Jan 2

I increased my walk distance from 2 miles to 3 yesterday. It wasn't because I just wanted to walk more, it was because Chris wanted something at the Dollar General that is 1.5 miles from the house. Now I'm wondering if I need to maintain the 3 mile distance because going back to two miles seems like regression. 
For right now, I'm okay with continuing to get some daily exercise. The coming days will have sub-freezing high temperatures, so I'll either be on the exercise cycle, the treadmill, or some combination of the two.
I should be able to get an outdoor walk today.

Diet felt good yesterday. I'm not ready to go back to calorie counting yet, but I may in the future.

John

Jan 1, 2025

It's been awhile.
I haven't been doing much in the way of healthy living during 2024. 
I reached my heaviest weight ever and am now on meds for my elevated blood pressure.
Although the 278 pounds (126 kg) is the most to begin a year, it is 7 lbs less than where I was at the beginning of last month. 

Damn! 
That's a lot of weight I need to lose.

Last week I was looking ahead and considering some healthful resolutions for 2025 and I decided that I didn't really need to wait until today to get started. I realize that starting slowly with a huge task ahead of me may seem counter intuitive to some, but I know that it is what will work for me. Today will be Day 4 in a daily exercise streak -- two days of walking, and one day on the exercise cycle. With the coming cold weather, I may be spending more days on the exercise cycle and treadmill than walking outside, but that will have to do for now.
My walks will get longer (2 miles, 3.2 km) so far, as will my cycling time (30 min). I'll also add in other work using body weight, dumbbells, and our weight machine.
The goal is to be in better shape and get off the blood pressure meds.

Diet wise -- damn, I just need to eat less.
A lot less!
The goals are simple -- lose weight.
Short term -- 5 lbs (2.26 kg) per week for the first 5 weeks, then half that (recommended for long term)...
Long term -- until I weigh less than 200 lbs (90.7 kg)

I should be getting close by the time I hit my 65th birthday in June.
I'll post regular updates in hopes that posting will keep me moving forward.

Wish me well,
John
278 lbs, 37.7 BMI

March 1, 2024

Damn!
A new personal high of 270 pounds.
Fuck

John

September 25th

So with less than a week left in the month of September I am basically where I was at the end of the first week. I guess it's a good thing I had a good first week!
I guess I need a more focused plan for October, and perhaps more reasonable goals. I'll take a few days to figure out what the October plan will be and post it by the weeks end.

John 

September 18

Oops!
I missed a weekly update. Maybe because I didn't have anything to really report and made little progress from the last update. With a dozen days remaining in the month I still have 8 pounds to lose to make it to 240 by the end of the month.
My week kind of sucked diet-wise and it showed. 

My overall activity was okay, but I have yet to establish any kind of exercise routine. 
The step tracker app on my phone is set with a daily goal of 7000 steps. I managed to average over that for the week, but actually only hit it on three days. The majority of my activity comes in the way of yard work and gardening. There is as much to do in the fall as there is in the spring when it comes to garden maintenance. Plus I'm building a new flowerbed along the front of the yard -- 96' by 4'. It's good work and I feel good about it, but I really should get around to the regular exercise thing.

I am hoping for a much better week on the diet side. It is my main focal point for now.

John

September 8

Well, it is one week into the September goal of losing weight and I am on track to reach my goal of weighing 240 pounds by the end of the month. In fact, I'm a little ahead of schedule. That's actually good because I tend to stall from time to time along the way. I was 250 at this morning's weigh in, so -8 pounds for the week. 
To be fair, the 258 from September 1st was probably a heavy day -- we all have them. I hadn't weighed in a little while, but was surprised that it was that high. Of course, even heavy days are usually only a pound or so off, so it's still a good week.

The area that I am not doing well in is getting regular exercise.
I have been pretty active, but I really do need to get in the habit of some regular exercise. Time certainly isn't the problem -- I have plenty of that. I just need to do it.

It's week two. Looking for 245 by the 15th.
Maybe I'll do better on the exercise thing.
Oh! And my bp is down a few points, too. I need that to stay of the meds.

John 

September 1

So the morning weigh-in was a little higher than I was expecting. It shouldn't have surprised me since I haven't been doing anything for the past two months since we got home from Mexico.
268
Damn

I'm going to modify my -20 pounds to reaching 240 (-18). 

After my morning quiet time, I'll walk to the Dollar General for a couple things that we need for dinner tonight. The DG is just less than 1.5 miles, so I'll get my walk in while it's still cool.

Here goes!

John

August 31

Well it is the final day of August and I see that I haven't written here since the first.
Tomorrow I will weigh-in, but I am not expecting much difference--maybe I've gained a couple of pounds. I don't really know.
I know that I haven't been exercising regularly nor paying close attention to my diet. 

That's about to change.
The oldest of my brothers (and the most health conscience) has enlisted us (the rest of the siblings) into his Set health/fitness goals for September and keep each other accountable program. Now I have to come up with some goals.

The biggie will be to lose 20 pounds in September. It's doable.
The rest of the goals will be what gets me there.
I'll go back to intermittent fasting, which is basically a fancy name for skipping breakfast and doing away with late night snacks. I won't count calories, but I will pay attention to the sweets like ice cream and chocolate and try to minimize the amount I consume. I'll also be limiting the beer I drink. Experience has taught me that beer drinking (even a pint per day) and weight loss don't work well together.

Exercise is something I need to figure out.
In general, I'm going to say 30 minutes at least 4 days per week.
It will probably include:
--some dumbbell exercises
--some body weight stuff like free squats and push-ups
--some daily stretching or yoga
--some weight machine work like lat pull-downs and rowing. (I'd like to be able to eventually do a fricken pull-up!)
and in addition to the 30 minutes of exercise --some daily walking.
I also have the exercise bands and ball that I just received from the Core Essentials Physical Therapy & Wellness drawing. 
I still need to make this part more specific.

Since I already have stuff planned for today, my September 1st 30 minute exercise might be to clean the basement room where the weight machine, dumbbells, aerobic fit rider, and stationary cycle are located. It will take way longer than 30 minutes.
There is also a Total Gym (the Chuck Norris machine) in the garage that Chris picked up from a friend last winter. It basically went from being unused in their neighbors garage to being unused in ours.

So...
Weigh-in day tomorrow
and get the basement ready for exercise.  

That's the plan.

John

August 1

I think it's pretty obvious that weight management and good health weren't taking up a great deal of thought in July since my last post was July 3rd!
I meant to weigh in the first thing this morning but didn't. When I checked my weight on Sunday (two days ago) it was just above the 250 mark, so basically no change in two months. I guess that's not entirely bad news, but it also isn't moving me forward in weight loss. I need for August to be a better month.

The hot weather has curbed my activity quite a bit. That can't be an excuse for weight management since I am that person that always says -- diet to control weight, exercise for better health.
My FB memories show that five years ago I was starting P90X with my daughter inlaw. I'm not going to be doing that this year, but I probably do need to begin some type of regular exercise. I'm starting a 40 day morning devotion/meditation time. It would be good to find a morning exercise or daily exercise time, as well.

And I really am going to have to watch the food intake. It's back to paying attention time!
Minus four pounds per week will put me at 235 by the end of the month. That's a very doable goal.

John

July 3

I'm calling it progress -- even though it really isn't.
I have made it back home at pretty much the same weight as when I left -- 248 lbs this morning.
I'm pretty sure that I ate and drank more when the kids were with us PV than when we were on our own since I lost a couple of pounds in the first week (they were in Hawaii), gained more than 5 pounds when they were home, and then lost most of what I had gained in the final week+ while they were in Europe and Africa.
I'm not blaming anyone for my poor eating/drinking habits; just an observation.

Now it's back to my normal life and getting back to my normal habits, or maybe I should say my new normal habits. The biggest loss from living in Puerto Vallarta for the month is going to be not walking as much. Sure, I could walk for exercise (and hopefully will), but there walking was simply transportation -- how you got from one place to another. The grocery store was around the block, most restaurants or breweries were only three or four blocks, the beach was a few blocks, even the homemade ice cream vendor was less than a half mile! 

I guess I could use the push mower on my whole lot rather than just the yard portion. That would be a few hours of walking every day and plenty of purposeful exercise!
No thanks!
I'm actually thinking of using the rider to do the yard today.

In any case, I'm back home and back to being focused on diet first, exercise second, and better health overall. I'm shooting for 230 by August 1st.

Time to get moving!

John