It's a New Phil, Weeks 87 and 88
A Setback
Up nine pounds since the last weigh-in to 239.
Sheesh. Well, I know what to do.
Live to see it.
September 26, 2007
September 11, 2007
It's a New Phil, Weeks 85 and 86
The Transformation of Desire
Charles Harper's talk at the Singularity Summit had particular resonance for the New Phil series. Here's the abstract from the relevant portion of his talk:
People use power to pursue ends they desire. Therefore the increase of personal power calls for the transformation of personal desire. Science, however, knows next to nothing of the transformation of desire. Monks, hermits, fasters, counterculturals – the athletes of the spirit; these are the sorts of people who work on and know about the transformation of desire. A wise approach towards the development of superintelligence probably should include serious consideration on how to transform desire so that enhanced powers are not abused to serve un-enhanced desires. The transformation of desire for humans involves what in virtue ethics is called “habitus” – the formation of habituated character through devoted, willful practice within a space of real freedom. Virtue is not a matter of either knowledge or “programming.” And it also often is not limited to only individual lives. It occurs in group contexts such as families, teams, monastic orders, communities. Also, people who engage in the transformation of desire often are involved in worship and prayer. They seek inspiration and transformative power from God. In view of such issues, what would be the “transformation of desire” for a superintelligence?
The national tendency towards obesity is a small but revealing example of what Harper is talking about. The "power" in question here is both technological and economic.We can produce and have access to far more food than we actually need to eat. I've been chronicling an attempt to create my own habitus. Who knew?
Next time -- a long overdue (and dreaded) weigh in. Stay tuned.
August 26, 2007
It's a New Phil, Weeks 83 and 84
Recently I added running to my exercise menu. While in San Diego last week, I got up one morning and starting jogging along the pier and just kept hugging the water's edge until I realized that I had run all the way from my hotel back to the airport -- which trip had cost $11 plus tip by cab! Of course, the cab driver couldn't take the same route I did, but still.
Running is a great choice while on the road -- especially when you're someplace like SD which provides such nice whether and beautiful scenery to run through. I mean, taking my bike with me isn't really an option, and I get pretty tired of stationery bikes, treadmills, and elliptical trainers in hotel gyms. Being outdoors is more fun, even in a city. Or maybe especially in a city. In some of the places I've stayed over the years, running would probably feel more like a survival thing than strictly a matter of ensuring fitness.
But the other reason for adding running is that I've observed lots more fat people riding bikes than jogging. Of course, that could mean a lot of things -- fat people start out riding bikes and then end up jogging, the fat joggers are all there but on a trail I don't use, people jog because they're thin and it doesn't hurt them the way it would heavier folks (as opposed to concluding that they're thin because they jog), etc. But I think it's also reasonable to assume that running might represent a somewhat more vigorous workout, or that metabolically, it might just be more effective at burning fat.
So I was very pleased with myself when, yesterday, I ran one of my suburban mountain-biking courses. The distance is hard to estimate, but it was somewhere between 6 and 8 miles, with lots of grueling uphill stretches, several highly satisfying downhill stretches, and very little flat ground: pretty much the opposite of the terrain on the San Diego waterfront, seeing as I didn't push on up the cliffs to La Jolla.
So let's call it 7 miles. That means that I did better than 10K, not bad for a beginner. I mean, you can't possibly run like that and keep much fat on your body, now can you?
Um, well, yes you can. Check out the September Scientific American if you get the chance. It's all about nutrition, obesity, starvation, metabolism -- all things food. One of the articles, Can Fat Be Fit? makes this observation:
Triathletes can now top 300 pounds, part of the fat-but-fit movement.
So people can be competitively engaged in an activity that has them swimming a mile, running 6 miles, and biking 25 miles and still look like this:
Not to say there's anything wrong with the way this guy looks, I'm just surprised that a person could do that much cardio exercise and still be so big. I tend to expect a story more like this one -- very similar to my own, with that starting weight of 297 pounds -- where people lose a bunch of weight related to improving their athletic performance. Per the Sci-Am article, there are those who argue that people should be focused on fitness, not weight loss. Our triathlete shown above would be an example of somebody who is achieving remarkable things athletically, perhaps all the more remarkable when one considers his size.
All of which leads me pretty much back to the same conclusion as last time: this stuff is complicated.
August 13, 2007
It's a New Phil, Weeks 81 and 82
Last time out, reader Gerald Hibbs wrote:
Howdy Phil,
I always notice people who have never struggled with weight saying something like, "Hey fatty, just exercise more and eat less. It isn't rocket science, you just have to have self discipline!"
Now that you have lost a good deal of weight but are stuck for a looooooong time at a plateau what do you think about this? You seem to be eating right and are certainly exercising a lot yet still aren't losing more weight! How can that be?! Is it possible that things are a little more complex?
This was driven home to me when I saw a documentary that follow people who received gastric bypass. One young girl lost a lot of weight but stuck with a plateau where she was still very overweight. Meanwhile she couldn't eat more than about 800 calories a day.
First off, people who say things like that really get on my nerves. The hardest thing about being fat -- at least in my personal experience -- isn't any of the physical stuff. It's the judgment that people will readily and willingly heap on you. I have an extremely fit friend who is similarly bothered by being told, "Yeah, well, it's easy for you," when in fact being in shape represents a lot of grueling work for her.
I don't know what it's like for anybody but me, and neither does anybody else. And for me, it's pretty hard.
Still, I don't think even a one- or two-year plateau is anything to get discouraged about. Nor would I think being stuck at 800 calories per day the end of the world. (And I should say that I'm taking in a lot more than that while maintaining my weight at the current level.) Metabolism is a highly versatile thing; if it can change in one direction, it can change in the other. It just takes patience.
Patience is key, anyway. One way or another, it took me a long time to become a 300-pound guy who was on course to be a 300-pound guy for the rest of his life. I could have become a 200-pound guy in a matter of months, but by now I might be halfway back to 300.
It is said that we live in an age in which people are able to reinvent themselves. Celebrities are noted for this, but regular folks can reinvent themselves, too. We adopt new careers, new looks, new relationships, new personal philosophies...all in pursuit of becoming new versions of ourselves. The New Phil program is a long-term project of self reinvention.
I knew from the start that, in order to work, it had to be more than a matter of making superficial or temporary behavioral changes in pursuit of some numerical goal. I've been down that road lots of times, with what could be a called a spotty record of success. But even that would be a pretty generous assessment. In all honesty, every one of those earlier attempts was an abject failure. The real motivation behind starting any diet or exercise program would have always been to go from being a fat guy to being a thin guy. And yet, a year and a half ago, I was still (or once again) a fat guy.
The earlier attempts didn't work, because on some level I didn't expect them to. The truth is, I believe that going from being a thin guy to being a fat guy is just about the hardest thing in the world. As much as I would have liked to have done it over the last 30 years or so, I never found a way to make it happen. Every diet I went on, I did it with my fingers crossed, fully expecting – even if I wouldn't admit it openly – that sooner or later I would once again be eating the way I wanted to. The stark calculus that said there was no world in which I could eat that way and also be a thin guy never got through.
So the primary thing I've been working on these many months is getting it through my head that if I want a different life, I have to become, in a very real sense, a different person. That's why it's called "It's a New Phil." What I eat, and when and how I eat it – along with how much exercise I get – these are all secondary. The real work is changing what I believe about who I am. It takes a long time, but I'm getting there.
That's why a long period of very little movement on the scale is not a matter of much concern to me. Every week in which I haven't started back up towards 300 is an assertion that I really have changed the way my body works and have made some progress on those fundamental beliefs about myself. So maybe now I see myself as a 230-pound guy. When I weigh in at or around 230 pounds, is that a problem?
Nope. It's a cause for celebration.
Sure, I want to go farther than I have, but that requires – above all – that I have once and for all put away the old beliefs and expectations. Even staying at 230 requires a constant struggle between the old beliefs and the new. (With things like metabolic changes adding to the challenge.) But the fact that my weight doesn't start back up means that the physiological changes are setting in and the new beliefs are starting to hold their own.
Moreover, it proves that when I'm good and ready, I can also change how my body works, along with my beliefs and expectations, to those of a New Phil who weighs 197, 187, 175 – whatever I decide the final answer is.
July 28, 2007
It's a New Phil, Weeks 79 and 80
Something Weird with Your Arm
Well, my week off from reporting did not yield the benefit I was looking for -- my weight remains at its stubborn, long plateau level of 230. I'm telling you, when this thing breaks, it's going to break. But not this week.
Getting up from the breakfast table last Saturday, my wife commented that there was something "weird" with my arm. I looked at my arm but couldn't see what she meant.
"Your muscle looks like it's...sticking out or something..."
So it turns out that "something weird" with my arm was muscular definition. This is a good discovery for her to make, one that will help to brace her for changes to come. Eventually there's going to be something weird with my whole body!
July 14, 2007
It's a New Phil, Week 78
I'm taking a 2-week hiatus on this feature. We'll rejoin the story come week 80.
July 08, 2007
It's a New Phil, Week 77
Well, another two weeks gone and my weight remains at 230 -- 3 pounds up from my low-water mark on the program, 67 pounds down from the starting point.
If I'm going to lose those last 30 pounds in the following 23 weeks, I'm going to have to take measures. Maybe I start counting calories again? I don't want to do anything drastic, but I would like to make that very round goal of 100 pounds in 100 weeks.
What to do, what to do...
July 01, 2007
It's a New Phil, Week 76
My Fifth Day of Exercise
At 127 hours for the year, I am well into my fifth consecutive day of exercise for the year. I'm still working towards a goal of doing 500 of all moves in one workout -- at which point I think I can claim some baseline level of fitness. However, I came across this article the other day which has got me now mixing up the longer and shorter workouts The relevant advice (Tip 31 of 16):
1. Limit your workouts to 30-40 minutes. Though the tendency of some people who really want to get a lot out of their workouts is to spend a lot of time at the gym, the truth is that after 30 or 40 minutes, the benefit isn’t as great. To go that long, you’d have to lower the intensity of the workout, and that means that you’re spending too much time working out. It’s better to work out at a higher intensity for a shorter amount of time.
I can see that, and I like the idea. Although I must say that the middle part of my longer workouts -- where I do the sets with the highest number of repetitions -- tend to be pretty intense. But they have an extended warm-up and cool-down before and after. I'm going to keep doing that variety at least one a week while working on doing some more high high-intensity work. I also might go ahead and move up to a heavier hammer now for the intensity workouts -- instead of waiting until I complete the 500, which was the original plan. That will give me the chance to try out tip number 8: Heavier Weight.
The 16 ideas strike me as mostly pretty good (although the list is a bit repetitious). I'm doing several of those things now and, as noted above, thinking about trying out a couple more.
June 23, 2007
It's a New Phil, Weeks 74 and 75
Ramping Up?
A break-even fortnight, with my weight holding steady at 230. I've been watching what I eat pretty carefully, although I did make one change about three weeks ago that may be a factor. My breakfast routine over the past few months has been a bowl of granola with skim milk: yummy, good source of energy, good source of fiber, etc. But I was noticing that with an intense workout in the morning followed by this breakfast, and usually a fruit and veggie lunch (tomato sandwich + apple + orange or some variation on that theme), I was feeling pretty washed out at the end of the day. Plus, I had noticed for some time that I wasn't building muscle at quite the rate I had planned.
Then one Saturday morning I followed up an intense workout with a breakfast of scrambled eggs, had a salad for lunch, and felt fine all day. My observation -- I feel better if I eat some protein in the morning. And, come to think of it, it couldn't hurt to take in a little more protein if I'm trying to build muscle.
So about three weeks ago I swapped the granola for a whey protein and psyllium fiber shake (my own recipe*), and I've noticed an immediate change in how I feel throughout the day. Plus, I seem to be observing a little more muscular definition, although obviously it's still fairly early in the process. The downside is that my weight didn't drop over the past two weeks, even though I was eating pretty reasonably and exercising vigorously.
Amanda, the nurse at Dr. Harris' office who does the weighing, suggested that if I am putting on even a little bit of muscle, I have to keep in mind that it weighs more than fat. I might even gain some weight, but it all comes down to the basics of watching what I eat, keeping up with the exercise, and recognizing the relationship between the two.
So with 25 weeks and 30 pounds to go towards my goal, I'm going to have to decide whether I should keep on my current track or ramp things up a little for the home stretch. For example, I might go back to counting calories. I don't want to do anything drastic, but I might have to do something to finally break out of this long plateau.
But first, I'm going to keep things exactly where they are for two weeks and see what the next weigh-in brings. If I've learned anything over the past year and a half, it's that losing weight isn't about snap judgments and instant results.
* Phil's Breakfast Protein Shake
4 scoops whey protein
2 tablespoons psyllium husk
20 ounces water
25-ounce shaker cup with lid (or you can use a blender)
72 grams protein
414 calories
11 grams dietary fiber
Pour 8-12 ounces of water into the shaker. Scoop in the whey protein. I recommend vanilla-flavored. You get a nice cream-of-wheat effect with the fiber in there. Some like chocolate, but I personally believe that adding chocolate flavoring to a protein shake is a disservice both to chocolate and to the shake. Better just to have a square or two of good dark chocolate at some point in the day; it tastes better and it's loaded with anti-oxidants. Using a spoon, stir the whey into the water until smooth (this avoids lumping.) Add the psyllium husk and then the rest of the water. Secure the lid and then start shaking -- 30 seconds or so generally does the trick. Enjoy!
On non-hammer (bicycle) days, I use only two scoops of the protein powder, which cuts the calories by about 200 and reduces the protein grams to 36.
June 21, 2007
The Lengths I Won't Go To
I didn't do a New Phil post this week. There will be a new one on Saturday covering the past two weeks. Those who have been following my weight-loss and muscle-building adventures know that I'm not afraid to try new things in pursuit of my goals -- things like getting up at 5 AM so I can swing a sledgehammer for 90 minutes, for example.
However, the overall objective has been to make slow and permanent changes in what I'm composed of and how I behave. It's primarily for that reason that I won't be sampling the new weight-loss wonder drug, alli. However, even if I were trying to lose weight fast, I think I would shy away from that stuff.
A link to an explanation follows. A little heads up here -- if you're offended by frank (very frank) scatological references, don't go there. Otherwise, enjoy.
Okay, then. Why I won't be trying out the new miracle weight loss treatment.
June 09, 2007
It's a New Phil, Week 73
Down two pounds this week, back to 230 pounds for a total weight loss of 67 pounds. With a weigh-in every two weeks, I'm actually going to have to speed things up to meet the new target. Onward!
June 03, 2007
It's a New Phil, Week 72
A Big One-Oh-Oh
No, not that big one-oh-oh -- as I mentioned last week, I plan to be there in about 28 weeks. The one hundred for this week is 100 hours of exercise officially logged for the year, putting me well over my fourth consecutive day of exercise for the year. It's only June, and I think I can safely say that I have logged more exercise time this year than any previous year of my adult life.
Some would argue that the amount of time spent exercising isn't necessarily the best measure of progress. I tend to agree. Like pounds lost, time spent exercising shows a certain kind of progress in its own right, but it doesn't tell enough of the story. For example, if you're losing pounds of muscle rather than fat, that's bad. Likewise, if you're spending hours working out but making no appreciable gains in performance -- speed, strength, amount of work performed, etc. -- you might still be burning some fat, but that isn't all we're going for, here.
So I'm pleased to announce that I hit another nice round number this week, the big three-oh-oh: on my way to the big five-oh-oh. At the rate I'm going, I should hit 500 moves per exercise right around the time I hit 100 pounds lost. That should be fun. Then I'm going to start focusing on an entirely different number --the weight of the hammer. By the time I hit 500, I think I'll be ready for a heavier hammer. Maybe an 18 pounder? Maybe a 22 pounder?
But where does it all end?
well, let me tell you. There was this female bodybuilder at the store where I buy vitamins yesterday afternoon. I just missed seeing her in person, but my wife and I were admiring her poster as we checked out. This program will be complete when I:
1. Have lost all the weight I want to.
2. Acquire the strength and physical endurance that I'm striving for, and
3. Get arms the size of that female bodybuilder.
Modest goals, perhaps, but they're all I need.
May 27, 2007
It's a New Phil, Week 71
A New Goal
Up five pounds this week back to 232. Dr. Harris and I got to talking about this long plateau that I've been on and we decided that it might be time to ramp things up a bit. So at week 71, having established that I can lose weight and keep it off, I think it's time to move on to my target within the foreseeable future.
So the new goal is -- 100 pounds in 100 weeks. That means I have 29 weeks to lose these last 35 pounds and get myself down to a svelte 197 pounds. Let the games begin!
May 19, 2007
It's a New Phil, Week 70
And..Resume!
As I mentioned last week, this was a rest week for me on the exercise front. I picked a good week for it, as I was in Boston at a conference most of the week and there weren't many opportunities for exercise, anyhow. The hotel where I was staying had a gym, but it's being renovated; and I have yet to try out bringing the hammer with me on a trip as checked luggage, but that's coming.
Meanwhile, I got a couple of encouraging messages along the way. First, we heard from reader Cypherk, who writes:
Keep up the good work. I started the 300 work out after your suggestion and it is working nicely for me although my moves are way low and i need to buy a pull up bar
The discussion of the 300 workout was here, for those who missed it.
Great stuff, Cypherk. I, too, am lacking a pull-up bar -- that was the one piece of equipment that kept me going back to the rec center before I started getting serious about the hammer workout. Pull-ups have got to be just about the best upper-body work you can do without weights. Keep us posted on your progress.
I also got a call from Amanda at Dr. Harris's office. It seems I haven't made it for a weigh-in in about a month. This mostly has to do with the fact that my traditional weigh-in day was on Friday and I now work in Boulder on Fridays, which is a longish commute from here and I just haven't been able to squeeze a doctor visit in. On the other hand, it might have something to do with the fact that I could possibly be up a few pounds and I don't want to know about it.
Which means I definitely need to get back there. Thursday. It's happening. Stay tuned.
Anyhow, Amanda wasn't calling to pester me about whether I was avoiding them or gaining weight. She just wanted to let me know that I was missed and that I could come in any day, not just Fridays. Folks, if you're trying to get healthy, I can't recommend enough finding a doctor -- or other professional -- who is truly interested in you as a person and your well being. I'm sure I've mentioned it before, but Dr. Harris and his staff are the greatest. It makes all the difference.
May 13, 2007
It's a New Phil, Week 69
And...Rest
After four consecutive weeks of doing 250, then 260, then 270, then 280 total moves for each exercise, I'm taking a week off. I think I'll take a week off every four weeks, to allow my body to recover and to lock in what gains I've made. At this rate, I will make it to 500 by the end of the year, rather than sometime in November.
May 05, 2007
It's a New Phil, Week 68
Working Toward the 500
A really intense exercise plan was developed for the actors in the movie 300 which allowed them to be just about the only thing in the movie that wasn't a special effect. The 300 workout is pretty intense, a total of 300 moves consisting of:
25 pull-ups
50 deadlifts at 135 pounds
50 push-ups
50 box jumps with a 24-inch box
50 "floor wipers" (a core and shoulders exercise at 135 pounds)
50 "clean and press" at 36 pounds (a weight-lifting exercise)
25 more pull-ups -- for a total of 300 reps
As I mentioned last week, I'm currently doing about 250 repetitions of six different exercises with each workout. Not all of my sledgehammer exercises are as intense as those listed above, although some are pretty much the same -- push-ups, for example. All that's to say, when I hit the 500 mark on reps later this year, I'll be doing a total of 3000 moves with each workout. But again, my moves aren't quite as intense.
So, no, I won't be in ten times better shape than the actors in 300.
Maybe just four or five.
April 28, 2007
It's a New Phil, Week 67
My Third Day of Exercise
I topped 72 hours of exercise for the year this week, meaning that I have spent a total of three days working out since the year began. Most of that time has been spent doing one of my two sledge hammer routines, but I have also been walking and have now added riding my bike to the list of activities.
Dedicating this much time for exercise hasn't been too big a challenge, but I'm getting to the point now where I have the endurance to do much longer workouts with the hammer, so I've started getting up early to work out. I might have to get me an alarm clock one of these days...
I think I mentioned a while back that the standard workout consisted of 100 moves of each of 6 exercises (several of which are repeated twice on the right side and the left.) I called completing 100 moves for each of the 6 exercises a Century. Usually I would do ten sets of ten moves each. Now I'm up to 2.5 centuries per day (ten sets of 25 moves for each exercise) and I plan to increase that weekly until -- sometime before the end of the year -- I'm doing five centuries a day.
If nothing else, that means I'll be doing 500 push-ups a day. So, you know, if the Marines decide they want to start taking guys in their mid forties, I'll be ready for boot camp.
April 21, 2007
It's a New Phil, Week 66
Suburban Mountain Biking
First bike ride of the year was kind of rough. I did about 8 miles, mostly just "laps" around the unpaved part of the open space across the street from my house. My subdivision, Highlands Ranch, was once three or four real ranches which were bought up 30 years ago or so for housing. My immediate neighborhood is on the site of the old Cheese Ranch (where they raised diary rather than beef cattle, obviously) and the open space is a little piece of the former grazing land. I also think the open space includes the site of the ranch house, although all that remains is the windmill. There are both paved and unpaved trails running though the open space, and these can be used -- sometimes with a quick jog of a block or three on real streets -- to connect to a whole system of trails running through other bits of open space and green belts throughout Highlands Ranch which, when I'm feeling really ambitious, can take me out of the subdivision to the Platte Rive, Chatfield reservoir, and up Waterton Canyon into mountains.
There are a couple of less extreme ways of getting vertical using the same system of trails; the route I just described would be at least 16 miles just getting to bottom of the canyon. There are nice bluffs to the south and east which I can get to in 20 minutes or so; they're enough to make one think that one is really doing some mountain biking, anyhow. I've not yet done any actual biking on real mountain trails. This summer I hope to be able to report differently.
Did some spring cleaning and decided to throw out my old golf clubs. They were ancient (I bought them used years ago) and they weren't very good. However, I kept the excellent leather bag. It now holds my sledge hammer and several smaller hammers.
April 14, 2007
It's a New Phil, Week 65
Down three pounds this week to 225 for a total weight loss of 72 pounds!!! Another landmark, yesterday I did a total of three hundred repetitions of each of the exercises in my standard sledgehammer workout. I'm hoping to be at 500 by the end of the year, with a stretch goal of being able to do 500 in 2.5 hours with an 18-pound sledge (currently still using the 10-pounder.)
And with the weather turning warmer today, I might even make it out on the bike this weekend.
April 07, 2007
It's a New Phil, Week 64
Got the bike back today, but with 1-4 inches of snow forecast and the temperature hovering right around a not-too-springish 27 F, I may have to wait a week before reporting on my return to the bike trails. (I'm not big on the outdoor sports when the temperature is below freezing.) No official weigh-in this week, so I'm still hanging tough at 228 for a total weight loss of 69 pounds!
April 01, 2007
It's a New Phil, Week 63
My Second Day of Exercise
For cumulative exercise so far this year, I passed the 48-hour mark late last week. So three months into the year, I have spent two out of 90 days exercising. That's about 2.2% of the total time elapsed. My goal is to add considerable exercise time to each week now that the warm weather is here by spending time on my bike, giving me a total of 300 hours of exercise for the year. However, at the current rate, I will likely exercise about 212 hours total this year. That's good for six pounds of fat loss at a burn rate of 100 calories per hour, or about 30 pounds at 500 calories per hour. I think the reality will be somewhere between those two.
March 25, 2007
It's a New Phil, Week 62
Back down to 228 this week, for a total weight loss of 69 pounds! Looking forward to getting the big seven-oh behind me once again. I'm also on my way to my second full day of exercise for the year, but let's save something for next week.
March 17, 2007
It's a New Phil, Weeks 59-61
Business travel, then vacation, then more business travel, then a really nasty cold/sinus infection (which I just can't seem to shake) have significantly slowed my blogging output over the past three weeks, with no feature taking a harder hit than my weight loss chronicles. I have not had an official weigh-in over this period, so I can only report that I am still (officially) at 231 pounds, with a total cumulative weight loss of 67 pounds.
I managed to keep the exercise program going well both for the first business trip and vacation. In fact, thanks in part to a vigorous three-hour hike -- during which I stopped only to take the occasional picture -- I did about 6 hours of exercise while on vacation, which is probably more than I would have done in a regular work week.
Then I took a week off in honor of the second business trip and the aforementioned sinus problem.
In the spirit of getting back on the horse, I took my mountain bike into the shop for a tune-up to prepare for the upcoming biking season. This is something I should have done weeks ago. I meant to do it weeks ago. Anyhow, the mechanics had such a backlog that they won't be able to get my bike back to me until April 3.
That was the second shop I went to. The first gave me a similar story, so I decided to take the bike home and tune it up myself. How hard can it be, after all?
Um, hard. When did bicycles get so complicated, anyway? I thought I was pretty much up to the challenge, until I identified a problem -- straightening the wheel -- about which the manual itself said: "Only a mechanic should do this. You'll be wasting your time and putting yourself at risk if you try to fix this yourself. Don't be an idiot."
Or anyhow, words to that effect. So my summer biking is delayed. But I'm getting the hammer back in swing tomorrow. And I'll definitely get over to Dr. Harris's office this week to see what these last few unusual weeks have done to my weight.
February 23, 2007
It's a New Phil, Week 58
The Check-up
Back up two pounds this week 231, for a total weight loss of 66 pounds. I seem to have about a six pound range that I live in over the past several months, from 227 to 233. Right now my weight isn't really going anywhere, so the fact that it isn't going down is nicely offset by the fact that it isn't going up.
Anyway, yesterday was my annual physical check-up. Lots of encouragement there:
-
For the first time that I can recall, I was normal (or better) on everything. Blood pressure, pulse, all blood levels, internal checks that they do on guys over 40 (okay prostate, are you happy?), reflexes, EKG, and so forth. Everything was at least good.
-
Great news on the cholesterol front. My total cholesterol measured in at 161, with an HDL (good cholesterol) level of 77. This gives me a cholesterol ratio of 2.09:1, well under the target of 5.1:1 or lower. Dr. Harris compared this level from the same test a few years back when my triglycerides were at about 230 (today they're at 51) and my overall ratio was at about 4:1. It goes to show what a role genetics plays in all this that even when I was a lot heavier and my diet was a lot less healthy, I was still well out of the danger zone. But still -- my ratio is now only about half of what it was.
A proposed new way of calculating overall cholesterol is to divide the bad LDL level by the good HDL level. When measured this way, a result of 3.5 is considered good while 1.7 or lower is, like, extremely good. Calculated that way, my level of 0.96 is practically off the charts. I think this all comes about as a combined effect of diet, exercise, and the daily intake of a fiber supplement.
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Dr. Harris noted that the stabilization of my weight noted above is apparently being offset somewhat by muscle gain. So the 230 pounds that I weighed four or five months ago isn't the same as the 230 pounds that I weigh now, composition-wise. I've added a lot of muscle. He endorsed the emphasis on exercise and made the radical suggestion that I might not need to lose any more weight, depending on how much I continue to bulk up.
Personally, I think I've still got at least 15-20 pounds to go, even with the muscle gain. The doctor agreed that that might be the case, but that I should continue on as I am now and see what happens. Will I stay at 230, with the composition continuing to change, or will I eventually break this plateau and drop another 20 or so before deciding that I'm done?
Either way, I can't tell you how satisfying it is to have my doctor tell me not to worry about my weight!
February 17, 2007
It's a New Phil, Week 57
Back down a pound this week to 229 for a total weight loss of 68 pounds!!!
I have now worked out 50 times so far this year, with a total exercise time of almost 31 hours. I've noticed over the past couple of weeks that my workouts are growing longer -- some of them are, in fact, just doubled up versions of standard routines. This means that the count of workouts is probably not going to increase as fast over the next few weeks as it did at the beginning of the year, but the total time spent exercising should either be the same or increase.
I's also started throwing in a few shorter "speed rounds" which can get the job done much more quickly. Of course, "speed" here is a relative term; there a few things that I can do very fast with a sledgehammer!
February 10, 2007
It's a New Phil, Week 56
My First Day of Exercise
Still couldn't make it to the doctor this week for an official weigh-in, so let's just assume that everything is the same, yadda yadda yadda.
On Thursday, I reached an interesting landmark. My trusty Excel spreadsheet told me that I had completed 23.96 hours of exercise for the year. We can round that off and call it a full day of exercise. If I continue at my current rate, I should complete 9.35 such days by the end of the year. This means, by the way, that about 2.5% of my total year -- not the waking year, the total year -- will have been spent working out. Which is definitely worth it.
I want to get a handle on two things:
1. How much fat does a day of exercise burn off?
2. How much muscle does a day of exercise build?
Obviously, the answers to those questions will vary widely depending on who's working out and what they're doing. (And the answer to question 1 is going to be a much higher number than the answer to question 2. ) I'm hoping that, by the end of the year, I'll have a good handle on the answers to both questions for me, doing my sledge hammer workout.
We shall see.
February 03, 2007
It's a New Phil, Weeks 54 and 55
No official weigh-in for the past two weeks due to a busy work travel schedule. So let's just say for now that I'm holding steady at 230 pounds for a total weight loss of 67 pounds.
For 2007, I'm focusing on exercise rather than diet as my way forward with this program. I have developed a number of exercise routines (most of which involve my trusty sledgehammer) which I will detail in a later entry. In January, I did 33 separate workouts for a total of 19.4 hours of exercise. If I continue at that rate, I will do about 233 hours of exercise this year. At 100 calories per hour, that will be good for burning off a little more than 6.5 pounds of fat for the year. At 500 calories per hour, it will burn off about 33.25 pounds. Splitting the difference between the two, at 300 calories per hour -- which I think is fairly realistic -- I'll be looking at a loss of right around 20 pounds for the year, from exercise alone.
As I progress through the year, I'll have weight loss data to track against exercise data, so we'll get an increasingly clear idea as to which of those estimates is the most accurate.
January 27, 2007
Remodeling El Jef, week 1
Goaded Irritated Inspired by Phil's year-long success on the weight-loss front (see here for the first and the most recent entries chronicling his progress), and not wanting my nickname to be changed from El Jefe to El Hefty, I've decided to embark on a program of my own to both reduce my overall weight, and to improve the measured composition of what remains.
(Please see the extended entry for progress to this point and other information.)
January 20, 2007
It's a New Phil, Week 53
The Set Point
Holding steady at 230 pounds again this week for a total weight loss of 67 pounds!!!
I'm beginning to suspect that 230 is my current set point, seeing as that all upward or downward movement seems to tend in that direction. Per Wikipedia:
Setpoint is the target value that an automatic control system, for example PID controller, will aim to reach. For example a temperature setpoint in a boiler control system.
The term setpoint is used similarly in physiology and psychology. Examples are body weight and happiness, both believed to have setpoints that are difficult to change.
If my set point is 230, my body is going to tend to "want" to weigh 230 pounds no matter what I do. So if I weigh too much, I try to eat less and exercise more, but if my set point is too high, what then?
A while back there was some interest around the Web and elsewhere around the Shangri-La Diet, which is based on adjusting weight down by lowering the dieter's set point. I haven't read the book, but I did hear the author, Seth Roberts, get a pretty rough treatment on the Laura Ingram radio show. (Glenn and Helen were a lot nicer to him.)
Laura didn't buy into all this talk about adjusting one's metabolism and, from what I heard of her listeners, neither did they. One of them complained that "set point" is just another way of saying "weight." The consensus seemed to be that Roberts was just making up a lot of jargon in order to sell a diet book.
But whether the Shangri-la approach of adjusting set point through consuming regular doses of sugar water and extra light olive oil works, there's no doubt in my mind that there really is such a thing a s a set point. My weight is like the temperature of the room; my set point is like the temperature that the thermostat is set to. There ought be some correspondence between the two, but they aren't the same thing.
Anyhow, getting back to the question of how I can adjust my set point...that's a hard one. I can say that over the past year, I have lowered my set point by around 70 pounds, along with my weight, and that has been primarily through the tried and true methods of diet and exercise. I think that those will continue to work, although I'm interested to see what change, if any, my new emphasis on exercise will have.
I'm currently doing one of five different sledgehammer routines just about every day. Sometimes I do two different routines in a day. To date this year, I have worked out 19 times for a total of 11.9 hours of exercise. My current goal is to do 300 workouts for the year. If I meet that goal, I'm on track to get in 187 hours of exercise in 2007. Next time, I'll look at what that might mean in terms of weight loss.
January 09, 2007
It's a New Phil, Week 52
Back down 4 pounds this week to 230, bringing me to the one-year weight-loss mark of 67 pounds!!! That's still four pounds up from my all-time low, but I'll take it. I'm recovering from the holidays one week at a time. And right now, the emphasis is on exercise. More on that later.
January 01, 2007
It's a New Phil, Week 51
Out with the Old, in with the New
No weigh-in, official or otherwise, this week. I'm giving myself a few days to recover from the last couple of weeks. I find that my New Year's resolutions have more to do with exercise than diet. The sledgehammer workout is starting to take shape, and I want to achieve some very specific things with it in 2007. I also want to put a fair number of miles on my bicycle.
But we'll get into those specifics later. Meanwhile. Here's my 2006 story in a nutshell. One side shows me in late '05; the other side was snapped a couple of weeks ago.
Sadly, as I have noted in the past, that image on the left shows me quite a few pounds shy of the all-time high water mark. But I think that's pretty much what I looked like at 297, where this whole thing started.
UPDATE: I forgot that I had a doctor's appointment yesterday (post-surgery checkup) so there was an official weigh-in after all. Up a distressing seven pounds, putting me back at 234 for a total weight loss of 63 pounds. Dr. Harris told me not to sweat it, likening a weight loss program to an airplane's autopilot. You're never really on course with autopilot, he explained. The airplane makes a continuous series of adjustments.
So let the post-holiday adjustment begin!
December 24, 2006
It's a New Phil, Week 50
Unofficially, I'm up about a pound a half this week, but that's without the benefit of Dr. Harris's scale. That still leave my right around 227 for a total weight loss of 70 pounds!!!
Anyhow, I think I'll be fine over the next couple of weeks, so long as I take it easy on the black pepper lamb chops, potato curry, rice, samosas, turkey, roast beef, mashed potatoes, dressing, gravy, mince pie, pumpkin pie, almond stollen, rum stollen, eggnog, yule log, assorted cookies, fudge, toffee, nuts, gingerbread cake, hot chocolate, leftovers...you get the idea.
Merry Christmas to all who are celebrating Christmas. For others, a happy Hanukkah, joyful Kwanzaa, solemn Solstice, festive Festivus, and a great big happy whatever I may be missing. Peace, joy, and best wishes to all.
December 16, 2006
It's a New Phil, Week 49
The Big Seven-Oh
Down two pounds this week to 226 for a total weight loss of 71 pounds!!! A new high. A new low. Call it what you will. It has taken me about three and a half months to go from 60 pounds lost to 70 pounds. It took a little less than two and a half months to get from 50 pounds to 60. And it took just a litte over two months to get from 40 pounds to 50.
So my overall weight loss rate has slowed to a pound and a half per week, and that includes all the rapid weight loss I had at the beginning. As the chart below shows (click on it for an expanded version) if I can stick with my current rate of weight loss of 1.5 pounds per week, I will reach my initial target of 207 pounds (90 pounds lost) at week 60, 11 weeks from now.
Since that means losing 20 pounds faster than I've lost any of the last few sets of 10, I think it's safe to assume that my overall rate of loss will continue to slow. If it drops to 1.25 pounds per week, I'll reach the 90 pound mark in about May of 07. That sounds like a long time from now, but it doesn't bother me a bit when I consider how far I've come.
December 11, 2006
It's a New Phil, Week 48
Well, I lightened my load on Friday via Laparoscopic Cholecystectomy. I slept through the procedure itself, awaking to find myself with three tiny abdominal wounds, all covered by what looks like bloody scotch tape as well as a big piece of the same tape covering my navel, which was absolutely squishy with blood. It's amazing that they can remove an organ using just these little holes -- especially an organ that was full of stones. It's also amazing that the the whole blood-and-tape thing means that everything went right. If there had been problems, I'd have a huge gash down my abdomen and I'd still be in the hospital. The times we live in!
Oh, in addition to the wounds, I should add that I awoke with a general anasthesia hangover which I managed to keep for most of the weekend. I'm felling better today. The wounds are less squishy and less sensitive. I still can't eat much, which is an unfortunate by-product of the fact that they had to pump me full of gas to perform the procedure, and eating makes me kind of, well, gassy.
On the other hand not eating is good for the overall program, I suppose. I slipped onto a scale in the restroom at the surgery center on Friday and weighed in at 228 pounds, which means I was down two pounds for a total weight loss of 69 pounds!!!! However, I was wearing just a surgical gown (quite a bit less than what I usually wear for a weigh-in) and this was not the official Dr. Harris scale.
But under the circumstances, I'll take what I can get.
December 01, 2006
It's a New Phil, Week 47
It's Galling
I'm doing back-to-back entries today; I missed last week due to illness. I have been sick since driving home from Thanksgiving dinner last week. It started with this strange cramping in my right shoulder and arm. I thought maybe I had worked the old potato masher a bit too hard. I awoke Friday morning to intense abdomninal cramps and symptoms which led me to believe that I had a bad case of the intestinal flu.
I suffered through the weekend and then went to see Dr. Harris first thing Monday morning. After listening to my story and giving me a quick abdominal exam (and telling me he didn't care if my weight stayed on its plateau for another six months), the Doc told me that it looked like gall bladder trouble. An ultrasound and a visit to a specialist confirmed this. My gall bladder is full of gallstones, and it's got to go.
I'm due for surgery next Friday, or Wednesday if I'm really lucky. The sooner the better, I say. I figure pulling that ever-growing bag of rocks out of me has got to break this plateau and make my weight go down. Seriously, that thing has got to weight, what? Two pounds? Three? It's a sack of gravel.
Now the ironic part. What ever might have caused my body to turn one of its organs into Charlie Brown's trick-or-treat bag? Of course, there is no one answer, and these matters are very complicated, but Dr. Harris says that weigh loss can lead to the formation of gallstones.
So now what do I do with this recurring conversation?
Acquaintance: Say, Phil, have you lost weight?
Phil (proudly): Um, yeah. About 65 pounds, actually.
Acquaintance: Wow, you look great!
Phil (slightly embarrassed): Aw, thanks.
Acquaintance: You must feel a lot better, too, huh?
Phil (enthusiastically): I do feel much better. And I love it that I now fit into airplane seats!
Now it will probably go something like this:
Acquaintance: Say, Phil, have you lost weight?
Phil (weakly): Um, yeah. About 65 pounds.
Acquaintance: Wow, you look ...er...really...really good.
Phil (weakly): Thanks.
Acquaintance: But anyway, you must feel a lot better, huh?
Phil (bitterly): Well, I feel okay sitting upright for an hour or two as long as I take some Darvon and don't eat anything with fat or protien in it. Aw, who am I kidding? I feel like crap. Crap, I tell you. Crap!
But that's only for another week. After that, I shed the bag of rocks that's been holding me back and start looking for other expendable body parts that might contribute to my achieving my weight loss goal!
Here's another interesting tidbit. Gallstone attacks are frequently triggered by the consumption of a high-fat meal. Even though they were really only slivers, I had three pieces of my mom's pie to top off all the gravy and other yummies on Turkey Day. (I was just being polite. She made three pies. What am I going to do? Play favorites?) The gall bladder specialist told me that Thanksgiving has given him more business over the years than any other two holidays combined (and apparently, they're all good for business.)
So weight loss may have given me the gallstones, but gluttony triggered the attack. There's a lesson in there somewhere. And if anyone can figure it out, please do me a favor -- keep it to yourself.
UPDATE: Had to go to the doctor this morning for some related stuff. Down one pound to 230 for a total weight loss of 67 pounds!!
It's a New Phil, Week 46
The Big Plat-Oh
Up one pound this week to 231, for a total weight loss of 66 pounds!! I've been hovering around the 230 mark for some time now. Doctor Harris says this is fine, and doesn't care if I plateau for six months or more. I tried to tell him that this hardly makes for a compelling series of blog entries, and that my readers deserve better, but there's no talking to the man. He seems to think that permanent, long-term, sensible weight loss is some kind of end unto itself.
November 14, 2006
It's a New Phil, Week 45
Here's the promised beach photo. On the left is our good friend Justin whom we visited in Florida a few weeks back. I'm thinking the next New Phil project after the weight loss might be working on the tan.
By way of comparison, here's a similar group shot from about a year ago, this time the two of us with my daughter Hannah:
Here's an even less flattering picture taken around the same time. I've got no better-looking people to protect me in this one:
Progress, I think...
November 06, 2006
It's a New Phil, Week 44
Down two pounds this week to 230 for a total weight loss of 67 pounds!!!
I had a relatively recent photo that I was going to post, but now I'm on the road and it's on my other computer. So I'll have to put it up later this week.
October 28, 2006
It's a New Phil, Week 43
No weigh-in this week, so as far as I know I'm still holding steady at 232 for a total weight loss of 65 pounds!!!
I haven't written much about exercise lately, so I thought I would give an update on the sledgehammer-and-two-chairs workout. It has actually evolved into three workouts, two of which I do regularly and one of which I plan to start incorporating more frequently. So here are the three workouts.
1. For Intensity
I do fives sets of the following exercises:
Elevated push-ups (using the chairs)
Elevated yoga push-ups (going from the upward dog to downward dog position and back)
Step up on stairs while swinging hammer overhand -- beginning with right arm and leg
Step up on stairs while swinging hammer overhand -- beginning with left arm and leg
Seated hacky-sack kick, sitting in one chair, facing the other and kicking my leg up and inward over the other chair
This past week I did 55 repititions of each exercise per set. Next week I will go to 60, which means -- if nothing else -- I'll be doing 300 push-ups per workout! I try to focus on speed with each set. The point is to get through each set as quickly as possible while maintaining correct form for the exercise. Although only the stair-step exercise involves anything like running, I think of each of these exercises as running a sprint. The point is to raise my heartbeat and get winded. And let me tell you something: it works.
This routine takes about an hour and I do it MWF.
2. For Endurance / Aerobic Fitness
I do 15 sets of the following exercises:
Lying on my back, raise the hammer with my right arm from the floor with my arm fully extended and the hammer head centered over my chest
Same exercise with my left arm
One-legged squats with left leg while pumping hammer from vertical to paralell with the floor using right arm
Same exercise, only now squatting with right leg and pumping hammer with left arm
One-legged calf raises (i.e., standing on tip-toes) with left leg while pumping hammer overhand with right arm
Same exercise, only now doing raises with right leg while pumping hammer with left arm
Full overhead hammer swing, beginning with legs straight and back arched back, ending with knees bent and hammer head touching the floor, with right hand near top of handle
Same exercise with left hand near top of handle
I do five reps of each exercise per set. That last one is an absolute killer. Unlike with the intensity program, I take no breathers between sets or reps in this program. I'm trying to fit 15 sets into 25 minutes. Yesterday I did it in about 28, so I'm getting there. I do this on Tuesdays and Thursdays. Sometimes Saturdays.
3. For Balance / Flexibility
I'm still working out the details of this routine, but basically it involves much slower hammer swings with an emphasis on breathing. One of the moves is an ovherhead swing and lunge. Another is a side-to-side torso swing. This is kind of the Tai Chi / Yoga portion of the workout. I will probably add it to every day as a kind of warm-up before doing the more demanding workouts, or possibly as a cool-down phase. Or both.
Stay tuned.
October 21, 2006
It's a New Phil, Week 42
Up one pound over the past two weeks, putting me at 232 pounds for a total weight loss of 65 pounds!! I am exactly 10 pounds away from the next milestone of 75 pounds.
Or maybe I'm closer to that milestone than I thought. An e-mail from Amanda at Dr. Harris's office:
Hey Phil. After we saw you this morning I was looking through your med chart reflecting on your success. I have to say I am impressed and inspired. There is something I want to share with you. While thumbing through the pages I found an entry from 9/27/05 when you came in for a [specific personal medical info deleted, you bunch of Nosey Parkers]. On that day, according to the chart your weight was 306. If we go by the highest recorded weight, and your weight recorded two weeks ago, you have lost 75 pounds!!! I wanted to be the first one to congratulate you. Congrats and God bless!!!
Amanda
I will reiterate what I've said before: Dr. Harris and staff are the greatest.
Still, I 'm not going to give myself credit for losing 75 pounds until I hit 222. So stay tuned.
October 06, 2006
It's A New Phil, Week 40
Get Your Kicks
Down four pounds this week to 231, for a total weight loss of 66 pounds!!!
I'm leaving for Florida tomorrow, where I'll be for a week -- work-related conference and trade show. Since I won't be available for my weekly weigh-in, the staff at Dr. Harris's office and I have decided that this might be a good opportunity to switch over to a bi-weekly weigh-in schedule. I'm not sure whether these entries then become a bi-weekly feature of the blog, or whether I just keep on waxing philosophical even on the weeks when there's no weight news to report.
We shall see.
October 01, 2006
It's a New Phil, Week 39
Back up a pound this week to 235, giving me a total weight loss of 62 pounds. After talking it over with the staff at Dr. Harris's office today, I have decided that -- after next week -- I'm going to start weighing in every other week rather than every week. I seem to be having one up week followed by one down week, so maybe this will show the progress is a smoother way.
But I'll keep updating this column every week, of course.
Stephen raises some interesting points about doctors now treating obesity as a disease, reated to this article in Wired:
My thought is that there is no down side to classifying any physical problem that medicine can actually help as a disease. Notice that qualification. When medicine couldn't treat certain problems (alcoholism, obesity, depression, and at present aging), it was not particularly helpful to think of those problems as diseases. Better to tell the sufferer to get some backbone and put down the bottle, drop the fork, and cheer up because we ain't getting any younger.
But to the extent that medicine can help a problem, what harm is there is classifying it as a disease?
I agree up to a point. If by treating it like a disease, we mean paying attention to it and constructively engaging patients to help them overcome it -- as my doctor has -- I'm all for it. I also don't have any objection pharmacalogical solutions, and when a reasonably safe and effective "fat pill" makes it to the market, I'll certainly consider it.
Where I draw the line is major surgery. I'm not saying that it isn't the right solution for some people, but I would personally rather be fat than have intestinal by-pass surgery. Whatever damage obesity may have done to my body, I would have a hard time believing that subjecting myself to that kind of trauma could help somehow.
September 23, 2006
It's a New Phil, Week 38
Down four pounds this week , putting me at 234 pounds for a total weight loss of 63 pounds!!!
The fluctuations continue, but highs keep getting lower while the lows keep getting lower. And I'm just fine with that.
September 20, 2006
It's a New Phil, Week 37
No change this week. Still at 238 for a total weight loss of 59 pounds! This seems to be my new set point, but we'll see where week 38 puts me. Owing to the lateness of this entry, we wo't have to wait long to find out!
September 13, 2006
It's a New Phil, Week 36
Transformations
Back up three pounds this week to 238, re-setting my total weight loss to 59 pounds. That's okay -- I'm used to these off weeks by now.
An interesting e-mail from Stephen the other day:
Reading passages from "The Singularity is Near" this afternoon I came across the passage where Kurzweil explained the impact of becoming Ramona in VR:
"The experience was a profound and moving one for me. When I looked in the "cybermirror" I saw myself as Ramona ratehr than the person I usually see in the mirror. I experienced the emotional force - and not just the intellectual idea - of transforming myself into someone else.
People's identities are frequently closely tied to their bodies... I found the opportunity to become a different person liberating."
You've now lost 62 pounds. [True at the time he wrote it! -- Ed.] Do you now think of yourself differently? Does this give you any insight into how the public will experience future changes (restored youth, super-strength, super-agility, super-endurance)?
Interesting questions. As a matter of fact, I do think of myself differently, but I'm not completely sure about the chain of causation. Did I see myself in a new light because I've lost some weight, or was I able to lose some weight because I started seeing myself in a new light? I think the two go together.
After all, I had already dubbed this series "It's a New Phil" before I had lost much weight at all. At that time, (as far as poundage is concerned) I was still pretty much the old Phil. Appropos of the Kurzweil quote, somewhere along the way I changed my Second Life avatar from looking like this...
to looking like this...
...which change, btw, my wife strongly approves of, primarily because of the wardrobe and hair modifications. I'm just glad that I don't look cross-eyed anymore.
Of course, weight loss is quite a bit easier to pull off in Second Life than it is here in the first one. Any transformation is. I could just as easily have made myself a beautiful woman or a menacing robot or a werewolf in a flannel shirt. People do all of that and more in Second Life. I met a vampire there a while back who gave me a lengthy explanation of vampire culture and its intertwined relationship with the werewolves, or lycans, as they call themselves. It's a big no-no for a werewolf (at least within the community the vampire told me about) to allow him/herself to be the "pet" or "slave" of any other being....apparently this would allow dangerous crossovers into plushie- and/or furry- centric lifestyles that are simply not deemed appropriate by the werewolf guild.
Now if this all begins to seem like a huge digression from the issue at hand, it's not. My point is that people are trying out all kinds of amazing tranformations even now. And they're taking them to their logical conclusions, building whole cultures to suit the kinds of beings they have become. Second life even has its own version of the Green Lantern Corps, superheroes to step in to protect the weak and fight off bad guys when needed. They're like Second Life's answer to the Guardian Angels.
Do all these folks experience what Kurzweil did when he first donned the persona of his female alter-ego? To some extent, I think they do -- at least to the extent that moving a mouse and staring at a screen will allow them to. Kurzweil had an advantage in that he was experiencing being Ramona with his whole body. I think that makes a huge difference.
My own transformations have been much more modest. A thinner New Phil in the real world still feels pretty much like the old Phil most of the time. And my Second Life avatar is really just an electronic version of me. I gave myself a last name that means a type of Dutch Christmas cookie simply because it sounds like "Speculist." (Also, I'm half Dutch, but that didn't enter into the decision.)
I think these modest transformations (even the extreme ones that take place in virtual worlds are relatively modest simply because of the limited way we are able to experience them) do, indeed, help to prepare us for a coming world in which we will be able to realize such changes in a much more immediate and profound way. Personally, I look forward to the day -- whether it occurs in the real world or an indistinguishable electronic alternative -- when I can step outside my door and, as I do in Second Life, leap up into the air and fly under my own power to wherever I want to go. However, by the time I am able to do that, it might not seem like that big a deal. I will have been doing it in increasingly realistic facsimiles for years (probably decades) by then.
It's like hitting the 75- or 80- or 100-pound weight loss mark. Sure, any of those will feel like a tremendous accomplishment and I'll be pleased when I get there. (And there will be celebrations.) But you don't hit the 100-pound mark all at once. By the time I get there, I will have already hit the 95-pound mark. So it isn't really this enormous ontological change to get to 100.
For a time, we will experince the big changes that Stephen is talking about the way I'm currently experiencing weight loss. Gradually, over time. With time to prepare. But then there will come a time when we can change the fundamental way we look and feel and act as rapidly as we can currently update a Second Life avatar. I don't know that anything can really prepare us for life in such a world. And it's kind of a scary thought, but I'm looking forward to it, anyhow.
So you see? It wasn't a digression at all. For a real digression, please continue with this entry after the following public service announcement.
This is the 999th blog post at blog.speculist.com. We're counting down to number 1000!
September 01, 2006
It's a New Phil, Week 35
Say, now that was a short week, wasn't it? Even so, I managed to lose two more pounds, getting me down to 235 for a total weight loss of 62 pounds!
Maybe I need more of these short weeks?
August 29, 2006
It's a New Phil, Week 34
The Big Six-Oh
Down one more pound this week to 237, bringing me (at long last) to a total weight loss of 60 pounds!!!
Amanda was kind enough to decorate her party hat with insignia appropriate to the occasion and to lend me a bear to model the hat for the celebratory photo shown here.
Very nice, eh?
The next big milestone is 75 pounds. At the rate we're going, that should be sometime between Halloween and Thanksgiving.
By the way, I know I'm a little remiss in getting this entry up, but I don't want to fail to mention that there was an excellent Glenn and Helen Show last week on the subject of real food. I've become a huge fan of real food over the past eight months. Especially fruit. And tomatoes.(Technically, they're fruit anyhow.) And Caesar's salads. And that really chewy Italian bread they sell at Whole Foods -- the kind that only has three or four ingredients. Now that's real food.
Also, as a follow-up to the show, Glenn linked to this blog, The Crisper, where blogger Dave Johnston tells how he lost 51 pounds eating real food. Way to go, Dave!
August 18, 2006
It's a New Phil, Week 33
Back down another pound this week to 239, giving me a total weight loss of 58 pounds! I'll be updating this entry on Tuesday when I have my bi-monthly check-in with the Doc.
August 11, 2006
It's a New Phil, Week 32
Variations on a Theme
Back up two pounds this week to 240 for a total weight loss of 57 pounds. Viva Las Vegas, baby.
Here's what I've experienced over the past few weeks, starting at week 26:
Down three pounds.
Holding steady.
Down five pounds.
Up two pounds.
Up one pound.
Down three pounds.
Up two pounds.
One way of looking at this is that I've lost six pounds over the past seven weeks. Or you could say that I've gained two pounds over the past four weeks.
Either way, I've lost 57 pounds over the past 32 weeks, so I'm not sweating anything.
August 04, 2006
It's a New Phil, Week 31
Back on Track
Down three pounds this week to 238, for a total weight loss of 59 pounds!!!. It's like the past three weeks never even happened. Back in the hunt for the big six-oh.
July 29, 2006
It's a New Phil, Week 30
Didn't make it.
Well, week 30 rolls along and I am up yet another pound to 241, for a total weight loss of 56 pounds. No perfect two-pounds-per-week average for me, I'm afraid. More annoyingly, this is the first time ever that I have gained weight for two consecutive weeks. So it's time to take a serious look at:
1. What I've been eating and
2. How much exercise I've been getting
I imagine the answer lies in there somewhere. However, I should point out that they were tearing out the floor at the doctor's office yesterday, and there's no telling what kind of damage all that disruption and dust might do to a delicate instrument like a scale.
I'm just saying. You never know.
July 21, 2006
It's a New Phil, Week 29
The Inevitable Off Week
Up two pounds this week, putting me back at 240 for a total weight loss of 57 pounds! I checked back over the previous entries and -- unless I'm missing something -- this is the first time I've gained weight since week 12. That's almost four straight months of either weight loss or maintenance. It had to nudge up eventually, so I'm not going to let it bother me.
Still, I do hope to drop by three pounds this week to hit the Week 30 / 60 Pound mark next Friday. Oooooh, the suspense.
Stay tuned.
July 14, 2006
It's a New Phil, Week 28
I think this whole hammer thing is working.
Down another five pounds this week to 238 for a total weight loss of 59 pounds!
If I have another plateau next week (that's been the pattern lately: lose, hold, lose, hold, lose, hold -- trading off week-to-week pretty regularly) and lose one pound the following week, I will have lost 60 pounds in the 30 weeks, for an average weight loss rate of exactly two pounds per week.
Or I might lose more between now and then, keeping the average above 2. Optimally, the rate should be about 1.25 - 1.75 pounds per week. I should figure out what the rate has been for the past 8 weeks or so. The overall average is skewed high by those first few weeks where I was dropping pounds like crazy.
At 1.25 per week for the rest of the year (still assuming 60 pounds lost at week 30) I'll be down 87.5 pounds total at the end of the year. At 1.75 per week, I 'll be down 98.5 pounds for the year, below 200 pounds at 198.5.
Bottom line: I'll have to keep the average higher than the Doc really wants it if I am to see triple-digit weight loss in 2006.
We'll see. One week at a time...
July 08, 2006
It's a New Phil, Week 27
Not a lot to report this week. Holding steady at 243 pounds for a total weight loss of 54 pounds!
Here's some more information on my sledge hammer workout. I do three workouts per week. Each workout consists of three core moves which I do every time, and which don't require the hammer, and two variable moves each of which I do only once a week and which do require the hammer. So there are a total of nine moves, as follows:
Core (Chair) Moves
The Anvil
The Tongs
The Bellows
Variable (Hammer-Swing) Moves
The Step
The Spike
The Piston
The Quarry
The Lunge
The Sideswing
Initially I was doing 10 sets of each exercise, 5 per workout. That was proving too time-consuming, so I dropped it to 5 sets. A typical week would look like this:
Monday
Anvil
Tongs
Bellows
Step
SpikeWednesday
Anvil
Tongs
Bellows
Piston
QuarryFriday
Anvil
Tongs
Bellows
Lunge
Sideswing
The goal is to do the same number of reps per set, and not increase the number of reps until I can handle it for all five sets. Yesterday I did 40 reps per set -- 200 reps total for each move. The goal is 100 reps per set for a total of 500 reps in one workout. After I reach that point, I will move on from this basic workout to some more advanced moves.
I should point out that although five exercises are listed, each hammer swing must be performed with both the right and left hand. So it's really a total of seven exercises per workout.
So what are the moves? Well, I'm not sure I'm ready to tell all that yet. Not just yet. Not for free, anyway.
More later.
June 30, 2006
It's a New Phil, Week 26
My pal John Henry Irons (AKA the Man of Steel, AKA Steel) is here to help me celebrate another successful week on the It's a SUPER New Phil program. In my opinion, Steel is the coolest of the Supermen who defended Metropolis while the Big Guy was, well, dead. Not only is he way cooler than any other African American superhero ever to reside in Metropolis, check out his favorite super-accessory.
So the big news is: I'm down another 3 pounds to 243 for a total weight loss of 54 pounds!
By the way, I just want to express my deepest sympathy for these chimps. How humiliated they must be. Even at my biggest. I was never mistaken for a whole new species. Sheesh!
June 23, 2006
It's a New Phil, Week 25
No big news to add after the excitement earlier this week. My weight is holding steady at 246 pounds for a total weight less of 51 pounds!
Stephen requested a recap of my methodology and progress.
I started out in January following a strict point system formula based on the Weight Watchers program. This was highly effective, although I quickly found calculating points to be needlessly complex and time-consuming. I switched over to counting calories in February and, over a period of weeks, came upon roughly 2200 calories per day as the optimual trade-off between amount of food consumed and continuing to lose weight. Slowly. In April, I quit counting calories in a formal way and simply tried to match my eating patterns to what had provided success up to that point.
In January, I also started walking on a treadmill every day or riding my bike when weather permitted. I would go a couple or three miles on the treadmill. Since spring, I have put the treadmill in the garage and now spend a lot more time on the bike. I go for one to two hours -- anywhere from 10 to 25 miles depending on the terrain. It's a mountain bike. I prefer the unpaved trials -- which means I don't go as fast (or far) as some.
Additionally, in March I began working on developing a new workout routine based on an older one I did a few years ago using a sledge hammer and, initially, a couple of chairs -- but I now use footstools at my wife's urging. I do intend to disclose the details on it fully at some future date. It promises to have a huge impact on the world.
Here's a visual representation of the first 25 weeks of the program:
June 19, 2006
It's a New Phil, Week 24
The Big Five Oh
As of last Friday, I was still weighing in at the stubborn one-pound-to-go weight of 248 pounds. However, I knew I would get a second shot this week because I had my every-two-months appointment with Dr. Harris this morning to check on my progress.
Bingo.
Down two more pounds to 246, providing for a total weight loss of 51 pounds! (So the above should really read "the big five one," but that doesn't seem as dramatic.)
June 09, 2006
It's a New Phil, Week 23
Another week, another pound. I am down one this week to 248 pounds, bringing my total weight loss to 49 pounds! I was all set to have the 50-pound celebration this week, but once again...we wait.
June 02, 2006
It's a New Phil, Week 22
Back from vacation and down another three pounds to 249, brining my total weight loss to 48 pounds! This is the first time my weight has been below 250 pounds in a long, long time.
Vacation was not so hard. The local food in Costa Rica was plentiful, but all it takes is a little portion control. I was quite partial to the local tropical fruit and had nothing but that for breakfast every day -- mango, papaya, and those little bananas that in Malaysia are called pisang emas. Oh, a couple of times I also had rice and beans, or gallo pinto as the Ticos call it. But I tended to eat that more as a lunch dish. Anyhow, it's low fat, high fiber, a good source of protein, and absolutely delicious. Plus, we were hiking or swimming every day, so it was easy to get my exercise.
Next week or the week after we should be celebrating the 50-pounds-lost mark. So stay tuned!
May 20, 2006
It's a New Phil, Week 20
Well, it looks as though I've hit the second plateau. Same weight for two weeks now. And I won't have another official weigh-in until I get back from vacation.
Hmmmm...I better take it easy on the vacation food.
May 15, 2006
It's a New Phil, Week 19
My work schedule on Friday prevented me from visiting the doctor for an official weigh-in, but my (unreliable) home scale -- which tends to add a pound or two -- shows me being right around where I was last week. So let's just say that I'm holding steady at 252 for a total weight loss of 45 pounds!
I'll update this Friday with my final pre-vacation weight, then "It's a New Phil" is going to take a week off. I sincerely hope that the old Phil doesn't try to take over while I'm on vacation, but even if he does...he only has a week.
Meanwhile, I really enjoyed this comment from HamsterBaffle:
Hey Phil, love your stuff, and this "It's a New Phil" series is sublimely inspiring.
Casual reader of the Speculist pops by for some hard fluff--gets sidetracked into a personal improvement diary--decides to get serious about cutting back on smoking and returning to a weight-lifting regime--considers starting a blog about it--decides not to--leaves poorly edited comment instead.
Yeah, that old story. If I've heard it once...
Shown here -- the New Phil attitude on the old Phil body. Vacation could be an all-out smackdown between the two of us. Kind of like one of those good Kirk / bad Kirk episodes. I may come back fatter, or -- who knows? -- sporting facial hair. [Note to Stephen: hey, is this our longest caption ever, or what?]
May 05, 2006
It's a New Phil, Week 18
Down two more pounds this week to 252 pounds, giving me a total weight loss to date of 45 pounds!
For weekend reading, I'm planning on picking up a copy of The Shangri-La Diet. Glenn's mention of it the other day got me interested. I'm not really in the market for a new diet; calorie counting and exercise seem to be working pretty well for me. But I have to admit that I'm intrigued by the premise.
I'll report back after I read the book.
Meanwhile I continue developing my unique exercise program using a sledgehammer...
...and two chairs.
I'm not ready to start publishing details just yet, but in case you decide you want to try to work this out for yourself, a few quick safety tips:
1. Don't hit the chairs with the hammer.
2. Don't hit yourself with the hammer. (Very important!)
3. Basically, don't hit anything with the hammer. Unless you need to bust up some old concrete or something. But if you do, be sure to use protective eyewear.
Good luck. And have fun!
April 29, 2006
It's a New Phil, Week 17
I was only home one full day last week, Saturday, giving me seven days on the road over a period of eight. As I have noted previously, business travel can be particularly challenging for the weight loss program. So I was very pleased to see no change in my weight with yesterday's weigh-in, meaning that I have maintained my overal loss of 43 pounds.
On the subject of caloric restriction, a topic raised in last week's entry, reader ktistecmmachine made the following very interesting comment:
What about the quality of life associated with CRON. I know it's possible that those few extra years gained could last you through until the next big break, but don't you think that by eating less food, your performance in life and what you can take out of it will be less than what you would get otherwise, despite the extra linear time?
I think I'll have to file that under "crossing that bridge when I come to it." So far, the moderate reduction in calories has been overwhelmingly beneficial where quality of life is concerned. I have more energy, I look better, my blood pressure is down, etc. Obviously, there is a point where these kinds of returns begin to diminish. Otherwise, everybody would just give up eating altogether and live in optimum health.
If and when I start to see energy levels going down rather than up, I'll have a choice to make. But at this point, I can only say that I look forward to having to make that eventual, difficult choice.
April 22, 2006
It's a New Phil, Week 16
Down two more pounds this week to 254, bringing me to a total weight loss of 43 pounds! Met with the doctor for my bi-monthly checkup. He is pleased with the progress, but still concerned that I may be losing too fast.
Of course, from where I sit, it feels like this thing is taking way too long. But the doc wants me to take a couple or three years to arrive at my goal weight. His thinking is that the longer it takes to come off, the more permanent the change is. I can see where this makes sense physycologically. And I know that physiologically, not permitting my body to go into starvation mode is important for maintaining (and possibly even building) lean body mass while avoiding rapid weight-gain should my daily caloric intake increase along the way -- which it shouldn't, at least not dramatically.
If anything, my daily calories will only continue to go down (as I originally noted here.) I'm still big enough that I can lose weight on about 2000 - 2200 calories per day. When I'm another 40 pounds lighter, I will probably have to drop that somewhat in order to keep losing.
In the end, I may end up practicing something not unlike the healthy life extension technique known as calorie restriction:
A calorie restriction diet aims to reduce your intake of calories to a level 20-40% lower than is typical, while still obtaining all the necessary nutrients and vitamins. CR is also known as CRON, for "calorie restriction with optimal nutrition." Mild CR may be as easy as adopting a much healthier diet, taking a few supplements and not eating snacks.
Looks like I'm already doing mild CR. According to the BMR calculation site I've used in the past, if I weigh 180 pounds when I'm 45 years old (which still has me losing weight faster than the doctor wants, but I think I'm just going to have to keep disappointing him in this regard) I'll need about 1800 calories per day to keep myself at that constant weight. Adopting a more rigorous CR strategy at that point would mean cutting my intake down to 1000 - 1500 calories per day. That would be pretty intense. Of course, at that point, I would start to lose weight again, even though 180 is about the least I can imagine myself weighing.
I'm pretty sure that some of what I'm currently carrying around is muscle, and I would hate to lose that. On the other hand, I don't mind the idea of living longer. Not one little bit.
Stay tuned...
April 14, 2006
It's a New Phil, Week 15
The Big Four-Oh
Down 3 more pounds this week to 256 pounds, crossing the 40 pound mark to give me a total weight loss of 41 pounds!
Speaking of the number 40, I also got some new pants with a 40-inch waist. Sure, that still sounds kind of big, but let's not even discuss what I was wearing before.
Okay, full disclosure -- a few 44s and some 46s. I have gone as big as 52 in the past, long before starting this program. That means my circumference is now an entire foot less than it once was. Amazing.
And of course, I've got another half-foot or so to go.
April 08, 2006
It's a New Phil, Week 14
Holding steady at 259 pounds this week, still showing an overall loss of 38 pounds!
There has been a lot of blogosphere chatter about dieting the last couple of days, not all of it encouraging. Jane Galt linked to this piece which seems to pretty much say that if you try to lose weight, you're going to fail. And even if you do succeed somehow, it isn't going to help you much. In fact, losing the weight may just kill you quicker.
Well, ouch.
Bless her, Jane takes issue with these findings, at least anecdotally. Meanwhile, Dr. Helen chimes in with a slightly different take.
Count on our old buddy Reason to put everything into perspective. Putting the issues of diet and weight aside for a moment, having excess fat around your middle causes inflamation, which can kill you six different ways. At least.
Besides, I found that I rather liked actually fitting in my airline seat when I flew a couple weeks ago.
I'm sticking with this thing, and that's that.
April 01, 2006
It's a New Phil, Week 13
Down five pounds this week to 259, giving me a total weight loss to date of 38 pounds!
I lost 13 pounds in March, with 13 now also being my average weight loss per month* since beginning this in January. I lost 19 pounds in January and 6 in February. Obviously, I'll need a few more data points before I know how representative that 13 pound weight loss really is. I do expect to see the rate to slow somewhat. Even if the average falls to 10, I'll be where I need to be by the end of the year.
* Well, okay -- 12 and some change.
March 25, 2006
It's a New Phil, Week 12
I love New York, but I become more ambivalent about business travel with every passing year. The most recent episode of The Sopranos* features a comatose Tony Soprano lying in a hospital ICU. On the brink of death, he hallucinates a different life for himself. He's not a gangster; he sells precision optics. In this dream world, his state of limbo between life and death is represented as a business trip.
All I can say is that whoever wrote that episode knows what a business trip is like. There is something surreal about breezing into town with a laptop and a suitcase, checking into an interchangeable room in an interchangeable hotel, and then setting out to engage in a bunch largely ritualistic, interchangeable activities. Tony's problem is compounded by a shattering loss of identity -- he accidentally exchanges his briefcase and wallet with another guy, whose identity he eventually assumes.
Simply put, we are not ourselves when we travel. We assume a distinct persona, often in spite of ourselves.
To bring these philosophical ramblings into the "new Phil" context: the only real surprise to me when I weighed in on Friday after flying back to Denver on Thursday was that I had only gained a single pound. This brings me back up to 264, for a total weight loss of 33 pounds. The on-the-road Phil has an approach to life, priorities, and a disposition which are often at odds with my own. Add to that the lack of sleep, lack of control over my environment, and the seemingly endless parade of goodies that midtown Manhattan has to offer, and I must say that OTR Phil did all right for himself.
* I acknowledge that I've been a little heavy on the TV-blogging the past couple of days. For all you TV lovers, you're welcome. For everybody else, don't worry. It's just a phase.
March 18, 2006
It's a New Phil, Week 11
Down another two pounds this week to 263. That's a total loss of 34 pounds since the beginning of the year!
I ran into some rotator cuff issues lifting weights and doing other exercises last year, so I've been working on figuring out strength training without the heavy loads. That's a bit of a challenge. One thing that I found that's working is half push-ups. Instead of going into a full push-up pose, I start from my knees. It seems ridiculously easy at first, but it becomes a bit of a challenge after the first few hundred. I also do seated abdominal crunches, hanging my legs off the side of a chair or the edge of the bed while leaning back and then sitting straight up. That one I do with two 10-pound dumbells. It takes while to make it seem like anything, but eventually it does kick in.
I like working with dumbells and -- I think I've mentioned this before -- hammers. In fact, I have a whole routine based on swinging a 10-pound sledge hammer. That's one I have to be careful with, lest the rotator cuff problems re-emerge. One of these weeks I'll write about my entire hammer workout.
March 10, 2006
It's a New Phil, Week 10
[ Welcome. I've noticed some folks have lately been stumbling upon this particular entry in my weight loss chronicles. This is the 10th entry in the ongoing saga of how a man weighing in at 297 pounds managed to work his way back to a healthy weight using a sound and reliable approach that doesn't involve any gimmicks or a lot of deprivation or other nonsense. As of writing this update, I have now lost more than 70 pounds. To see the story in it's entirety, please click here. To learn more about the Speculist and our vision of a world worth living to see, please click here. And thanks for stopping by!!! ]
Down four more pounds this week for a total weight loss of 32 pounds!
Some quick and extremely obvious math tells me that my overall average weight loss since the beginning of the year has been 3.2 pounds per week. If I could continue at this rate (not likely with the approach I'm taking, and probably not healthy in any case) to hit my potential ultimate target weight of 175 pounds, it would take about 29 weeks. If I average 2.25 pounds per week from here on in, I've got about 40 weeks to go. If I average 1.75 pounds per week, it will take exactly a year. Four pounds per week, on the other hand, would get me there in a little over 22 weeks.
Here's a table I drew up to show the number of weeks required to achieve the target. (As before, click the picture to access a legible version.)
Here's a link to the Excel spreadhseet for calculating weeks to target, if it would be useful for anyone.
March 03, 2006
It's a New Phil, Week 9
Corrections
Had a little bit of good news this week when I got on the scale and saw that I had dropped three pounds. Then there was even more good news when Amanda, the physician's assistant does the weekly honors on the scale, pointed out that I had gained three pounds last week, not four. So the trend has been reversed* and the damage has been undone.* Ao I am back to a total loss of 28 pounds!
I used Excel to create a faux control chart of my progress. For those of you well versed in statistical quality control (poor wretches!) the UCL and LCL stand for upper and lower calorie limit, not control limit. I haven't figured any standard deviations. This data is not "valid."
Still, using a reasonable man's lower limit of 1500 and upper limit of 2200, this shows how well I've done. The number of spikes over the UCL accompany the plateau I just broke fairly consistently. There may be a causal relationship there, but of course we need more data. Click the image to see a legible version -- two months of dieting.
*I know, I know. For now. This is a one-week-at-a-time kind of a deal.
February 25, 2006
It's a New Phil, Week 8
The First Plateau
I was actually up four pounds this week, making the past two weeks a complete wash, although I'm still down 5 pounds for the month. Four pounds seems like a big gain. I have a digestive theory that might account for part of that. (My wife told me this morning to consider a laxative.)
As a precaution, I'm cutting my calorie intake by 10% for the next week. I've been going over my goal of 2000, anyway -- my average daily intake is right at 2090 -- so even just keeping my intake where it is supposed to be would no doubt help. But I think what I'll do is round that 2090 up to 2100 and say that I need to reduce my intake by 210. So I'm going to be very careful not to exceed 1880 calories per day over the next week, and we'll see where that gets me.
This "setback" may go a ways towards rationalizing my high burn rate, which I knew I was going to see get corrected sooner or later. With 5 pounds lost in the month, my burn rate is now only 2818, which is actually still pretty darn good. We'll see where it ends up over the next few weeks.
By reader request, here's a link to a blank copy of the spreadhseet I use. I hope it is self-explanatory, or that earlier editions of this feature will make it clear how to use it. If anyone tries it out and gets stuck, drop me an e-mail
February 18, 2006
It's a New Phil, Week 7
Sooner or later, we're going to have to face this head-on. I might as well deal with it now. It's a little something I Like to call:
The Calorie Paradox
And it goes like this. As I noted last week, during the month of January I experienced a total weight loss of 19 pounds. My average daily consumption of calories was 1613, giving me a daily average calorie burn rate of 3829, which I pointed out is probably skewed high due to intial water loss. So here I am more than halfway through my second month, and on my doctor's recommendation I have upped my calorie intake somewhat. My current average intake is 2019 calories per day.
But here's where it gets weird. So far this month I have lost 9 pounds -- bringing my cumulative weight loss to a whopping 28 pounds!! -- meaning that long after I should have passed the initial water weight loss, I'm still showing a daily burn rate of 3769 calories per day. I still can't help but think this is skewed high, and I'm looking for a somehwat lower rate next month or even by the end of this month.
But hey, I'll take burning more than a pound of fat per day for as long as I can.
My estimated BMR -- basal metabolic rate, what I would expect to burn off if I just lie in bed all day -- is about 2300 calories. At that rate, and at the rate I'm consuming calories, I should lose roughly 0.6 pounds per week. Right now, my average weight loss per week is an even four pounds.
Obviously, between getting out of bed in the morning, going to work, doing regular workouts on my treadmill, chasing the dogs around the back yard, etc., I should expect that 0.6 pounds per week to be more like 1.2 or even 1.8 pounds per week -- especially since, as Kathy pointed out, the BMR might not do a good job of taking muscle mass or activity level into account. But four pounds per week?
Anyhow, the paradox is that I've upped my calories, but the pounds keep dropping. Color me pleased.
February 10, 2006
It's a New Phil, Week 6
Three more pounds lost at this morning's weigh-in. I'm down a total of 24 pounds so far this year. Woo-hoo!
On the subject of counting calories and monitoring the burning off thereof, reader Ivan Kirgin writes
It is pretty hard to gauge how many calories you burn from activity. You could trust tables like this:
http://www.nutristrategy.com/activitylist4.htm
But who knows how much they apply to a given person.
There are companies like BodyMedia which make medical devices that strap on your arm and glean everything they can. It’s a big sensors and machine learning problem. Apparently they can get a live estimate of the rate at which you’re burning calories, along with dozens of other numbers.
Unfortunately, like any smart company, they are targeting high-end patients like those with insurance and heart problems.
For those of us who’d like to know exactly how many calories we burned in a day, but don’t want to spend thousands of dollars, there seems to be no gadgets available…
WAIT … as I was writing this comment, I found this:
http://www.bodymedia.com/products/bodybugg.jsp
$499 for the “BodyBugg” by BodyMedia. Horrible name, but apparently it’ll track your calorie burning rate & has web tools to upload that info plus food consumption and all.
Phil, you should totally see if your insurance would cover it. I’d certainly like to see someone’s recommendation before I buy something like this. Excellent gadget though.
This sounds like a very neat gadget, and if anyone is using anything like it, I would like to hear from them.
Personally, I'm not so much interested in the burn rate of a particular activity as I am my daily burn rate. That I can calculate to a sufficient level of accuracy using Microsoft Excel and the doctor's scale. I'm using Excel to keep track of every single thing I eat, with an estimated calorie count for each entry. These entries I sum into daily, weekly, and monthly totals. I'm also tracking my weight loss for each of those periods. So the math looks something like this:
Total Calories Per Month / Days in Month = Average Daily Calories Consumed
Weight Loss (lbs) * 3500 = Total Excess Calories Expended
Total Excess Calories Expended / Days in Month = Average Daily Excess Calories
Average Daily Excess Calories + Average Daily Calories Consumed = Average Daily Calorie Burn Rate
This might make more sense if I plug in some real numbers.
For the month of January, I consumed a grand total of 48379 calories. Divide that by the number of days in the month (I started my program on the second of the month, so I'm only counting 30 days in January), and I get an average calorie consumption rate of around 1613 calories per day.
48379 / 30 = 1613
Over that same period, I lost 19 pounds. There are approximately 3500 calories in a pound of fat, so that means I burned 66500 extra calories.
19 * 3500 = 66500
So my excess calories burned per day were 2217:
6650 / 30 = 2217
And my total calories burned per day were 3829:
1613 + 2217 = 3829
Wow, burning calories at that rate, it's amazing that I was ever fat to begin with! But the truth is, even though as a big guy I do have a pretty high burn rate, the rate shown is almost certainly skewed high. Probably ridiculously so. That's because the bulk of the weight loss in the first month probably wasn't entirely fat -- a lot of it was retained water. However, by scrupulously employing this method for a period of months, I will get an increasingly accurate picture of my burn rate, which (unfortunately) is likely to go down the smaller I get. But by adjusting the rate of calories down, as needed, to compensate for the difference, I will eventually have a very clear picture of what it takes to keep me at a healthy weight.
February 03, 2006
It's a New Phil, Week 5
At my weigh-in this morning, the nurse practitioner told me that she had been over my results to date with the doctor. Apparently he's pleased with what he sees, but concerned that I may be losing a little too fast. In the business world, that's what we call a "good problem to have."
So coming back from the doctor's, I stopped by Krispy Kreme and picked up a half a dozen glazed doughnuts, which I was able to polish off by the time I got home. That should slow the old weight loss down a smidge!
Just kidding.
The doc recommends a long-term plan to take off 1-2 pounds per week. This is sensible and healthy. An eating plan that achieves those kinds of results will help my body to avoid the dreaded starvation mode, slowing my metabolism in anaticipation of the eventual arrival of more calories to turn into fat (not to mention wasting away my muscle mass.) But I wonder if the rapid-weight-loss effect these first few weeks hasn't had more to do with water weight than over-doing it on the diet?
It's hard to be sure, but one way to check is to try to get a handle on how many calories I've been eating and how many I've been burning. If the difference between those two comes close to the pound-or-two-per-week rate, I'm golden. If not, I may need to make some adjustments. This is where the BMR (as recommended by ivankirgin in a recent comment) comes in. From the BMR you add in your level of activity, and that gives a pretty good idea of how many calories you burn per day or week.
I'll report more on the math next time. For now, suffice it to say that I have lost an additional two pounds, bringing my weight down to 276 pounds.
I now weigh 21 pounds less than I did at the end of 2005.
January 27, 2006
It's a New Phil, Week 4
Weighed in this morning at 278 pounds. That's 19 pounds lost in my first four weeks!
January 20, 2006
It's a New Phil, Week 3
Weighed in this morning at 283, bringing the total weight loss to 14 pounds.
One thing I've learned -- when you're counting calories, calories really count. Go figure.
Meat is just way to dense to eat more than once a day -- if that. (And by "meat, I mean meat, poultry, or fish.) I'm getting a lot more mileage out rice and beans with a little salsa thrown in. Plus, I've discovered a wonderful thing called baked tortilla chips. Not bad.
Whole grains are good. I've discovered these little Swedish crackers called Kavli. The packages says that they're "flatbread," but I'm 43 years old and I guess I know a flipping cracker when I see one. Still, they're pretty good. Plus, of course, lots of fresh fruit and vegetables. All that sensible stuff. It works!
Also, Weight Watchers makes some pretty good ice cream novelties for those moments where it seems like some chocolate is required, but you'd rather not just blow the whole thing. Turns out you don't have to actually be on the WW program to eat their stuff. Who knew?
January 13, 2006
It's a New Phil, Week 2
I weighed in this morning at 285 pounds, representing a total weight loss of 12 pounds.
All I have to do is lose 12 pounds 7 more times and I'll be just over the 200 pound mark. I have decided to put off deciding what my final target weight should be until I'm in that neighborhood. Reader "Ross the Heartless Conservative" suggested that I should have fudged my starting weight up to 300 so that when I hit the target of 150, I can brag that I lost 150 pounds. That's a great idea, but I'm not sure that I will want to go quite as low as 150.
The goal is to come out of this thing looking more like this than, say, this.
January 06, 2006
It's a New Phil, Week 1
I've just had my first official weigh-in after beginning a weight loss program recommended (and supervised by) my primary care physician. I had my annual physical a couple of weeks ago and the scales showed an alarming 297 lbs.
Now please note that this was not alarming because of any specific health risks (the general risks associated with lugging that kind of baggage around being more than sufficient), but more because it put me three pounds shy of the big three-oh-oh, which is just not a respectable weight for somebody who isn't starting for the NFL or who isn't a Sumo wrestler and I must come clean -- neither of those apply to me.
The plan the doc has me on is one of those moderate and super-sensible deals. I count calories, fat, and fiber (the latter being something of a mitigator.) I don't currently count carbs, although the tools I have could do the math that way. I personally don't want to go down that road again. As far as I'm concerned, low carb is a mirage in a desert of getting nowhere with diets. (Of course, your mileage may vary.)
One of the interesting features of the program is that I will be cutting my caloric intake further as I lose, so this could potentially begin a foray into the world of CR life extension, although right now -- at 1500 calories a day -- I think I'm still well north of any CR plan.
Still, you have to crawl before you can walk. And my first week of crawling has resulted in a 7 pound loss. At two-nine-oh, the big three-oh-oh seems a lot less menacing and I plan to see it quickly receding in the old rearview mirror.
More next week.
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