The Year of Less Me

I don’t like New Years’ resolutions. Like getting a lover’s name tattooed on your arm is an almost sure way of jinxing the relationship to fail, New Years’ resolutions are a sure way to not make a positive change in one’s life. Gym memberships sky rocket at the start of a year. Bustling with new crowds of people waiting for their turn on treadmills, stationary bikes, and leg extension machines in January, gyms are usually bearable by February, and back to a normal calm come March. Where do they all go? Most of them have given up hope that they could ever keep up with their commitment. Reality kicks in on how hard it really is.

It starts one day in late January by the alarm going off 2 hours before they have to be at work. While it is warm and comfortable in bed, outside it is a suffocating, dry, and frigid morning. They had a huge project due the night before and worked into the dark hours of the night and they only got 3 hours of sleep.  They are tired.  They are really tired and they realize that they could get another hour of sleep if they didn’t have to go to the gym. They ask themselves if skipping this one day would really put a negative dent into their progress. They rollover in bed to give themselves just a couple more minutes to ponder these thoughts but fall asleep again before a decision is made. Before they know it, it is February and they realize that they haven’t made it to the gym in a couple days but the next morning is Saturday and they really have earned a day off.

This has been me on more than a couple occasions and at the beginning of 2010 the feeling hadn’t been much different. I had been overweight for a good part of my life, but had been apathetic about it for the most part. I mean, sure I would love to have gotten rid of fat and changed my appearance, but life always got in the way of that.  I would feel guilty when doctors would remind me of the health risks involved with being my size, but that guilt would usually dissipate shortly after. What can I say? I loved food. In all of 2009 I had lost 20lbs by loosing a pound here and there with simply being more active and making small cuts to my diet. But this was nothing substantial.

It was around that time that my doctor, during a non-related visit, gave me some tangible numbers. He told me that if I lost 30 more pounds it would drop my chances of getting this, this, and that by 90% and he reminded me that because I am still young that my chances of preventing this, this and that from happening are still extremely great. I smiled and made some kind of acknowledgement that I had heard and understood him. Though the interaction had left little affect on me at the time, it was the first time someone had not made me feel like I had to completely change whom I was to make a huge impact on my health. “I can lose another 30lbs” I thought. I wish I could say that I went home that night and started working out, and throwing away not needed junk from my house, but I didn’t. It wasn’t until mid January 2010 that I started taking it seriously.

So what made me start taking it seriously? In all honesty, it was boredom. I was waiting for something and had forgot my book but had my iPod Touch. I opened it up and started browsing the App Store.  I found a simple app that counted calories and calculated how many calories I could consume to be able to lose 2lbs a week. Remembering what I had consumed that day I entered the information in. While I was way over the day’s limit of calories, I did get a glimpse at how this might actually work. I started removing items I didn’t really care about from the list. I had noticed that I had put butter on my toast that morning and that removing it would drop 100 calories. I drank 24 fluid ounces of lemonade and that had cost me 360 calories. When it comes to finances I am very frugal. It didn’t take long before I started to see calories as dollars and cents as I continued deleting things I didn’t care about all that much off my list. By the time I was done, I would have had another 350 calories to spare in my daily allotment. Which would have been enough for a peanut butter and jelly sandwich (my favorite comfort food).  I decided that I had nothing to lose. The next day I set a goal of 60lbs but was really only concerned with the 30 it would take for me to get “healthy” in the eyes of statistics.

That was January of 2010. January of 2011 is here and I have lost 80lbs this year alone (over a 100lbs including that last couple months of 2009). I am addicted. With exception to a 3-week vacation to Italy, and a holiday here and there, I have counted calories every day since that one day I was bored with my iPod. I now consider exercising fun for the most part and currently I am on day 50 of a 90-day commitment to working out for one hour, 6 days a week. I am continually surprised by the changes I feel physically, emotionally, and in my strength and stamina.

So what have I learned this year? I still think New Years’ Resolutions are stupid and I don’t plan on making one this year. But I will never underestimate the power of goal setting. I learned that goals should be small and dreams should be big. I dream that one day I will not only be at the ideal weight for someone of my height and age, but that I will also be fit, toned and completely satisfied with my appearance. For now, I am just focused on finishing my 90 days and losing another 30lbs.