Well, I said a while back that I would start using this journal as a place to keep track of my weight and health, but I’ve felt too busy to do so, but now I have a moment, so here we go.
Yes, once upon a time (about two years ago, I think), I had lost about 34 pounds, and had gotten down to a low weight of 170. That felt good! I still had a ways to go, even at 170, but believe me, losing 34 pounds makes a BIG difference in how you feel.
Then, Hurricane Wilma hit, and I stopped using the gym, and life got a bit crazy for a while, and then I met Russ, and my priorities shifted, and slowly but surely most of the weight I had lost crept back on.
So here’s the bottom line: I had gotten back up to 196. Now, today, this morning, I am back down to 191.4. I say “.4” because I have a digital scale that tells you your weight to the 10th of a pound, so that’s how I’m keeping track. And sometimes, it can be very encouraging. Like yesterday morning, I was 191.6, and this morning I’m 191.4, so even tho I am still 191 (on a regular scale), I have the psychological advantage of being able to say, “YES! I lost weight. Only 2/10ths of a pound, but I LOST.”
So this is the current state of affairs. Also, I have officially joined the “big gym” on campus, and hope to be going quite often. It’s so much nicer than the little gym where I had been going. The big gym doesn’t smell, the air is fresh, the equipment is new, and the locker room has both a steamroom and a sauna! So I’m really looking forward to making this place part of my daily routine.
Anyway, I’m now about 20 pounds away from the low weight I had achieved, two years ago. It’s such a drag that I have to do this all over again, but I like to think of it this way: at least I’m not starting at the 204 pounds I was originally. So I am already 15 pounds ahead of the game.
Trying to keep a positive attitude on all this. It goes on slow, it comes off slow. That’s okay with me. As long as I’m headed in the right direction.
One of my “problems” is that I become obsessive about weighing myself. Like, sometimes I weigh myself two or even three or more times a day. (Before I eat, after a meal, after I shower, after I go to the bathroom, after I take off my heavy pants, etc). Multiple times always with the excuse that my last weight wasn’t accurate because “insert excuse here”. I won’t have a scale when I move, and I am not so sure buying myself one is such a good idea. There’ll be a gym in my complex though, so I can weigh myself there and, obviously, won’t be able to weigh myself more than once a day.
But I know what you mean. The scale I am using now rounds to 0.5lbs. I like that better than the tenth of a pound, I think, because 0.1 isn’t a sizable amount. 0.5 is so easy to lose or gain, but it takes a day or two, you know? So, when you see that you are 0.5lbs down, it seems like an even greater accomplishment, but it happens twice as often as 1lb down.
Man, that was some crazy ass logic there…o.o
Not crazy at all, if you ask me. It’s absolutely true that when measuring in half pounds weight will “come off” twice as often as it does when measuring in full pounds. It’s only psychological, but it does give that little boost.
I also weigh frequently, but only in the morning, and I also find that a change of clothes or a trip to the bathroom can sometimes mean the difference of up to an entire pound. I take the lowest weight I get for that morning, and that’s what I go with. I realize it may not always be entirely accurate, or representative, but I’m going for the psychological boost at the moment. I know the “real” weight loss will take place over a series of weeks or months, but I like feeling good about that particular moment.
If you weigh yourself at the gym once a day, just try to make it always around the same time of day, and always in similar clothing, and always just before OR just after a meal. That will give you the truest reading, trying to be as consistent as possible in the “variables.”
Lucky! You have a gym complex at your apt! How convenient! I’m sure it won’t be very big, like the CC gym, but sometimes location can be a more important factor. Get a routine going, and stay healthy!