Time to say goodbye

When I started this blog, I thought that it would help my weight loss, after all, I only had 10 kilograms to lose, that should take 3-6 months and then I'd be onto maintenance. How I was wrong. About a year ago, I started gaining, I really don't know why, but maybe my girlfriends resistance towards my losing weight was one of the factors. Maybe. Then I got burgled, which caused more problems in terms of stress and taking away the source of immediate feedback: my graphs on my laptop.

So here I am, almost 20 kilograms over my goal weight, almost double what I started with. Weight loss blogging is a good idea - I have no doubts on that, just that if you are having problems, it probably won't solve them. It is good for writing down how you feel about weight loss, the problems and solutions though.

Anyway, here is what I have learnt through this blog and other sources:

Motivation is the key means far beyond all others

Being slim and eating well is not enough motivation for most people to be successful

A physical, high value thing (such as a new camera, trip overseas etc) is the best motivation in my opinion

Protein really removes appetite for about 3 hours

Having a sleep for a few hours can reduce appetite for about 4 hours

Sugar and bread and related foods increase appetite dramatically

Stress is by far the biggest factor in weight gain

I still intend to lose weight, as I still intend to get the camera. I have a new blog now, totally different though. Simplistic, posting daily, writing about how I feel about my weight loss and stress daily I hope will help things.

Thank you for all those who have left comments on this blog, and for those who simply moved up the counter by one.

Good luck with all of you in your weight loss, I'll still read your blogs and celebrate with you when you reach goal.

3kg lost, 15kg to go

I have pleasure in saying that yet another kg has gone. Whats my secret? I can't really think of any, just trying to not indulge or do anything foolish. The difficult bit is yet to come, of course.

Becky and I were talking about my weight loss, she's been watching me for the last 3 years, with no success, she thinks the chance of my being successful this year is about 8 percent. At least she's honest, and she acknowledges that her use of junk food is making it harder for me to lose it. It doesn't bother me - her lack of faith, she even says that I may decide to finish the weight loss for 'spite'. In other words - to prove her wrong. Thats not the major motivating factor - which is my digital camera, but it all helps.

Lowest weight since 20th Jan, weight: 80.9kg

An invitation to chat

Recently I got broadband, and have since rediscovered chat, something I did in the past but stopped because it used the phone line for long periods. Now that isn't a problem anymore, I decided that it would be nice to chat with fellow weight loss people, so for those who are interested and have msn please send me a message at m1i2h3a4v5o6c7@hotmail.com please remove the numbers to get my correct address.

Another kilogram down

Well, I have pleasure in saying that yet another kilogram has been lost. This makes me equal to my weight on 20th March, about a month ago, 16 more kilograms to lose. I still want to lose this weight, it's quite a lot and there are a whole lot of reasons, both physical and psychological to lose it.

I'm just taking it slow and steady at the moment, not trying to bust myself with the weight loss. Who knows when I'll finish this, I'm not making estimates at the moment, for obvious reasons.

Weight: 82.0kg

Highest weight ever

I delayed posting this (my highest weight was on the 3rd April) but on that date I was my highest weight ever in my life. This was obviously quite disappointing for me, when I started this blog I thought that yeah, it was going to help me lose weight and it would only take one 'go' at it if you know what I mean. How I was wrong!

So I peaked at just over 84kg, 18kg above my goal weight. That's a lot to lose, especially for me. Will I do it? No doubt. I am sure that the camera is still a good idea, the problem is that I am really short of money for it which has caused the recent weight gain.

Anyway, I've been losing since, I have lost 1kg which is pretty good, although it may just be my body emptying out food that I consume, due to me eating less. I'll find out soon.

So my theory was: no money for camera - no weight saved, lost interest in weighing myself therefore weight gain. Sorry but true.

I'll keep this short. I just feel awful about the whole thing, and for this reason I have disabled posting of comments, just for this post. I just can't bear any, positive, negative, neutral.

Weight: 83.0kg, lowest weight in 22 days

100g day

Today it's been pretty easy to consume only 100g of carbohydrate. That's not surprising, since it is quite a lot, I'd actually run out of food here, so I had to eat what I could, so I didn't eat totally properly. Thankfully, I've gone to the supermarket and have bought up on veges and fruit.

Tommorrow I'll try to consume about 80g of carbohydrate - until the evening when I'm allowed to indulge a bit as it's Becky's sisters birthday party. I'll not over do it though, she's paying for it so I'll probably have a few sandwiches and maybe a beer or two.

Good news, Becky and I have made a $150 bet on whether I can stay within 2kg of my goal weight for a year after I reach it! This is good for me for two reasons, first it's motivation to keep me on track, secondly it's more money towards the other camera I want to buy, 3-4 years from now. More on that later.

Carbohydrate experiment

The woman who runs my depression support group yesterday talked about sugar/carbohydrates, which got me thinking about performing a little experiment about seeing what it's like to control the amount of carbohydrates that I eat. Surprisingly, I've never done this, so I'm curious what it's going to be like. I'll start at 100g a day and head down from there, starting today (Friday).

Holding steady

One of the problems with this get-a-new-camera diet is that when I don't have the money to put into my jar, I decide to stop losing weight. Such is the case at the moment: money is a bit tight and it will be so for a few weeks, so I am not trying to lose weight at the moment. It does make sense though, my motivation for the camera is greater than the motivation for the weight loss, so I'd rather just hold steady than try to force weight loss and then feel some negativity towards the whole thing and put on a lot of weight.

So that's it, really. Holding steady.

Oh, by the way, the appetite reduction lasted a whole one day. It was rather disappointing, but reading the blog that the books author wrote, he showed graphs on weight loss, people with little weight to lose didn't really lose much on the Shangri-Lah diet. They certainly lost it though if they were heavier though. I'd still recommend it to others to see if it works for them.

Appetite, what appetite?

As it happened, I didn't start off well with the Shang-ri Lah diet, but the last 2 nights I've been having two tablespoons of extra light Olive oil in the middle of the night, when I have my 'gap', which I've been having for years now (caused by depression). It doesn't taste bad, it's quite easy to drink. I wasn't sure whether taking it in the middle of the night was the right thing to do, but it was easy in terms of needing to be at least 1 hour away from the consumption of other food.

So today, I get up and don't bother with breakfast, as I wasn't hungry. By about 2pm I decide that it was probably a good idea to eat something, so I had some whey powder and a few other things. Not much, though. Later on in the day I decided that again, it was a good idea that I should eat some food, lest I become faint due to lack of eating.

I may be corrected later on, but it looks like the Shang-ri Lah dieting is working! I only consumed about 20g of protein today, which is a lot less than usual, but I have to honestly say that today

I HAVE NOT BEEN HUNGRY TODAY AT ALL!

I suppose that I have this fear that the appetite suppressant will lose its effectiveness, after all, things can't be this good, can they? I was surprised that 2 days was all it needed to work. I will slowly get rid of the fear 10, 20, 30 days from now when my appetite still is low and I know that it's not going to come back.

So that's good, I don't know how to take it all in, I'll just wait and see I suppose.

On another good note, the price of the camera that I want to buy when I finish my weight loss has dropped by $100! That means that I won't have to wait too long in order to get it, the day I save up all my money is the day that I finish my weight loss, the two go together. It's a special price, so that means it may go up again, I doubt it'll increase to what it was before.

Yesterday Becky and I were talking about my weight loss. I suppose she's sick of it just as much as I am, so we came to an arrangement. When I finish my weight loss, she'll pay me $100 rather than $5 per kg, and we are going to make a bet about afterwards. We've bet $150 about whether I can maintain my weight after I finish this weight loss, and not gain. I have to stay within 2kg for a year. I think that I can manage that pretty easily, it's a good incentive although she obviously has doubts so it is my job to prove her wrong.

Lollies galore!

(For those not living in Australasia, lollies mean confectionary).

I don't know if I have said this before on this blog, but I should say something about my girlfriend Becky. She eats a lot of junk food. Sweets, chocolate, chips, fatty fried food, you name it, she eats it. Since she spends most of her time at my place now, that means that I am surrounded by tasty treats that are very tempting, and sometimes they are too tempting, and I end up sampling her latest bagful of lollies. As you can imagine, this is not good for my weight loss (yes, her health as well, but let's not go there...) as once I have a few nibbles of what she's just bought I often just can't stop myself (sugar addiction?) and grab a handful of what there is, only to come back a minute later for another handful.

Anyway, this happened quite a bit yesterday, I realised that I had been going well on the old weight loss thing, and Becky's treats came calling, I just couldn't resist. I'd broken the old no sugar a few days earlier (I'd gone 6 days which wasn't too bad), was trying to get back into it, then this happened. I don't blame her, of course, but the situation isn't ideal.

To top it off, I had one of those weird, all sorts of concepts dreams, where you dream about this and that, whatever is on your mind. Anyway, in the dream I opened a box at my parents place, and what did I see? A lollie. Immediately, I scoffed it down in less than a few seconds.

It does show that I am a fast eater. I wish I wasn't, I suppose I've trained myself to be this way, but the fact that I'd dreamt about it made a clear that I was that way.

I was reminded of the television show The Biggest Loser where they had jars and jars of their favourite lollies to tempt them. Were they tempted? No. I wished that I was like that.

So I decided to do something about it, I got some money and headed out to the local supermarket to buy some sweets, enough to fill a 2 litre water container. I glued the lid down, and the container of lollies is now sitting proudly right next to the container of money. As time progresses, the container of money will fill up next to the container of sweets.

The basic idea is to remind myself that

1) I am trying to lose weight
2) I need self control in this department
3) I can eat this when I've finished the weight loss

So that is something new. I'm hoping that it will be useful and remind me that I'm meant to be in a journey of learning self control and how to lose weight easily.

So what happens if I break open the container (unlikely, but you never know)? I promise to donate $20 to the ACT, a right wing political party here in New Zealand that I despise.

I'm hoping that these reminders (the money container and the sweets container) will remind me that I should be losing weight, avoiding fatty, sugary food and looking after myself.

New diet

Yesterday I found out about a new diet, the Shangri-lah diet. The idea is roughly that you trick your brain into thinking that you live in a place with abundant food, by having food with high energy and low taste. This is meant to suppress your appetite. Yes, it does work for some people (and doesn't work for others, of course). The thing about it is that it is simple - I only have to take some olive oil at a specific time of the day.

I've decided to make a commitment to try it for 2 months and see what happens. Yes, I'll carry on with the no sugar, flour, fried food since that is going well.

Finances are as follows:

Wednesday $1 daily save bringing $154 in total so far.

Weight 80.4kg, lowest weight in about 50 days.

5 days and counting

It's been 5 days since I've had sugar, flour and fried food. It's going well, just like it went well about 4 months ago. The biggest issue will be when I have to go to social occasions, there is a certainty that I won't be able to keep to my diet, that's sad, but there won't be fruit or veges or other things. I want to keep my diet private from the people who invite me, I've been on a diet for so long a while ago I decided that I don't want to get a reputation as being a 'permanent dieter' so any weight loss will be done in the privacy of my own home. Sounds kinky, doesn't it?

I look back and wonder why I didn't keep on with the no sugar etc after the wedding I went to in November. It just is so much easier without it, I don't have the cravings and urges and conflicts that I recall having. Because of this, I've decided to see if I can jump back on the diet when I have to go off because of a social occasion. By that I mean within about 24 hours of going off it, I'm back on it. So a goal for the future is to see whether I can do the 24 hour thing, I hope so but that sugar urge is very strong, as I have come to see clearly now.

It does feel strange that my finances have become such an issue in deciding when the diet finishes. The good thing about being on the sugar/f/ff free diet is that I do spend less on food, yes veges are expensive and I try to have 500g of them a day, but one trip to Muffin Break will buy the equivalent of almost 4 days of veges, so I am definitely saving there.

Speaking of finances, here is the current breakdown on my savings for the camera:

Christmas and birthday gifts = $140

Sunday $1 daily save + $6 food tax = $7
Monday $1 daily save + $2 food tax = $3
Tuesday $1 daily save + $2 food tax = $3
so in total I have $153 towards an estimated $700 for the camera.
(food tax is a fee I charge myself of $2 when I by any food)

Weight: 80.6kg, lowest weight in about 13 days.

Starting over again with the camera money

I have decided that now that I'm losing weight again, I'm going to start over again with the finances for the camera. The reason is that I'm just too far behind, and it's pointless trying to catch up, it'll take too long (months) and be a distraction from the proper saving. It looks like the actual saving is really important for my weight loss.

So I've got money from Christmas and my birthday, and I'm from today putting in money using the same rules as before - currently a dollar a day. I've been putting on weight as the graph shows, I'm back to where I was about a month ago. That's a shame, but those trying to lose weight will know that you've got to let these problems go because there are so many of them over a space of time.

The going without sugar, flour, fried food is going really well. It's only been 2 days (actually about 45 hours) but I haven't been missing it too much. I'll be going shopping today, this is probably the hardest part as walking through the supermarket aisles and seeing all of the food you can't eat can be a bit depressing and frustrating.

No sugar, flour and fried food again

Although it shouldn't be, my weight just seems to be going up, up and up. Slowly, but it's definitely in the wrong direction. I was reading another blog where the author said how they couldn't go more than a few days without sugar, and then they had a big 'blowout', so I decided to do the no sugar, flour, fried food again. For as many days as possible, although if I go on a trip to see where the ashes of an ex-partner are buried, then I'll stop when I do that.

Last time I did it, I lasted a whole 24 days! Actually, that's just going without sugar, but I lost 2.5kg, which isn't bad. I'm hoping that I'll get under 80kg with this one, who knows when that happens.

I've realised that the money container for my camera and my weight loss are very tightly linked. If I don't hear the jingle jangle of coins falling into the container every day, I just won't lose weight. So my giving it an IOU recently because I'm really short of money had an effect on my weight loss. It's unexpected and disappointing but that's the way it is.

Back to the no sugar, flour, fried food. I Started this yesterday (Friday) and will continue as long as possible, unless I go travelling.

Money vs weight

I have to admit that I've been putting on weight recently, my girlfriend and my birthdays are only 8 days apart, I'm allowed to eat freely on those days, but as a lot of people would expect, I'm finding that I'm eating freely in the days between them. I suppose it's to be expected.

Anyway, I have realised that a greater problem has arisen. I'm going to save a lot of money towards the camera, and I want to syncronise the saving money and losing weight so the day I have saved up enough money to buy the camera is the day that I finish losing weight.

Unfortunately, I think that maybe I've bitten off more than I can chew in terms of the cost of the camera, or rather the daily amount to be put away is just too much. This means that I've got to delay the losing weight as if I achieve goal weight and have not got enough money to buy the camera, I'll be frustrated at not having it.

Because of this, I've decided for a halving of current weight loss / saving efforts, until there is what there should be in the container (I've been basically giving it an IOU). I'm not sure when that will happen, so I won't even try to guess. This could delay the whole weight loss effort by as much as 5 months, but that's unlikely to happen.

So, until I am not owing the money container:
average daily goal: 50g loss

each day: up to 149g loss over a week: throw away $1
150-299g loss throw away $0.50 and save $0.50
over 300g loss save $1

I will double the 'food tax' to $2 which is paid into the container each time I buy food, plus my girlfriend is sponsoring me to the tune of $5 per kg.

I'll be giving all the readers here the stats on how I'm saving, rather than keeping it private, where it's likely to be 'fiddled' with as needs arise.

It's just too hot here

Today must have been the hottest day of the year here, the temperature got to about 32 degrees, something that I'm just not used to. I really like the heat, but today it got to the point that it was too hot, and I got sufficiently tired from it that I needed a sleep.

That's good because it shows that when I lose 15kg, I should be a lot cooler. I really like the heat normally so I am looking forward to enjoying it again, rather than feeling uncomfortable and sweaty.

Birthday indulgence

I had my birthday on Tuesday, and I have to say that I enjoyed it. Becky and I spent the whole day together, we went to see the film Babel which was ok, and I ate as much as I wanted to. Actually, I overate, I reached a point where I have consumed so much sugar that I couldn't eat any more for half an hour or so. That happens about once every 2-3 years so it is more proof that my system to suppress my appetite is 'broken'. This may be related to tiredness because one of the best appetite suppressants for me is an afternoon sleep.

Anyway, I am getting back into the weight loss. First, I'm going off the sugar, flour, fried food again. I usually lose quite a bit of weight when I start doing that. The annoying thing is that social engagements provide these foods in abundance. So I am allowed to eat these foods for the duration of the engagement and no more, ie after the event I am not allowed to eat the same way.

Camera news: I found out that the Kodak C875 does not have an eyepiece viewfinder, and have decided to not buy it, choosing instead a Canon A630. This is more expensive, but it's all relative really. I will be the lowest weight in 11 1/2 years so I'm allowed to treat myself. The good news from this is that I have to extend the weight loss period so I can save up the money, I'm looking at about 100g a day weight loss, quite doable.

Yesterday I tried on my new jeans, the ones I haven't worn for longer than a couple of hours. They are tight, the thighs are really tight, let alone actually doing them up. Yes, they were put on while lying down, the ideal position to put on tight pants.

I've been at a plateau for a while now, which means that I am throwing money away, part of my plan to speed up the weight loss system. That is fine, I don't mind doing it because there is a chance that I'll get the money back. I'll explain later on.

I haven't weighed myself in the last few days so a graph is not forthcoming. That'll happen in a few days when I start to 'empty out'.

90kg. Oh dear

As an experiment, I decided to calculate the value of all the weight that I've put on and taken off over the years since I became unwell. On my spreadsheet, I chose to average the last 6 weeks of readings (I chose that value because it ignores short-term fluctuations) which is graphed above, then calculated the total amount that I have put on and taken off. If I add the 15kg that I expect to have lost in the next 4 months, that means that I have put on and taken off 90 kilograms. That is an awful amount of weight, it's heavier than I've ever been, or would want to be. It is also nearly 2 years of losing weight at the maximum recommended rate of losing weight, and probably about 3-4 years of seriously trying. It's a lot of stress for me, and it's something that I could have done without. Seriously done without.

I think that my plan when I reach goal weight of putting money away for a fancy camera (for a few years) is a good one. A gift to myself, something that I would normally not had spent money on. As said earlier, money will only go to the fancy camera when I am within 1kg of my goal weight.

I'm hoping that this will be enough to help me maintain my weight. It's not an issue now, but when I finish losing weight it will be.

I've been thinking about motivation recently

With this decision about getting a new camera when I finish my weight loss, I've been thinking more about motivation recently. I've come up with some thoughts. These are of course not the first time they've been written. Just the first time I've accepted them and placed them in my train of thought for more than a few seconds.

I have difficulty at university, mainly because of health issues (lack of ability to study full-time due to physical health issues and also depression). But I keep battling on. Course after course. What is my prime motivation? Graduating, of course, but there's more than that. In 2002, when my mother was dying I did something very smart. I didn't realise how smart until a few years ago. I asked her to write a graduation card for me. I then gave her $5 and asked her to place it in the graduation card, so I could have an afternoon tea that day. I also suggested that she place some money of her own in the card, as $5 won't get a very good afternoon tea. I have no idea whether she did or not, I will find out when I open the card, probably a week before I graduate. I'd say it's 50/50 either way. Anyway, when I am studying, I often think of the moment when I open the envelope and see what is inside the card. Did she put in extra money? I'll never know until I finish my degree. I suppose that the mental image of my opening the card and seeing did she or didn't see is my immediate motivator for my degree. Having the degree is the long-term motivator, but knowing whether she did or not is the immediate motivator.

Weight loss. I've been reading weight loss blogs for about a year now, probably 10-20 regularly so that's maybe 15 years of people losing weight, and I have yet to read of someone finishing their diet. Ok, that's not 100% percent correct. I did read of one person who lost all of their excess weight, but she wrote that at an earlier time, as I was catching up on her blog posts. Also, most people who finish their diet will put in back on. Only about 3% of people are at a weight that they lost to reach and are stable at that point. It comes back to an immediate motivator.

I am so glad that I copied Renee's idea about having a significant purchase type reward when I finish my weight loss (my camera). I won't be able to afford the camera otherwise, but by putting a few dollars in a jar each day when I lose weight, I'll be able to buy it. I'm not happy with the camera I've got now, so the new camera is the immediate motivator.

I think that people don't use this method to lose weight, usually it's just something way in the future such as "to see my grandchildren grow up". A much better motivator would be "my pants are too tight" or "my high school reunion is in 6 months".

Anway, that's my thoughts about this motivation issue. The more definite a reason to lose weight, the more likely it will happen.

Slacking off somewhat

As the graph shows, I've been putting on a bit of weight in the last 2 days. Nothing too much, but I know that in the past these 2 day things have turned into 2 week (or longer) events, with my putting on a kilogram or two. Nothing to worry about, yet.

Anyway, the system is now working - my giving money away unless I lose 600g or more, thankfully today has been ok: I lost 650g in the last week, but there is a chance that I'll be giving money away sometime in the near future. Time will tell I suppose.

I'm keeping the time period at 7 days for the moment - but I may drop it a day or so, depending on how I think that it would go.

Valentines day is over, I ate badly that day but I've got my birthday soon, that's an issue as well. I don't normally put on much weight over my birthday anyway, it's going to be ok I hope.

1 kilogram less, 15 to go

I have managed to lose my first recent kilogram. No, that's not a great achivement (I am, after all up where I've been greater than the blog starting weight, as well as post Christmas weight) but each kilogram that I lose is one small step towards success. The whole getting a camera thing seems to be a good idea - or put it this way: I can't think of a better one.

Kilogram 15 was put on between the 14th and 20th January, rather a short time I think, I was probably indulging too much on treats and just not getting into the whole dieting thing.

Yet again, I have modified my whole putting money away for the camera, due to a change in the way I calculate weights. Up to 299g weight loss per week, I throw away $2. 300-599g a week I throw away $1 and $1 goes towards the camera, above 600g $2 goes towards the camera. This starts on Wednesday, since there is a small plateau from last week I want to get rid of first. I may change the period that I look at from 7 days to 6, I'm not sure on that, I'll give this system a few weeks and then look at it again.

Currently I have $38 towards the camera, about 10% of its price in New Zealand. I've thrown away nothing (so far). Also, I've been thinking about the whole what happens after I've lost the weight. What do I do to keep motivated? I told my girlfriend (who has been watching me diet for the last 3 years, with no real achivements) that I'd pay her $20 for every kg that I put on. I'm fine with that, but what about for me? Current idea is to put $1 away for each day that I'm within 1kg of 66kg, to be put towards a new digital SLR-type camera, probably getting one after about 2-3 years. That's likely to change of course, knowing me.

Jean Free

Yesterday, I realised that my current set of jeans had worn out in the thigh area, and the wear wasn't worth patching, so now I am without jeans. Or rather, jeans that I can wear. I really like wearing jeans, they're warm, soft and flattering. I'd happily wear them everyday for the rest of my life if I had the chance. It is telling that the last pair wore out in the thigh, I don't think that's happened before, the thighs rubbing together did that and we all know what causes that. Yes, thighs aren't meant to rub together to that extent.

I will miss my jeans, but there is salvation. In about April last year I bought some jeans that I had decided that would be smaller than my current set, in anticipation of losing weight. They have never been worn, as they were just too tight for more than a few hours, it just wasn't worth trying to wear them. I guess they are a month or two away.

So that's more motivation. No jeans, just beige pants that are too 'flappy' which I've never been keen on. Wearing them will motivate me, no doubt you will read about the time when I can wear the new pair.

Back home, losing

As the graph shows, the last few days I've been losing weight again (two dots per day), the stress at my fathers place has stopped, but now my girlfriend has requested that we delay getting married so she can accept the concept of marriage (being a child of divorce). I've found the last few days quite depressing, no appetite so I suppose that's one good thing.

To change the subject, I've been 'good' here, although as the graph shows, there was a plateau earlier on in the week.

Because of all of this stress, I'm not throwing away money at the moment, which will happen (or rather, it may happen) in about 5 days when the plateau is not in the recent vicinity. More on that later.

However, the camera fund is going well, I've got roughly 7% of the value of the camera, which is roughly the amount that I've lost, so the two correlate.

Lowest weight in about 15 days.

Still here and losing

Right this very moment I am staying at my father's place - it is very stressful for all sorts of reasons, mainly related to my brother staying here as well. I thought I'd visit and we'd have the whole family here for the first time in 4 years, I'd forgotten how difficult he is to be around. That said, I'm going home in a day so I can relax then.

Surprisingly, I'm losing weight. I'm not sure why, since I am comfort eating because of the stress, I think that the scales are telling me lies but I can't be sure and I don't want to start using two scales, it's too fiddly.

While it's nice to lose weight, the problem with this is when the scales start telling the truth, I may not seem to be losing, or even may start gaining. In terms of money towards the camera, I'm still doing that, but I've decided to not throw money away until I get back home. I see the punishment of throwing money away as not fair since this situation is out of my control.

Time for a new graph, I'm taking reading twice a day and then fiddling the numbers so fluctuations are smoothed out. The last part of the graph looks really good but how long will it last?

Updated plans

I've been thinking about how to speed up the process of losing weight (and getting my new shiny camera), and here's what I've decided:

Weekly weight loss (each day)
up to 299g giving away $3
300-599g giving away $2
600-699g saving $1 and giving away $1
700-899g saving $2
900 and up saving $3

I think that is a better system - it speeds things up if I lose weight quickly, the day I reach 66kg is the day I get the camera so I want to know that I've got the money stored up.

Oh, forgot the blogs anniversary

So the 11th of this month was the one year anniversary of this blog, and I forgot it. Looking at the graph, I started well, then had a slow increase over a number of months, followed by about a month of losing weight, then the increase for Christmas. So after one year, I was about 2kg heavier than when I started, which is something that I didn't expect to happen. Additionally, I've put on weight since the 11th, but for the moment, I'm ignoring that.

The line on the graph moves up and down quite a bit, something that I intend to analyse some time in the future. Hopefully, when I do lose weight, and keep it off, the line will be as flat as possible.

Still having trouble with motivation

Even though said on Sunday that I was ready to start again, nothing seems to be happening! Motivation is still a problem for me at the moment. I think how it would be good to do this and that, but the actual progress in that department is lacking. So what to do about it?

Although my $10 per kg plan towards a camera is a good one, where there is a lack of motivation, a better one is just $2 per day towards the camera. In reality, it ends up being the same, but dropping $2 into my container each day is a lot more motivating than dropping $10 or $15 each week, or at least for the moment.

So here is my new plan. Yes, the old plan didn't last very long! Each day, I weigh myself and I know what my weight is quite accurately due to various methods. I ask myself a question: am I 700g or more lighter than 7 days ago? If the answer is yes, $2 goes into my container. If not, $2 goes into my pocket, to be dropped somewhere on the pavement or left on a seat or table somewhere public. Since I don't know what I weighed a week ago, I shall assume that I'm losing weight and place $2 each day for the first week. I will also try to take one photograph with my current camera each day. That my motivate me more to lose weight.

Time to get back on the horse!

I feel as if I'm treading water here, just maintaining and not putting any real effort into losing weight. That is so true, I have to finish my diet before I get married (probably in October) and I'm sick of having this 'I'm on a diet, but I'm not acting like that I'm on one' feeling.

I got broadband a week ago, and had a look at Renee Gets Fit. She had this video blog entry where she says that she'll buy heaps of things when she finishes her diet. Well, I want that. Or more specifically, I want a better digital camera. I just got an insurance replacement for the one that was stolen in the burglary, and it's not that great. The LCD display is too small, since I like to view photos on the screen, that is an issue for me. An important issue. Also, the resolution would be double my current resolution (8MP vs 4MP). It's a Kodak C875.

So my plan, similar to Renee's is to put away money, $10 per kg towards the camera. That's good, but I want to lose weight quickly, not slowly. So what's the plan for that? Each week (on a Sunday), I have $5 that can either be placed in the (sealed) jar if I have lost 700g or more, or the money is simply given away. That's right, left in the library, dropped onto the pavement, something like that. Since I hate wasting money, that's my disincentive to gain weight or be stable.

I'm back

My apologies for not having updated the blog for some time. My computer was being fiddled with, then it was Christmas, and then New Year, so finally I'm back. I've put on about 1.5kg but that's ok because most people put on weight over Christmas. My diet restarts about 3:30pm this afternoon, no sugar, flour or fried food. Let the losing weight begin!