Results from Day One

Good morning!

Well, I got through the first day relatively unscathed.  First the stats:

Calories consumed:  1823

Estimated burned:  3052

Fasting glucose level:  126

Blood pressure:  133/98

My diet was very good yesterday.  Breakfast was a whole grain english muffin with a pattie of lean sausage and a slice of cheddar cheese.  Mid-morning snack was an apple.  Lunch was whole-wheat pasta with meat sauce, afternoon snack was a banana...and dinner was 2 cups of steamed vegetables.  I tried to keep the bulk of my calories consumed during the breakfast and lunch meals.

I also had 2 diet cokes and nine 8-ounce glasses of water.  I have to admit something here...I hate water.  But, it felt good drinking it yesterday.  I actually had a headache most of the day, but a friend told me it was because the water was flushing toxins from my cells and the headache would go away once the body had eliminated the toxins from my system.  She must have been right, because the headache is gone today.

I got in a 45-minute workout last night on the Wii with 340 estimated calories burned.  I'm doing the Wii workout right now because it is easy on my knees.  Once I drop the first 20-25 pounds, I hope that I can amp it up a bit and do more high-impact aerobics.  I have the original Power 90 workout system and I would like to give that a try again.  I have several friends doing the P90X system now, but I'm not going to jump on that bandwagon just yet.

This morning, I had bit of a shock when my fasting glucose level shot up to 146.  It was strange because before I went to bed last night, it was only 101.  Perhaps I need to re-code my machine.  My blood pressure dropped a bit this morning down to 128/86.  I took both of these measurements right after my morning shower.

I also meditated for 20 minutes before bed last night and I slept like a baby.  I'm still working on the hypnosis CD and should finish it by the weekend.

All in all, a great day yesterday.  Looking forward to today!

Fifty for Fifty - Day One

Well, it's officially begun as of this morning.  I kicked off this mad dash towards losing 50 pounds over the next 6 months.  I know it's a realistic goal and I believe I can do it if I keep my motivation and determination strong.  So, I'll be throwing information up here on this blog quite often to keep the wind at my back.

A lot of this work is really based on remedial math skills.  In order to lose one pound, I need to burn 3500 calories more than I consume.  So, I started with calculating my basal metabolic rate (BMR) to determine how many calories per day I need to maintain my current weight.  Now, depending on which calculator I use that number has been calculated anywhere between 2550 calories and 3200 calories using my height of 6'4", weight of 300 pounds, and age of 49 years old...and also indicating a sedentary lifestyle in the calculator.  Most of the calculators I've found online resulted in a BMR between 2800 and 3000 calories per day, so I'm using 2800 as my baseline amount.

Without any exercise at all, I burn 19,600 calories per week based on a BMR of 2800.  Therefore, I must consume no more than 10,850 calories per week to lose 2.5 pounds (19,600 - (2.5 lbs * 3500)).  That equates to a 1250 caloric difference less per day that I consume versus what I burn. You get the picture, I'm sure.

So, this is the basic premise for my diet.  I must document each and every food or beverage item (other than water or diet soda) that I consume on a daily basis and calculate the calories in each item.  Then I have to calculate my estimated calories burned and ensure that my net caloric intake per day is at least 1250 under my estimated calories burned.
.

If you watched my video blog in my previous post, then you know that yesterday I posted my weight as 298 pounds.  When I weighed in this morning, it was 300 pounds even and my waist was measured at 47 inches.  My fasting blood sugar this morning was 126 and blood pressure was 133/98.  These are the numbers I'll be tracking as I go down this road.

My target weight loss per month is 8-10 pounds...and I assume that my blood pressure and glucose levels will fall in response to that weight loss.  I have to track these measurements closely because being on medication for both type II diabetes and high blood pressure, there is a chance those levels could fall too much and my meds will have to be adjusted accordingly.

I had blood work done a couple of months ago.  Those measurements were:

Fasting blood sugar - 156 (down from 213 in October of 2009)

A1C - 7.2 (down from 11.4 in October of 2009)

Cholesterol - 132 (down from 250 in October of 2009)

I'm due for more blood work this month, so I'll post those as soon as I get them back.  As I said in my video, I'm going to be using hypnosis as a tool in this fight as well.  I'm putting together a CD to listen to every day.  I'll share that with you guys once it's complete.

Ultimately, I hope that documenting this fight thoroughly in this blog will help others who may be considering a similar effort.  If you want more information on anything that I'm doing, feel free to drop me a line and I'll answer any questions you may have.

Blessings to each of you!

Ray

Fifty for Fifty