Frustration

I haven't blogged in quite some time. Probably because my weight loss has come to a strange stop, and I'm frustrated. It started when I tried to go onto the Zone Diet, and decided that it just wasn't for me right now, and then went back to Eating for Life. I thought, this will be an easy transition back, but with weekends away, a 24th birthday, and parents coming into town, life has been anything but normal lately, and my eating has suffered as a result.

That's where I am with that. It's been a couple of weeks since I've posted a loss on the scale, and I'm getting discouraged. It seems like once you're in the groove weight comes off so easily, but as soon as you get out of that routine for just a bit, it's a real pain in the butt to get back into it.

I'm still going though, and hopefully I'll get back to progress soon enough.

Higher Jesus, Higher!

Last week I told you that I was going to try and start eating according to 'The Zone' diet. Well, I had intended on going to the store and gearing up for the first week of being in the zone, but that didn't happen until Sunday morning, so I've not been on the diet for more than 12 hours now, but it feels good so far.

The way you eat breaks down like this:
- Food is broken up into one of three macronutrient categories: protein (for rebuilding muscle), carbohydrate (for sustained energy), and fat (because your body uses it as a lubricant if you will).
- Blocks are used to denote how much of something you should eat to get the correct amount at each meal (1 block protein = 7 grams of protein, 1 block carbs = 9 grams of carbs, 1 block fat = 1.5 grams of fat).
- I'm trying to eat no more than 20 blocks in a day, meaning that at each of my 5 meals, I'm trying to consume 4 blocks of protein, 4 blocks of carbs, and 4 blocks of fat.

It takes some getting used to, but I'm confident that this last 25-30 pounds will come off relatively quickly if I can stick to this diet closely, then I'll reevaluate and determine where I'd like to go from there.

I dropped down to 248.8 pounds this morning. That's significant because last Wednesday I was down to 249.6, and I was thinking that it was just lost water weight, but with this finding this morning, I'm thinking that it's actual fat being burned off. I'm going to start seriously looking at taking creatin (sp?) to build up some more muscle. Who doesn't want to be totally jacked right? Well not me, I'd just like some more wiggle room within my diet.

--End of workout post, beginning of church related post--

Last night at church we discussed more of what we as Christian's should be hoping for about heaven. Both the physical and the spiritual side of things, and how that relates to the bodies that we presently occupy here on earth. Thad didn't go too far into things, so I'm not going to sit here and discuss something I don't yet comprehend, but he did ask a fun question: what is one thing that you're really hoping for when we get to heaven?

Some of the answers were typical:
- Seeing Jesus
- No more pain
- Seeing loved ones again
- Big pearly gates

I had an answer in mind, but in an effort not to look like a total attention whore, I didn't speak up. You know when you have a baby that's about 7-11 months old or so? They are at that point where they are able to interact with you and have fun, laugh, and smile (I do really well with these babies, not so much with the ones who can't yet emote). I love throwing them up in my hands, letting them just escape my grip and then catching them again. The babies seem to love it as well. Well my dream for when I get to heaven is to have Jesus do that with me. Silly huh?

Back to Basics

I was told this morning that I hadn't blogged about working out/losing weight in quite a while. There's a reason that this is the case, and it's mainly because I was feeling a little narcissistic about always detailing how I'm trying to change myself and look better. It was beginning to feel like one of those crappy reality shows where some 'celebutant' is trying to better herself and expecting us all to enjoy watching/reading about it.

I will say though that I've gotten down to 250 lbs. as of this morning. That seems crazy to me. 250 lbs! It's taken a bit longer than I would have expected a year ago today, if you had asked me then I'd have told you that by now I'd be at around 200 pounds. Things change and the process has gotten a lot harder than it was at the beginning. I'm still trying to tighten up my eating routine, trying to find new and more fun ways of working out (riding my bike, playing basketball, playing ultimate frisbee), and trying to be open in this whole process.

Nighttime eating is still my biggest problem. I try and have my big meal at breakfast, usually about 400 calories after a workout, with black coffee, or around 300 calories if I don't workout one morning, with black coffee. Then snack--lunch--snack--dinner--snack. It's that last three that really start to throw me off. I love carbs and sugar, and comfort foods (which typically involve lots of thsoe three things!). Danny has agreed to loan me his Zone Diet book. From my knowledge this is the diet they put olympic athletes on, and we've all seen how cut up they are. well... that's sort of my goal, but not entirely.

I'll keep you posted early next week when I've started on the Zone with a few earlys thoughts about what it's like.

Plus the Aggies lost, and that sucks.

Backyard Baptismal

Last night at ComChurch was one of those night's that I am not going to soon forget. We don't baptize people very often in our church, not because we don't believe in the need for it, but because we like doing it outside, and sometimes it just takes some effort to get the entire church to a pool. Yes we often do baptisms in someone's backyard pool. I thought it was weird at first, but after experiencing a few of these backyard baptisms, it becomes a really beautiful thing. For those of you who are used to seeing this occur behind the podium on a Sunday morning, I'd certainly encourage you to break from that mold at least once in your life and see what it's like outside. The water's fine.

The night was good for reasons other than just the baptism as well. We got to swim after the ceremony (is that the right word for what a baptism is supposed to be) was finished. I take t the water very quickly, since most of my childhood was spent in or by a pool. The pool we swam in last night was great too because they had a diving board.

Now for a bit of insight into what it's like to be a big man: you can't jump off of a diving board without the fear of hearing a very large pencil like crack. You just can't do it. Who wants to be the guy that broke the board? Kids would cry. The owner of the board would be pissed that you wasted their money and now they have to go out a purchase a new board. And on top of all that, your embarassed that you were the guy that broke the diving board.

So for the majority of my adult life I've opted to stay away. Erring on the side of caution, and just jumping off the side of the pool and having fun doing that. What a waste of time that was. Diving boards are a lot of fun! You can make large splashes in the water, and kids love that. I feel like a lot of the time that when I'm with my church and around the kids (at our church there are kids EVERYWHERE, like there are always three or four women pregnant at all times!) there are college aged girls always wanting to steal their attention away. I don't usually get angry, because I realize that them and the kids are often closer to each other, babysitting and all, but playing with them is a lot of fun now and then. Cue the pool time. There is no one cooler in a swimming pool than a 20 something guy. Think about it, when you weighed in at a whopping 43 pounds, you could be thrown half way across the pool and swim back to ask for more. I'm more than happy to oblige for the kids, for a time, but after a while it gets boring/tiresome. So for 15 to 20 minutes each time I go swimming I play the part of 'Pool Hero', and enjoy every moment of it.

Weight Loss Update:
This morning I am down to 254 pounds. That's 116 pounds since I started at my estimated weight of 370 pounds. I'm working on a cool visual to really demonstrate how significant this much weight really is, more on that in a later post.

Other exciting news. I've talked for a while now about getting a tummy tuck/skin cut-off operation to take care of all the excess me that is just sort of hanging out right now and being really annoying. Ross asked me how much I thought something like that might cost. And said that if he has the chance, he'll kick some money my way to get started on that fund. This made me feel really really good about not only what I mean to these people, but about what they mean to me.

The fact that I go to church with someone who can understand the significance of having lots of excess skin cut off, makes me realize that backyard baptismals can wash away all sorts of things.

Circumstances Dictating Joy?

I really have a problem in letting my circumstances dictate my attitude. Sports is a big one of these in my everyday life. Aggie sports in particular. If the football team wins a game, I feel great for the rest of the day, my joy is dictated by the fact that my favorite football team won a game (silly huh?). If we lose... my day is pretty much shot. I have to stay away from certain websites, one of which I work for because i know I'll just get more pissed from reading what other pissed off people are writing about. In addition to that, I spend the entire next week convincing myself that it's going to be OK, the season isn't totally shot, and (most importantly) it is just a game.

My weight, same story different verse. For a long time I was the guy who was really good at losing weight. It was like someone walked up to me, hooked a faucet up to my gut, and turned it on full bore. For nine months or so the fat just fell off of my body. Every week someone was telling me how good I looked, or wow, this is a good week for you dude. I let the fact that I was good at losing weight define who I was as a person. Just like I had let the fact that I was really fat for a long time define who I was (albeit in a much more negative light). Getting over this is tough on me, hence the reason I'm writing this blog, another thing I'm trying to help myself get through this rough patch of weight loss.

New of the day, I'm down to 260.8 pounds. That's big for me, since i havent really been down below 265 since, well... I don't really know when. I remember being in high school my junior year, and getting down to about 275, and I remember being a freshman and weighing in during football practice at 236, but those are really the last weights I have to go by. This puts me at a weight that I haven't seen since the awkward times of post-freshman-year in high school, through my junior year. That is a long time, but a really short time to put on something like 40+ pounds of fat.

I know that I made mention of the fact that i wanted to quantify how i was feeling with more than just weight lost each week. That means that when i lose weight i want myself to feel good about more than just dropping a few pounds, and when i gain weight, i dont want that terrible feeling to ruin my entire day. Right now I have quite a bit to be excited about:

• In a week we're heading to Arkansas for a back country trip down the Buffalo River


• All three of my roommates are graduating this coming Friday/Saturday


• Work is fun right now, and we have some big stuff getting ready to roll out in the very near future.

These things, coupled with the fact that I have actual weight loss (not just water loss) mean that I'm feeling pretty good about these new meals I'm trying out. Plus the workout this morning was insane, below, in picture form, what we had to do...

200 Squats at 175 lbs.(this seems about right)

200 Sumo Squats with 53 lb. Kettle Bell

100 Row to Narrow Push up w/ 40 lb. Dumbbell

All in all I got my butt kicked this morning, but I was more than willing to take it, since I had lost weight for the first time in a while. But there has to be more, I'm just not sure I can see all of that right now.