Man in My Shadow

I woke up this morning, stepped on to the scale and I almost screamed!  (which would have been bad since Sheri was still sleeping).  I did it!  I hit my goal of losing 100 pounds.  What an awesome feeling!  Just then, good old MC (The mediocre cheerleader) started talking.  “Hey, you hit your goal!  Lets celebrate.  Lets go blog about your victory.  After all, you said you wanted to blog more, right?  So lets skip your run this morning and blog…blah…blah…blah..”  I was so pumped from hitting my goal I did not pay one bit of attention to MC.  I got dressed and headed out to run.  My thoughts were dominated by the huge accomplishment I had made, and it really fueled my run.  I hit the 5k mark in 36:20!  Are you kidding me?  June 9, I ran a 5k in 39:40.  A week ago, I ran a 5k in 38:23.  Today…36:20!!!!  I felt so amazing, when I got out of the shower I decided to try on one of the 2xl shirts I bought in Cozumel.  I knew when I got it, it did not fit, but I was going to use it as a goal.  I fit into one of the other shirts I got the same week about 2 months ago, but this one was cut smaller.  Low and behold, it fit!  3 victories before breakfast?!?

My day started great and I was on cloud 9!!!  I find myself thinking a lot about what things I will be able to do in 6 months based on what I have been able to achieve so far.  I can’t wait to see what is to come.

Now for the progress on my goals and my weight.

For my goals:

•  1000 crunches - 600 done
• 1000 penguins - 600 done
• 1000 push ups (Knees on ground) - 560 done
• 1000 squats - 625 done
• 600 BOSU ball squats - 510 done
• 60 minutes of planks - 28.8 minutes
• 12 Couch to 5k runs - 5 runs
• Run 48 kilometers - 27.14 km
• 75 miles biked - 51.12 miles
• 10 pounds lost - 2.2 pounds
• Write 6 more blog posts this month – including this one, 4 blog posts

So to sum up Week 74:

Weight:

• Current weight – 7/4/11 – 284.6 pounds
• Last weeks weight – 6/27/11 – 286.8 pounds
• Starting weight – 2/13/11 – 384.8 pounds

Weight loss for this week - 2.2 pounds

Total Weight loss - 100.2 pounds

Filed under: Diet, goals, Health, Inspiration, Journal, Journey, Losing Weight, Mens Weight Loss, Other, Overweight, Personal, Uncategorized, Weight Loss | Tagged: diet, Goals, health, inspiration, journal, Journey, Losing Weight, Mens Weight Loss, Obesity, other, Overweight, weight loss | 3 Comments »

” If all goes well, I will hit my 100 pound weight loss goal next week!!!!”  That is how I ended last week’s post.  My goals this week were simple, work on my monthly goals and lose 2 lbs.  So how did I do?

For my goals:

• 1000 crunches - 360 done
• 1000 penguins - 360 done
• 1000 push ups (Knees on ground) - 350 done
• 1000 squats - 360 done
• 600 BOSU ball squats - 270 done
• 60 minutes of planks - 13.3 minutes
• 12 Couch to 5k runs - 3 runs
• Run 48 kilometers - 15.24 km
• 75 miles biked - 29.6 miles
• 10 pounds lost - 0 pounds
• Write 6 more blog posts this month – including this one, 3 blog posts

As for the weight, I did not hit my goal.  I weigh the same this week as I did last week.  This is a prime example of why I have the mentality of focusing on what I can control.  1) what I put in my mouth and 2) what I do to burn off what I put in my mouth.  This week, I did fairly good on my food choices and I did a very well with my exercises.  My calorie goals are based on me losing 2 lbs a week, so if I eat all my calories each day and don’t exercise, I should in theory lose 2 lbs a week.  This week I had 3545 calories extra left over as a result of my workouts and a 3500 calorie deficit should result in a 1 pound loss.  On paper, it looked like a good week.  I should have lost 3 pounds.  What happened?  No clue.  I did what I could do to lose the weight but I can not control what my body decides to do.

I am not concerned or deterred as a result of not losing weight this week.  I know I did what I needed to and I will keep doing it regardless what the scale says.

So to sum up Week 73:

Weight:

• Current weight -7/4/11 – 286.8 pounds
• Last weeks weight -6/27/11 – 286.8 pounds
• Starting weight -2/13/11 – 384.8 pounds

Weight loss for this week - 0 pounds

Total Weight loss - 98 pounds

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I was doing my run the other morning, which allows for 45 minutes of uninterrupted thought.  It was just me and my thoughts to the rhythmic pounding of my feet on the pavement.  About 35 minutes in, I realized I had been listening to three distinct voices.   They were having one heck of a conversation too!  I am sure there are more than three different voices in my head but I think that only 3 of them were up at6:30in the morning.  I will tell you about the different voices before I tell you what the conversation was about:

The lazy victim (LV) – Well, the name should give you an idea what this voice is about in my head.  This is the voice who wants to quit everything.  He wants to sit in the house, play computer games, eat all that yummy junk food and watch TV.  He wants to give into all of the temptations.  He reminds me over and over that I have failed before and I am going to fail again.  Oh, but he gives me comfort.  He tells me that this is not my fault.  He has a dozen or more reasons for putting the blame of my failures on other people or things.  If you listen to him, it is my parents fault for allowing me to become this way.  It is my friends fault for always wanting to eat at places that have no good health options.  It is my co-workers fault for bringing in those “hot, fresh, now” Krispy Kreme doughnuts or those bagels.  It is my wife’s fault for skipping the gym or making fried rice for dinner (which I asked her to make).  Oh, wait, one of my favorites, it is genetic!  It is in my makeup to be fat!  This voice has had his way in my mind for the majority of my 44 years.

The mediocre cheerleader (MC) – This voice wants better for me than the lazy victim.  He is not willing to live completely recklessly, giving into all temptation and gaining all of the weight back.  He has encouraged me to work out and to make right decisions.  But much like some cheerleaders get once their team in up 21-0 in the first quarter, He is happy with our progress and thinks we can take it easy.  He wants to know why we have to get up at5:45 to go running and why did we just up our distance and time of running.  He wants to skip the gym more to go smoke a cigar with friends and go out to dinner.  He wants to know why we can’t eat the bagels that someone paid their hard earned money for.  After all, we have lost 98 pounds!  Our life is so much better now.  We have more energy, less pain and are a lot healthier.  He is happy where we are at and wants to slow down some.

The Winning Dreamer Drill Sergeant (WDDS)- Here is another voice that you should be able to figure out by the name.  This is the voice that does not want to settle for second best.  He is always pushing me to do better.   He is the one that gets me out of bed in the mornings to go running.  He is the one that pushes me to get those extra few reps in the gym, a few more seconds or minutes running, a few better choices on my daily food.  He accepts NO EXCUSSES.  He doesn’t quit.  He will remind me that there is NO ONE to blame but myself.  He is the ROCK that makes it easy to say no to the fresh chips and salsa the Chili’s server put in front of me at a company outing.  He is the one that thought of the idea to run a 5k and to get my scuba certification.  He is also currently lobbying for me to do a 15k, Triathlon, half marathon, marathon, rock climbing, and sky diving.  He is the one that made up the goals list for this month to push me.

The conversation:

5:30am – Alarm goes off

• LV-“ARE YOU KIDDINGME!  Go back to sleep!”
• MC – “no, wake up but take it slow, you know your back has been hurting”
• WWDS – “GET UP NOW!!!”

Winner – LV, I fell back asleep

5:40 am– 2^nd Alarm goes off

• LV-“Seriously, you need to quit this morning stuff!”
• MC – “you should get up, but maybe you should skip running, you would not want to hurt your back more and be out for good.”
• WWDS – “GET UP NOW!!!”

Winner – WWDS – I got up

5:50 am– Realize that I forgot to map out my new run for today

• LV-“Seriously, I am not sure why you even try.  Once again, you failed to prepare and now are stuck.  It is too late to look it up now, you are going to be late for work if you do”
• MC – “No Worries dude, skip your run this morning and do your research instead and then we will do the run tomorrow”
• WWDS – “Make it quick, log into Map my run while you are getting dressed and hammer out the route and let’s hit it.  You were supposed to be out of the house already”

Winner – WWDS – logged into Map My Run while getting dressed

5:53 am – Map My Run was not cooperating and it was taking longer than I had

• LV- “since you got me up this early, the least you can do is check your 2 email accounts, 2 Facebook accounts and catch up on your 2 games”
• MC – “This is taking too long, why don’t you catch up on your blog reading and all of your ‘friends’ on My Fitness Pal and then do a few core exercises so that the morning is not a complete waste.”
• WWDS – “You almost have it.  Try once more and if you cannot get it to work, then just go run a path you already know.  You are wasting time now!”

Winner – WWDS – I got the website to cooperate and I got my new path.

6 am – 5 min walk complete, time to start running

• LV-“UGH”
• MC – “Take it easy, you are going to aggravate your back again”
• WWDS – “No Pain, No Gain!”

Winner – MC/WWDS – I ran my normal pace (not pushing myself) and, while I could feel twinges in my back I kept going.

6:02:30 am– 2 ½ minutes into my run

• LV-“Gasp, cough, wheeze, gasp…can’t breathe!  STOP OR DIE!!!!”
• MC – “any second your back is going to seize if you don’t slow down”
• WWDS – “Pain is just weakness leaving your body”

Winner – LV/MC – I ran for about 15 more seconds and stopped because I was wheezing and something felt like it was stuck in the back of my thought. 

This continued for the rest of my run. LVkept begging me to stop running and telling me that I will never get better.  MC kept trying to get me to settle for the achievement I have made of running a sub 40 minute 5k and to not push myself.  WWDS kept pushing me to keep running longer and faster.

As you can see, there was no clear winner in this conversation.  To be honest,LVhad little chance of winning that day but it was a tough battle between MC and WWDS.  I think that MC ultimately won because, while I ran a faster pace than I did at the never quit race and finished 5.44 km, I set mini goals along my run and quit before I hit any of them.

It is true when they say weight loss is mostly a mental battle.  On any given day, any one of these voices wins.  The easiest voice for me to ignore isLV.  I KNOW I am not a loser.  I KNOW that it is no one’s fault but mine that I got fat.  I KNOW that living the lazy lifestyle will not help me at all.  It is easy to recognize the lies fromLV, which makes them easy to ignore.  On the flip side, the voice that I NEED to stop listening to is MC.  This voice puts enough encouragement and support in what he says to make start listening to him.   There is some truth speckled in there that makes it hard sometimes to differentiate good advice from a lie.  A great example is the whole part from the conversation about my back hurting.  There is a fine line between pushing myself to my physical limits and pushing myself to injury.  Learning when it is sound advice to not push any further to avoid injury and when to ignore the desire to rest on my laurels is the thing I need to focus on.

And so, the mental battle continues.  I am sure I will have some tough battles but I am determined to make WWDS my predominant voice.

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Back in my Comments, comments, comments post, I mentioned the trainers at my gym had been introducing me to some of their new clients who were trying to get into shape.  They took it one step further a few weeks ago when they asked me to speak at their seminar entitled “The best  shape of your life”.  In addition to the education they had planned for the session, they were looking for a couple of real life examples of people who worked with the trainers and had weight loss success.  When they asked me if I would be interested in talking about my weight loss success, I jumped at the chance to speak like I used to jump at pizza!  Now don’t get me wrong, I knew this would be a seminar designed to sell Custom Built Personal Training’s services but it had nothing to do with my desire to speak, I will gladly be a spokesman for Custom Built. While they are a business which, on one level has to be concerned about sales and revenue, I believe they are more concerned with helping people get healthy in a safe and efficient manner.  My real  motivation was because I wanted the chance to help encourage more people and show them weight loss is possible with dedication and hard work.

The seminar was this past Saturday.  If you have been reading my blog for any amount of time, you pretty much know what I had to share at the seminar. (if not, you can start at my first post And So the Journey Begins and catch up.)  I would, however, like to share a few morsels of knowledge they shared in the seminar:

1)      Invest in yourself!  – This is a simple concept really.  What is our life worth?  I don’t know about you, but mine is priceless!  So why is it a big deal to pay for things like a gym membership, trainer sessions, healthy food, etc?  We are worth it, RIGHT?  Maybe that’s the real issue.  Maybe we don’t really believe enough in ourselves to believe we are worth it.  Well, as for me and my wife, we are worth it, we are investing in our health and wellness so we live longer happier lives.

2)      Lean muscle over Fat – Here is a concept which most of us have known all of our lives.  5 lbs of fat is larger in size than 5 lbs of muscle.  The added benefit is muscle continues to burn calories after you work out and fat does not.

3)      All cardio is not good -  If all you do is cardio and do nothing to build lean muscle you could be doing more harm than good.  While it is true if you do hours of cardio you will lose weight, not all of the weight you are losing will be fat.  Because you are doing nothing to maintain or build your muscles, part of what you could be losing is the muscle which we just mentioned burns extra calories.

There were two very cool things that came out of this seminar for me.  First, I got to encourage others in their weight loss efforts.  The second was, after hearing my story and my successes, Gary Brown, the managing partner of Custom Built gave me 20 trainer sessions to help me meet my goals.  20 SESSIONS?!?!?!?  Are you kidding me!  To put this into perspective, the sessions are $45 each, so we are talking $900 worth of sessions.  I plan to put them to good use

This week, I was reading thru some blogs and I ran across Mandy Kay Makes It.  Mandy was listing her goals for July and I got to thinking I should start making monthly goals to try to start challenging myself.  All of the goals I listed are cumulative totals for the month.  Here is my list for July, which starts tomorrow and will go thru the end of the month.

• 1000 crunches
• 1000 penguins
• 1000 push ups (Knees on ground)
• 1000 squats
• 600 BOSU ball squats
• 60 minutes of planks
• 12 Couch to 5k runs
• Run 48 kilometers
• 75 miles biked
• 10 pounds lost
• Write 6 more blog posts this month

Now for my Week 72 update.

Weight:

• Current weight – 7/4/11 –      286.8 pounds
• Last weeks weight – 6/27/11 –      290.2 pounds
• Starting weight – 2/13/11 –      384.8 pounds

Weight loss for this week - 3.2 pounds

Total Weight loss - 98 pounds

If all goes well, I will hit my 100 pound weight loss goal next week!!!!

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My friend Carl posted a comment on my weight recap to ask me what I am going to do to celebrate my milestone when I hit the 100 pound loss.  I think it is very important to have rewards for goals you set.  But you have to make sure the reward is appropriate.  One of the things I try to avoid is using food as reward since it could be counterproductive to what I am trying to achieve.  I try to make my rewards things which support my efforts and not hinder them.  Some of the things I use are new clothes, new fitness related items (DVD’s, equipment, running shoes, etc), massage, etc.  Don’t get me wrong, I will still use going out to a special restaurant as a reward but it is more about the special-ness of the restaurant and spending time with my wife and my friends than about splurging on the food.  Remember I have an “I can eat anything in moderation” mentality so when I want a food, I find the appropriate time to have it and not necessarily hold it off for a “special occasion”

So, back to the question at hand.  What am I going to do to celebrate my 100 pound loss milestone?  Well, I have decided to get my PADI scuba certification.  If you read my Things to come post, you will remember I set a goal for this year to get my PADI certification.  Part of my reasoning for wanting to get my PADI certification is because of the physical achievement it would be.  The other reason is because I have ALWAYS wanted to go scuba diving.  I think this would be an excellent reward for hitting 100 lbs.

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On Sunday I realized I forgot to post my weight for last week.   I decided to wait till today and give you both weeks.  As you can see, I am getting closer to my 100lb weight loss goal!!!

Weight recap:

• Week 71 Weight – 6/27/12 – 290.0 pounds
• Week 70 Weight – 6/20/12 – 293.6 pounds
• Week 69 Weight – 6/13/12- 296.0 pounds
• Starting weight -2/13/11 – 384.8 pounds

Week 70 Weight loss – 2.4 pounds

Week 72 Weight loss – 3.6 pounds

Total Weight loss – 94.8 pounds

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If a picture is worth a thousand words, then here are a few thousand words for you.

The right picture was taken 4/11/11 and the left one was taken 6/10/12

The right picture was taken 4/24/11 and the left one was taken 6/10/12

The top picture was taken 4/24/11 and the bottom one was taken 6/10/12 (Size 50 pants)

The top picture was taken 4/24/11 and the bottom one was taken 6/10/12 (Size 50 pants)

These are my original size 56 pants with a box of Puffs in there

This is my original belt

My 5xl shirt on me now

My 4xl shirt on me now

My 2xl shirt laying on top of my 5xl shirt

The left picture was taken 9/6/08 and the right was taken about 2 months ago

The left one was taken on 5/27/07 and the right one was taken on 6/9/12

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I mentioned in April that I signed up to run my first 5k.    Before we go any further I should clarify, when I say I am going to be running this race, what I mean is, I will be alternating between running and a brisk walk since I am not capable yet to run the entire thing.  The event is the Never Quit Race on June 9 and my goal time for this race is 40-45 min.

In preparation for the race, I have been using the Couch to 5k program.  I started out doing 3 days a week on the treadmill and was doing well.  At the end of week 3 of the program, I decided I should start running one of my days on the road so I could get used to running on a solid surface.  The first road run was a bit rough and I was not able run as much on the road as I could on a treadmill.  In week 5 I decided I would start the program back at week 1 and only do road training.  After all, the actual race is not on a treadmill so it does not matter how much I can run on a treadmill.  Right?

During my training I have done a couple 5k test runs and my times were 42:02 for a 5.21km on 5/21 (8:03/km pace) and 40:49 for a 5.16 km on 5/31 (7:54/km pace).  I then decided last Saturday I needed to do a test run on the beach to see what running in the sand would do to me.  My time for that was 41:35 for 5.12 km (8:07/km pace).  As you can see, the sand did not slow me down too much, so I think I will easily hit the top range of my goal and am hoping I will actually beat my bottom range as well.

The Never Quit event is to educate the community on how to avoid Brain Bleeds, Stroke and Heart Disease through healthy life choices and to encourage everyone to take on a Never Quit attitude and live life to its fullest.  As part of the event, they leave a place on the runners bib for participants to write who they will NEVER QUIT for. 

I have spent a lot of time deciding what I am going to write on my bib.  There are several names which pop into my mind.  Clearly my parents would be at the top of the list.  They have spent 44 years being my biggest fans.  They have NEVER QUIT me!  Even through those hard times when I marched to my own drum (which honestly is most of my life) they have been there for me.  We have not always agreed on the way I should do things or on some of the decisions I have made in my life but they have always loved me unconditionally and been there for me.    

The second obvious person to write on my bib would be my best friend in the whole world, my wife Sheri.  I am not sure what I did in life to be blessed with such a loving, caring, supportive woman in my life but I am thankful every day for the blessing she is.  As you know, she willing went on this journey with me and I would not be where I am at without her constant encouragement and support. 

There are several other names which have popped into the whirlwind of thoughts and emotions but these are the most prominent two.  So who am I going to put on the bib?  Surprisingly I have decided to put neither of them on the bib. 

In my process of deciding who to put on my bib, I solicited several people’s opinion and 2 or 3 people suggested I should put my name on the bib.  My first reaction was they were out of their mind.  The more I thought about it, the more it clicked for me.  While I have been on this journey so I could spend more quality time with my wife and family, ultimately I am on this journey for ME.  It is because I wanted more out of life than I had.  It is because I wanted to grow old with Sheri.  It is because I wanted to see my nieces and nephews graduate, get married and raise families. It is because I wanted to LIVE and not just exist!   I AM DOING THIS FOR ME first and foremost. 

This year, I will be writing ME on the bib.  I WILL NEVER QUIT MYSELF!!!!

I am sure it has clicked to all of you the race is TOMORROW.  I have never looked forward to a birthday more than I am this one.  What better way to celebrate my 44^th birthday than to accomplish a major goal in my life.

I would like to challenge you to the question which I have just answered.  Who will you NEVER QUIT for?  Give it some thought.  I would love to know who and why.  Leave a comment to let me know.  And make sure you check back to see others comments as well.

I think my quote from a few weeks ago is becoming my new mantra….

Failure lies not in falling down. Failure lies in not getting up. – Chinese proverb

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