Sardoni

So I've maintained my routine. I did miss a Wednesday in my M,W,F routine because my sleep schedule got messed up and I couldn't be bothered. HOWEVER I'm pleased to announce that I've lost another 15.4 pounds. I started this journey on March 10th and in two months I've lost 32 pounds. To recap the major highlights. I only drink water or orange juice. Most days it's just water. I've cut out milk, cheese, grains, bread, dairy, sugar all together (with a few exceptions). Some of the frozen foods my family picked up to help me out have wheat. The baked beans used maple syrup (which I guess is better than sugar all together), but all in all I've definitely changed my eating habits for the better. We still have candy, ice cream, cereal, and all the old junk that used to dominate my eating habits in the house, but I have had no desire to eat any of those things. If I feel the need to eat a snack I've been grabbing bacon or left over veggies. It really isn't as hard as I thought it would be. I'm still on body-weight training phase 1, but it continues to be a challenge. I haven't graduated from inverted pushups to knee ups yet. I did shift to prisoner squats from just regular squats. My planking is still on my knees but I'm holding it for up to 30 seconds now (instead of 15). I've decreased my time walking around the block to just doing once around the block. It is just .6 miles all told, but I'm focusing on doing it faster each day. Once I can do it without needing to drink water constantly (which water is good but I'm using that to gauge my level of winded-ness if that makes sense) then I'll add in a second lap. All in all on M, W, F it takes me about 40 minutes to do the body-weight routine (this includes the warm up and the cooldown) and then I got for about a 15 minute walk around the block. On Su, M, Tu, Th, Sa I do a 15-30 minute walk around the block. I've also been eating about 2,000 calories a day (I'm 6 foot 3 inches (190.5 cm.)). Most of the time less than that. I don't plan on setting a hard calorie number until I hit a plateau. Since I've lost 32 lbs so far I think I'm okay with what I've been doing. I went from 417 lbs March 10th to 385 lbs on May 10th. I see it in my face, and I see it sort of in my clothes, but I'm not going to argue with the scale. I spoiled myself a little yesterday when I had a sweet tea and later a Gatorade. I noticed there was more sugar than I was happy with so I only drank half of each of them. As we speak I have a flank steak slow cooking with green beans, sweet potatoes, onions, bell peppers, and celery. All that in some beef both with garlic, a little ginger and lemon pepper seasonings. That should be portioned out over the rest of the week (if it survives the rest of the household tonight lol). Last week I had some hamburger meat so I tossed that in the slowcooker with some fresh brocolli, onions, and bell pepper. It stayed in for too long, but it was still sooooo good. It ended up being like a mashed up soupy liquid after storing it. So I used that vegetable brothy mixture to add into my scrambled eggs in the morning. I brought some to my mom and she ate the whole thing. I told her it had sweet potatoes in it and she usually hates sweet potatoes lol. I know I've been bad about updating, but that hasn't stopped me from maintaining my diet and at least a 15 minute walk around the block each day. Originally I needed to post here daily to help develop my habit. I've got it down without needing to hold myself accountable somewhere else. I've even got my mom going "Damn! 32 lbs? I gotta do whatever you're doing this summer!" I think I'm proof positive that small changes can add up over time... even in just two months! I with you luck with your own fitness goals! I'll still be around!

Sorry for the delay in updating! Usually I needed making these posts as a way to keep me accountable to a routine (think of it as my own self-motivating tactic). I've neglected updating for a number of reasons (some illnesses struck my family), but I forgot that others might be inspired by my actions, so I'll be more diligent even if I don't "need" to do this as much for myself anymore. So a week in review eh? I've stuck to the M,W,F body-weight exercises! Still doing Level 1, but I added in 10 inverted rows to up the difficulty for myself a bit. I'm still not to a point where I can graduate from inclined pushups to even knee ups, but I'm continuing with the activities for now. And it's not for want of trying. I'm listening to my body and I don't want to twist my knee again. I'm hoping to get more of this fat off my body so moving into different exercises puts lets stress on my joints. Still focusing on the baby steps. I've also regulated myself to doing two brisk laps around the block on my non-strength days (1.4 miles total). I want to work in a speed up, slow down routine (can't remember the right word atm lol), but I find it hard to keep time in my head as I try to regulate that myself. Treadmills force you to do it whether you like it or not. I have a treadmill in storage but I need to lose more weight before I meet the minimum weight capacity to use it. I think I also have an old exercise bike, but I remember being too tall for it. I'll be shuffling around some rooms in the house later in the week-ish so maybe I'll dig that out in the meantime to see (at the very least get rid of it if it's no use to me). I've also been making meals in advance (specifically breakfasts). I actually got my mom to start making breakfasts in the morning too. I made her three days worth of breakfasts (green peppers, onions, scrambled eggs, diced ham in coconut oil). Didn't tell her about the coconut oil. Didn't tell her each tupperware only had one egg (she thought they had two). She reported back that it was delicious and filled her up for the through lunch. Then I broke the news to her and she was surprised. Right now I've got a savory chicken slow cooking following this recipe: http://www.lifewith4boys.com/2013/01/paleo-savory-cinnamon-slow-cooker.html I was out of nutmeg so I substituted ginger. I was also out of chicken broth so I used a cup of water with a tablespoon of soy sauce. Should turn out well and something I can portion for the rest of the week. I also added celery. I'm tempted to throw a sweet potato in there, but I think there's enough veggie goodness packed in there. As I look back to last month the only "cheat day" I had was when I didn't walk one Saturday and just took it as a day of rest. I maintained the diet at all times thankfully! Nerd news: Been watching the development of Crowfall closely and semi-excited to maybe finally have meaningful objective based open world PVP in my MMO again. A bit jaded in the MMO industry lately so I'm tempered by the years of wasted spending. Also binged watched all of Game of Thrones to catch up. And also just binge watched Daredevil on Netflix. It was surprisingly more dark and gritty then I expected, but I liked it. Also just wrapped up Tokyo in Secret World. I liked Tokyo, but I'm not a fan of their new "you can only damage this thing if you're wearing the right color thing" mechanic. Seems tedious for the sake of tedium and leveling that system up doesn't help you in any other current area of the game. Three cheers for a new week! I actually did end up buying into the academy a little over a month ago and the videos and exercise plans have helped me out immensely. Thanks for the goal setting tips I might incorporate some of those in other ways! One day I'll even fit into the super-suit! Sorry! Just got busy with other things! I'll remake this a priority! I still don't have a working camera, but I'll put that on my agenda for real. Actually when I was cleaning out my closet I found my old 35mm, but what are we savages? I know I should document some photos, but I prefer to just keep on keeping on. I'd rather look into the mirror some day and not recognize myself in a positive manner rather than maintain a photo journey. But I'll keep an eye out for a cheap digital camera when I go shopping.

It was pouring down raining yesterday (still is a bit today as I write this) but I still went around the block twice briskly. I came back drenched but I did it lol. I'm not up to sprinting just yet, but I think I'm going to keep going for twice around the block and keep upping the intensity in which I walk. Maybe this will help me walk further at a lower intensity. It makes sense in my brain but my brain hasn't always gotten things correct. I woke up this morning pretty early and I decided to make some breakfast. I actually started to pay attention to serving sizes. So I took a small spoonful of coconut oil to grease the pan, scrambled one egg, put two sausage patties (jimmy dean) in the microwave while I was scrambling, and finally steamed some broccoli. The broccoli bag said it was for four servings so I scrambled up another egg and two more sausage patties and put that in Tupperware for tomorrow's breakfast. Also portioned the remaining broccoli into two separate containers for later meals. I didn't even add seasonings or butter or anything that I might have used to do. It was still appetizing and I'm surprised that one egg filled me up. Usually I go for two or three. Maybe that's just because of what I was in the habit of doing and not because of what I should have been doing. And still I continue having only drank water for about a week now. I have low sodium V8, orange juice, and some Odwalla fruit smoothie things still in the fridge, but I may just give them away to my family because I don't find myself "wanting" those things anymore. I could drink them because they are there (and probably out of boredom more than anything else)... or I could just drink water and keep losing weight. I think I'm going for the weight loss. I contemplated having some of that during a time where I might not feel hungry but still feel a sense of obligation to consume a meal... but then I realized I can just drink .5L+ of water and probably not be hungry... so I'm going with the water. It is increasingly weird how all this is working out. I'd hate to say that I expected it to be harder... but I really expected it to be harder. There's still breads and pastas in the house. There's still ice cream in the freezer. There's still grits, oatmeal, cereal, and stuffs in the cupboards. But lately any time I'm hungry I go for the fridge and get a meat and vegetables. I think once last month I had a peanut butter craving (I think that might end up being my weakness ), so I had half a tablespoon of peanut butter with a banana and a pickle spear (not all combined together... ugh... that taste sticks in the mouth now lol). And I did that in lieu of a meal so it wasn't something "extra" I had. A friend of mine was telling me about this things called Peanut Butter burgers and at first I was horrified, but now I think I'm curious. Not enough to ever make them on my own, but if I ever make a trip to New York (where he is) I may have to try one of those... without the bun of course! Today is a strength training day, so I'll be off to do Body-weight 1-A again. I think I'm going add in inverted rows and just make that my routine until I can up the difficulty. I'll just be listening to my body. And not in the way that my body might say "Don't do this" (which again hasn't happened yet... if anything my inner monologues are kicking my own butt harder lol). Thanks for the words of encouragement. I'm not going to steer too far out of the comfort zone, but like this morning for breakfast it only took me a few extra seconds to be mindful of the serving size. I think that might be a stepping stone to calorie counting! And surprisingly I do think the water is keeping me full. My mom told me I should drink 1L before every meal, so I don't eat as much and just the thought of chugging water just to chug water doesn't sit well with me overall. Even without doing that implicitly I still feel like I'm eating less overall. Also I don't really eat "three meals a day" lately. I only eat when I'm hungry and the past few weeks that's really only been two meals. I keep a bottle of water next to me at pretty much all hours of the day. Sometimes I look over and see that it's still relatively full and feel obligated to drink some of it so it doesn't feel bad. Like my water bottle has feelings or something lol. Whatever works eh? And thanks on the congrats. With all the stories I've heard from other people I actually expected to gain weight the first month (since I was also doing strength training etc). Or that I would've lost water weight, but gained muscle weight so it would've shown no progress. But hey I'm not going to look a gift horse in the mouth! I think I'll just step onto the scale every month and see where I'm at. Seems like a logical pattern.

So even though I set myself a goal to not weigh myself until I could zip up my N7 Hoodie I realized that I wanted to see more how much progress (if any) I'd made in a month. On 3/13/2015 I weighed myself and came in at 417 lbs. On 4/12/2015 I weighted myself and came in at 400.2 lbs. Even though it might be mostly water weight I am still pretty shocked to have dropped 17 lbs so far without really doing a whole lot. I want to clarify that clearly I've changed a lot with my diet, starting up a walking routine every day, and doing body-weight exercises on M,W,F... but in my mind I feel like I could be doing so much more. I hit another milestone in my book yesterday. I've never been huge on "portion control." To clarify if I make a bag of steamed veggies even if it says "serving size per container 3.5" Usually I've just been splitting that in half and putting away the rest for later or if I'm really hungry that bag serves 1. So I was grilling up two hamburger patties, some sweet potato fries in the oven, and a drained can of peas. Usually I'd be cutting up the hamburger patties and putting them into a salad or between a lettuce leaf to fake a bun. This time however after cutting up the one patty and eating it with the peas and some fries I realized I didn't need to eat the other one. So I took the other patty with the extra pees and put it in Tupperware for later. When I realized I made too many fries in the past usually I would just scarf them down anyway. Instead I gave them to my mom (who also had never had them) and she didn't mind them either. So now I'm sort of more aware of serving size and my stomach seems to want less so yay! Now I just have to look up what sort of calories a 400 lbs. 6 foot 3 inches (190.5 cm) male is support to ingest and figure out how to incorporate that into my weight loss routine. Some friends have told me that counting calories helps with weight loss (or at least eating to my caloric deficit or something). I doubt they are wrong; however focusing on the small changes up to this point have started to lead me in that direction rather than force myself down the path. I think I'll keep listening to my body for now and only eating when I'm hungry while also only eating paleo centric. Haven't had dairy, bread, pasta, corn, or refined sugars in a month! Well the bread one might not be entirely accurate because my grandma's meatloaf was eaten and even though it's chock full of onions and bell peppers I think she uses bread crumbs. So that's been the extent of my bread consumption this month lol. Up to 2L of water a day consistently with no other liquid calories. Really trying to force myself up to 3L for the quest.

So I think I'm going to stop updating the food journal because by this point I'm pretty sure I've established proper eating habits. If I come across any amazing recipes or anything like that I might update that. I think I'll keep a liquid log though as I scare away the non-waters. Tuesday: I went around the block twice at a brisker intensity for 1.2 miles. 2L of water no other liquid. Wednesday: I didn't feel up to risking the strength training on my knee yet (even those this was a day I had scheduled). I actually went around the block 4 times for 2.4 miles. I stopped at the halfway mark to get more water at home, but then kept going. The knee was behaving so I wasn't complaining. 2L of water today with 1 small glass of OJ. I actually didn't have "dinner" but ended up having a banana, table spoon of peanut butter and the OJ. Thursday: Usually not a strength training day but I wanted to do it today since I missed Monday and Wednesday. I completed the full circuit of Body-weight 1 A. I've been neglecting to do B because I don't have a table that could support me or a bar. I figure at least continuing to do A is the right thing to do since I am exercising. I might add in inverted rows in the future just to up the difficulty a little bit. Still on inverted pushups but still challenging overall so don't see the need to advance too quickly. 2.5L of water only. Friday: I did a brisk/sprint around the block once for .6 miles and was pretty wiped. Since I did strength yesterday I was just going to wait until Monday to reset the week. 1.5L of water only. Even though I'm not updating this daily as I used to I'm still maintaining the habits I wanted to distill. 4/10 is my one month anniversary of joining this site and getting going and the habits are still going strong! Well hopefully I can make my fiction more interesting then my life

Thursday I managed to walk around the block three times for 1.8 miles. Yay! I made a sausage/egg/broccoli/cauliflower medley and had that for late lunch/dinner. Late night snack I had a pickle spear and a piece of ham lunch meat. So Friday. I had the sausage/egg/broccoli/cauliflower medley for breakfast. I was doing the body-weight 1 exercises and my knee twisted/popped out of joint when transitioning from planking to jumping jacks on the second circuit. It got a bit swollen, but it didn't feel sprained. I stopped right there. I did force myself to go walk around the block once (probably to my own detriment). I've sprained this knee before a while ago when I was in high school. That took about 3 weeks to recover from. This doesn't feel the same as it did back then. For lunch I had this prepackaged salad that my dad brought me. It had blue cheese crumbles in it that I did my best to pick out. I didn't put any dressing on it. I think I managed to ingest some of the blue cheese crumbles though because my body responded violently about an hour later. Compounded with the knee out of join it was a lovely day! lol So Saturday and Sunday I just kept my leg elevated and just rested (not because it was Holy Saturday and Easter Sunday ). I did put an ice pack on it on Friday, but didn't feel the need for the ice pack on Saturday or Sunday. I did keep stretching that leg to keep it flexible. I've kept to the new style of eating. On Saturday we actually had one lean cuisine meatloaf and red potato thing left in the freezer, so I did have that for dinner while having the remainder of the sausage/egg/broccoli/cauliflower medley for lunch. I've tried to avoid those frozen meals but I was trying to keep my leg elevated. On Sunday I avoided much of the Easter foods. I did manage to grab some turkey and ham. Most of the vegetables were covered in creams or cheeses or bread crumbles so I avoided them. Really all I had yesterday (Sunday) was two hard boiled eggs and two pieces of bacon for lunch. Then turkey and ham for lunch and dinner lol. I didn't get enough veggies yesterday for sure. Should've steamed some broccoli. Also Thursday, Friday, Saturday, and Sunday (and well today) I've also had nothing but water to drink. Only up to 2L so trying to get to 3L for the "challenge to count." I guess you could say I shifted my focus from exercise to diet for the time being until I feel confident to push my knee. I hate not being able to jump up and go when I want to. I am stretching my knee and making sure it's flexible. It doesn't hurt today as much but I think I'm going to give it until tomorrow. Today (Monday) is a strength day on the calendar. I'll have to mark that one as not complete. As much as I want to lose this weight I don't want to do and lose a limb along the way. I guess that would be a different way to lose the weight though. I'm sticking with the water/paleo style of eating for sure until I feel steady on the knee. Nerd news: since I've had to keep the knee elevated I started playing Secret World again with some friends over Friday/Saturday/Sunday. I've always enjoyed that games puzzles even though most of the other content still feels a bit buggy after 3 years. It took my mind off the knee. Although as my character was sprinting around and jumping over fences it really made me want to go out and briskly walk. Pace myself. I guess I'm glad that I'm seeing that mindset shift in me more than anything. I also gave him sweatpants and a workout look overall lol. I think that's how I torture myself. Yeah sorry I hit sort of a rut when I twisted my knee out of join on Friday. I updated everything above

Monday I managed to move onto the Bodyweight Level 1 routine. I thought it was going to be easier than the Recruit workout, but boy was I wrong. I managed to complete all the circuit but I was more wiped than the recruit workout. So... yay! I also did a walk around the block (15-20 mins) for 0.6 miles. I had a light dinner with two pieces of bacon, banana, and a piece of ham. Only drank water all day, but only 1.5 L Tuesday I at the remainder of the sausage vegetable medley for breakfast. For lunch I did some more of the Italian sausage soup. For dinner I did the rest of the tenderloin cooked with some onions, red peppers, cauliflower, and celery. So good. It was 80 degrees with 80% humidity, so I only managed to walk once around the block pretty briskly to get out of the heat. Only drank water all day. about 2L Wednesday I woke up late and skipped breakfast. Only drank water so far today. Did the body-weight 1 workout again. I accidentally clicked on the body-weight level 4 workout and my jaw dropped at the stuff I couldn't do yet. Then I went.. oh wait... this isn't level 1 lol. I went for another walk around the block after (0.6 miles). Then I came home and grilled up some hamburger meat with celery, onions, bell pepper, cauliflower and had that for dinner. A small bowl's worth. Also had about 2L of water so far today (almost up to 3) but the night isn't over yet! I also noticed the neighborhood dogs are getting used to me. They don't bark as much. I also realized that nearly a third of my neighbors seem to own dogs that they keep outside a majority of the time (at least all this time I've been walking ). I only notice because of the Lady and the Tramp style barks that transcend me walking. At long as the first dog doesn't bark none of them do. So I always hope for some peace and quiet but rarely get it. I've learned to tune them out. Also there's a man in a wheelchair I always see and salute as I walk by. I've started to notice trends in the neighborhood. Oh and a good news milestone-ish. Remember how I said I couldn't close the top velcro thing on my new shoes? As of yesterday I could. So at least I seem to be losing foot fat at the very least. Still not stepping onto the scale until I can zip up the hoodie!

Sunday. I splurged on breakfast with 4 pieces of bacon, two hard boiled eggs and orange juice. They were small pieces but who are we kidding For dinner I had a tenderloin steak with lots of asparagus. So good. No condiments. My mom loves her A7 sauce but I think that's a tragedy on any steak myself. Did 1.2 miles (two laps) around the block. Monday I had two pieces of bacon, two hard boiled eggs, and a fruit smoothie thing. I then crashed hard (had an interview early and stayed up all night instead of sleeping like a normal person ). I woke up and was starving so I had 3 small bowls of homemade Italian sausage soup. The only "non-paleo" thing in it I think was white beans but overall it was nummy vegetable delight. Now I'm off to do my body-weight exercises and then a brisk walk around the block. I'm going to try and make it through all three circuits again last I did on Friday. I'm not going to kill myself trying to top it just yet. A friend of mine introduced me to trip-hop music recently and then threw a giant youtube play list my way. So I think I'm going to find a way to make it portable. I've just been walking around without music, but we'll see how that goes. I haven't looked back all that much just yet, but I do acknowledge that progress is being made. I had to throw out one pair of sweats because they were falling off me (which is a good sign) but to be fair they were already a bit lose before I started this process. I shouldn't balk at any form of progress but I keep looking forward. Once some of these other sweats start falling off THEN I might be more convinced . I have more energy overall that's for sure. I used to be at the mercy of sugar crashes/caffeine crashes and now I just really drink water and the fruit drinks are my only sugar source. I'll probably stop buying orange juice, but we'll see how it all pans out. Personally I'm terrible at smoothie recipes. To be fair I've been picking up the ones at the grocery store that just have real ingredients on the label. I think Odwalla is the brand. I want to get to that point to where I'm stockpiling fruit and making my own but I'm also dragging the rest of the household along with me (sometimes kicking and screaming) and they're not big fruit eaters . Right now those replace any soda/sweet craving I might get but they are still empty calories overall. Since I'm trying to lose weight I need to leave them alone. Awesome job on the tea replacement! I feel like I have more energy but I won't say that I feel like I've lost weight. That's fine though. I just keep moving forward. As long as I keep the momentum before long I should see the results I want. At most I'm spending an hour doing a workout routine of some sort (either prepping for it or what you). There's 23 other hours in the day for me to do other things. I can't really fault that math lol.

So on Friday I did my recruit workout fully! (Yay) I had to trim down some of the lunges to 10 instead of 20 (they kick my butt more than anything else) but yay circuits. I skipped breakfast and for lunch/dinner I had two hamburgers chopped up into a salad that was tomatoes, lettuces, carrots strips, and cucumbers with no dressing. Was still delicious. Also had about 2 oz woth of peanuts throughout the day snacking and a tall glass of orange juice. Went through four .5L bottles of water. I also did another .6 mile brisk walk around the block (20 mins roughly). Saturday I woke up early and took two chicken/pork sausages and diced them up. Grilled them up with a whole white onion and green bell pepper (also diced). Then added about 8 eggs to scamble into the mix. Fried all that up together and fed the household. Portioned a bit of it for Sunday breakfast. They were amazed it was as good as it was because it had some many veggies. Today is my rest day (and my back was hurting) so I did a walk around the block for .6 miles. As dinner crept up I was tempted with hot dogs and baked beans. So I sliced up the hot dogs small and dumped them in with some baked beans. If anything that's my first "cheat thing," but even beans are somewhat paleo! Drinking another fruit smoothie before bed. I need to get more veggies in my diet and the grocery shopping is done and the freezer is jam packed as well as the veggie drawer. It's also neat after spending the last 3-ish weeks walking the block to notice patterns to some of the residents. I wave at some and briefly chat with others as I power walk by. The other night the sky was so clear I could see the thumbnail moon. I probably could've walked more just to look at that but I was a bit winded. Today I watched a crow/raven fight with some smaller birds over something. Lasted a while and they chased each other down the street. Little things you don't notice until you're just walking around.

Ack forgot to update yesterday. Ran out of eggs so I had 6 sausages and a fruit smoothie for breakfast. For lunch I had a cobb salad (turkey, egg, bacon). Label said it was 250 calories (and I threw away the dressing and had it plain). For dinner I had the rest of the prime steak and broccoli. I was hungrier today. Maybe from the strength training yesterday? /shrug Did 1.2 miles today (roughly 30 mins brisk walking around the neighborhood). It is getting easier thankfully! And since I'm about to go to sleep now (stayed up late chatting/gaming with friends again) I had two more sausages a few hours ago. They are tiny ones but meh. Food log! I've really got to get some easy-to-snack on veggies. Also my parents are evil. They bought me a new air freshener and it's cinnamon roll scented. Even after spraying it a few times I still wasn't hungry for bread so yay? Haven't decided what I'll eat tomorrow but I've got plenty of stuff to dig through. Hope everyone else is making positive progress

I ate the hamburger meat stuffs last night for a late dinner. I also stayed up later than I should of chatting with a friend, but no ragrats! He also convinced me I should watch Game of Thrones (never read/saw any of it), so now I'm on season 1 episode 3. Sigh. Needless to say I woke up late and skipped breakfast. For an early dinner I made cheese pizza for the rest of the house hold and I made myself prime beef steak with broccoli. I cut the steak in half and portioned half of the broccoli for later. It was funny when my mom saw what I was eating she was like "Wow, yours looks much better." I also grilled up some sausages for later breakfasts. Sadly they have honey and brown sugar so I might just stick to bacon. I started the recruit workout. Made it through the warm up (yay). Made it through two circuits. (yay!) Then I took a small break and was able to get through the next set of inverted rows before I stopped. So almost through a full three circuits! (yay!) Then I went and did a 0.6 mile walk. To clarify a brisk walk takes me 15-20 minutes to do .6 miles and I don't take a break or stop. When I leave the house I keep going. For the first time I wasn't winded at the end. So yay! I'm not really hungry. I mean my goal is to lose weight, but not sure if I could be concerned that one meal is getting me through the day. I did have a glass of orange juice just now and up to 4 glasses of water. I'm not intentionally starving myself so not sure. I'm sure I'll get up and grab a salad here in a bit. Mainly I'm surprised I'm not craving much at all this far along. So yay?

I stayed up way later than I should have playing the new episode of Life is Strange with some friends in team speak. So amazing. I now want DontNod to make more adventure games. Also Dreamfall: Chapters is also a wild ride. When I did wake up I took the hamburger meat concoction and added 4 eggs and scrambled them. Portioned half of it for tomorrow and ate the remaining half for a late breakfast. So good. I'm about to head out for my walk. I'm still a bit sore from strength training yesterday so I'll debate if I want to interval style walking or just do another 1.2 miles. I know the goal is always do a little bit more than the day before but when you're walking a block it's hard to stop halfway and go back home. I'll debate this. I might just push myself harder the last half or something. Don't have any immediate dinner plans but I did pick up some ready made salads so I might just have that. Best thing I can suggest is when you feel full drink a glass of water and give yourself 15 minutes before you start to eat again. Maybe the time mixed with the glass of water will make you stop? Just an idea. I know about the photos... ugh. I still haven't gotten a replacement for my digital camera. I looked it up online but it's discontinued. Those suckers aren't cheap. I'll go through some storage boxes and see if I can't find maybe a web cam somewhere. It'll take potato photos but at least I'll have some photos. Thanks I'm taking a one day at a time thing. My parents are still eating ice cream sandwiches and all sort of stuff, but I don't find myself craving them. I know it's a mentality shift in me personally. At this current stage in my fitness world (which is at the very start since I'm week 3) I won't allow myself to allow myself to want those things. I know that's a confusing sentence, but bear with me. My mom was diagnosed with diverticulitis (as was my grandmother). The tl;dr on that means they can't eat corn or nuts or small things that have a chance to get stuck in their intestines. They were basically told to stop eating those food or risk dying. That's a bit extreme (since most of the time it's just very bad discomfort with the potential of bad bacteria forming), but that's what they both convinced themselves of. Now I won't say I've completely said "eat cake and you'll die" but I've sort of shoved junk food into that category. Junk food doesn't provide me with anything my body needs to be healthy. Period. So while I may have cravings for cake or ice cream I instead go for the fruit smoothies I've got prepped and in the fridge already. Brownies are on the counter while we speak, but I don't want them. When I visualize where that brownie will be in a week when I eat it and if a week from now I'll be in better shape because I ate it; I know the answer is no. The immediate gratification of eating that brownie I've tried to move to other things... like fruit. Once I get to a more fit level I might allow myself some of these "treats," but if I forward think enough what I'd probably end up doing is making it less of a treat and more of a fitness goal. Example if that treat is 400 calories I'm going to do a workout beforehand to burn 400 more calories before consuming it. Most people seem to feel the need to "work it off afterwards" and that seems a bit counter intuitive to me. Granted my knowledge of fitness isn't that great but I'm just basing it off my own brand of common sense. It could very well be an innate willpower thing. I wouldn't go so far as to say it can't be learned. When I quit smoking I quit cold turkey. When I quit drinking I also quit cold turkey. When I quit soda I also quit cold turkey (but this one I did have a few sprites when my stomach was upset). I guess I just try not to let outside influences control me. My parents still smoke up the house with their cigarettes but I don't crave it. I just acknowledge that stuff exists and don't process it as something I want to do. Not sure if that makes sense. A friend of mine linked me this Paleo mug cake recipe. I haven't tried it yet (ingredients on the grocery list already) but he swears by it. So maybe another approach could be that you need to surround yourself with snacks or sweets that adhere more to your own nutrition/fitness goals. I'm sure there are plenty of healthy tasty alternatives out there that might satisfy a sweet tooth. I don't feel the need to eat it, but my mom wants to join my new style of eating and I can already predict she's going to need things like this. I don't mind the off-topics. We're all here to help each other so do your thing

Last night I did 1.2 miles (twice around the block). When I got back I ended up making up a chicken/broccoli/cauliflower/carrot medley. I portioned half of it away for tomorrow. I got off to a late start this morning so I skipped breakfast. For lunch I finished off the chicken/broccoli/cauliflower/carrot stuffs from last night. For dinner I made up some hamburger meat, a whole onion (diced), a green pepper (diced), tomatoes (sliced/diced/seeded), caramelized some tomato paste and fried up the veggies in that. Then added the meat and spiced it up. Used some cumin, lemon pepper, thyme, oregano. No salt. I made up white rice for my mom to put that over it. Took the flour tortillas leftover from the other night and put the meat creation between 4 of those and made sort of a faux lasagna creation-dish for my dad. Then I made up some french style green beans for myself and just had the meat by itself with that. Everyone enjoyed their food. I attempted the recruit workout again (since M, W, F are my strength days). Made it through the warm-up and two circuits. I then went out and walked once around the block for .6 miles. I'm pooped. Not hungry at all though so yay. I did sort of create a goal for myself. Intentionally or unintentionally I've been working out with my old N7 hoodie. I bought it ages ago when Mass Effect 2 came out I think. Well it's a 2x and it doesn't zip up. So I think what I'm going to do is just continue walking/working out with this hoodie and by the time I can zip it up... that's when I'll step back on the scale to see my progress. That way I'm not focused on the scale I'm focused on getting my clothes to fit. That might help motivate me some more (I do like that hoodie). I stepped on the scale 3 weeks ago and it said 417 lbs. I know... phew huh? But I've made some positive changes to my diet and other habits so it'll only improve over time! I'd like to say I'm making pop culture references but they are a bit dated lol. We're all here to learn from each other. Glad to see someone else beat me to answering your class question! I'm an aspiring assassin but starting out as an adventurer for now

Yesterday (Saturday) I had two sunny side up eggs, with two pieces of bacon and some green grapes. I was going to have some cantaloupe along with it but I quickly realized I still don't like cantaloupe after trying a piece. For both lunch I had chicken and broccoli. I made two portions to have some the following day, but I ended up being hungry for dinner. I also did once around the block (.6 miles) before I went to bed. I stayed up later than I should have gaming with some friends, but we had a blast. ------------- Today I woke up late (but hey it's Sunday) and my grandma brought over some bbq ribs, baked beans (with onions), potato salad, pasta salad and home made bread for lunch/breakfast. I only ate the bbq ribs and baked beans. I declined the rest. It wasn't hard to not eat those things as I thought it might be (grandmas make the best homemade food ._.). I actually stripped the ribs and added them to a salad I made with bell pepper and spinach. So far that's the only thing I've eaten today except for a coffee mug full of the odwalla strawberry banana smoothie stuff. I'm not actually as hungry today as I was yesterday. It's kind of strange. I'll be heading out for my walk soon. My new shoes came in the mail yesterday (14 double wides). I got velcro because I thought it would be easier to manage and the top velcro part won't close. So sigh. I'll be getting some more velcro. The shoes fit snugly though as long as I don't run (which I can't run much anyway) so I'll be fine for a while. The only thing that brought me here to Nerd Fitness was that I made a choice for myself that it was time to stop being a prisoner in my own body. No one else, through teasing or well mannered intentions, ever phrased it in quite such a way. If I were to look back and remember those people who made fun of me the only thing I would feel would be pity. Mainly because it's a shame they didn't take the time to get to know me beyond how I looked. Their loss! Thank you for the kind words!

So yesterday did the hamburger dinner (sans bun) as planned. Also made up some french fries for the house hold. Had no desire to eat them... or cheese. It's weird it's like I flipped a switch in my head. I wasn't sure if pickles were paleo friendly or not... so if not that's my cheat item. My dad picked up these Odwalla fruit smoothie things and since I don't eat enough fruit I thought they might be a good source of fruit for the time being. Then I realized (after I drank one of the small ones) that it contained milk. So -shakes angry fist- hehe. I'll check the ingredients more closely next time but it was kind of him to get them for me so I won't look a gift horse in the mouth. I fried up the bacon after everyone was good and fed. I snuck one piece while cooking and tucked the rest away for later in the week. For breakfast this morning I had two hard boiled eggs, two pieces of bacon, and one of the banana/strawberry/blackberry/blueberry fruit juice drinks (no added sugar or weirdly pronounced ingredients). I have to make a note to pick up some kale (never had it; never heard of it before this site). For lunch I had a salad with spinach leaves, cabbage, baby tomatoes, cucumbers, ham/turkey/bacon (sliced up small from the night before) with a pomegranate vinaigrette drizzle (didn't put on a lot of dressing and it was much sweeter than I expected). I designated today as a strength day and I made it through two circuits of the recruit workout (10 incline pushups, 15 squats, 10 inverted dumbell each arm (used a gallon jug of water lol), 15 lunges, and :15 plank. Then my body started making more creaks than I was used to hearing so I took that as my stopping point. I'm pooped. I might go for a walk later this evening but as it stands I'm sore from pushing myself to do that (first time I was able to complete one set let alone a second one... so woo!). For dinner I might do chicken and broccoli. I think the chicken I still have in the freezer still has a teriyaki glaze. If so that'll have been my only non-fruit source of sugar in two weeks. I didn't realize there was a section suited more toward that. Once I hit a milestone I'll probably migrate over to that section (unless an angry mod appears and thumps me on the head sooner! ) I appreciate the tip either way. It's something I'll keep in mind. At the very least if it's not something I incorporate it might help someone else that stumbles on this thread to read it. Win-win either way!