I used to fall for the whole, “I need to make New Year’s resolutions!” thing, but as I’ve gotten older I have come to the conclusion they are totally meaningless.

I am all for people making positive changes in their lives, but why do we feel the need to set these changes to some sort of date? Most people get discouraged with them after a couple of weeks and think, “Oh, well, no one keeps to their resolutions, so I might as well drop it.”

No, how about instead you just think through out the year, “You know, I really need to change aspect X in my life” and you just do it?  You don’t need to wait around for a certain date to happen, you just get up, you get it done and you keep at it.

I have chronicled my battle with weight loss on this blog more times than I care to remember, and trust me there are many days I just want to throw in the towel.  I do not enjoy going to the gym as it is just not a generally pleasant place, but I keep going.  Why?  I like the results I see and it is about the only time every day where I get a quite hour to myself.  I put on the iPod, fire up a podcast, and I zone out for 30 to 60 minutes.  There are no instant messages, no e-mails, no Tweets, no phone calls, it’s just me working to better myself.

Perhaps if this had started as a New Year’s resolution I would have given up after a couple of weeks, but instead it was just something I woke up one day and went, “Forget this, I’m going to lose weight,” and I did it.  I am healthier than I have ever been, have more energy and I look better.  Yay.

It isn’t just weight loss, however.  Is there something in your life that you could change for the better?  Of course there is.  Instead of waiting for that magical date of Jan. 1st to roll around, why don’t you just do it now.  You want to curse less?  Just stop.  You want to go to the gym?  Just go.  You want to find a better job?  Start looking.  But pick something, tell yourself you’re going to do it, and do it.  Stick with it until you reach that goal, and then keep going if you can.  Just don’t tie it to some stupid date.

Now, excuse me, but I need to head to the gym.

Over the years I have come to the conclusion that for all of its build up, Christmas really needs to be more than one day.

There is a certain melancholy that comes with Dec. 26th when you realize it’s all over.  You spend literally months in a frenzy of preparing for the day, rushing to buy gifts, being bombarded with ads and never really getting to enjoy “the season” as it were.  Then you get to the actual day and it’s more rush, rush, rush as you open gifts, cook the big meal, get to the right house and so on, leaving you drained.

And then it’s all over.

The music stops,  the lights come down and the tree is tossed out or put back in the attic.  Life returns to “normal” on the 26th without you ever having gotten to take a breather and actually soak in the celebration we all just killed ourselves over.

Luckily this year the 26th falls on a Sunday so you can take a moment to breath, but why don’t you not worry so much about ending the festivities?  For years my family has left Christmas decorations up year round not out of laziness, but because working in retail we never really get to enjoy the time.  We also launched a blog called Remembering Christmas so we could talk about it all year long.  Why should an event we wait all year for be restricted to just one day?

I say fight those doldrums, leave your tree up for an extra week if you want, who cares if it’s mid-Jan. and the garland is still on the mantle?  Are the Christmas police going to come and bust you for it?  Do what you want with your own home.  (Although I do recommend taking down exterior decorations just to protect it from sun damage)  Don’t let others dictate to you how you keep the Christmas spirit going.

As for me, I do it year round … and I don’t care what anyone thinks about it.

I have come to the conclusion that one could go broke trying to get into shape.

Long time readers of this blog know that I have gotten progressively more serious about trying to lose weight and get into shape, but with this has come a seemingly never ending stream of new expenses.  Every time I turn around it seems like there is something else I need to spend money on, and I just have to wonder where it stops.

The most obvious one is I have lost ten inches off of my waist, so I have had to buy several new pairs of pants over the past year or so.  Generally pants last me years, so that was something I wasn’t planning on.  I have also gone down two shirt sizes, so I am slowly rebuilding my supply of polo shirts.  During my recent trip to Philadelphia, the Diabolical Miss M insisted that we go clothes shopping because “nothing you have is fitting you!”  So, there was yet another clothes expense (although I escaped with just two sweaters and a pair of jeans that she bought for me), and it almost makes me fearful to keep losing weight!

Not really, but you get the idea.

Then comes the exercise expenses.  Due to my severe allergies, I can’t really go for long outside walks where I live out in the country, so a treadmill at the gym is necessary, which costs me $35 a month.  (I looked into buying a treadmill, but decided this makes more sense since I also have access to all the weight machines)

However, I don’t always feel like going to the gym, so I have also spent a goodly chunk of change on barbells for home ranging from 15 lbs to 45 lbs.

Oh, having barbells just laying around gets tiresome, so I also had to buy a rack to put them on.

Oh, and when using barbells, or weight machines at the gym, you should really wear gloves because otherwise you tear up your hands, so I had to buy gloves.

Oh, you need to buy a lock for your locker at the gym also.

Oh, you also need workout clothes.

Getting the point?

Now, something the Diabolical Miss M has been trying to talk me into for ages is giving Pilates a go.  She has probably been after me for a year or so to do this, and I finally relented.  I bought a beginners DVD she suggested (Gaiam Pilates: Beginning Mat Workout, affiliate link) and thought, “Oh, that’s all I need to buy.  I don’t really need the mat.”

… wrong.

Turns out the mat is essential for properly aligning your spine so you don’t risk injury.  I did the workout a couple times without a mat, and finally bit the bullet and spent $69 on a mat (yes, there are cheaper ones out there, but I needed one that is longer than most due to my height).  I’ll be using the mat for the first time tomorrow night, and I hope it was worth it, but yeesh, what am I going to have to buy next?

Although, I will say, Miss M was right, I have never felt my abs burn quite like they do after Pilates.

While I am thrilled to be be in what is probably the best shape of my life, and I’ve become a total gym addict, I just keep wondering when all of this money spending stops.

If all goes according to plan, by the time you are reading this I should be on the road, heading to a vacation … yes, another vacation.

After last year’s trip to Boston I said that I should take a vacation more than once every 13 years.  Well … 13 months is better than years I guess.

I’m heading to Philadelphia for five days to hang out with the Diabolical Miss M (she’s out of law school and moved her evil lair).  As she has an actual job now I will see her mostly in the evenings, but will spend my days wandering around the city, and of course hitting the historical spots.

As for the promise, well I said I would take more time for myself, and I’m trying to.  I really came out of last year’s vacation a changed person, and I have made a ton of alterations to my life such as massively purging my house of stuff I just really didn’t need (still not done, but boy is it different), trying to make sure I have some more time to read (mostly comic books, but I’ve read more comics in the past 13 months than I’ve read in years) and just generally trying to not be as stressed.  My biggest stress reliever has been the gym, and while I weigh slightly more than this time last year, it’s all muscle.  It is amazing how much bench pressing can actually relax you, though.

I am sure there will be some photos posted from Philadelphia, and I’ll be commenting a lot on Twitter, I’m sure.

And, yes, there will be posts here.  No way I’m breaking my five and a half year run of daily posts for a measly vacation!

Now, lets just hope this morning goes off without any hitches …

Every year I debate if I still need to do this post, but then I realize that somehow talking about some stupid movie or television show, ranting about a law that irritates me and so on just wouldn’t make a lot of sense, nor would it feel right.

Last year I talked about how you shouldn’t wait for another disaster to say “thank you” to emergency workers, and I hope you have taken that time.  This year I’m not going to preach to you about anything, but I just hope you take a moment out of the normal everyday things that distract us to think about what happened on that fateful Tuesday morning.

Think about those that we lost in the buildings and on those flights.

Think about the brave passengers of Flight 93 that fought back.

Think about how that morning changed the lives of every American in some way.

While I didn’t lose anyone that morning, it set so many things in motion for me.  It closed many chapters of my life, and, unbeknownst at the time, set a series of events in motion that would in a round about a way open up another chapter.

Just take a moment, and think about the world prior to 9/11, and what it’s like today.  At least in my lifetime there has been no other event that so clearly defined a change in the entire world.  It’s odd to know that you actually lived history.  You always think of history as something that happens to someone else, but every citizen of the United States became part of a moment in history that morning, and it’s up to us that no one ever forgets what exactly happened that day, or those that came after.

Each year Beloit College makes a list for its professors about the things the incoming freshman have never known in life. This list has gained some notoriety over the years, and I was reminded of it this week when listening to The Grizzly Bear Egg Cafe podcast and they were mentioning it, so I thought I would address the ones that me feel really old.  Remember, this class was born in 1992 and will graduate in 2014.

1. Few in the class know how to write in cursive.

I was not aware they had stopped teaching this in schools.  What the heck?!?

8. With increasing numbers of ramps, Braille signs, and handicapped parking spaces, the world has always been trying harder to accommodate people with disabilities.

Wow … I had forgotten we used to not pay any attention to these folks.

11. John McEnroe has never played professional tennis.

Oof, that really does make me feel old.

19. They never twisted the coiled handset wire aimlessly around their wrists while chatting on the phone.

This one doesn’t make me feel old, it just makes me grateful the wires no longer exist!

26. Unless they found one in their grandparents’ closet, they have never seen a carousel of Kodachrome slides.

I bet they’ve never seen school films with out of sync audio either.  Poor kids.

27. Computers have never lacked a CD-ROM disk drive.

I remember saving up for my first one.

28. They’ve never recognized that pointing to their wrists was a request for the time of day.

I haven’t worn a watch in years, but I still find myself looking to my wrist every so often to check the time.

32. Czechoslovakia has never existed.

Ouch.

50. Toothpaste tubes have always stood up on their caps.

Thank goodness for that.  I don’t miss screw on caps in the least.

68. They have never worried about a Russian missile strike on the U.S.

This I’m kind of jealous of.

You can see the full list over at the school website.  You can tell they were reaching on some of them, but oh well.  Still, it’s amazing to think how quickly some things have changed, and things that have disappeared from out lives you just didn’t even really notice.  (Although I can’t stress how happy I was to be done with phone cords …)

All of my life I have been a fairly lazy person in the physical sense.  I have never liked physical labor, and due to health problems as a child I couldn’t go out and play as much as other kids.  A good solid afternoon of outside play resulted in my being laid up for two weeks.  It was horrible.  So there is something I have never really dealt with before, and that’s weight gain from packing on muscle mass.

It’s been quite a while since I have written about my weight loss.  The last major post was when I broke through 100 pounds lost, and then I followed it up in Nov. of last year with a series about how to lose weight.  Since then I have been quiet, and there was a reason.

I was gaining weight back.

I got down to 278, a total of 122 lbs lost, but then I started creeping back up.  I blamed it on the holidays, but it just didn’t stop, it kept going up, and I couldn’t figure out why because I wasn’t eating that differently than before, and I was still working out, hitting the gym and so on.  So why in the world was my weight creeping back up on me and finally saw me climb back over 300 lbs to 305?  It was depressing me, and it was starting to just anger me more than anything.  I was getting discouraged and felt like giving up, but I kept going.

Then I started to piece it together.  I thought something had bit my leg, and I lifted my heel to look down at the back of my right leg and noticed something I had never seen before: muscles.  Not just a little bit of muscle, but like a whole lot of very clearly defined muscles.   Then I noticed my forearms and … veins?  When did my veins start showing?  And then one night while lifting weights in my bedroom, I saw my chest reflected in the glass of a picture I had hanging up as I was lifting the weights and … what the heck?  When did I get those muscles?

As I started to think back, I hadn’t been paying attention to my muscle growth.  Last August when I went to Boston on vacation I had just started bench pressing and was doing 95 lbs.  Pathetic, I know.  Just this week I moved up to 140 lbs on the bench press, and actually feel like I could probably move up to 145 lbs.  Last summer I was doing 290 lbs on the seated leg press and now I’m up to 350 lbs.  All of my weight work is considerably higher than it was last year at this time when I thought back to it.

I still wasn’t convinced I had packed on 27 lbs of muscle, but I knew there was one final test, and that was putting on shorts I hadn’t worn since last summer when I was 295 lbs.  I put them on and instead of being snugger at 305 lbs, they were looser.  I was finally convinced what I had actually done was put on 27 lbs of muscle … and now I don’t know what to do.

While I am loving the extra strength and stamina, it is still 305 lbs of stress on my heart.  I don’t care if its fat or muscle, 305 lbs is still 305 lbs.  The question is how do I balance this out?  I would be fine with keeping the muscle if I could just get more of the fat off, but it’s a tricky line to walk between the two.  So I am cutting back on the weight training some and increasing my cardio/walking in hopes of getting the two to equal out, but we’ll have to see what happens.

This is somewhat of a follow up to the whole series I did on weight loss because apparently too much of a good thing (i.e. weight lifting) can still turn into a bad thing no matter what it is.

So, I killed a deer last night … with my car.

I don’t mean to sound flippant, because I feel absolutely horrible the deer is dead, and this is one of the pitfalls living in a rural community.  Also, I live in Adair County, Missouri, which, at one time, was the white tail deer capital of the country … they are everywhere.

However, my car is not out of commission until next week, and I had plans for this weekend that actually required me to drive to Iowa.  So, now my car needs to be fixed, and that won’t happen until Monday at the earliest.  While it looks cosmetic, it turned out this morning I was leaking transmission fluid.  No one in town has the part, and of course with New Years in the mix, everyone will be closed, so no car for me.

Luckily I am insured, and even better luck it looks like I only have a $50 deductible on this type of damage.  Yay me!  Doesn’t change the fact I’m still annoyed by this whole thing.

Here are more pictures of my day.  Any image in this post can be clicked for a larger view.  (except for the one of the deer fur, no one needs to see that bigger)

Feeling like you just can’t get on that treadmill one more time?  Feeling like you want to give in and have fried chicken?  You need to stay motivated.

You’ve started exercising, and you’ve changed what you eat, but do you have what it takes to make the long haul?  Believe me, I know it isn’t.  You are surrounded everywhere you go with food that is bad for you, advertising telling you how delicious things are, all of them trying to lure you in to buying & eating them.  It is so easy to give in and “cheat”, but you simply can’t.

So here are some simple points to staying motivated as you try to lose weight that have worked for me.  As always, this is what has worked for me, and everyone is different, so you need to experiment to find what works best for you.

First Step, “The Cheat Day”

Okay, I have mixed feelings on this.

A lot of diets suggest you give yourself a cheat day on your diet one day a week, but I found that to be like inviting trouble into your life.  It becomes easy to say, “Oh well, I’ll make this my cheat day …” and then you do it again … and again … and again.  I finally did away with a set cheat day and just try to gauge it, but I have made it more like once every couple weeks.  Basically, if I have to think about when I last cheated, more than likely I’m okay.

I also think “cheat DAY” is a bad term because it implies you can cheat on your diet all day long.  I have preferred to just call it “treat”, and I allow myself something like a Pumpkin Pie Blizzard from Dairy Queen (they’re available only once a year, I figure one a year definitely qualifies for a “treat”), but that is the only cheat I allow myself on “cheat day”, the rest of the day is just like any other day of my diet.

If you don’t allow yourself some sort of occasional reward, you do run the risk of just going nuts one day and eating everything in your sight.  So, moral of the cheat day story, use your own discretion to figure out what works best for you, but you do need to factor this into your plans.

Second Step, “Entertain Yourself”

I know this may sound a tad odd, but it’s vital.

There is nothing more mind numbing than walking on a tread mill or doing free weights.  Boredom will kill your motivation faster than just about anything else out there.  However, if you use the time constructively, you won’t even notice you’re really exercising.

So, how do you entertain yourself?  Well, when I do free weights at home I’ve set up a TV and DVD player in the room I do them in and have taken to catching up on all sorts of DVD sets that I’ve been meaning to watch forever.  So far I’ve worked my way through all of Batman: The Animated Series, Batman Beyond, The Batman and am now working through The Adventures of the Galaxy Rangers.  Yes, I am only watching cartoons for now, there is no denying I am a cartoon fan, but it is also for safety reasons.

Although, let me stress that whatever you do to entertain yourself, you must put safety first.  If you are putting in DVDs of something that requires you to read subtitles, pay attention to big plot points and so on, you are running the risk of losing track of your repartitions, how much energy you put into the way you swing a weight, possibly over extending your muscles and so on.  So it’s fine to watch TV while you work out, but make sure to keep it light and not overly involved.

As for in the gym, I have discovered the wonders of podcasts on my iPod.  Again, I try to keep them somewhat light so I can concentrate on my working out, and you also run the risk of laughing out loud depending on the podcast you’re listening to.  (hint: The Kevin Smith & Scott Mosier podcast, Smodcast, has made me trip on the treadmill more than once thanks to laughing)  The way I look at it, as I am a podcaster myself, this is almost like doing work while I work out as it allows me to keep up with what other podcasts are up to.

The ultimate goal though is to give yourself at least a bit of a distraction while you work out so it doesn’t become repetitive and monotonous.  Those two things can become two of the biggest dangers to throwing you out of the mood to exercise.  I have actually gotten to where I look forward to “my podcast time” as I don’t have any other time during the week to listen to them.  I can’t wait to get to the gym each week when the new episode of The Grizzly Bear Egg Cafe comes out, the working out is just a fun by product of me listening to podcasts.

(by the way, safety tip on iPods, make sure to put your earbud cord inside your shirt unless you like them being torn out of your ears by certain machines … not that I have ever done that …)

Third Step, “Make Sure You Have A Support Group”

Many times I thought, “Okay, I’ve gone far enough, why not just stop?” I will admit that I am a lazy person at heart. I would much rather sit and watch TV, read a book, play a video game … basically anything other than exert myself.  That, however, is also how I got into this situation, and I know it.

This doesn’t mean I don’t still occasionally think about calling it a day and stopping.  Don’t kid yourself, this is hard work!  I am exercising for over an hour a day, six days a week, it’s a lot of work!

Whenever I get discouraged though, there are my parents constantly telling me how much better I look every time I turn around.  Then I have my long time friend, F, who has taught me a lot about picking the proper foods when I eat out, and telling me that he can see the difference.  By far, the biggest booster, and a one woman cheerleader squad for this journey of mine has been the Diabolical Miss M.  I thanked her profusely in my post about having lost 100 lbs, so I won’t embarrass her again, but I credit her bottomless encouragement with a lot of what has kept me going.

Never underestimate the value of the people around you to keep you motivated.  I’m not saying to make an annoyance out of yourself by asking them, the people who really care about you will let you know how you’re doing.  And remember, I said this is a selfish act due to how much time you have to spend focusing on yourself, but at the end of the day you are also doing it for them so that you can remain in their lives longer.

Fourth Step, “Don’t Get Discouraged

I can’t believe how many times I came close to throwing in the towel because I would hit a plateau.  It happens.  There is nothing you can do to prevent it, and you just have to struggle through them.

When I returned from my Boston vacation I had a really weird weight drop of 10 lbs over a two week period, and then I sat at 285 for just over 2 months.  I was infuriated, I was discouraged and I wondered why I was killing myself in the gym and with the free weights if I wasn’t going to make any progress.  I really wanted to throw in the towel this time, but I noticed parts of my body tightening up, but no weight coming off.  I worked harder and harder and finally the plateau broke and I’ve lost six more pounds now.

You can also keep reminding yourself of the benefits of your weight loss:

• More energy – I can’t believe how much more energy I seem to have, and I love every minute of it.
• You’ll feel better about yourself – I finally admit it, this has definitely boosted my self confidence.  It isn’t that hasn’t given me an ego, but it has certainly made me feel better about myself in general.
• Clothes fit you better – I have also been able to get back in my favorite jacket from high school (an army fatigue jacket), that really makes the whole thing worth it!

Honestly, the benefits are far too many to list.  On the other hand I can not think of one drawback to weight loss, and how could there really be downsides to that?  Always remember what you are doing you are doing for you and your health.  Is it selfish?  Yes, but this is a good selfish because it can also benefit your family as you will be around longer.

Conclusion

This entire series has been a lot longer in the word count department than I anticipated, but I hope everyone learned something from it.  These three posts have been far more revealing about myself than I originally planned, but it was worth it all if it encourages even one of you to start trying to lose weight.  If I can lose 121 lbs, you can lose 10, 20, 30 or whatever that number is you are looking to drop.

As you can see from these posts, I radically changed my life, all for the better, and most of you don’t need to make such a radical shift, but it can be done if needed.

In short, if you need to lose weight, I am living proof that it can be done, you just have to get angry with yourself first … that was oddly the easiest step for me …

One last disclaimer: I am not a physician, a nutritionist or a fitness professional.  Before starting any diet or exercise program make sure to consult your doctor.

Okay, you’ve started exercising, but have you changed what you eat yet?

Yesterday I talked about getting started with exercising, which most weight loss programs suggest is your first step, and then you work on changing what you eat.

As I said yesterday, I am not a medical expert, I have done this mostly by the seat of my pants with some input from a couple of close friends, and eventually my doctor.  If you do plan on embarking on any serious weight loss, you should always consult your physician first.

First Step, “Put Down The McDonalds!”

Look, I know it’s bad for you, you know it’s bad for you, just simply stop eating fast food.  Even their “healthy alternatives” are about as healthy as drinking a cup of fat.

Need more convincing?  Simply watch Super Size Me.  Slanted?  Probably.  It doesn’t matter, it will still scare the living heck out of you.  Once I watched it, I dropped all fast food from my life unless I’m travelling, and even then I try to be careful as possible in what I order (focus on turkey or grilled chicken items with as few condiments on it as possible).

If you go to a walk-in restaurant such as Ruby Tuesday or Chilis, they have healthier choices, but even then you have to be careful.  I have lunch once a week at Ruby Tuesday and I order the Turkey Burger Wrap (tortilla instead of a bun, less carbs), but as a healthy “alternative” it still comes with french fries.  I change the fries out for rice mixed with tomatoes and green peppers, but even that gets ruined with melted cheese on top of it, so I have them leave the cheese off.  So they give you a “healthy” main item and then try to kill you with the sides, so watch that closely.

Second Step, “Watch What You Drink”

Sodas have to go.  Period.  There is nothing redeeming in in soda pops … nothing.

Iced tea is okay in moderation, but try to watch what you sweeten it with, and if you can skip sweetening it, do so.

I have taken my coffee black since I was about 17 or 18, so I didn’t have to consider cream and sweetner, but if you use either or both of those, consider low fat alternatives or cutting them completely.  And those big ass drinks you order from Starbucks?  Go read the facts on them, and then if you must go there, try to choose their “healthier” alternatives.  Personally I get a venti sized Latte when I go, but since I have no Starbucks in my town, that is one every couple months, I consider it a treat to myself and factor it into my calorie take for the day.

Caffeine also makes you retain more water, so the more caffeine you cut from your life the better as it will lower your water weight.  I’ve written about my cutting my caffeine before, and the eventual withdrawl it caused, but all is good now, and I have been able to maintain the level just 2 -3 cups of black coffee a day, and one cup of green tea.  There are days I would love to have more coffee, but I keep myself in check.

And did I mention no sodas?  Yes, it is worth mentioning twice.

Oh, and for the love of the deity of your choice, stay away from the “energy” drinks!  The amount of sugar they contain could kill a small animal.

Third Step, “Read Everything”

There is a reason nutritional facts are printed on packaging.  Use it … embrace it … let it become your friend.

Make sure you read how many “servings” are in a package, and remember that the facts printed are for “one serving”.  So, if a nutritional fact chart says “200 calories” and you plan on eating the whole package, multiple that 200 times the number of servings the package says it contains.  So 3.5 servings per container would be 700 calories total.  Read carefully, they try to sneak stuff past you to make it sound healthier.

Fat calories are pretty much unavoidable, but anything under 50 percent of the total calories is pretty acceptable.  However, just remember it is acceptable once or so a day, not 3 times a day.

Fourth Step, “Cut Your Servings”

As Americans we are constantly attacked with “All you can eat buffet!” ads, and fast food employees asking if you would like to “super size” your order … just say no.  If you are walking up to a food service station that looks like a feed trough, this is probably not the place for a person attempting to lost weight.

All that being said, the first place you need to cut how much you eat is at home.  This has been the biggest hurdle for me as I do live with family, and my mother is an outstanding cook … I hate her for that.  Saying no to her food is like telling a classic artist, “I’m sorry, I don’t care to look at your latest sculpture.”  I have to build my eating each day around what she is preparing, and then I simply have to try to control how much of it I eat.  This is never an easy task, but it has to be done.

Fifth Step, “Eat More Often”

I know this sounds crazy, but if you want to lose weight, eat more often.

The theory is that if you eat around 100 calories every three hours you will keep your metabolism burning through out the day.  The problem is that after you have a large meal, your body only continues to process that food for another 2 to 3 hours.  By introducing another 100 calories you can basically reignite your digestive system, and it will continue to process that food.  It will also help control your hunger when you get to a large meal.

Believe me, it isn’t always easy to consume another piece of food.  It may sound like Heaven to get to eat all day long, but you do get really tired of it after a while.  Just remember to change up what you eat and you should do fine.

While I have no scientific proof that this actually works, it sure seems to have helped me out with my weight loss.

Sixth Step, “Build A Diet That Works For You”

I can not stress enough how these plans may not work for everyone.  You have to experiment and find what works best for you, start by reading up on other diet plans, mix-and-match if you need, but I honestly see no reason to ever pay for a diet plan.  The Internet is an amazing resource, why should you pay some entity to tell you what to eat when you can research it for yourself?  Take that money and spend it on a gym membership or exercise equipment for your home.

Again, as with any weight loss advice, consult your physician for advice before beginning.  I am in no way an expert, or nutritionist, and you should remember everything that I suggest in these posts is what worked for me.  These suggestions may not be correct for you.

The next entry in this series will be about staying motivated.  It’ll be published on Thursday of this week, you may want to subscribe to my RSS feed to make sure as not to miss it.  Also make sure to check out part 1, Exercise, The First Step To Losing Weight.

If you’re thinking about trying to lose weight the first thing that comes to mind is changing your eating habits, and then exercising.  Well, let me tell you, reverse that thinking.

A few months ago I wrote about having lost over 100 lbs now (121 lbs since I wrote that).  I made brief mention of the fact I might write up a guide to how I did it, but wasn’t sure.  Well after several people contacted me about the subject, I figured I should, but I also wanted to collect my thoughts on it before I just launched into it.  I also figured firing this up just before we went into the holidays made the most sense.

Let me say right up front that I am not a medical expert, I have done this mostly by the seat of my pants with some input from a couple of close friends, and eventually my doctor.  If you do plan on embarking on any serious exercise plan,  you should always consult your physician first.

First Step, “Okay, I’m fed up”

The first step to me deciding that it was time to start losing weight was three-fold: I bought my first ever pair of pants with a 60-inch waist, I was having trouble walking around Walmart without my hip starting to hurt and I came to the realization I never saw heavy set older people.

The pants happened in Oct. 2006, and the walking around Walmart incident happened shortly before the end of that same year.  The noticing that I never really saw heavy set older people was more of a general observation, but one that really hit the point home to me that I needed to do something about my weight.

Like any good sheep, I decided to get serious about weight loss on Jan. 1st.  It wasn’t so much a New Years resolution as I have always just liked to be able to remember dates.  So, come Jan. 1st, 2007 I just said, “This is it, you are now going to exercise every other day.”

The reason for every other day was that I had taken a weight training class some years ago in my aborted attempt to go to college.  I learned a couple things in that class, #1 being that you should not exercise the same muscle groups more than once every 48 hours, and never go more than 72 hours.  So, lets say you do legs one day, you do arms the next, and so on.  Since I was starting from a cold start I decided once every other day doing the majority of everything was the right course.

I started off slowly with free weights at home, I think the heaviest weights I had at the time were 15 lbs.  I worked very slowly at this, and only bought heavier weights when I felt I was ready.  How do you know you’re ready?  Well, that was lesson #2 from the class I took, “If you can’t do 7 reputitions, it’s too heavy.  If you can do more than 12 reputitions, it’s too lite.”  This is an excellent rule of thumb, and is the one I have stuck with to this day.

Things will be slow when you first start, but don’t get discouraged.  I really felt like throwing in the towel multiple times, but as the amount of exercise you do increases, the more your weight loss will accelerate.  When I started this weight loss attempt, I was 400 lbs.  By July 2008 I was 360, so it took me nearly 18 months to lose those first 40 lbs, but in the 16 months since then I have lost another 81 lbs.

This was a combination of acceleration and adding more exercise this year.

Second Step, “Keep pushing yourself”

Those first months in 2007 were horrid.  I hated the exercise, I wasn’t seeing any progress, and I came close to giving up many times.  However, I knew that giving up would get me nowhere, and everything I read said to expect slow progress when you start.  I grunted a lot, and just kept plugging along.

The big turning point to me was the first time I went, “Huh… I think I can tighten my belt by a notch…”, and I did.  After that I was sold and kept plugging away at it as I finally had a visual marker that I was making progress.  Once I had that moment, I found it immensely easier to keep pushing my limits just a bit more.

Third Step, “Push yourself even more!”

I went to my doctor in October 2008 for a flu shot, and we discussed my weight loss briefly.  He said if I wanted to really lose weight, I needed to start walking.  I grunted and shrugged it off as I had never been a fan of walking.  I however made one large mistake … I mentioned this tidbit to the Diabolical Miss M, my sometime Scattercast guest.

Miss M has mentioned walking to me many times before, and now she had an ally.  At the same time, F, another friend of mine, had been talking to me about getting a treadmill.  So I was getting it from 3 angles to give in and walk.  In Nov. 2008, Miss M guilted me in to giving a walk a try after  a long instant messenger conversation.  Well, I did it, and I walked 2 miles just out of pure stubborness … and wound up sick from it.  It was probably the weather, but I was amazed I had done 2 miles when I thought I couldn’t do anything really.

I tried walking a few more times, and each time I ended up with some sort of health problem, so I started researching treadmills as I knew it was my allergies causing the problems, and had come to the conclusion I was going to need one that probably cost around $2500, something I wasn’t willing to do.  In March 2009 I went to the doctor to discuss my weight loss stalling out at 325 lbs, and again walking came up.  I finally agreed I would join a gym and try it on the treadmills there.

I researched buying a treadmill some more, and after talking to the local 24-hour gym, I figured out I could join the gym for over 7 years before I was losing money over buying a unit for my house.  The other bonus would be access to all of the other equipment, so the pros of the gym really started to win out.  On May 1st, 2009, I went to the gym for the first time.

So, what did I do with my rule about every other day?  Well, I decided to go for it and upped my exercise to 6 days a week: 3 at the gym, 3 at home, 1 day off each week.  The gym was all about defining muscles with a focus on my legs, and the days at home were all about building muscle with a focus on my arms and torso.  It seems to be working so far, and it also seems to have really accelerated my weight loss quite a bit.

Fourth Step, “Do what you are comfortable with”

What I have done for myself may not follow the letter of the law, as it were, when it comes to weight lifting, but I again stress this is what has worked for me.  Every person out there is different, and that’s a lot of the reason I don’t agree with cookie cutter diet systems and programs.  You have to find what works for you, your health, your budget, your schedule and so on.

Probably the most important thing is set an initial goal in your mind of what you want to accomplish, and then start researching it for yourself.

The next entry in this series will be about changing what you eat, and the third will be about staying motivated.  These will be published on Wednesday and Thursday of this week respectively, you may want to subscribe to my RSS feed to make sure as not to miss them.

You know what’s fun? Having a fire siren in your attic go off in your attic at 5:15 A.M. … when it’s right over your bed.

At 5:15 A.M. Saturday morning I was awoken to the most atrocious sound I have ever heard, and what do I do? I grab my BlackBerry thinking it’s my alarm. One small problem I quickly notice is that it is way too dark to be my alarm … and my phone isn’t that loud.

I take a second to gather my thoughts and realize it’s the house fire alarm in the attic going on.  I quickly throw on some pants and start running around the house looking for a fire, but after about 45 seconds the siren stops, which it isn’t supposed to do.  I make my way to the ground floor and my four Cocker Spaniels just look at me like, “What in the hell was that?!?”, but they make no noise.

I continue searching the house for fire, sniffing my way as I go, and after I have checked every room on every floor (basement and two above ground floors), I find nothing.  Satisfied it was a false alarm, I go back to bed.

Nothing else happens all day Saturday until I put the dogs to bed on Sunday morning around 1:30 A.M., and after about 10 minutes the siren blows again for about 1 second.  As the dogs are wide awake, they go nuts.  So I let them out of their room for awhile to calm down, and after I put them back to bed, I start the hunt for the control that will shut down the smoke alarms … and this is where I start to get angry.

When e built this house 25 years ago, we made a decision that each floor of the house would have its own electrical panel so everything as compartmentalized.  I start on the top floor, check the panel, and there is no mention of smoke detectors or alarms.  So, down to the ground floor I go, and there is one marked for “alarm”, but when I flip it, the smoke detectors continue to have power.  Okay, now I’m getting miffed.

I head to the basement, and on that electrical panel is a marking for “smoke detectors/office”.  Uh oh.

Not only had I discovered a mistake the electricians had made 25 years ago, but of all the rooms for them to tie in to, they tied into the office.  Little did anyone know 25 years ago that would be the room that holds my cable modem and one of my two network switches.  In other words, shutting down that room means me losing my Internet.  I take a chance, flip the switch and sure enough the red light goes out on the smoke detectors on all three floors.

Damn.

This means I need to leave the office turned off if I want to sleep, but this means no Wi-Fi, no femtocel to boost my cell phone signal, no Skype phone and so on.  I decide sleep is more important and leave it all shut off.  I get to bed around 5 A.M. from running all around the house trying to piece this together.

So, wake up Sunday, what are you going to do?  I go buy a 50′ extension cord, run it down the hallway from a working room and power up all the Internet stuff and leave the office and smoke detectors dead until we can get it looked at.

Long story short: obviously my priorities go Internet, then safety and then bothering to get things fixed.  Yep, I have my priorities in the right order!