There’s a lot more to being obese than fat cells.  The psychology of being overweight weighs heavily on a woman.  Especially a single woman. The last time I remember being thin enough to fit into a normal size was 1992– twenty years ago.  It’s almost shocking when I realize as an adult I’ve been overweight longer than I have not been.  My two youngest children have never known me not to be overweight. For a brief time after my divorce, I had lost about 40 pounds, but I was still not thin.  What I find so interesting is that I never think of myself as morbidly obese.  I see myself in my mind’s eye as I was in my teenage years and twenties.  Even when I star in my own dreams, I am never overweight.  A friend of mind recently sent me photos of us in the 70s and 80s.  I remember those days like it was yesterday.

In my case, it wasn’t a layered ten pound gain per year that racked up the extra weight.  I had been prescribed a medicine that, nearly overnight, put over 100 pounds on me.  As hard as I fought against it, I couldn’t beat back the sudden weight gain. With kids, a husband, a job, responsibilities that piled on in my thirties, I just became resigned to living as yet another obese American.  But, there is no denying I have been quietly amassing a bitterness about the new me.   I can’t blame the Pharma drug, because it has always been within reach for me to diet and exercise.   I am looking forward to this year to make progress toward my “50% off” campaign.  I see losing half my weight as the “bad” half.  The half that has kept me from doing all the things I want to do, and would have liked to have done the past twenty years.  It’s more of a reverse metamorphosis or something.

To that end, I’ve been evaluating how to go forward.  I ended the My Fit Foods challenge on Christmas eve. (More on My Fit Foods in another post.) I plateaued at 13 pounds lost, but I’m still content with that. I realize it is going to be a long haul and that program gave me a great kickstart.  It also taught me the wisdom that surrounds eating more frequently in small quantities every day.  I’ve also kicked coffee.  I tried coffee after not having it for such a long while, but it just didn’t taste the same.  Tea, much better.  I’m also getting on the treadmill every day and doing the HIIT training technique my old trainer, Claire, had shown me.  My one major disappointment is that I have not been to the Saturday ATX100 meeting in two weeks now.  That is going to get remedied this week.

I will continue to persevere with my plans.  Zach just sent me a note that Health Rally launched today.  I signed up.  Not sure exactly how it works, but  I hope you will participate in the program.  I called my rally, “Tally Ho!”  The reward is $200 towards riding lessons after losing 80 pounds.  Kind of a mid-term goal, but a good one.  The basic idea is your friends and family pledge what they want.  If you reach your goal, they pay up.  I think I can find 40 friends to pledge $5, no?

All in all, I’m happy I’m moving forward (literally and figuratively).   Happy New Year’s y’all.

I’m coming to the end of my 21-Day challenge.  So far, down 13 pounds.  I’m really happy about that.  I realize it’s going to be a rough couple of weeks ahead though.  My 21-day challenge actually ends on Christmas Eve.  I’ve been steadfastly sticking to the My Fit Foods plan, with the exception of some white wine I had last weekend.   I’m not sure what comes after the 21-day plan.  I’m going to have to learn how to cook these types of meals.  Not sure where I will figure out how to do that, short of cook books and web sites.  I may continue to get meals from My Fit Foods.

I wasn’t able to attend the ATX100 Saturday meeting this weekend because I had to take a short holiday day trip to Houston.  I did sign back up for the gym, however.  I was surprised how much easier it was to do a half-hour on the treadmill.  My main issue right now is finding out a convenient time to go there.

This is just a short update.  I have a longer post I want to write, but haven’t been able to fit that into my schedule yet.  But, so far so good. Still motivated and working toward my long term goal of essentially having a life.  

I know these results are unusual and more a reflection of the sheer mass I need to shed (and more likely a lot of water weight), but 9 pounds loss for the first week still is rewarding.  Yay!

I attended the group meeting yesterday down at RunTex.  It appears they’ve combined the two groups (ATX100 and ATX50) for the Saturday meeting.  This is fine by me, because the fitness levels seems to make more sense.  Considering I’m new and not conditioned at all, I imagine another newbie who had less to lose would feel fine tracking along with me at the beginner level.

Where it does make a difference, however, is in the group dynamic.  There’s an active Facebook group page where many of the members who’ve bonded over the past few months get a lot of support from each other.  Some in the group feel the 100 pounds+ group has unique issues they’d like to share only with their peers.  This makes sense to me, as I’ve spent the last few years running a peer-only community.

The surprising perk I realized yesterday, however, is that I too now have a peer group with whom I can discuss my issues.  On our two-mile walk yesterday, I spent the entire time talking to a another peer and felt so comfortable about talking openly about many issues surrounding obesity that we all share.  Austin ranks in the top 10 cities in the country for fitness, so there is much peer pressure here to eat right (Whole Foods was founded here) and be active.   After I get to know more people, I may suggest we create a Ning network where there can be more robust online sharing in a private community.

In my industry, there is a popular study that always makes me cringe when I hear it during industry conferences.*  The study asserts that social networks influence obesity.  I often joke that one of my colleagues (who uses this study in his presentations) won’t connect socially to me because he’s afraid he’ll become obese.  The truth is, this study does not apply to me at all.  I don’t have any friends who need to lose 100 pounds.  Some of my female friends are in varying stages of “I’m overweight!,” but I know very few females who are not on that spectrum somewhere.

Yet, the converse of that study, that people who opt-in to a network of peers (in this case, obesity) can influence each other very positively.  I’m going to put it to the test and see if it makes the difference when I eventually get to that plateau that has me start listening to that inner mocking voice that says, “Why are you doing this?  This is pointless and futile.”

To that end, I sighed up for Runkeeper.  I also heard from Zach Lynch, founder of HealthRally.  He said they have an alpha I could sign up for, but he said it would be better if I could wait for the beta that will be released in a few weeks.  I decided to wait, but have good feelings about it.  It seems HealthRally might be a way to involve my larger social graph in my journey.

So, I’m on day 6 of my 21-day challenge.  I’ve been religiously sticking to it (well, except the drinking of liver blood part).  I haven’t been feeling well, so I’m not sure if it’s a touch of the flu coming on or if the detox is really working over my inner gears.

I haven’t been exercising, until today.  There is a lovely park about a mile away from me that has a long walking trail. I went early this morning and there was this spooky layer of fog that hung low across the landscape.  It was kind of beautiful.  The temperature was in the 40s, but not too cold with just a sweatshirt on.  I downloaded the “This Morning” Wall Street Journal podcast on iTunes which runs 36 minutes.  It comes out every day, so this is just about the right time I need to walk around the park or my neighborhood.  If it’s too cold, I’ll use the treadmill.  I think I’ll pick up a pedometer this weekend.  Thinking I should wait for the fitbit until I know I’m definitely going to stay on track.

Tomorrow, there is a “cheat” meal on the 21-day challenge plan.  The literature cautions you to avoid alcohol, caffeine, artificial sweeteners, and dessert.  It’s like faux cheating.  Not much fun in that!

I was also thinking of renewing my membership to the gym.  I have this amazing gym very close by, Life Time Fitness.  It’s like the Country Club of gyms.  Again, think I’ll wait until I keep progressing along.  I haven’t weighed myself again, because I don’t want to get disappointed if the scale doesn’t meet my mental expectations.  Tomorrow is another ATX100 meeting.  I’m looking forward to that.  I may take it easy on the exercise part, as the group is about 3 months conditioned where I’m just beginning. I think I mentioned they’re starting a new program in January, so I’d rather track with that.