I’m not sure when my boys started calling me Big Fat Daddy but I know that I chuckled when I first heard that moniker and it stuck. At 5’8” my weight has steadily increased over the years. When I turned 40 I was 240 lbs. and generally feeling lethargic and self conscious about my appearance. Primarily I viewed food as entertainment and despite a nutrition class I had in college, I didn’t realize that I was not eating a healthy diet – shocking – I know.
In October 2008 I had been an on again, off again dieter and I seemingly lacked the self control to maintain a significant or permanent weight loss. I knew I really wanted to diet for my health (I’ve got kids to support) and I can’t stand that post-Thanksgiving dinner feeling when you are half comatose from an immense feast.
What got me started on the right path was a cold/flu episode which kicked my butt for 2 weeks. That illness combined with a modicum of success with my low carb (South Beach) diet and I and got down to about 220 lbs. By the end of November 2008 I had hit 205 lbs, for the first time in many years. I realized this was the perfect opportunity to get serious about losing some weight. I set a goal of 205 lbs. originally and revised that figure twice more, down to 175.
To be clear, weight loss is nothing more than a calorie deficit. You burn roughly 1600 calories a day doing nothing and double that with a decent amount of activity. Exercise is a necessary component and my activity is tennis about three times a week and a daily routine of pushups and sit ups. I had never been a sit up fan and I started by doing one set of 10. The great thing with any activity that becomes a routine is that you make progress and in no time I was doing multiple sets of sit ups and enjoying them.
In early December I discovered the Weight bot iPhone app. It’s a simple app that allows you to enter one weight a day and then provides you with stats and graphs of your progress. Something about wanting to post a good number for the next day was tremendous motivation for me. I’d even call it a “land grab” to myself in some situations. If I hadn’t eaten much for the day and was about to eat a “late in the day” meal – I’d try not to eat knowing that I might weigh 1-2 pounds less in the morning having consumed a low number of calories for the day. It’s a temporary loss of course but the psychology of making progress is potent momentum.
One of the primary things that repeatedly derailed my best intentions was having junk food in the house. I have come to realize that if I have unhealthy food in the house – in a moment of weakness (usually after I fall asleep and wake up a few hours later with a ravenous hunger) I will go right for it with my cranium disengaged. I resisted removing chips, fruit snacks, candy and soda because I thought my boys would be upset. The reality was that they did not notice. There were perhaps a few complaints at first but none since. This was just like when we struggled taking the bottle away from my oldest son. He didn’t like the Sippy cups and was comforted by the bottle. Once we decided that we must take the bottle away our son, he was fine with it in just a few days. So who had the issue with the bottle?
The other major influence with my weight loss was the New York Times best-seller Skinny Bitch by Rory Freedman and Kim Barnouin. In their words, “Rory Freedman and Kim Barnouin started a movement when they wrote their best-selling manifesto, Skinny Bitch. Both a wake-up call and a kick in the ass, Skinny Bitch exposed the horrors of the food industry while inspiring people to eat well and enjoy food.” And, as I put it – SB is a mildly offensive book demanding that you become a Vegan and complaining about the horrors of animal slaughter practices. However, the book has a lot of good nutritional information and it debunks several myths. I read it twice. Here were some of my epiphanies:
1) Soda is evil. I was drinking 1-2 cases of soda a week. I lost 10 pounds in a week when I stopped drinking soda and I have zero desire to drink soda today.
2) Embrace hunger. 50% of your body’s energy is consumed digesting food. By delaying eating each day until you are hungry you can give your body extra time to heal and do all the other things it needs to do. Hunger is a good thing and it means you are making progress.
3) Not all carbs are bad. Since I have always gone the Atkins route I usually avoid carbs and I like fish, chicken and beef. Fresh fruit is high in carbs but they are the right carbs and easily digested. Fruit has become my candy. Wawa’s Melon Mix or Fruit Medley are truly delectable treats.
4) Eat slowly and smaller portions are key. (I consume probably 1/3 of the food I used to in a day.)
5) Know what you are eating. If you don’t know, don’t eat it.
6) If you are going to cheat don’t “sneak” it. Make a big deal about it. Talk about how much you are looking forward to eating “x” (in my case x = an Oreo Blizzard). Put whatever you are going to eat on a plate, go slow and try not to finish it.
Now that I have reached my target weight I am in a maintenance mode. I can eat virtually anything but I still maintain a low carb diet and I like the flavored waters with sucralose (Splenda). Aquafina Grape – mmmm. One thing that comes along with weight loss is that none of your clothes fit. You must acquire a new wardrobe but your savings from the decrease in money spent on food will more than offset that expense.
On a day to day level, here’s my general strategy. Weigh yourself, record it and think about (plan) what you are going to eat for the day. Wait as long as you can to eat in the morning, have lunch and dinner and snack on your designated staple. You can’t simply go hungry and expect to have a lasting weight change. I need a snack food that I can basically eat as much as I want, whenever I want. Over the years this “go to” food has been a few different things and it’s important to find a healthy option that you enjoy. For me its baby carrots and kettle roasted peanuts. I keep fresh carrots in the fridge and snack on them constantly when I’m home. You can also buy carrots on the road and some stores sell them with peanut butter – yum! In the car, I keep a package of Planters kettle roasted salted peanuts. These peanuts are the same nutritionally as the regular peanuts but they are extra crunchy and delicious. So, by always having a source of food that can enable me to skip a meal if necessary I can avoid getting off my planned diet. Finally, coffee and the flavored waters are wonderful drinks that I enjoy often.
All things in moderation. That is true in so many ways. I essentially stopped drinking – not that I set out to do that – it’s just how it turned out. There’s no real scenario where downing a few beers (and being around junk food) is going to help you post a good weight the next day. I simply wanted to lose weight more than I want to ingest high calorie beverages.
To summarize, if I can do it – then anybody can. I am not the model of discipline and self restraint. You can do anything you focus on and knowledge is power. Understanding nutrition enables you to be successful which will aid you in other areas of your life. Thank you to my friends for being so amazingly supportive of my efforts. A single positive comment made in passing to a person dieting can make a world of difference to them. I can remember so many comments that deeply affected me. As Tony Robbins says, anything you can do for three weeks becomes a habit. You can get to any weight you’d like to be, enjoy the process of getting to that weight and love your healthy life afterwards.
