jeffbearer.com a slackworthy weblog

If you follow me on Twitter, or are a friend on Facebook then you no doubt know that I'm working on losing a lot of weight. Hell nearly all of my status updates are in the weight loss topic and the Beer talk has been a little lean as of late. The biggest surprise to me so far, well other than watching my weight drop, is that I'm inspiring other people to take a similar look at their health.

I've had a few people ask what I'm doing to lose the weight and since it's awful hard to explain in 140 characters I thought I'd dust off the old blog for this. Who knows maybe this is the start of a good habit of blogging at least once a year maybe once a season.

No way in hell I'm getting size 40 pants.
There were a lot of reasons that brought me to the decision to take action. My pants were getting tight, I was in 36" since high school, a few years ago I upgraded to 38" pants and now those were getting tight. I refuse to upgrade to size 40 pants. I also noticed after the holidays it was more uncomfortable than it should be to tie my shoes and nothing makes you feel fat like having to work to reach your shoes. I'm 33 with 1 kid and a second on the way. Those kinds of things make you want to stick around a little longer. Oh, and it was the beginning of January, what better time to embark on a new weight loss adventure? I'll have lots of company for the first month at least...

You bring it, I'll eat it.
Over the holidays I was a glutton. Eating anything and everything that was put in front of me. I got so used to having a full stomach that I was always grazing to keep topped off. I'm not sure how many calories I ate in a day but now that I have a better awareness of what is in food. I'd say that I was eating 3500 to 4500 calories a day. And on the many special events over the holidays I probably ate 8000 to 10,000 calories those days. When I did my first weigh in on January 9th I was shocked that I wasn't 20 lbs heavier than I was because of all the eating I was doing and how I was feeling. So while I wasn't feeling great. I wasn't packing on the pounds even though I was eating like a pig. Was it possible that I was burning more or less the same amount of calories that I was eating? if so, Go Metabolism, Go! I'm going to need you over the next couple of months.

Lets set some ground rules.
I did not want to be unhappy for the rest of my life and I didn't want to lose weight only to have it bounce back after I stopped dieting so I wanted to create some ground rules that I needed to mold my new routine around.

• No Diets
• Beer has to be a part of this routine
• I want to eat real food.

If you go "ON" a diet, then you expect to get "OFF" of it some day when you lost the weight. What happens then? Well if you return to your old habits you are just going to put the weight back on and that won't get you anywhere but frustrated. The key is to make a lot of small changes that you can see yourself maintaining for the rest of your life instead of a few drastic ones that you can't wait to be done with. It's cliche, but it's true, It's not a diet. It's a lifestyle.

If I had to remove beer from my lifestyle that was going to be a game breaker. So all the no-carb diets were not considered, not to mention they probably would of been disqualified by the no diets rule anyway. I want to be able to enjoy beer in moderation. If I couldn't do that I had to re-consider if living a long healthy life was worth it.

And finally I want to eat Real, Tasty, Food. No rabbit feed, no cardboard. Again, if that was the secret to living a long life, a short artery clogged life might not be so bad after all.

Buff Like Alton
I've become a big fan of Good Eats. I like Alton Browns style and how he ties in history and chemistry into the cooking. On January 4th I caught the episode titled "Live and Let Diet". It starts out telling how he found himself fat and went on a mission to lose 50 pounds and how he was going to do this all by not going on a diet. This show was a huge inspiration for me and I've been using the guidelines, and recipes in this show as the cornerstone of my weight loss, I'll get into the details in a bit.

Dear Diary
Not mentioned in the Good Eats episode, but part of my own design was that I wanted to keep track of everything I was eating. I've heard rumors of the benefits of keeping a food journal so I thought I would give it a try. I did a quick Google search and found FitDay.com. Fit Day has a database of foods you can search for to add to your daily journal, or you can create custom foods. It not only tracks the calories, but the entire nutritional label letting you know how you are doing on getting the nutrients you need.

It also allows you to track your weight, body measurements, and activities. There are reports on your weight loss, setting weight goals, and reports on if you are on track to meet your goals regarding your calories in and out. I've been using FidDay to keep track of everything I've eaten since January 9th. Logged my weight every day and also keep track of the exercise that I've been doing. There is a public profile that I can share so all of you can see what my current status is.

Livestrong also has a similar website, I haven't checked it out, but it does have mobile apps for the iphone and blackberry.

Get off the couch tubby.
This one is a no-brainer, exercise. I work for a company that has some pretty nice perks. Our site is too small to warrant a free fitness center on site. But they do subsidize most of the monthly fee for the near by gym. It's only $15 a month to join and there is the added bonus that 4 of the people in my group are members to the gym so we can help motivate each other to get there and work out.

When the weather gets nice, and daylight is long enough (it almost is) I'm going to go back to riding my bike to work and to the gym. I never did get cold weather riding gear, and even so It's not safe to ride on the roads that I need to ride on in the dark. I miss the adrenaline rush of getting out on the road with only a bike among all those cars.

The Alton List
Ok, so I'm going to be calorie counting, eating properly sized portions, and exercising. But just what am I putting into my mouth. Lets go back to the Alton Brown diet episode, he has a pretty easy guide to follow, and IMO it's easier than doing the traditional food pyramid servings a day. His guide suggests to eat the following items at the frequency listed:

Daily

• Fruits
• Whole Grains
• Leafy Greens
• Nuts
• Carrots
• Green Tea

3 times a week

• Oily Fish
• Yogurt
• Broccoli
• Sweet Potato
• Avocado

Once a week

• Red meat
• Pasta
• Dessert
• Alcohol

NEVER!

• Fast Food
• Soda
• Processed meals/frozen dinners
• Canned soup
• “Diet” anything

PLUS: Eat breakfast every day, no exceptions.

I find this list works pretty well for me. It was an adjustment to get used to eating leafy greens, and carrots, and nuts every day. But I was able to get there mostly, I don't have leafy greens 7 days a week, but I do make 5 or so. I'm a little short on the whole grains too, but man bread has so many calories. I try to squeeze in some whole wheat or multi grain bread a few times a week.

I also find that the 3 times a week list is the most difficult, mostly because I don't eat that much food anymore. you have 5 things you need to eat 3 times a week, 15 servings in 7 days. That is a lot of food! I do my best but I need work on this list. I haven't had sweet potatoes yet.

The one time a week, and the never lists I'm pretty good with. Of course I'm ignoring the alcohol guide. and Canned Soup is tough because a lot of the light recipes I've been using uses a can of soup in it. I should see what I can do about that.

Food On A Typical Day
Breakfast: This is one of the recipes that I got from the Good Eats Episode. Every morning I have the Buff Smoothie. It's a big breakfast coming in at 24 ounces and tasty. It takes a me an hour or more to drink it which helps keep me full till lunch.

Morning Snack: I have a half ounce of almonds between breakfast and lunch. This keeps the metobolism going. I find it makes me hungrier for lunch so that probably means that my metabolism is doing it's job.

Tea Time: I have a green tea when I'm getting hungry before lunch I find that the tea helps quell any hunger that I'm feeling.

Lunch: Every week day lunch I have a can of sardines. Yeah yeah ewww smelly sardines. But I'm hooked. Lots of healthy fat, protien and calcium. Sardines are small fish so Mercury is not a concern. I'll sprinkle on a little tobasco if I want something that tastes like more than a can of fish.

Afternoon Snack, Another half ounce of almonds.

Dinner: Alton didn't really have any specific recipes for dinner. Keeping his guide in mind I was on my own to find some things to cook. I have a recipe book that I think my mom gave us a while ago called America's Favorite Brand Name Light Cooking It's a cheesy title but I've found a few things in here that have been pretty good, and servings range from 250 - 320 calories. Not too bad over all. Not that I'm saying that you have to get this book I think I've about exausted the best dinner recipes that Heather will eat already.

I make sure to have a vegetable side, usually leafy greens ( spinach, asparagus, or brussels sprouts) side to do with the meal.

Evening Snack: Sometimes I'll have a fat free yogurt, a beer, or some bread or cheese.

Exercise
I go to the gym at lunch. mon, wed, fri I'm doing a toning workout. tue, thur, I do 30 minutes on the elliptical trainer. The last two weeks I went on Saturday because I missed Friday. I'm not sure what I'd do on Saturday if I go every week day.

So that's it. that is my diet plan. I'm at 236.6 as of this morning down 18 lbs since I started on January 9th. My goal is to get to 215 by April first.

Update: February 19th, I'm at 218.2 nearly 3 pounds from my goal. I have a un-documented goal of getting to 205 by April 1.