donald Trump, Kim Kardashian, and other innumerable fame-whores who crowd out the real news unless it is a full-blown terrorist attack?

Do my self-absorbed fat-posts really change anything a whit?

Let’s suppose not – at least for now. Here’s what I am going to do – or try to do – this might be another pointless ‘begin again’ post that does nothing and goes nowhere. I go a lot of these here.

Anyway: each day – or most days – I will attempt to briefly post what I ate, what I weigh, how I’m doing, and probably prattle on about something unrelated (I have a well-documented tendency to do this).

The diet? Ketogenic.Why? It’s worked well for me in the past. That’s not to say that it *will* work for me this time – this could end up another diary of failure. The best features of the ketogenic diet – one where you get most of your calories from fat, enough protein to avoid your muscles from wasting away, and very few carb (under 50 grams per day) – for me is a huge reduction in overall hunger and, given enough time in ketosis, a certain calm. It literally mellows me out.

Exercise? Nah. I’m 270 plus on a 5′ 10″ frame and a lifelong endomorph lacking grace in movement. Exercise is more likely to damage me than help me at this point.

As a reminder – or an intro to those new to the blog. I’m a guy in my 54th year who lost 80 pounds on low carb in 2004 and kept a good part of that off for about a decade – then rapidly gained it all back – and a little more – to where I am now,

I’m not big on New Year’s and like to start my next year’s resolutions early so today, the day after Christmas 2015, I started my new diet.

God – it sounds like a joke to write that. Like *I* don’t even believe it.

Another thing I should warn you about if you’re new and plan to stick around and see what happens to this fool: I’m a grump. If by some miracle I keep writing and that changes, then it is probably due to ketosis – which mellows me out – or somebody’s slipping happy pills into my Metformin bottle.

So let’s get on with this – shall we?

Setting Some Goals

Let’s play with some numbers. According to the BMI I should be in the 170s – but screw that. The BMI is a bullshit measurement. It’s also unflattering for me. I lost major amounts of weight 3 times in my life and when I was in the 170s people thought I had Anorexia.

I’m going to pick a number as a goal that is realistic for me. That’s a funny sentence to write because losing ANY weight right now seems as likely as finding a pony in my bedroom wearing a bowtie and singing Queen’s ‘Bohemian Rhapsody’.

Regardless how laughable, I have to have a goal so let’s pick a number out of my butt – 195 lbs. This was my high school weight. I wasn’t thin then, but I stood out because most kids start their fattening well after high school.  Being 53 and too thin (unless you’re cut) looks like you’re sick. 195 on my current frame, decades removed from high school, would be fine.

So next step is: how long will this take? Not that I am in a rush (I am but let’s pretend not), but having an ongoing expectation of rate of loss helps to anchor this in reality somewhat.

Now, science says a lot of things regarding nutrition and obesity that I don’t agree wth, but with regards to the rate of safe weight loss I am going to go with their 2 pounds per week. This will not be a steady incline (if it works) but a jagged bouncing about with spikes and crevices punctuated by plateaus. I’ve never seen it NOT work like this so to expect different would be pointless.

Success will have me weaving above and below the 2lbs./week line until landing at 195.

So how much weight are we talking about? 273.6 – 195 = 78.6 pounds to lose. Ugh.

If I lose 78.6 pounds at 2 pounds per week it will take me 78.6 / 2 = 39.3 weeks. As these decimals suck, I’m going to ditch them and round up to an even 40 weeks – a nice round number.

I used the calculator at http://www.timeanddate.com/date/dateadd.html to add 40 weeks to today and got a target date of October 1, 2016.

10 months to lose almost 80 pounds is aggressive but not too aggressive.

I still have lots to figure out (again) but at least I have a goal and a date.

Day 1 – Saturday, December 26, 2015 – Wt: 273.6 Blood Glucose 106 – 78.6 pounds to go

For breakfast I had 3 fried eggs cooked in butter. I also had coffee with cream. I don’t know if I am ready to start the infernal counting and measuring – I’m just going to get a few days under my ever-tightening belt of eating the ‘right’ things.

Even if I screw up nutrient balance, fat to protein ratio, or some other detail – I don’t care: I just need to get some ketones going and can adjust from there.

For lunch I had an entire container of cream fraise – over 800 calories of pure fat.

I stumbled at dinner. i had some leftover chicken, duck and vegetables from Christmas, but then gave in to some mashed potatoes, stuffing, and a slice of bread. I also had a chocolate-dipped dried apricot.

Not exactly the perfect start but you’ll find the word ‘perfect’ does not apply to any of my characteristics – unless you count ‘fool’.