It's the end of my fourth week and I am straying a little from my ediet plan.  I think it's mostly mental fatigue of feeling like I am giving up things I like (such as chocolate chip cookies or beer) and the initial pop of weight loss that comes from moving from a mostly sedentary life to a more active lifestyle has started to cool a bit. 
      In general, I am pretty practical and logical.  Our society makes weight loss and looking good seem like some mystical and magical thing.  Have you ever wondered why you walk through the grocery checkout aisle and seen a rack full of magazines with titles such as "Lose 15 Pounds for Spring by Eating Chocolate" or "The 3 Best Ab Exercises."  This follows having spent 30 minutes to an hour being bombarded by cheaper, more accessible foods that are anything but healthy for you.  The grocery stores are not stupid, they win when you buy the cookies that are on sale and they win when you buy the magazine that is marked up 50%.  My philosophy is that being able to have guidance that continually encourages the right behavior by suggesting the right things to you (especially when you are hungry and when you are shopping), gives you emotional rewards for doing well or punishment for doing poorly (tracks your progress easily), and is easy to access and implement is the path to not just losing weight, but living a healthy lifestyle. 

      I was dreading my weigh in all day.  Before my family's visit I had been doing great on my eDiets plan.  In fact, I was ahead of my plan.  This week, my plan has me moving down to 174 pounds and passing the half-way weight loss mark at 175 (8 pounds of 16 total to lose to go from 183 to 167).  As I walked into the gym after a 20 hour workday the day before, my energy level was pretty low.  My mindset was to just hope that I didn't go too far backwards and I will be fine.  I kept telling myself "I can lose 2 or 3 pounds in 3 days if I have to in order to get to my goal."  Staying on track and keeping the positive momentum going is very big for me psychologically.  If I start feeling like I am failing, then I get more and more frustrated and lose the confidence that I have right now that I can do this - I can change my lifestyle to be in great shape and still work long hours and meet all the demands on me. 

     My family flew in to visit me for the weekend.  It was their first time visiting me at my new house and all too infrequent opportunity for us to all get together at the same time.  My workout routine was going to be put to the test as sacrificed excercise for driving to and from the airport and eating out.  This test comes just as I was closing in on my half-way goal of 175 pounds and a gift for myself. 
     Overall, I would say I did well for 3 of the four days of my family weekend.  The first two days went well despite the fact that we ate out 2 meals a day.  When put in a position to ruin my diet, I chose controlled portions or split the food with my family or girlfriend.  Also, I managed to sneak a workout into the itinerary for one of the days.  There's nothing like a good sibling rivalry game of hoops to burn a few calories - unfortunately I lost the best of three one on one tournament to my older, less in-shape, but more basketball experienced brother (ok - he just pushed me around with his height and weight and threw cheap little hook shots all day, but who can fault a guy for playing to his strengths)? 

I made it through the weekend pretty well with my girlfriend out of town and my meal choices totally up to me.  My exercise routine was more of an activity routine as I did some yard work and some chores.  The big test of the weekend was going to a friends barbeque and moderating my eating.  Since this is what normally ruins most diet plans, I will share with you my approach to enjoying myself, but not ruining two weeks of hard work.  Click here to read more.....

Here it is the end of the work week for the second week of my ediets program and I have exceeded the program's expected weight loss again!  My target weight for this week was 178lbs and by Friday I was 177.75 before my workout and 177.25 afterwards!  Considering that I started out at 182 when I signed up two weeks ago, but really jumped up to 183 over the weekend before I started, I am pretty pleased.  Losing 4-5 pounds of real weight (not just water weight) in two weeks is great! 

My workout regiment has continued and I am pleased with the good decisions I have been making.  Last night I was left to create my own dinner instead of eating just a slightly larger portion of what my girlfriend (also on ediets) was eating.  I had calculated my calories during the day to be about 600, so I thought maybe I could have some DiGiorno Pizza if I monitored my portions. 

I was a little nervous today as I went to the gym.  After 2 days of not weighing in over the weekend, then not working out on Monday while going to a baseball game in which I had a hotdog and split some nachos and a soft pretzel with my girlfriend, I was a little worried I may not make my weight goal today.  However, while I did come in a pound heavier than I had hoped, I was only at 180.25 before my workout ant 179.5 afterwards. 

I have one week down and I did really great!  My goal was to lose 2 pounds and get to 180 by the time I checked in with my ediets plan on Sunday.  I made it to 178.75 pre-workout and 178.75 post workout on Friday (my last day in the gym and on a scale for the week).  Some people have a scale in their house, but I am a big fan of using the same scale all of the time so I know the instrument is not changing my weight in a good a bad way, not even a half pound.  The weekend was a little challenging as my routine I had developed during the workweek was going to be changed for the first time since starting the diet. 

As a follow up to my "find carrots for yourself" entry earlier this week, I thought I would explore the eDiets tracking system for you in more depth.  My personal approach to this has been on the lazy side because I track my weight and workout in an Excel sheet and then stick to somewhat simple plans offered up by eDiets for my meals - so there is not too much to worry about for me when it comes to counting every calorie.  Also, since I have spent some time in my college years tracking my diet very closely, I have a pretty good handle of the nutrition and calories involved in the food I eat.  That being said, tracking your meals on the site can only help. 

Day 4 is here and another pound is shedding away from my belly.  I have been all over this diet and have used it to inspire me to workout more and workout harder each day.  Today I did a 37 minute cardio workout that burned 615 calories just during the workout.  I weighed in before my workout at my week goal of 180 and dropped to 179 after the workout.  179 officially puts me ahead of my ediet plan!