Lady Luck

I am so ecstatic to see how far I have come since mid-August when I began this pilgrimage to a better me. When I look at what I weigh today I know that I have lost almost 24% of my body weight since starting this blog, less than four months ago, and over 27% from my highest weight of 266 pounds.

Because I have kept track of what I weighed when each progress picture was taken, I know that I had a:

5.81% loss from August 12 to September 5
6.67% loss from September 5 to October 3
8.22% loss from October 3 to November 7
5.65% loss from November 7 to December 5

I find it reassuring to look at the percentages in this manner, because it helps show me that I am still in the same range now as I was at the start of this journey. If, for example I were to lose ten pounds between now and my next progress picture, I know that is still over a 5% drop from my current weight, even though at my highest weight that amount of lost pounds would have represented less than 4%. The lower my weight gets the more I need to alter my expectations of what is possible to lose. I am not saying I will cease working as hard as I have been, nor that I will not be thrilled if I continue to see the higher drops, but I do think that it is good for me to do a bit of a reality check with this. The same goes for how quickly or slowly I will continue to drop inches, although I haven’t done any number crunching for that.

I have been so lucky to have had relatively impressive weigh-ins up to this point. A big part of that is due to my current overall circumstances in life. I have an enormous amount of free time right now, a pretty positive outlook most days, and a fabulously supportive husband whose endless faith in and love for me leaves me speechless on a regular basis. On top of all those ideal factors, I also believe that my commitment to this is at an all time high and that each and every victory I have experienced along this path to a healthier version of myself has spurred me on with even greater determination. I have health and happiness on my side and opportunities in my corner of the world which others may not. I am blessed with friends, family, and the relationships which I have discovered online, in this blogging community. If I wasn’t working arduously at this, with just about every single element in my life being perfectly tuned to allow for my success, then I would have to call myself the most hopeless person on Earth. Fortunately, I do recognize exactly what a great chance I have right now and I am taking full advantage of it!

FOOD & BEVERAGES:
- 9 glasses of water throughout the day
- 2 egg wrap on a soft tortilla shell with grated cheese and orange pepper
- 1 banana
- 1 mug of gingerbread steamed skim milk
- 4 cups low fat popcorn
- 1 Mandarin orange
- 1 wrap on a soft tortilla shell with sliced deli chicken, grated cheese, lettuce, dried cranberries, fat free Miracle Whip, mustard, and pepper
- 3/4 cup fat free peach yogurt with 1 cup Life Multigrains cereal

EXERCISE:
- 5K race completed in 37:59