Tête-à-Tête-Tête

You & Jay are making my meager advances look like Spud Webb standing next to Shaquille O’neal. You guys are awesome. Cripes, I’m sitting here eating low-fat yogurt after finishing off a protein drink and I feel as though I’m behind the curve because you guys are kicking so much butt.

Thanks for the update…..been looking forward to seeing your HEALTH (not weight) progress. You’ve already added length to your life & your heart is probably doing backflips.

dude,

that’s freaking rad. keep up the good work. and it doesn’t matter where you been, it’s where you’re at. and honestly, that’s not as important as where you’re going, so keep it up, man! i’m rooting for you!

daniel

Buck,

I can’t even begin to describe how happy I am that I have played even a small role in your decision. It makes my sacrifices over the past year-and-a-quarter all the more worthwhile.

300 pounds isn’t bad. Heck, I was within 15 pounds of that at my heaviest, and I’m now below 190… It takes a TRUCKLOAD of willpower, and a LOT of research.

Fortunately, the obesification (I think I just made that up) of America has led to light being shone on fast- and not-so-fast food, and as a result more and more restaurants are providing low- or lower- fat offerings, so if you do a little digging, you can find menus online with nutritional information.

I’ve found that, as a general rule, I haven’t been STARVING on this diet; I made a conscious effort to change HOW I eat rather than WHAT I eat. I did NOT want to “go on a diet”, because that leads to eventually going “off a diet”, and if you don’t change your eating habits other than to starve yourself, when the diet’s over, the weight comes back.

How can I be so sure of this? Because I’ve been doing it my whole life…

So this time, I took a good look at how and what I ate. I documented everything I ate for weeks on end, and then calculated the calories involved. One of the biggest things I did to help myself was to be HONEST with myself about just what I was eating - for example, one of my favorite late-night snacks was a Hershey’s candy bar (full size, of course), with a generous dollop of Skippy Chunky Peanut Butter on each piece. This would be consumed with 1-2 glasses of skim milk. Well, before I took an honest and accurate look at things, I wrote it off as 2-300 calories, when in reality it’s more like 800+…

Best of luck, Buck, although I doubt you’ll need luck as you’re well on your way. Please, please, please do not hesitate to give a yell if you need hints/encouragement/cheering section.

Great job so far! I trust we’ll get regular updates throughout this year… 33 pounds is a lot for just the 10-11 weeks so far this year!

I wrestled down my own demon when I quit smoking a few years ago. It was without a doubt the hardest thing I’ve ever done, but I’m in much better shape because of it (even if I did put on a few pounds in the process). I have a treadmill now that I get on every day that doesn’t include some other form of exercise. I hate that damn thing a lot of the time, but I always feel good when I get off of it. It’s got a bookholder on it, and if I walk uphill at a moderate pace, I can read while I tread and the time passes pretty quickly.

Anyway, keep us posted! ;-D

Nice, Buck. Good to see you taking care of yourself. And, having the cajones to come out & tell everybody what you’re doing. Pressure is on now. I’ll be looking forward to those weekly reports, now.

I promise at least one MONTHLY report. When you are taking it off just a couple of pounds per week it takes a month to make a decent showing. The reason I came out of the closet with it was just because it now forces me to stay on track. When I first started I weighed once a week and there has not been a week that I was not less than the last. It has been pretty consistent.

Ricky is right. It is really more about health than weight and Jay G is right also. This ain’t no diet. This is forever.

I liked the advice you give over on your site too Daniel. Being stuck behind a computer and flat on my wide ass for 8 hours a day, 5 days a week is one of the reasons I got where I got.

I have not yet quit smoking Alice. But I am not a pack a day man or anything like that. I can’t smoke at work and I can’t smoke inside my house so really less than half a pack a day is about as good as it gets for me. Out behind the dumpsters with the other reprobates every now and then. But they are my kind of people.

I feel better now that this is all out in the open. I am already looking forward to my next report. And my next bowl of chowder

Even though I’ve met you only once, Buck, I know you weren’t exactly self-conscious about yourself (we’ve had that banter on my board). You just “dealt with it”. Well, I’m trying to lose weight, too, just so I don’t have to try to pour my fat ass into my jeans anymore. I’m far from a pound a week. I’m having a tough time at it because I let myself go too far.

It is all about what you eat. As someone who gets limited exercise myself, peanut butter sandwiches at lunch isn’t exactly “lo-cal”, and breads at 8:00 PM doesn’t do well for keeping weight off, either.

But between you eating better, Buck, and your disc golf outings, you should be able to get on that treadmill in a few months. I wish you luck. Your kids won’t recognize you if you keep it up.

It is all about what you eat.

That is a big part of it. Jay G nails it here

So this time, I took a good look at how and what I ate. I documented everything I ate for weeks on end, and then calculated the calories involved. One of the biggest things I did to help myself was to be HONEST with myself about just what I was eating - for example, one of my favorite late-night snacks was a Hershey’s candy bar (full size, of course), with a generous dollop of Skippy Chunky Peanut Butter on each piece. This would be consumed with 1-2 glasses of skim milk. Well, before I took an honest and accurate look at things, I wrote it off as 2-300 calories, when in reality it’s more like 800+…

I got a big belly laugh out of this. Jay G and I sometimes seem to be twin sons of different mothers. It is uncanny how similar my changes are to his. When I started being HONEST about what I was eating I was stunned at the amount of calories I was putting away every day. It is a miracle that I was not bigger than I was (and still am).

Years ago I knew a guy who worked as a janitor at the same company I worked for. He went away for a while and was working at another company location. When he came back I hardly recognized him. He had lost over 100 pounds. I asked him “what do you eat?”

He said something I have never forgotten. He told me “I eat anything and everything I want. I just don’t eat very much of it”.

Works like a charm. Calories in minus calories out will pretty much determine whether you lose or gain. Or at least it is working in my case.

The janitor was correct.

I spent a week logging my food plan slash diet (I hate using that word since people assume it means “starve”) and it was a ‘bad’ day when I only had five meals. Normally, I eat every 2-3 hours. It’s just that what I eat now is a lot healthier & the portions aren’t the normal “meat and three veggies” that I grew up loving.

People at work are used to my eating habits….whenever I deviate just one iota, someone is noticing. People are ALWAYS asking me what I’m eating, since that’s what I do a lot. A LOT. It’s a little after 3 right now & I’ve had four meals (assuming that a 17oz protein drink is a “meal” since it has all the nutrients of one & definitely fills me up) & am about to partake of some flavored grits in prep for my afternoon cardio workout (need some quick carbs).

[...] I was 291.4 this morning. That means I lost 9.4 pounds since my last report. 9.4 pounds in a month is not bad but it is not the best I have ever done either. [...]