A couple of weeks pass

Well it's now almost 2 weeks, still here, thankfully still primal. No weight for now, my plan is to weigh in Sunday morning (I have a haircut tomorrow so want as much weight loss as possible lol) as it will be the closest to 2 actual weeks and I will see how things fair. 

That's all for now 

S,

A week later

Well a week later give or take and I am winding down for the night. It is amazing the difference a week makes to your outlook ( give or take a couple of days lol). I made it through about 9 days without eating out ( sorry but chi town hotdogs doesn't count as ember needed food). I feel better for it and is weird I almost feel hungrier not eating out. Think it says a lot about how non portion controlled restaurants are.

My goal is to make it to the end of the month and being able to say my eating out budget is sub 40 bucks. I hope that as well as saying that I will also be below the 219 I was last month and the angry Scot won't appear again.

Peace out and have a great Monday tomorrow.

S.

May Update

Well another month has passed and its now been 152 days since I committed to the primal lifestyle. To say that it required a rethinking of what I do and how I eat is an understatement. When I started back in trying to lose the 30ish pounds I had gained I didn't realise the improvements I would make and where I would be now.

When I started I had crept back up to 268lbs (my pregnancy weight LOL) from 232. Now as most know 232 is not where I want to be that is another 30-50 pound lower so that being said it meant I was 70-90 from my goal but still a good 50 lbs less than I was. Even with that good news (what good news) I was not happy being heavier again. 152 days later I can happily report that I am now down to 229 lbs that is the 36lbs I gained plus 3 *grin*. For the month that means I lost 7lbs for the month.

Its not just the weight that has changed thankfully. I am seeing it in other areas also. For the first time in ohhh 20ish years I am in a size 36 Jeans. I will admit its a loose size 36 but hey its 36.  I am also working out more than I used too. Not as much as I should really be doing but I am trying to rectify that. In the 2-3 months I have had gym membership at NFC I have visited it more than the last one (3 times in a year erk). Most times it is to work with weights with Jen but on those times she is with her PT I instead do cardio. Cardio for me is still the bike and if I can get 30 mins on even a stationary bike it means I still get 30 mins.

On the food front I have been fine tweaking what I eat, a good example being that at the start of the year i was eating way to much red meat, and have been trying to vary the primal foods that I can have. We purchased coconut and almond flour to assist us and these have resulted in "alternate" cooked foods that are primal. Over the last few months coconut flour pancakes have become a regular breakfast food at the weekend (more for ember as she LOVES them LOL) but my most recent discovery was primal banana nut bread which I baked a couple of days ago and it has been a huge hit (just need to reduce the amount of salt in it though) and use the almond flour. Given time I am also looking at trying some of the almond flour breads just to see how they work. For those interested the nutrition info for the pancakes and banana nut bread are as follows

	Cals.	Fat	Sodium	Carbs.	D.F.	Sugar	Protein
Pancakes per pancake (14 per batch) we include a banana	92	5g	39mg	8g	3.5g	3g	4g
B.N. Bread per slice (assuming 20 per batch)	142	11.5g	135mg	6g	2g	3g	5g

Laters peeps
S.

Getting back

I have not posted quite as much as I wanted this month, guess life took precedence *LOL*. Its another 30 day block over and done with and the one stat that we check at the end of each block i that of weight. Yeah I know its not a true indicator of how well things are going but when you are obese its something you can look at and see that some ground is being made.

Weighed in on Saturday and the scale reported 240 lbs so that's a loss of 9 lbs for the month. I am again happy with this as it is not too drastic of a weight loss for the period (only 1-2 lbs a week). I am hoping that I can continue to go to the gym and continue to eat as primally as I do. I will say that the eating part has not been bad and the working out has actually been fun although I missed most of last week due to "stuff".

I still think I have problems with my eating though as I think I am still not eating enough or drinking enough water. To top this off I got my vitals checked and while BP was a LOT better than it has been in a long time (it was 126 / 90 WOOT) and my triglycerides were way down I have elevated LDL and cholesterol. For now I am having to make some changes to my red meat consumption (reduce it and meat more fish and chicken) but I have elected to avoid all drug use to combat it until I can let the primal lifestyle do its work and hopefully equalize my stats. My hope is that one year from now I will be able to report lower weight and better all round stats.

Enough for now. Laters S.

next step

I am hoping I have taken the next step on my journey from fat to fit. I signed up at Jens Gym and had my stats taken. Overall stats were body fat percentage and then neck, arms, chest and legs were measured. I'm not sure my stats for the body but I have a Body fat percentage of 35%. That means I have 91lbs of Fat on me... ERKKK.

I would like to get into a routine of going regularly (I would like every day) but just now that's not happening as I have a home pre project to get done for this weekend (read : ripping up plywood and Lino from the kitchen floor to prepare it for laying down laminate flooring this weekend) which I will be working on tonight and I have an appt at 6pm tomorrow. Goal for this week is to get to Gym Thursday after work.

Another part of the gym membership is that I will get remeasured May 27th (every 90 days). I hope by then to be able to report better stats all round *LOL*. Benefits I have seen from just one session last night? Normally I come home and feel tired and just want to eat and relax. Last night after the Gym I was awake and raring to go. It was the coolest thing. It may have been a freak but Jen indicated that this was normal. SWEET.

Ok Enough for now. Weigh in is tomorrow morning so talk to you after that.

Steve

Still here honest LOL

Well its now day 24 and I am still living the primal lifestyle. True to what I said I have still not weighed myself and will not until the 1st Feb. My focus for now is making sure I am eating and living right which I think and hope I am doing. The part of this that amazes me is not the eating part (I can do that without really thinking...ok give up bread and stuff and eat steaks n veggies... SIGN ME UP LOL) but the fact that I am 24 days carbonated drinks sober *grin*. I was probably the worlds worst soda drinker. While I drank diet it was still too much and not good for me. For now the only caffinated drinks I partake in is coffee. Apart from that its water all the way.

The one task I need to work on is exercise. I have been busy moving stuff at home but I should still have exercised more. At this time I am getting walks in at work but they are sporadic at best. Goal for the next week is to get more reliable on them.

Well let me sign off for now and I will let you know the status Feb 1st.

S

purposeful delay

Ok so almost 10 days have passed since my last post and 10 days have officially passed since I started back on my path. This was an intentional delay you see as we are not weighing in every couple of days or every week. I am going to wait till the end of the month for that instead. Rather than focusing on weight I am focusing on eating and being healthy.

In the 10 days since my resolve returned and I started following the primal blueprint (I need to read the book, what I know comes from Jen) we have been working on eating low carb and healthy non hormone injected meats n veggies. for this month the goal is to keep to about 50 carbs a day and for the last 10 days I have. No slip ups, no sodas, no ice cream nothing. The last few days I am especially proud of since Jen and Ember are in Florida and I am in bachelor mode LOL.

Setting out on this journey a few years back I swore I would never go back to the 320lb mark and thankfully I haven't but having been at 230 I HATE being up in the high 260's. As ever my primary goal for this journey is to get to 200lbs and see where I go from there. Along the way I want to work at getting rid of my huge ass gut (if I make it all the way I have before and after pics - before at 267 though). If I don't make it those pictures stay buried.

Who knows where it will go this time. I feel more resolved than I have been in a while. Life is busy but I just need to deal with it and take care of business as and when it happens. Again if you are following this I welcome you here but people need to realise I'm not posting this to have people follow I'm posting this to let me output and to give me a history of what I have done over the last few years.

Have a great day

S.

New Year, new resolve, old battle

Well its 2012 and I am still fighting the battle of the bulge. I am hoping I am over my 18 month funk and that my new resolve is here to stay. Started working on the primal blueprint and am at day 3 (hey 3rd of Jan its Day 3 LOL). Weighed myself on Sunday and weighed in at 268 lbs. Not as good as I like but not as bad as I thought it could be.

My goals for this month are to do what needs to be done, report on the progress and start getting myself ready to ride this year.

Steve

sod the dreaming I just want to sleep

What does the title have to do with this post you ask? Nothing *grin* being a newborn dad I have jokingly used this modification on the "to sleep perchance to dream" line. Amazingly still going strong and still primal. Yesterday was just a little rough as I didn't eat enough (only about 1200 cals) and worked outside for a couple of hours on the yard. I am hoping against hope that the corner has been turned on getting back on track. there seems to have been to many false starts.

To assist I may even be able to ride a few times in the next week. Keep your eyes posted and you will hopefully see some bike routes and rides being posted. Ok let me get back to my coffee (hey it prevents cancer, and Alzheimer's, and can help in weight loss wooooooo, that plus since I gave up soda it is my only source of caffeine heh) peace out peeps

S.

ps sorta weird that the blog bug has caught me again since almost everyone else seems to have quit it.

Day 4

I don't know if its Karma or something but it always surprises me how candy can mysteriously appear when you try to eat healthily. Every where I go there seems to be taffy sitting about. Thankfully no temptation. Kept the fires burning and eating healthily last night. Today (day 4) is going ok but man am I hungry, I had a 5am start at work but means I'm out of here come noon.

Hoping that by the time I weigh in this weekend there is at least a 1 or 2 lb loss.

S.

Update

Well no riding was done this weekend. Mainly due to crappy weather but also due to illness and trying to declutter the house. I blame watching hoarders as I realize I have the hoarding tendency and have been making sure to get rid of stuff not touched in 5 years *LOL*. That aside I just want to get rid of old stuff we don't use (and sell on craigslist *LOL*).

I am also starting to monitor my caloric intake and trying to stay primal. I need to lose weight and gain muscle strength. Step one eat right. Step two work my lazy ass out. (in between making sure the 2 ladies in my life are pampered enough and know that they is da bomb!!).

Ok gone for now. Think weight is stagnant at 263 but might have gained. Will try update tomorrow.

S.

Weigh in

Well weigh in for the week was a little late (this morning) due to having to work Saturday (12 hrs in a server room moving lots of hardware) and getting to the scale.

Couple of pound weight loss which I'm happy with as food intake was bad this weekend (and I'm sure the donut for breakfast will not help, thanks Colton ..... actually its all I will have for breakfast so as long as I eat the way I plan to the rest of the day there is zero damage).

Weigh in at 6am - 248.5lbs

Still having motivational issues with getting on bike and going to Gym. Its still being worked on but I am seeing it as a multi step process where I seem to have the eating almost in check and I can partially blame the lack of riding on the crappy weather the last week (cant blame no Gym on it though).

Goal for this week is at least 1-2lb of weight loss, we shall see and if I can I want at least a bike ride in.

See yah soonly.

S.

Busy Week

Its been hectic this week, in work and out. I have been dealing with rearranging the house and so far its in a not bad shape. I would say oh about 60 percent complete and I'm hoping to work on it more this weekend if I can. In amongst it all two things have happened. One I have eaten pretty healthy all week (yay me) and I have cheated and weighed myself a couple of times to see what was happening, If i can avoid badness this weekend I will be hopefully reporting a loss. The down side to the business..... I have not been able to work out all week!!!!

Tasks for next week are to get the house into excellent condition, get back to my normal workout routine and continue eating healthily. I think if I can keep it up I will be able to restart my journey for real (instead of hovering around 250 like I have for the last few months). The differences I have noticed are that I am making smart decisions. Instead of eating at Wendy's last week I went and bought a chicken which fed me for 3 days *LOL*. While meeting Larry and Barb for lunch today I could have been sooo bad as we were at Teds Montana Grill and they do excellent food. My order was Teds bowl of chili and their wedge salad with blue cheese dressing. I had 2 onion rings and 3 or 4 chili fries courtesy of Larry (damn him for knowing my weaknesses) but all in all I kept calories down to about 700-800 cals for the lunch (150 were the 2 onion rings *sigh*) This to me is not bad considering the chili cheese fries alone for an order were 1200 calories, as with the onion rings. Old me could have got them then a burger probably eaten the lot and have consumed over 4-5000 calories....as I have said previously I think I have changed for the better forever (eat less 99% of the time) and the old me is gone. I plan to NEVER go back to ~320-330lbs.

Oh Yeah I have a pic on my fridge of me at my fattest I think. My goal is to scan it and a current photo and you can tell me what you think.

Steve

Ramblings

So its been a little bit since I last posted..... STILL at 250lbs I actually did well last week then the weekend hit and it was hectic. lots of bad choices and it took me up to the same weight.

Exercise has suffered since Friday also. I am in the process of rearranging the whole house (think moving 3-4 rooms around and getting rid of a LOT of crap) and it has cut into my time for other stuff. College is being done at work during lunch time *groan* so I have zero free time at the moment.

Just waiting and hoping for spring to hit, cause the trainer is all well and good but I need to get out and ride. Its just to easy to stop get off the trainer and go do something else. Or in the current situation not have room to do anything.

Now you know where I am, I will talk to you soonly with a better weight update.

Steve

Weekend etc

So we spent the weekend at Gabe and Ems, I don't know how well I did, I guess we will know tomorrow at weigh in. Saturday we headed out to a Sushi place and finished off the evening by going to an British pub and then back to their place for some rock band. Sunday involved a lot of relaxing and watching movies.

Today I have felt sorta out of sorts. I cant put my finger on it but just know that I aint my usual chipper self,. ahh well tomorrow is another day *grin* I did however get my ass onto the trainer for a bit. Stats as follows:-

• Total Distance :- 5.7 miles
• Trip Time:- 21 mins 58 secs
• Ave Speed:- 15.57mph
• Ave Cadence:- 67rpm
• Max Speed:- 19.07mph

Apart from that not much happening Getting my head round being in school and arranging for the books I need. Talk to you tomorrow with the official weigh in.

S.

Update

Well it seems that I might just be serious about keeping myself on track this time for getting the rest of my weight off. It has now been two weeks and I am keeping track in sparkpeople every day and making sensible decisions about what I take in and how much I eat. I still have a little bit more to go before I am happy that I am back on the right road that continues me on my journey. For me I think a major detour that is looming upon me is the start back of college classes. My goal however is to not let this affect me and for it to be just a very worn speed bump. Another hurdle that needs to be overcome is for me to work out at home. It seems that there is always something coming up that I do not work out at all when I am at home. Last week it was only one day I did anything. For this week I need to increase that to 3 maybe 4 times to make me happier. To be able to get to my goal of completing a century it is a necessity for me to get back on to the trainer.

As I have been told " No excuses - Just do it", I can do the walks in work so I can do the bike at home.

Ok back to work... Peace

S

Day 3

Well day one and two went well with me eating right and perhaps not enough. I walked both days and had personal training last night. Today I worked from home due to snow and while not walking I also ate pizza for a combined lunch / dinner. It was one of the delite pizzas from papa murphys so it could have been worse. By sparkpeoples estimation I think I ate 2100 calories for the day and while It was not majorly bad (they gauge me at 2000-2300 a day) It was over the 1500 I am trying for each day. To help combat this though I got on the bike trainer as I kept on threatening, partially because I knew I needed to and partially to combat the pizza. All I can say is WOW. I can tell its been too long.

Stats for ride are :-

• time taken 16 mins 59 secs
• ave speed 14.81mph
• ave cadence 64rpm
• max speed 19.07
• trip distance 4.15 miles

stats are ok but not really to my liking, I could feel it and the legs etc feel it after the ride. It makes me want to do it more get back the 2-3mph I have lost. If I am really serious about the century I need the 2-3 mph plus another 2-3mph. I need to get it up to 20ish I think. Working out 100 miles in a six hour time frame it would be a constant 16.66mph but i know I will have to stop. Give myself 45 mins and in theory I could get away with 19mph, even at my best last season I was not even close. Work has to be done and its started thankfully.

Thoughts

Have you ever had those times where you don't know where the time goes and never seem to have time to do anything. I think I'm living that just now. Thankfully I am making time to ride the motorcycle and that is keeping me sane but hmmm there are other stuff that needs a doing. I think this is part of my issue with continuing on my journey. It is just easier to go out and eat when I get home at 7pm. The problem with that is I don't loose weight and, as this morning showed, my stomach gets very unhappy with me.

I think I have to make a new rule for my life. While unexpected things happen and while out and about I will probably eat out, when at home I am limiting myself to eating out for dinner no more than 1 time a week. I am doing this in the hopes that I will stop myself some times and minimize the cost and maximize the weight loss.

Wish me luck.

S

Thoughts and updates

Ok I have had a bad month or more where I have not been focused at all on my weight and continuing my journey. I dunno why just haven't wanted to for some reason. I realised last night I have to give a damn. I WANT to get down more.

Weighed in this morning - 247lbs

Thankfully not to much damage but I need to focus. As part of my re focusing I have put all my foods in for the day (except dinner) at sparkpeople. This way I know what I am eating. Its also not easy just now in work. So far I have passed about 6 piles of help yourself candy and a tray of help yourself cupcakes. I have walked away from all. I hope to report next Monday a drop and that I am not just deluding myself again.

Peace out

Steve

Chapter 2 begins

Its been busy of recent and I have not been able to get much riding in (we did the rails to trails on Saturday but that is it). It has been so busy I have not even been able to pull out the trainer I bought. I have made it my goal to get this done so I can get my leg muscles back *LOL*.

For the last 5 days Jens cousin Ken and his wife Amy were visiting and Ken and I (more Ken) worked on the eaves problems we have. After the 5 days I am glad to report new wood has been installed and has also been pressure washed. I was going to post pictures but I have decided to wait. At the moment I have the start pictures, the in progress (needs painted but repaired) and as soon as I have it painted and pictures taken I will post the finished result.

Weight has fluctuated due to rich eating. Weigh in on Sunday was 245lbs but I hope to get it back off soon. Goal for end of year has now been set at 220lbs this gives me the ability to lose 2lbs a week with a couple of weeks to fix any gains or plateaus. Official date I am looking at this for is January 3rd (Sunday) To get to my Goal of 200lbs I am calling March 28th the goal date. The problems I foresee for these goals are as follows:-

• Halloween
• Thanksgiving
• Christmas
• Jens Birthday
• New Year
• My Birthday

Basically multiple dates where I may end up eating or drinking badly. Probably should add this weekend also as we have Gabe, Em and Marina coming to visit. Looks like we have Jazz on the lawn and other activities in our future *LOL*. But you know that's why I build in a cushion to my weight loss. It allows me to have the occasional bad day then get back onto my normal eating. Without these occasional days I doubt I would have got to where I am today.

It may have been quiet on my Journey of recent but it is not at an end. I would say that now that I have reset my goals that Chapter two has officially started. I have the tools to continue this journey and its time for me to use them. Don't expect this to be quiet again, this blog gives me an output for my thoughts on my weight, my cycling and anything else I need it to be. It also pushes me to continue if I get lazy. Its out here for anyone to read but its also here for me to read and realise how far I have come.

Talk to Y'all soon.

S,