Weight Loss Wednesday

Well today officially starts my journey to slenderness. First a word of warning to everyone with a weak stomach. At the end of this post I have included some topless photos of myself. I will try to include new photos monthly so you can visually track my progress.

As to my goals. I mentioned my goal of losing 28 pounds by the end of 2008. Currently I am at 208, so this should have me at 180 by the end of the year. BMI says I should be 165, so there will be room to work next year.

However, our family is going to the beach on vacation in the middle of September. It would be nice to be able to feel comfortable taking my shirt off in public again. So this would actually mean I need to lose 7 pounds a month to lose 28 pounds by the time I leave. I do think this is doable, but I need to stay dedicated.

To that end, I will give you the good and the bad news. The bad news is, I eat like I want to have a heart attack at 30. Here is a sample eating day for me:
3 hard boiled eggs
A candy bar
Plate of Pasta
Vitamin water or Mountain Dew
Ice cream Sandwich
Granola bar
Supper of usually meat and Macaroni and cheese
A bowl of cereal no milk

And that is on a lite day. On a really bad day, ad in a few more candy bars and you get the picture. Clearly this is the most obvious area to attack. We will come back to this.

On the physical activity front of this war, I have had a measure of improvement lately. I have developed my own workplace workout which is seeming to be sticking with me on Monday, Wednesday, and Fridays. Still working on creating the habit on Tuesdays and Thursdays.

The MWF workout utilizes my 2 union breaks per day, and 10 minutes of my lunch break. During those periods I will do the following:

20 bicep curls each bicep- 20 pound weight
30 triceps extensions- 20 pound weight
10 pec butterfly's- 20 pound weight
30 crunches- I need to up this soon
20 arm spread eagles- 5 pound weight
20 back lifts each arm 20 pound weight
15 backups- opposite of a sit up
15 push ups- yes I am that out of shape
20 hand raises each hand 20 pound weight
20 trap lifts each trap 20 pound weight

Clearly by the photos below, I am not completely up to date on all the fitness lingo. To that end, I made up the names of many of my exercises I engage in. Feel free to question what each one is if you want to know exactly what I am doing to get such great results.

Now back to the food front, my first step will be to eliminate the remaining two sodas a week I have been eating. After that, I need to reduce the snack food intake as well. Next week is my goal for the no sodas, I will keep you posted.

WARNING!! Once again, the pictures that follow may cause you to vomit on your keyboard. If this happens, do not blame me, you have been warned.

That being said, here I am in my current state:

Weight Loss

Now that I am thirty, it has become more pressing on my mind to do something about my spare tire. Slowly but surely over the bast ten years since I got married, my weight has increased. The time has finally come to do something about this. With four kids, my decreased energy from my being overweight is not exactly a good thing either.

So as part of my journey to lyving well, I have determined to lose 28 pounds of ugly fat by end of 2008. With just over 7 months till the end of the year, the means I need to lose a little under four pounds a month to reach that goal.

At LyvingWell.com, I will be making Wednesday's "Weight loss Wednesdays." Every Wednesday I will update you all on my progress and what I am doing to reach my goal. This coming Wednesday I lay out my specific action steps I will take to achieve this.

The biggest obstacle for me will be my job. I have job which only engages about 3% of my brain power. Unfortunately, when I am bored, I typically eat. I also have a sweet tooth which further compounds the problem. I am currently attempting to rewire my natural tendency of eating when I am bored into typing when I am bored.

A second major challenge for me in regards to my job is the hour at which it begins. My job begins at 6:30 AM which requires me to wake up at 5:40 AM. If I was a morning person, this would not be a problem. However, my biorhythm is naturally night driven. So not to long ago, I was up to a can of Mountain Dew a day to keep me going. The past couple weeks I have been able to reduce my Dew dependency down to 2 cans a week. No difference noted yet on my weight, but hopefully I will soon.

Clearly I have my work cut out for me. Any ideas anyone has to help me get there faster, feel free to write and let me know. Also feel free to help keep me accountable.