Monday, October 13, 2008

Two in One

My weight is going down (yay!) but my mileage is not going up. No no no, it is not. I also didn't run over the weekend at all. I need to make time for a four mile run sometime soon.

Thursday 10/10/08
156 lbs
2 miles
? time

Monday 10/13/08
157 lbs
3 miles
33 minutes 25 seconds

Sunday, October 05, 2008

OMG Hills

158 lbs
3 miles
37 minutes

Up up up to Alamo Square Park, around the park, down down down to home.

Hot dog and Junior Mints for dinner = not a weight loss strategy.

Thursday, October 02, 2008

Painful but okay morning run

? lbs
3 miles
31 minutes 42 seconds

I tried to run 10 minute miles, but couldn't keep it up. Also, weightlifting yesterday made my muscles sore which made today's run hurt hurt.

Saturday, September 27, 2008

Outdoor run along the Embarcadero

Taking the subway somewhere just to go running felt weird, but the run itself was far more enjoyable than just running in my neighborhood.

157 lbs
3 miles
33 minutes

Wednesday, September 24, 2008

Half Marathon? Maybe.

157 lbs
3 miles
33 minutes 17 seconds

Andre invited me to join him and Kathleen in running a half marathon in January. I'm not currently planning on doing that, yet. But I did print out a training regimen. We'll see how it goes.

Wednesday, August 06, 2008

What Do I Want?

Today I filled out the survey about maintaining weight loss that the (insert name of study that I can't remember right now here) Study sends me every year. I was proud to report that for the 5th year in a row I maintained my weight loss (within 5 pounds is their mainenance criteria, but I actually didn't deviate at all).

The survey contains hundreds of well thought out questions, about how and how much you eat, exercise, portion sizes, if you are usually hungry all the time, questions to measure your stress and anxiety levels, etc. But what gave me pause this year, like last year, was the question "Are you currently trying to lose weight?" I answered "Yes," since I kinda sorta am. But let's be honest here: I'm actually sabotaging myself daily.

Let's take today for example. I rode my bike to and from the train station (on the San Francisco side) for a total of 5 miles of biking (good). I did not go to the gym, partly because my gym buddy was too busy and partly because I'm lazy and partly because I justified it saying my bike ride was good enough (not even close) (bad). I ate dessert at lunch, even though it wasn't that tasty. I ate a lot of chocolate covered peanuts from the mini-kitche. I drank two cups of coffee. I did not get enough sleep.

This kind of day bears little resemblance to the days that made me lose fourty pounds in the first place. I know what to do in order to low weight, but I'm not doing it. Why not? I don't really know. I wish I knew how to find out.

Monday, January 28, 2008

Skin of my Teeth

I was utterly convinced that I would lose $15 this week, but just like last week I squeaked by and lost exactly one pound. I've been eating fairly clean at work, but it's the weekends that are enabling me to keep this up.

This week will separate the girls from the women, however. To get the moving average of my weight down to 148.9 lbs (today's target) I weighed in at 147 lbs this morning. I've never maintained a weight that low for very long, though clearly I would like to. I'll have to weight in at 147 lbs every day for a week to make next Monday's target of 147.9 lbs.

I almost wrote that "I would desperately like to", but clearly that's an exaggeration. Since I'm quite well aware of what steps I need to take to lose more weight, if I were desperate to do so I would have done it already.

Any suggestions for followup goals? I'm thinking of a week or two of weight loss maintenance, potentially followed by trying to lose another 3 pounds.

Monday, January 21, 2008

Money as Motivator

As Andre can already tell by the fact that he's not $15 richer, I succeeded in losing one pound this week. Hooray!

The threat of losing $15 was a powerful motivator, and many times over the week I chose not eat when I was stressed but not hungry. As usual, I'm reminded now that I feel physically better when I'm a little lighter, when I'm eating simple whole foods, when less food is going through my system.

Okay, one week down, two to go.

Monday, January 14, 2008

Stick to your Goals

I've been thinking a lot lately about the power of accountability and goals. Two years ago when I was training for a triathlon, I was not only becoming a faster runner and swimmer and cycler at a frightening pace, but I was at my lifetime lowest adult weight, and I felt great! It was a lot of work, but I also knew that every hour of training would make the race that much easier to complete. That race made me accountable, and I rose to the task by squeezing as much out of my training sessions and nutrition as I could.

I haven't had a goal that I'm adequately accountable for in a long time, and my eating and exercise have suffered. Some days I feel like eating well and exercising intensely, and others I don't, and I have only my willpower to rely on. Even the two weight loss contests at work, where real money was on the line, didn't do the trick.

So last week when I was invited into the stickK beta I signed up, hoping that it would help. The idea is simple: create a goal, set a penalty for not meeting that goal, and check in at regular intervals.

It's the penalties that are really unique to stickK. You pledge to pay REAL MONEY every week that you fail in your goal. You can send your money to charity, anti-charity (a cause you disagree with), a friend, or a foe. Wow!

I created a weight loss goal, but didn't set any monetary stakes since I was just trying the system out. But when I checked in for the first time last Friday with a failure, and it told me that I would have had to pay a penalty if I had set one up, I honestly freaked out a little. Maybe once a week check-ins with something actually at stake can help me resist the lunchtime cupcakes and reach 138 lbs.

I'm going to set up a new weight loss goal in stickK right now. In the spirit of small attainable goals, I want to lose 3 pounds in 3 weeks. I'm going to give $15 to Andre every time I fail at my weekly goal.

Here we go!

(Note: my starting weight and check-in weights will be the moving average of my weight in Physics Diet.)