July 20, 2008
This is a direct follow-up to a twitter I wrote yesterday. Anyone who has been reading my page this summer knows that I am attempting to turn back the clock in my life.
I’m 35, and have been slowing packing on the pounds during the last 10 years or so. That’s not to say I wasn’t heavy in my late teens or early adulthood, but I was very athletic and could carry the weight well back then. Some point after college, that changed.
I adopted a life that could probably be best described as sedentary. Sit on my ass, played video games, watched TV, and worked on the computer. In my mid twenties I’d have to say any remnant of athleticism left when I started driving a car. Retiring my mountain bike, handing it off to my brother-in-law was in hindsight the final straw. Without realizing it I had closed a chapter in my life, and had opened a new one in which I would pack on pounds year after year, and watch my waistline grow.
This summer a number of events happened around me in my life. It’s hard to say which of them triggered changes in my thinking that caused me to sit back, reconsider my lifestyle, and ultimately make progressive changes.
One event was hearing my nanny was diagnosed with diabetes. Her lifestyle was pretty sedentary. Bad food choices, little to no exercise and smoking have all contributed to a health situation that can only get worse for her. I love her to death, and owe her a debt I could never repay as she is the trusted guardian of my child as me and my work each day. My daughter loves her, as do I and my wife. She is as much a family member to me as my mother. More so.
However, I see something in her plight. She’s at the age common for retirement. She’s lived a full life, raised a number of children, and is currently helping to raise my child. I saw that once you get to a certain point in your life, it’s going to be near impossible to change food habits, to change exercise habits etc. I have no real expectation that at this point in her life she will change her dietary habits, or her sedentary lifestyle.
So, I had that playing around in my head.
Even my own child has given me reason to be concerned. She adopted many of the habits of my nanny’s family. As such, she’s ballooned a bit herself. I think what set me off, was hearing my child, who should be full of energy tell me she’s tired alot. Turned out at the time that a lack of real food, too much junk food, and far too much chocolate all led to what was clearly going to be a obese child down the road.
This led me to get more involved. Dictating a good and bad list of food for my daughter, and taking a more active role myself in ensuring she get daily and regular exercise, with weather NOT being an excuse to no go out and get some.
Then I saw my own mother and her husband. My mother is recently retired, and her husband is about 5 years or so from that event himself. Both are over-weight, and likely clinically obese. My mother in the last few year dropped a significant amount of weight, but only with the help of aggressive pills, and no real change in lifestyle or exercise. The result, no real net change. She’ll eventually die, as will her husband, and likely from health conditions tied to their obesity.
With all of this happening around me, earlier this summer I took it upon myself to start making some changes. Exercise was the first thing that had to change. The job I have now, while it keeps me on my feet all day, and moving and active, it’s not as physically demanding as one I had for 10 years where I lifted alot of weight daily. So I don’t burn enough calories during the work day to counter the intake of calories during the day.
So, with no change to the diet, I started riding a mountain bike I bought 2 years ago. When I bought it, I think I rode it 4 times that year, then let it sit and rot the second summer I had it. Bringing it out of retirement, cleaning it up and making it road worthy took me a weekend. I then started to ride it to work, but not for work. I made the rides after going to work, working my shift, getting home, having dinner then riding back to work. (and then of course, riding back home)
That gave me 30km a night a couple night per week early in the spring/summer. At the time, it took me about an hour to get to work at night.. and longer to get back home. Keep in mind this was on top of the work day. I eventually worked up to a point where I felt confident enough that I could make the ride to work in the morning, work my full shift, then ride home.
This is where my life changed. The first week of doing that, I rode 4 out of 5 days. Felt amazing. Saw no changes in my physique or my weight, but that wasn’t important, nor was it even a goal at first. I quickly renewed a long lost love for riding I have long since missed in my life.
Around week 2 or 3 a change was happening. I didn’t notice at first, but others did. People noticed weight was falling of my face. That was nice. I started to take the notion that I was, and could, lose weight. I quickly schooled myself in current nutrition research, and general health info. I devised a plan that should work for me, and be workable. My wife was instrumental in working my plan. She supported the changes I was proposing.
Many of the changes I was proposing would directly or indirectly involve or affect her, so she became involved. We changed my diet, turning it upside down. Potato chips, buttered popcorn, cookies, beef patties and pizza pockets and ice cream were removed from our night diet, and our meal were replace with more sensible and nutritious options wherever possible.
My own diet took more radical changes. Before I changed things, a typical Monday diet might look like the following:
Wake up, have a drink or cola, (not eat breakfast which I learned was the old and biggest joke a person can play on themselves), having a cola or sweet drink at 9:30am with at least one sandwich loaded with stuff, then another drink with 2 sandwiches at lunch, following up but another drink at 2pm, and a drink and likely a bag of chips at 4:30pm. Follow that with a heavy dinner usually lacking in nutrition, and a guaranteed "snack" at least once after dinner. That was pretty typical. I would dare say that was the minimum. Many days, you could have another small bag of chips or so, or mixed salted nuts, etc to the mix. I also fooled myself into added Gatorades, etc a few times a day into that whole mix.
Now, 2 month later things have changed 360 degrees. I wake up, Take a medley of pills that currently include a potent multivitamin, glucosomine, green tea extract, and another thermogenic. I then ride 15km to work. Once there I having a protein shake, or alternative "drink" for breakfast. That takes me 9:30 where I have a nice portion of mixed fruit that includes no less than grapes, and strawberries, and sometimes many more fruits. I’ll chase that down with either water, or a low calorie (5-10 max)additive to the water. At noon, I eat a salad, no dressings, with either Tuna, Salmon, or Chicken. Water or Low cal flavour to chase that. 2pm I have usually only straight water. Whenever I get off work, whether it’s 3:30 or later, I have a bottle of water, and sometimes a banana to keep me going. Dinner is nutritious, and I limit myself to usually only one helping now. If I feel a need to snack, I have another serving of fruit. that is now my typical day. Toss in extra water during that day whenever I can squeeze it in.
Most of my current diet I have covered in previous posts, so that isn’t news. But it does serve to show the differences over time. Part of these radical changes, is little to no fat, little to no breads, cereal or grains, and little to no dairy. That has been the hardest change to make. I love breads, and I love cheese and milks.
This week, I decided to take the changes to another level, and started to look for some alternative to what I have been actively cutting out of my diet. The first was milk. I love milk. Once upon a time it wasn’t uncommon for me to take down a litre or two per day. So looking at alternative, Soy keeps popping up. One problem I found with Soy anything, is that the salt content is noticeable. However, given that I’ve been on this road to change for about 2 months now, and things are going good I feel that my salt level is not high, and the human body does need some intake.
So I bought a 2 litre carton. Tried it, ..not bad. It’s not milk though. But, I can have it in place of milk, and feel less guilty about it. More so, the one I’m buying seemed stacked with good stuff. A win-win I suppose. The same grocery trip scored me 2 cereals. Something I had given up on. One is Kashi, the other is Fibre1. Both are so much better for us than the shit we used to buy like Cheerios, Honey Comb, Special K, etc.
One thing I noticed though, is portion size. You’ll lose weight for sure, as the average portion size on these so called healthy alternative is half that of conventional and popular cereals. Both were surprisingly good.
Now, I titled this post 8 inches, and have taken a long time to actually get to that. When I started getting serious about change, and losing weight, I told myself and others I’d wait until September to buy new clothes. After all, why buy now if I haven’t stopped changing my body. This week though opened my eyes. A woman I worked with came up to me, put 2 fingers into the waist of my jeans.. and pulled them out to see how much space was actually there. (my belt was tight and secured)
It was painfully clear that while I could reasonably wear the belt, the pants were many inches too large now. At the time I didn’t know just how large. Turns out that many of the jeans I wear for work are 42 or 44 inches. What inspired me to shop though, was that it was clear my shirts were too large as well, as I felt they weren’t hanging on me right anymore. So the trip starts, and I find some golf shirts I liked. I commonly wear T-Shirts for work, so Golf shirts would be a step up and a nice change. Tried some on.
Turns out, I’ve gone from wearing 2XL and XL shirts to Large shirts. I was ecstatic. Not entirely shocked though. I knew I’d get to this point, but as I said, I’d figured it would be in September. Anyways, we picked up the shirts, and went to the car dealership to pick up my buddies car. We continued to shop, and I decided that the jeans I worked in, needed to be replaced now. I simply wasn’t going to make it until the early fall to replace my entire wardrobe.
So, with the help of my friend, who helped to scour the Jeans shelves, I tried on pair after pair, finding that I now fit a 36×32 quite nicely and comfortably. My friend for shits and giggles tossed a 34×32 into the pile, and I tried those on. I got them on. They however felt tight in the upper legs. Not shocking given the leg muscles I’ve developed since riding to work daily. Still, it was nice to see that I dropped an average of 8 inched from the waist.
I’m not done yet. I haven’t set that goal, but for those that do ask, I tell them another 20 pounds. (that 20 pounds has been constantly moving…) I don’t tell them my weight. I actually don’t believe much in weight as a number or as a true indicator of health. Body shape, mass, and fat percentages are far more important. No one number should represent me or my goals. At some point I will stop losing weight. I will also likely gain some back as I switch from a burn process, to a build process.
My goals right now are still to burn and lose. Problem with that is the body will break down muscle as well. I try to maintain muscle mass as much as possible, and take in protein as much as possible to maintain as much muscle mass as possible. Once I’ve stabilized, I’ll decide if I want to go the other way and build above average mass in the muscles.
My goals currently are to continue to work out, continue to ride, continue to eat better. I may never have a "weider" body, but I’ll be happy to not have to shop in big and tall stores.
EDIT: Before bed last night the wife was preparing the laundry for this morning. We decided it was time to toss the old before introducing the new wardrobe to the dressers. Once we had filter through my clothes, I was distressed and dismayed how many old favourites would not be suitable anymore. a dozen or so 2XL hockey shirts, while meant to be big, looked ridiculous on a L shaped person. Sweaters, pullers, etc. All had to go. Worse, my wife pulled out the 2 suits I owned, and both looked like ass on me now. I have a wedding to attend in December. Looks like I’ll have at least one more shopping trip between now and then.
Peace,
HSDEMONZ, the somewhat thinner Blue Bastard.
