Dance, fat-boy, dance!

270.8 this morning, but it was after an absolutely k-razy weekend that saw me and a SO at two major dance events, The Crystal Method @ The Roseland, and the Beloved Presents fundraiser, week two, featuring Jujuba, Medicine Drum and Ganga Giri. By 2am, I was wasted tired, and some dude stomped my foot, twisting my ankle, but up until then I was a pretty hard-core dancing fool. Back to the weight: it's already ticked back up to about 272 after rehydration and meals today, but I so don't care. Had a great weekend with my sweetie, and life feels good. I feel so much more in control now.

Two more shows this month at a minimum: Peter Murphy on Wed, and then another rump-shaker: SHPONGLE the week after. There is no question to me that dancing is my favorite form of sweat exercise. Well, second favorite, but whatever...

What a wonderful world...

273.6! I feel so much better! I love the motivated feeling. I now have even more motivation. Went on a fabulous date last night that turned into a fabulous date here @ D-Flat. Pretty innocent. Well, "innocent" in my world, anyway. No nekkidness. There. Anyway, I now have yet another reason to keep up my good work. She's perfectly fine with who I am, but I want to be better. I want to go do more things. Be active. Go out. I want to hike. Swim more. Get better. Be what I've always wanted to be.

I now have two beautiful women in my life. If anything, I need to get my ass in shape just to keep up.

Food yesterday? Barely had time for it. Had a bacon, egg, cheese and bagel sammy, then had a scant bit of humus plate with date last night over a beer. A bit carby, but no gain. No walk yesterday either, but energy burned cleaning and tidying the flat. Damn glad I did.

Very dance-intensive evening tonight and tomorrow night as well. I think maybe if I do this right, I may be able to dance my way past 270 by Monday. I'm not really setting that as a goal, but with the way things have been going, I think it's a real possibility. It is, without question, the second best exercise there is ;)

Getting better... over night!

274.6!

I am really pleased. That should go without saying, but there; I said it! I have been trying, and it's been paying off. Interestingly enough, I haven't been trying all that hard, and it's still paying off. At times I get a bit nervous that if I try really, really hard: throw everything I have into this, that when I plateau in the 260's or somewhere that I won't have the energy or enough physical ability back yet to take it to another level to get over the hump. We'll see.

I think the breakfast ritual needs to change. I typically have exactly the same thing for breakfast every day. Part of that is helpful; I don't go over-board with breakfast, nor do I spend lots of time thinking about it. I have a bagel with Tofutti BTCC, some dill shake and my mocha. But the bagel is high-carb, the BTCC, vegan as it may be, is fat with a touch of protein, and the mocha, while vastly less negative an impact as a commercial variety, especially fat-wise, is still pretty carb-o-riffic. I need to start concentrating on protein. I think we're headed to smoothie-ville.

Although today due to lack of BTCC, I made myself a bagel, egg & bacon breakfast sandwich, which was damn tasty. My buddy made the seitan bacon, and while he thinks it's sub par, I think it's great. Plus, he gave me two pounds of the stuff. Yeah, it's carb-riffic, too, but seeing as I only have two pieces of the stuff, I'm not so worried. The egg stuff is almost nothing but protein. If I switched to a sprouted grain bagel, that'd really be decent.

I'm thinking of starting to track all that I eat. As the weight-loss continues on, knowing my caloric deficit and my nutrition numbers will become more and more important to me, and this process. But also, having it there--having everything I eat laid out in front of me--will help in mindfulness. It is all rooted in mindfulness.

Everything is...

Getting better all the time...

277.8

Just got back from the walk to 39th & back. That's just enough to really make me work. Start going down-hill to loosen everything up, then a gentle grade going slowly up-hill to the light at 50th, then a real bit of a climb back up Mt. Tabor to my flat. About 1.6mi, so sayeth Google maps. Come into the flat in a serious huff & puff. I will not lie and say I'm not enjoying the central a/c of D-Flat! Also not lying when I say that I'm starting to enjoy the exercise again. Why oh why do I ever stop doing this? Then again, why do I ever start doing things that make me feel terrible? Maybe some other blog...

Doing okay with the food. My kid asked to crash here last night after having a stressful run-in with her roommate-who-wants-to-be-her-boyfriend, and asked for a pre-crash snack. I'd made the Big Burger with Egg for dinner, and she called at like 10pm, right as I was wrapping up things and heading for bed, so a snack was sorta against my stated policy of not eating after dinner, but we had chips, salsa, vegan sour cream, rice and jalapenos ("deconstructed nachos", essentially). I tried to be good. I was slightly less than good, but only slightly. Was no change in weight this am, so no harm/no foul apparently.

I can feel my metabolism starting to get some traction again, almost like lighting the pilot light on a furnace. Nothing happens without a flame. I also feel my desire to over-eat and stress eat ebbing away again. Thank god. That felt awful. I know I was eating from a place of sadness and loneliness, but that feeling of "out of control" is just awful. I feel like I'm the one behind the wheel again.

Some of the positive control comes from knowing it works. My ex dropped something like 140lbs just from will-power and exercise. She will always be an inspiration to me that way. Part currently comes from my current girlfriend, who's lost about 60lbs so far. She's a bit less inspirational in the regard that she does so by eating meat, which I'm still not jiggy with, but at least she respects my want to do the weight-loss with non-critter protein. But I want to look better for her, and be more attractive to her. That's not only fair, but helps strengthen our relationship, which I value.

But then suddenly, I have yet a new motivation. Someone I've always found very attractive and had a mini-thing for spotted me on OKCupid. She works just down the street. We always talked about getting a drink together. We look at each-other's profiles and see how much we (a-hem...) "have in common". We're gonna catch a beer together tomorrow after she gets off work. This actually makes me feel rather attractive again (in my own unconventional way). I've been feeling really ugly lately, and this just makes me feel like there's hope.

And I know there's hope. I just need to stay serious about this. Like the poem said...

“How shall I a habit break?
As you did that habit make.
As you gathered, you must lose;
As you yielded, now refuse.
Thread by thread the strands we twist,
'Till they bind us neck and wrist.
Thread by thread the patient hand
Must untwine ere free we stand.”

-John Boyle O'Reilly

Goin' down. Down, down, down, down, down...

277.8 this morning. That feels good. I already physically feel better. Thank whomever. Actually, thank ME.

I've walked three days in a row, but will take tonight off. Was planning on it, but something suddenly came up. I used Google maps and discovered that the walk I'd been thinking I was doing that was a half-mile each way is more like 4/5ths of a mile, so my "mile walk" has been closer to 1.6 or there-abouts. That actually sorta makes me feel good.

Ate responsibly again, even though my GF and her OBF were talking about the desire for KFC. Used to love the stuff. Probably still would. Won't go back there.

I had my boiler-plate breakfast. Didn't eat anything all day until after I got home. Made a veggie burger with light mayo, cheese, my friend's vegan bacon (which turned out pretty well) shredded lettuce, K&M, and decided at the last minute to make a RediEgg patty. 0 fat and 0 cholesterol, and about 5-6g protien. I figured the protein would be a good addition, especially since it's a no carb, no fat addition. My intestines are a bit unhappy about it, though. We'll see how that goes.

I kinda plan on really ramping up the walking once I get down to about 270. If I remember last time around, that was a plateau that I found hard to get past/over/off of, so...

There; that's better...

Back on my real diuretic. Without it I ballooned up to 291, even with taking OTC water pills AND watching what I eat. That was about as depressing as could get. Now after being back on them for three or four days, I'm back down to 279.8. It's good to see two-seventy-anything again. It feels good going in the right direction again. I was talking eating/weight-loss with TKW the other night, and we agreed that at times "not-negative" progress is still progress. You've progressed beyond what you'd usually do, which is back-slide. No matter what, it still feels good.

Will make sure to go for a walk today.

This is so damn irritating...

WEIGHT: 291!

Been better with the food lately, yet putting back on weight. Did get my dieuretic back. Hopefully that will help.

I just have such trouble not eating after dinner. I really need to get on that.

Simply. Must. Not.

I went to the pool yesterday and did a water aerobics class. Awful. I wish they wouldn't do the "let's do 80 different movements, and switch between them all every three seconds..." Seriously, I don't get any real cardio that way. The gal's up there going a hundred miles an hour, and I can't get a rhythm going or any kind of burn. Honestly, I think I'm just gonna force myself to walk more. Actually, I need to go do that soon. Beautiful day out. No reason not to.

Know what sux?

Gaining weight when you've eaten even better than you normally would have.

I'm off my BP diuretic while I figure out the whole Medicare/Medicade prescription thing. I've been REALLY GOOD with food lately. Yet I have GAINED SIX FUCKING POUNDS OF WATER.

Seriously, this sux...

Added:

Just filled said prescription out-of-pocket. I am NOT happy about gaining a pound a frackin' day even though I'm watching what I eat!

Actually did something today...

Mowed my GF's lawn. It was about 82f and very sunny, so I got in a good sweat. Then again, I can break a sweat by thinking about work at this point in my life. Check that: at any point in my life. It's one of my greatest embarrassments. Granted, since I suffered a neck fracture at 15, it's been worse, but honestly, it's always been 90% from the weight. I damn-well know that.

I remember as a pudgy kid, I was generally a rather active boy. Biked everywhere I went, walked, ran, played Little League baseball. Admittedly, I was still a bit of a quitter; dropped out of Freshman football, (hated running long distances). But that fall, I played inter-mural softball. But the accident stopped everything cold. Immobile for months. Every muscle I built just turned to jello.

But I know that I've kept myself there, or here, I suppose. I need activity. I need to go someplace where I can just sweat. Sweat and not care about it. Sweat it off. Sweat and let it pour out of me like poison.

I'm thinking about joining a support group or three. I think I've realized that I need that help.

This hurts, but...

...it's time to start this.

I'm fat and I'm miserable. I hate the fact that I put back on all the weight I lost 2 years ago, and I hate myself for being so damn weak. I am careening out of control again, and I feel like at any moment I'm going to hit the curb, flip and roll over the cliff. At times, sadly, that sounds like the best alternative for my life. 41, no job or real viable career, divorced, disabled, unattractive, unwanted and unloved. The weight has always been there as an issue. More than that, it's a metaphor for my life. It's everything I should accomplish, yet somehow or for some reason don't. It is the illustration of the failure that is my life.

I am okay with calling myself a failure at this point, mostly because it's quantitatively true. It's not a measure of me as a personality; I know I'm a good and worthy person. But I have not accomplished nearly as much as I should with my life. The weight is just there as a big fat exclamation mark on that sentence.

I must take up this challenge. If I don't, I'm gonna die way too early, unfulfilled and unhappy, and I don't want that. I don't deserve that. I can't let that happen.

Today is Sunday, and I make vegetarian sausage egg & cheese biscuits & hash-brown pucks for breakfast. I usually have 2 of each. Today I had 2 hash-browns but one biscuit. Even the small effort is *something*. I've been doing a bit better with the food lately, but honestly, I think I may need to go back to eating a near-vegan diet. That and cut the fat and simple carb out. Peanut butter has to go; I can't stay in control with that stuff around. I finished the small jar I had, only to find that EX had packed a large remnant tub in with some of my things. I'm pretty sure I'm just going to throw it out. Hate to waste, but I know damn well that if it's after 8pm and it's in the flat, I'm gonna eat it. Exercise control wherever I can, even if it's throwing something away while I feel strong enough to do so in order to protect myself from myself when I feel weak later on.

Exercise is next. I MUST start walking again. And moreover, I need to swim. It was without question the best exercise for me. $4 a swim though. For someone with no money, that's a killer. The Parks and Rec department here say that there are scholarships available. I think I'm going to apply. Even if I can get the rate cut in half, that'd help. I'd like a year pass. I'd like to just make that my full-time job for a while. Drop 30 in a few months--I can do that. I just need to try. I'd feel like I did a few years ago; capable, healthier, more attractive, less dead--inside and out.

I'll pursue that scholarship thing, but in the meanwhile I think I'll go scout which rec center I want to go to regularly. I hate the namby-pamby water aerobics classes for older ladies. I like shallow water best--my disability plus all this weight makes deep water aerobics too damn hard. Shallow lets me get in there and really hammer--really pound and I don't need to worry about tripping and falling, sweating and overheating, being too far from the bathroom and all that biz. It's the perfect exercise environment for me. I just need to start. Like this blog. I just need to start.

I just need to start.