Today I stepped on the scale at 262.4, which for my height means that my BMI is under 40 for the first time in over a decade. At the beginning of the pandemic, I weighed in at 318, and back in February, I remember tipping the scale at 333. For the past 10 years, I had been maintaining a weight in the 310-340 range, and the pandemic was the kick in the ass that I finally needed. Hearing about how obese people have worse outcomes, combined with the fact that everything locked down really motivated me to use the forced change in my lifestyle with the lockdown to my advantage. My main hobby before this was playing poker in public card rooms, and they closed all my card rooms! So now I had to find a new hobby, which I decided was going to be focusing on my health. Here are some things that have helped me.
- An incredibly supportive wife. She has been on her own weight loss journey starting a year before I did and already lost 60 lbs when I started, and is now on the home stretch of her journey. She waited until I was ready, and has been incredibly supportive the whole time. If you don't have a SO, find a friend or a close family member or this subreddit to motivate and support you. I could not do this alone.
- Greek Yogurt, Greek Yogurt bars and air-popped popcorn are my jam. Greek yogurt is my typical breakfast, and those 120 calories fill me up until my lunch, and the 100 calorie Greek Yogurt ice cream bars are tasty and filling. High protein is definitely the way to go. My "indulgence" is air popped popcorn. I invested in a countertop air popper back in May, but if you don't have one, you can use your microwave as an air popper, cover a glass bowl with a plate for about 4 minutes and youll have nice air popped popcorn. I know it's not the most nutritious thing in the world, but it allows me to have handfulls of food to snack on for only 110 calories. My wife jokes that I'm keeping "big popcorn" in business.
- Exercising 5 days/week and slowly making those workouts longer and more intense. I started with just 2 mile walks when I was at my heaviest at the start of the pandemic, going all the way up to my new record of 8.64 miles, and running about 25% of the time during those walks. My "normal" days are now doing 4 miles and running about 40% of the time. The progress that I have been able to make here has been tremendous and just unbelievable to think that at over 300 lbs, I was able to run for short distances, and now that I'm well under, I can do so much more.
- CICO using MFP, and a Fitbit to track HR and TDEE. My resting HR has gone from 65 to 53, and my exercise routine is a big part of that reason. MFP started me at 1950 cal/day and now I'm down to about 1720. As those numbers have declined I have been cutting down portion sizes during meals and usually hit between 1500-2200 cal/day (usually the 2200 on the weekends, and not every weekend). With my activity level and current weight and age, my TDEE averages around 3,800 cal giving me a good deficit. There's no magic bullet, do what works for you whether you're following a specific diet or just want to do CICO, measuring all your food is a must.
Of note: I can now comfortably wear a 2xl for the first time in over a decade. None of the pants I wore to work when I was still going to the office fit me! I'm long overdue for a wardrobe update anyway, and plan to go shopping in August before we go back to the office in September. I still have a long way to go, and I'm super motivated by the progress that others have made. I hope I can provide the same to others on this sub. I'll report back again once I leave the Obese category, which is about another 35 pounds. Only 63 pounds away from my goal!
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