In a previous blog, I talked about how I lost 25 lbs in 2 months. Since then, I’ve lost another 8 lbs and hovering at 200 lbs. But it’s gotten very hard to get that damn scale to show me a number starting with a “1”. I haven’t been this light in a very long time. And I can feel my size 36″ pants loosening up. My goal is to comfortably sit in a size 34″ pair of pants. But making gains is much harder for me now because, well frankly, there’s less of me to lose!
Now, I know what you’re thinking:
- Michael, you’re cheating! There was Halloween and then Thanksgiving. You must have indulged. Answer: NOPE! I avoided all candy and treats and had salmon and veggies for Thanksgiving. Ask my wife. She’ll tell you how determined I was then / am now.
- Michael, you’re not monitoring! Actually, I’m monitoring everything using MyFitnessPal app. This App (I think I paid $70 for the full app for the year) is WELL WORTH IT and you should get it now. I love being able to input my daily intake of food, water and exercise. I also set my caloric limit to 1500. Basically, everything I’ve read says that I need to end up with a deficit of 3500 calories in order to burn 1 lb of fat. THAT IS HARD! So I take my time by allowing myself to have a deficit of around 1750 every day or two so that I can lose 1 lb of fat every 2-3 days. It was working really really well for a long time, but then I hit the dreaded plateau.
- Michael, you’re eating sugar! Nope. Still sticking to my diet, but even cleaner now. In fact, I’ve got so much wine in my office that I’m giving it away to dentists at our events / conferences / seminars. So no sugar!
- Michael, you’re not sleeping properly! This may be quasi-correct. I do find that with all the pent up energy I have from not eating sugar, that I’m not getting more than 7 hours of sleep (I’m hovering around 5-6 hours a night and I feel great when I wake up). As per my previous blog, I’m using my Oura Ring to track everything.
So why am I stuck? I think it’s basically as I said before: there’s less of me to lose. So I need to crank up my efforts.
And here’s how I adjusted in order to start losing again (albeit in smaller amounts):
- Meditation / Mindfulness. I’m thinking about this more and more. Just enjoying the here and now. Breathing is so important. It’s amazing how so many of us don’t know how to properly breathe. I just heard yesterday that, through breathing techniques, we can actually trigger certain parts of our brain which are activated through drug use! Wahh???
- Lower Fats / Increase Protein: ok, this is something new I’m trying. I’m moving away from Keto and moving towards Paleo. That means I’m having way more chicken, fish and protein shakes than I otherwise would. How much. Well, I’m trying to get my protein intake up to 100 grams per day. I’ve read that, given my body weight, it should be around 200 grams per day, but I just can’t do that much protein. I start to feel not so great. At the same time, I’m reducing my use of butter and coconut oil and sticking to avocados and nuts for healthy fats. I’m also reducing cheese (which I love) and cream in my coffee. But I still haven’t given up my whip cream in my coffee (that’s my treat).
- Increase Water / Decrease Salt: apparently, I’m supposed to drinking 3-4 litres of water a day (not including exercising or coffee). That’s tough, but apparently it helps make you feel full. I also love salt in certain things – like hot sauce. So I need to reduce the amount that I use.
- Increase Calories Burnt during a Workout: previously I measured that I burn about 500-750 calories per High Intensity Interval (HII) workouts that I do almost everyday for 30 minutes. Nowadays, I’m aiming to burn 1,000 calories during an hour long + workout session that involves weight and cardio. I also focussed on dancing (yes, I wrote dancing) that incorporates latin and soca moves that concentrate on core work. I found that dancing not only helps to SEAMLESSLY burn calories (because it’s fun), but also makes your core stronger.
- Intermittent Fasting: I’ve been changing this up. I used to go from 12 p.m. noon until 6:00 p.m. at night but now I feel hungry at around 9 a.m. so I just eat when I’m hungry and count 6 more hours from that time.
What else could I do? Here are a few options:
- Reduce Caloric Intake: I’m happy with my 1500 calories per day intake (3 square meals at 500 calories per meal), but I’m thinking I might need to decrease it to 400 calories per meal and end up with only 1200 calories per day (based on 3 meals). This is a bit extreme and I’m not yet ready to do that.
- Fasting: I haven’t gone down this road yet, and I’m not sure I would, but I’ve heard that there’s lots of benefits. I did try going 18 hours and I started to get a headache and I didn’t feel like I could just sleep it off. Once you get through that initial pain, however, I’ve heard that you feel full of energy. I might try this just for one day, but I’ll need to focus on drinking green tea and chicken broth (limited salt) that’s homemade and boiling for hours with veggies and spices.
Please keep in mind that I’m doing this on my own and I accept the risks; you should always consult your family doctor about whether you should be doing some or all of this stuff (Keto, Paleo, Intermittent Fasting, etc.).
Once I get down to 190 lbs, I think I might just stabilize and switch my diet to something more balanced. But the journey has been fun and I like looking at myself in the mirror more and more these days 😉 . Plus, my wife commented to me today that this is the best she’s ever seen me. Damn… Compliment and insult at the same time…
