My first second anniversary with Fla!

Nope, that wasn't a typo.  I really mean it when I say, "My first second anniversary" with Flaminia ("Fla"), my trainer.  As I explained under "The omens and the blue-haired tormentor," I met Fla on August 19, 2014, the day after I joined my gym, Total Woman.

Although we started training together that same week, once a week, it took me three months of stubbornness before I started listening to her.  Once I did, on November 29, 2014, I started seeing incredible success immediately.  Consequently, Fla and I have two anniversary dates:  when we met on August 19 and when I started listening to her on November 29.  So...today is our first second anniversary.

The highest number I ever saw on the scale in my lifetime was 306 lbs. in 2010.  I was almost 50 years old.  By the time I started my weight-loss journey two years later in December 2012 after joining Weight Watchers ("WW"), I was 52 years old and weighed about 300 lbs.  I had weighed about 300 lbs. for over a decade by that point.  Under WW, I lost about 40 lbs. during the next two years.  I actually lost 50 lbs. in several months, but then I got stuck on a long-term plateau.  By the time the plateau was over 16 months later, on November 29, 2014, I had regained over 10 lbs.

In any case, this is how my weight changed since meeting Fla:      

Met Fla on 08/19/14:                                          261 lbs.

Started listening to Fla on 11/29/14:             255 lbs.

Our first anniversary on 08/19/15:                196 lbs.

Our second anniversary, today 11/29/15:    184 lbs.  

 

In the last 15 months, since I met Fla, I've lost 77 lbs.!  This is incredible considering that before meeting her I was stuck on a plateau for more than a year during which time the scale wasn't cooperating at all.   

To date, I've lost a total of 122 lbs. since my heaviest weight of 306 lbs.  It's really shocking to realize that I've lost more than one-third  of my body size!  I find it incredibly sad that I got that big in the first place and lived like that for so many years.  I'm beyond ecstatic that I'm now seeing a "1" in front of my weight and that I'm far, far, far from the 300s.

The last time I weighed 184 lbs. was in the early 1980s when I was in my early 20s.  What's amazing, too, is that my body today at 184 lbs. is smaller than it was at the same exact weight many decades ago.  The reason is that now I have muscle which weighs more.  I'm also stronger and can do more physically than I could back then because of all the working out I've been doing - and that's despite having a bad knee which I didn't have in my 20s.  I often heard people say they were in better shape in their 40s and 50s than they were in their 20s and 30s, but I never believed it.  I kept thinking, "How can that be?  Age wears the body down."  But I understand it now because it applies to me, too.   

Once I started working in earnest with Fla, I lost 14 lbs. in one month.  Although my weight fluctuates every week (never mind daily), I averaged a loss of 7-10 lbs. a month after that.  In the last three or four months, however, I noticed that my weight loss has slowed down considerably.  Right now I'm averaging a loss of about 0-4 lbs. a month.  This would have driven the old me insane because I would have viewed such a meager loss as a failure and not worth the trouble.  The new me realizes that any  weight loss is a success.  It's certainly better than gaining!  Sure, I'd like to lose more and get to my goal faster, but losing weight is a daily struggle and my view now is that as long as I get to my goal eventually, that's all that matters.  As it is, my life has improved exponentially during the journey.  

The main reason, if not the only reason, that I'm not losing more faster is that I've never been perfect on my calories.  Yet I still managed to lose weight despite personal struggles, binging episodes, setbacks, injuries, ailments, and other life problems.  If I had been perfect on my calories every single day, I would have reached my goal many months ago, but I can never be perfect especially as it relates to food.  I decided when I started this journey that the only thing that works for me is to not deprive myself entirely every day because then I start obsessing about the foods I can't have and I end up sabotaging myself even worse.  If I indulge in satisfying my cravings now and then, this works best for me because I can lapse momentarily but will get back on track immediately.  This way I don't feel deprived.  Of course, I had to change how I view my food indiscretions.  Instead of seeing these lapses as failures, I see them as something I had to do and I can brush them off and move on.  This allows me to get back on track as soon as possible.  It'll take me longer to get to the end, but that's okay.  At least I'm enjoying the trip in the meantime. 

My goal weight is 160 lbs. so I'm "only" 24 lbs. away.  After losing 122 lbs., 24 seems like such a meager amount, a drop in the bucket.  They'll probably be the hardest 24 lbs. of my entire journey.  I don't know if I'll ever get there, but then again when I started my journey and was facing having to lose 130 - 150 lbs., I didn't think I'd ever succeed either and here I am, almost there.  In any case, I'm going to keep trying, but if I stay at my present weight of 184 lbs. from now on, I'm happy.