Feeling alright

Tipped the scale at 320 pounds this morning.

In honor of Ben Davis at bendoeslife.com I had my first peanut butter and banana sandwich tonight. My only complaint is that the banana wasn't ripe enough. It was still a little green at the stem. Other than that it wasn't bad and worth having again.

I had a couple comments from friends this evening that said I looked a little leaner in the face. I have to admit that even though I've lost only 15 pounds, I'm feeling better about myself and my pants don't feel as tight.

Like the band Traffic once sang, I'm "Feeling Alright."

Finally went running this week

Made it out for a run tonight after work. Did my average 30 minute run around town. Still need to sign up for another race.

The diet is going great, much better than the exercise. I'll post my weight tomorrow morning so look forward to that. I can definitely tell my pants are fitting a little better and I don't have to suck it in as much to button them and put on a belt.

Thank you to everyone that's emailed me or sent me messages on Facebook or left comments on my wall. Keep it up, please, as it's great motivation to keep me going and hold myself accountable.

Really helpful tools in the kitchen

Since I started keeping track of food, there have been a couple different items in the kitchen that have helped me immensely. Those things are a kitchen scale and measuring cups/spoons. A lot of serving sizes are by the ounce and others are tablespoons or cups (or less). And even if you have more than the recommended serving size, as long as you're measuring the amount you eat, you'll at least know how much you're having and how many calories that is.

If you think it's a hassle to do this, try it for a week or two and familiarize yourself with recognizing how much a cup or 1/2 of a cup is, etc.

I honestly believe it's helped me out tremendously.

The weekend

I had a pretty good weekend as far as food intake goes. I'm not doing near as well on the exercise. I haven't been out for a run since Friday...again.

Sunday night my wife and I spent the evening at Emerald City Market in Manhattan for one of their cooking classes. The theme this time was Gourmet Comfort Foods. Not everything was low-cal but everything was scrumptious. I didn't bother keeping track of the calories because (1) I wouldn't enjoy it as much if I was worrying about that the calories whole time; (2) with the variety of food, it would be too time consuming trying to find the foods in the database or at least something close to it and (3) since I knew ahead of time about the evening would entail, I could go easier on breakfast (which didn't go exactly as planned) and lunch. I made sure to drink water throughout the day as well so while I was hungry come dinner time, I wasn't starving and really enjoyed the evening with my wife and the awesome staff at Emerald City Market.

I admit that I hopped on the scale this morning to see the damage done and was surprised to see I weighed even less than my Saturday weight.

Weighed in at 324 pounds this morning

Lost at least 11 pounds in a month.

Posted a picture from this morning on the Progress page.

An early Halloween scare for you. Bwa ha ha!

One thing I've noticed

Since starting my journey and keeping a food diary, I've been drinking a lot less milk. Seeing that 1 cup of 1% milk is 100 calories, a normal day for the old me would often be 6 to 8 cups. I'd have 2 cups at a time in a large cup. I'd have a large cup every morning for breakfast, another for lunch, some after work, one for dinner and more after dinner. I would easily go through a gallon of milk in a couple of days without trying too hard.

Growing up I always drank a lot of milk and that continued into adulthood. I've known for a long time that milk isn't a necessity and I can get calcium from a variety of foods.

So drinking less milk has made a big difference in consuming fewer calories on a daily basis.

Friday night run

Went for a another Friday night run, a little earlier than last Friday. I started out a bit quicker but jogged at a slower pace for the majority of it. Still made it farther than Wednesday's run so that's a good sign.

For dinner this evening I grilled some turkey burgers. I ate one with some lettuce, light mayo and spicy mustard on a whole wheat sandwich thin. It made for a nice combination of flavors whereas the turkey burger by itself would have been a bit bland. While I was grilling, I did sample half of a burger to make sure they were cooked all the way through, this being my first time grilling ground turkey. Next time I plan on having some fresh rosemary available to enhance it.

According to my food diary, dinner was only 434 calories but I feel full.

Tomorrow is a big day. It will be one month since I started this blog and took the first picture of myself. I also plan on weighing in first thing tomorrow morning. Not sure what to expect but I'll be sure to post the results.

Confession

Back before I started this journey, I would take the time before going back to work after lunch to get a large ice cream cone from the local fast food restaurant known for its frozen treats. For a while, I averaged 2 times a week. I would use the drive thru window, drive around while I snarfed it down and make sure I was finished before going back to work. No one knew about this other than the 2 or 3 people at the restaurant window depending on the day. That is until now of course.
Since starting this journey, I haven't been back.
When it came to having ice cream at home, I would always have a large bowl late night when I'm the only one still awake. I always took the time to be very quiet when dishing it out and making sure the ice cream scoop didn't clang the bowl and wake anyone up. Same goes for when I ate it. I was very methodical and deliberate in making sure I was as quiet as possible.

For anyone that reads this, did you ever do anything to hide what were you eating from anyone?

Shouldn't go 3 days between runs

Today was my first run of the week and the first since Friday's. My legs were tight at first but then they loosened up and remembered what to do. It was another 30 minute run tonight around town.

For dinner it was 3 slices of Papa Murphy's Herb Chicken Mediterranean deLITE^®. I've sampled that before and thought it was good so my wife picked it up on her way home from Manhattan. It's definitely one of their healthier pizzas that's full of flavor. According to their website, it's 180 calories per slice. Not bad.

If you look at my diary on myfitnesspal.com, my lunch has consisted of a reuben sandwich lately, not the healthiest of choices. Other than that, I have been consciously trying to eat less red meat. We Americans love our red meat but I know 1 guy who isn't getting kidney stones anymore because he's cut it out of his diet and my father has cut back after having his prostate removed recently.

Completed today's food diary

And came in around 800 calories under my My Daily Goal according to myfitnesspal.com. Looking over everything I had to eat and drink today, I had a lot of the same types of things I normally do, just a little less or the recommended serving size. Take lunch for example, I used 1 tablespoon of mayo that covered 1 slice of bread where I would normally use double that for both slices. Same goes for the American "cheese" slice; I had 1 slice instead of two. Doing little things like that will add up as I found out from today's food diary.

I haven't run since Friday. I slept in this morning and got up around 6:15 and had to be at work by 7:30. I didn't go after work as I had a boy's night with my son while my wife met a friend for dinner. I need to get back on track literally and figuratively as I've got a good thing going. Getting on the scale this morning and weighing in at 327 is an especially good motivator to keep running and eating better. I should stop weighing myself everyday or else I'll become obsessed with it and maybe discouraged because a person's weight can fluctuate a bit.

Sunday

We had a family get together today at the park with dad's side of the family. I know that it was going to be tough with all of the food everyone was bringing. There were burgers, bratwursts, hot dogs, plenty of sides and several desserts and sweets. Considering all of this, I was pretty good. I only had a hamburger with a slice of cheese along with a little ketchup and mustard, plus some baked beans and a couple of homemade  tamales. For dessert, I did have some of the trifle my cousin made.
The old me would have had a burger, bratwurst, a couple helpings of baked beans, the trifle and severals cookies and brownies. Although I'm not 100% sure I accounted for all of the calories I consumed at lunch, I feel that it's pretty close.

I'm enjoying the myfitnesspal.com site and app. It's helped tremendously.

A huge victory - passing on cookies

I was given about a dozen homemade chocolate chip cookies yesterday morning to cheer me up after my team got slaughtered Thursday night. Chocolate chip cookies are my favorite and I could have easily eaten all of them but I didn't have a single one. That's right, not a single cookie. Instead, I shared them with anyone in the office that wanted one. Some took one, others didn't have one because they're trying to be good like me. One guy helped out by having 2 or 3.

I worked out last night also a little after 7 - on a Friday night! Still doing the 30 minute runs. Combined with the walking before and after, totaling 42 minutes this time, it ended up being 3.1 miles. I feel that when I run my next 5k (still looking for one), I will definitely have a much better time.

Giving myfitnesspal a try

On a recommendation of a commenter, I'm giving myfitnesspal.com a try to keep track of what I eat and what I do. It's free and there's a iPhone (or in my case iPod touch) app. Both are completely free and relatively easy to use. And they also sync with each other.
I had been considering using something like this and looked at the Livestrong.com app but it's $2.99. I figured I'd give the free app a try first to see if I can stick with it. I'll see how dinner goes later this evening but it might be tough as there's a football game on tonight and there will probably be food and beverage that's not the healthiest but I've got 1,165 calories left today.

I fought the chinese buffet and I won

I went to lunch today with a coworker and it had been several months since his last trip to the local chinese buffet so I went along because he was driving. In the past I would make at least 2 trips, often 3 to the buffet. Today I made 2 trips. The first was to the salad bar. I had some salad that consisted of iceberg lettuce, some shredded carrots with roughly 1 1/2 tablespoons of ranch dressing. I also had some cantaloupe, a hard boiled egg, maybe a cup of red grapes and a couple california rolls. The 2nd trip was the toughest. I had 1 egg roll, 1 crab rangoon and 1/2 cup roughly of a chicken and shrimp with vegetables in brown sauce dish. I did finish the meal with a fortune cookie and only had water to drink the entire time.
Normally I would eat a couple helpings of General Tso's Chicken with a bunch of white rice and 5 or 6 crab rangoon as well as a pile of lo mein noodles.
I'll be returning to the buffet in just 2 weeks as I have a monthly meeting there so I hope I will be as good then as I was today.

UPDATE - I forgot to mention that my coworker was nice enough to pay for lunch because he saw how good I was trying to be. Thank you.

The dreaded workplace candy jar

Another huge win for me lately is not raiding the candy jar at work. One of my coworkers keeps her candy jar well stocked with fun size candy bars like Snickers, Kit Kats, Crunch bars, you name it. She also has a separate jar specifically for Peanut M&Ms. For the past few weeks I've been able to be strong and resist the temptation to have any. In the past, I would have enough of the fun size to make up 1 or 2 regular-sized candy bars. It wasn't good. I'd visit 3 or 4 times a day and clean house.
I'm not doing anything special to resist eating anything other than just keeping my hands away from it when I'm in there. Hopefully this will be good practice for Halloween and not being a ravenous zombie when it comes to chocolate.

First run post C25k

I can officially say that I'm still running after completing the Couch to 5k program. That was a problem I thought I would have but I went for a 30 minute jog after work tonight around town. I'm not sure if I'm doing enough yet because I'm not seeing huge results from it. I'm still hovering around 330 pounds.
I still have a lot of room to improve when it comes to eating but I don't think I'm eating that poorly. My wife made an awesome pasta-based dish tonight with homemade noodles from our neighbor. The dish included red peppers, onions and mushrooms and red sauce from a jar. I only had one bowl of it and one slice of buttered texas toast that's found in the frozen food section. I so wanted to go back for seconds but I resisted the urge.

I completed the Couch to 5k

So I did it. I finished the Couch to 5k program this evening after work. I had planned to wake up early and go run but I overslept. Anyway, I did it and now I just have to keep on keeping on if you know what I mean. It was last Wednesday when I ran last. I was out late on Thursday so Friday was wasted and it's tough to get up for the weekend. I need to work on that. Regardless, I'm glad that I made myself do it this evening.

Week 9 - Day 2

I decided to go for a run around town this evening after work. I was dragging but I kept going and ran for the entire 30 minutes. One more day and I will have completed the Couch to 5k program. After that it's just a matter of sticking with the running and going for 30 minute jogs or longer. I didn't have any trouble with my shoes tonight like I did after my first run so that's a good sign.
I still need to find some races to run in the area. My official time in the 2-mile run last Saturday was 21:35.

Human garbage disposal

This is still a work in progress. I always had trouble growing up in that I ate too much. I wrote in an earlier post about how I ballooned while attending junior college. As long as I can remember, I never let food go to waste whether it was on my plate or everyone else's at the table. I was the human garbage disposal. After finishing my burger and fries, I would finish everyone else's fries. I just hated seeing food go to waste. I remember a specific time in high school when Taco Bell was the latest and greatest thing. In addition to having a huge order of Nachos Bell Grande and a burrito, I also knocked out a friend's untouched burrito and taco.

Week 9 - Day 1

I didn't make it out this morning. I'm not quite ready for the sub-40 degree mornings yet. Instead I went after work and made it almost 3 miles in the 40 minutes I was moving - 5 minute warmup walk, 30 minutes of jogging and then 5 minute cool down walk. My quadriceps were sore all day and this evening. I need to make sure I keep drinking plenty of water.
I also broke in my new shoes. The inside of both of my heels feel like they could turn into blisters. I think I'll go for a walk tomorrow to get used to them some more.
I almost stopped running after 1 lap around the complex this evening. I was sore, hungry and tired but the old me couldn't stop the new me. I just hope the new me continues to stick around for a good long while.

I rocked the 2-mile run

So I completed the 2-mile run yesterday. I was hoping to make it in under 25 minutes. I came up with 25 because my 2-mile split during the 5k race a couple weeks ago was 26 minutes and change. Not only did I make it in under 25 minutes but I completed it in under 22 minutes. I haven't seen my official time yet. Hopefully it will be online soon. As soon as it is I'll post the time.
I felt that I pushed myself pretty hard because I was gutted at the end of the race and picked up the pace going up the last hill.
I rewarded myself with a new pair of running shoes designated solely for that and nothing else. I've been wearing a couple different pairs that got me by but I needed something just for running.
I purchased a pair of Asics GT-2150 from Manhattan Running Co. Being properly fitted for a shoe will make me feel even better. Can't wait to try them out but the 37 degree low in the morning isn't very appealing.

Race just a few hours away

So the 2-mile race I'm running is less than 12 hours away. I should be in bed. I hope I do alright but it looks like the course is going to have a longer incline than I thought. I just hope I run the whole thing and push myself.
If I do well I think I'm going to reward myself with a new pair of running shoes that will be properly fitted.

Workout Song #5 - Sunshine (Adagio in D Minor)

I can't remember the first time I heard this piece of music but I hear it in more and more everyday on TV and in movies.

Check out this blog for some great details on it. The Paradise of Horror

I can't add much other than what it makes me think. My wife think it's depressing or should be played at a funeral. I can see where she's coming from but I see it differently. I listen to this at the end of my workout as motivation that I'm almost done and to not give up at the end.

Video after the jump...