Realistic life and realistic goals.

No, I'm not dead. I weigh 187 as of this morning. Last time I wrote about my journey to 10 percent, I was pretty pissed about drifting back into the nineties. Well for the better part of this month, I've been under that.

Last couple weeks have been filled with birthday parties and big dinners. But as I told a buddy of mine, it's easy to see where I ate too much over the last week.

My scale says 26% body fat and 36 percent muscle, but I don't think that's accurate after my last body fat caliper test which put me almost 5 percent lower than that. Either way, its a good yard stick.

I'm going to see if over the next month i can slowly creep toward 180 again. When I actually get into the 170's, I think I'll get another body fat test. After all, the goal is 10 percent.

I've been fairly consistent with not eating anything other than protein at night (after 8 pm), and that's a big deal. I'm pretty in control of my eating during the day, but at night after a hard work out I'm looking for that food reward.

So, let's not do that.

I'll try to take a new picture of myself and let you decide if its working. Yes, 10 percent is the goal, even if it takes me all year.

God bless,

Chris

I'm in trouble again

194. Man for a while the weight was just falling off. I've thought about whats going on and I think it just keeps coming down to bad food choices. We've had oreo cookies in the house for a couple weeks now and I'm eating kids sugar cereals. I did the math on the serving size and calories and its almost double the calories of the cereals I'd been eating previously. I keep wanting to get out and walk but our son is potty training and I really want him to get that down (I go on little hikes with my son all the time.

So these are my rules for the next two weeks. No cereal. No pop. No alcohol. No cookies.

Things I'm going to add back in themogenic coffee, bioslim drinks, and as much whey protein as I want. I tried adding in more vegetables hoping that would fill me up, but I'm finding I eat the vegetables and then I go and eat the cereal. So, veggies are in still, but cereal has to be out for now.

Lastly, I've got to stand on the scale every day. I think when I do this, I'm honest. When I only step on every two weeks I've been unpleasantly surprised.

So every day, all of that. I'll post next week to show you the direction I'm moving.

Dr. Chris

I got fat this week

I went up to 188. Sigh.

Two weeks and four lbs the wrong way!

So, I got on the scale a few days ago and it said 187. Uh-oh. I guess I had been steadily losing weight so fast a few weeks earlier that I had basically given up on watching what I was eating. Well apparently that backfired. So this morning I weighed in at 186 lbs, flat. My body fat measurements are about 27% fat and 36% muscle, which haven't really moved much over the previous few weeks.

Our workouts have been really good, often super intense, but my calories, particularly calories in alcohol consumption have gone way way up. I think I've consumed on average a bottle of wine every week for the last two to three weeks.

That's the biggest change I can think of and pow, boy has it effected my weight loss.

So, even though the studies show red wine might be good for mice, it's not great for my waist line.

Dr. Chris.

Its easy now

This morning I weighed 183. Three pounds until the seventies. Whoo hoo.

Dr. Chris

Small victory

Hello,

Today i weighed in at 187.2. Its the first progressive weight loss I've had in over a month, even if it's only a single pound. However, yesterday I weighted 186, so maybe I'm finding my foothold in the 180's? I sure hope so.

I was better with my supplements this week, even taking them with me to house sit for my parents.

I have a picture of what I looked like last week, even though I didn't post. So that's what's up today.

Hang in there.

Dr. Chris

Two weeks of stationary orbit

I got on the scale this afternoon and it said 190.2.

So I've crept up .6 lbs since this time two weeks ago. Well at least I know how to maintain the weight.

Good thing I was gung-ho on that calorie reduction the first couple weeks because now that I've lost 16 lbs. My body doesn't particularly seem interested in losing more.

Did my body ever really seem interested in losing that weight?" I asked myself last night as I was cramming my wife's homemade cinnamon rolls into my mouth. The answer is decidedly no.

I'm starting to think that all our cardio was really starting to pay off, but on the flip side, I've been eating too late in the evening and I can't run as hard because of it.

Eating late is something that's just going to happen sometimes because of work.

I still intend to get down to 10 percent body fat but I'm hardly motivated at all.

I could say, "Hey I lost 16 lbs. Win."

But that's not really what I'm interested in doing. I really just don't feel like suffering much at all and quite frankly food is a comfort sometimes.

I don't really feel disciplined about losing fat right now, thank goodness for my friend Jamie who relentlessly drags me to the gym. Without him I would be in a world of chubby hurt.

So wherever you are buddy, Thanks.

We'll see how I do next week.

Dr. Chris

Mountain Dew is the Devil

This week I weighed in at 225 lbs.

No, that's not true but if you asked me how my journey to ten percent was going this last week, I would be forced to tell you. "Not well."

This morning (Thursday) I weighed in at 189, but I honestly expected to gain a ton of weight this week. (28 percent bodyfat my scale reads and 36 percent muscle...whoo hoo. I'm more muscle than fat! :)

I drank soda and ate cookies and indulged in all kinds of comfort foods.

Stress is the reason. Oh my goodness, this last week was so stressful and I had to admit that I was making bad food choices precisely because of my emotional state.

On the plus side, I really think I'm starting to figure out what supplements are working in my favor and which ones are aren't, because this last week was ugly and I still didn't turn into a moose.

Another plus side is that my friend Jamie and I have increased our cardio to 30+ mins a night (that's 3 nights a week). I don't know for certain that this is the reason for my improved weight control but I've made some very nice increases in speed and endurance. I could probably outrun a bear now. A very tiny bear...who was already preoccupied with a bowl full of honey.

Ummmm...honey.

Speaking of sweets. Almost every day this last week I had a Mountain Dew. I found this guy's blog today that discusses the real and imaginary problem of Mountain Dew addiction.

I have to tell you that for me this is a real thing. Even as short as four years ago, used to drink as many as 6-7 mountain dew's a day. Sometimes I joke with my patients about how pop is the cigarettes of my generation. I joke...but only a little.

I'm just glad I didn't set a goal of 10 percent body fat in some completely unrealistic timespan. I know if this was job and that if I had no other distractions in life I could be doing much better by now, but I think that's true for everyone.

I'll try to put up another picture of me in shorts in the next couple days and let you guys decide if I'm winning or losing the fight.

But as Rocky says, "Muna mooo mah mumahamaa."

Sorry, he's really hard to understand.

Dr. Chris

I'm an idiot

So it turns out my scale was wrong, but not entirely for fault of it's own. So when I went to the gym last week I found out that my body fat was 23.3 percent. So was my scale off by 17 percent? Actually, the problem was that my wife switched the scale over to woman settings and I'd been weighing in my body fat percentage as "a woman."

After catching my mistake, the scale read 28 percent. Ok, so that means that I'm actually somewhere between 23 and 28 percent body fat. Now we're on to something.

This week I gained back a little weight at just over 192, but at least I have a better idea of how my scale is working.

Nevertheless, I am certain that I had it set up right on my very first weigh in, now I just have to keep checking the scale in the morning.

1o percent is still my goal and the gym trainer told me to up my cardio. So I've changed our work outs to be half cardio/half weights. Last week is a little early to tell, but all I can do is keep working toward my goal.


Have a great week.

Dr. Chris

The 180's

Alright,

So this week was....crazy. Just to let you know, my son was sick for several nights last week and in our infinite mercy as parents, we let him sleep in bed with us.

So that's 3-4 nights of sick boy coughing in my face and kicking me in the head from midnight till 5 am.

Needless to say, I got sick for Superbowl weekend.

Exhausted, sick, and pumped up for the big game, I nevertheless put in some pretty good workouts last week, but my appetite was gone.

Wow, no appetite+disease+good workouts=188.8.

The scale says I'm still 40 percent bodyfat. Does that mean even after almost 20 lbs of weightloss I've only lost 2 percent body fat and have 30 percent to go still.

Well, tomorrow I'm going to get the trainer at my gym to measure body fat. This way I get a second opinion. If she confirms that I'm still 40 percent fat, then so be it and on we go.


Either way, I can only assume that 188 is still better than 206.

After I get the results of what the trainer measures, I'll share that with you too.

Dr. Chris

I suck

I weighed in this morning at 193.8. Which is +.2 lbs from last week. Sigh. Alright, let's try this again next week.

Dr. Chris

A lesser Wednesday

This morning I weighed in at 193.6. Horay, I lost...less than a pound. To be honest, I totally blew my calories and carbs this weekened. Movies and dinner out and late night bowls of cereal.

I also stopped taking my supplements and boy did it show. Saturday night I weighed 199. I did a "yikes" face and decided I had to act. I had to get really tight Sunday-Tuesday on my diet. Moreover, I missed a work out last Thusday. I'm just glad to have lost any weight at all.

It's still my goal to get to ten percent body fat, and I've pretty much decided that my scale is screwed up. But I've been looking at photographs of guys with 10 percent body fat and I realize I have a long way to go. I'll let you decide :)

This week, I've also added in Creatine to further minimize lean tissue loss.

I'm going to try really hard to get under the 190's this week. No gym skips or late night bowls of cereal....except for tonight.

See you next week.

Dr. Chris

2nd Wednesday Weigh-in

I got on the scale this morning and it said. 194.4 and 42% body fat. After two weeks of losing 5-6lbs a week, I'm pretty happy. However, I'm quickly losing confidence in the body fat measurement. I suppose that it is possible that I am losing muscle and fat in equal ratios as I drop numbers, but I find that pretty hard to believe. Michael Ventrella on this season of Biggest Loser weighed over five hundred lbs and he had mid 50's % body fat.

My scale says I'm 42%?? I'm having trouble buying that. I may have to find another way to measure body fat.

Also, I performed a biomeridian last week because I wanted to know how I was doing. I performed a second biomeridian because I've had two episodes of falling asleep on the couch in a week.

Last night I had a mild headache and fell "asleep" on the couch for 3 1/2 hours last night before going to bed. I didn't even watch the Biggest Loser. When I woke up Conan O'brian was on. I had almost the same thing happen last Friday.

I've been restrictive on calories to be sure, but not like I have been when dieting in the past.

I remember my first attempt at weight loss in Chiropractic school. I got on atkins and dropped 17 lbs the first week. However, I'm not just interested in weight loss, or even fat loss per se, but I'm really interested in being healthy and lean.

So I'm eating my veggies, rice, fruit along with protein and fats. I'm not eating much in the way of breads. My wife made a cranberry scone cake last week and I've eaten probably two cuts off of it over several days. Really what i'm trying to avoid is "useless" carbs, foods that have been manufactured and processed until there is no life in them. Soda, snack foods, most bread.

I should tell you I've taken my favorite carb: "cereal" and turned it into a game. Every time I lose a new pound, I get to have cereal for post work out desert. Whoopie! Oh don't you wish you were having fun like me.

So obviously, I'm consuming fewer calories and my available energy is reduced. However, I also think that I'm detoxing. I look at my liver numbers in the Biomeridian and I see that I've been in the yellow two weeks in a row. Moreover, my immune system and my skin are also flaring up. So I think I'm going to have to start helping my liver process poisons faster.

I think I'm going to add a scoop of Ultra Clear into my diet in the morning to see if I can unload my liver from all the work it's doing. I'll be sure to post my pictures tonight.

Dr. Chris

I put new batteries in my scale and it still says 42% fat. So (shrug)...I don't know. I still have the same goal so....and it's clear in the mirror I have allot more to lose. On we go.

Dr. Chris

First Wednesday Weigh-in

I'll be honest, I've been weighing in almost every day, but until this morning I wasn't really sure that I was doing what I had intended to do.

Alas....as of first thing this morning. The scale read 199.8. But the scale says I'm now 42% body fat. I don't think that's right. I'm thinking maybe the batteries are going bad...or maybe this thing doesn't work right.

But the pounds numbers sound about right, as I stepped on a couple scales. So for now, let's assume and hope that my fancy new fat scale is not quite right and that' I haven't spontaneously gained another 10% body fat in a week.


So that's about 5-6 lbs in a week. I'm really happy with that, but I'll be frank, I wasn't sure I was going to be able to pull it off.

I'm 34 years old now. I've been told by people that the older you get the harder it is to lose the weight. So, even though I promised myself that I wasn't going to get crazy, I did cut back pretty hard.

So let me tell you what this week looked like.

Three really good nights at the gym. Jamie(that's my workout buddy)and I pushed really good intensity all three nights and had equally good cardio work outs.

Our workouts consist of 45 mins of diverse weight training and 15 mins of cardio. For cardio, we generally do 5 sets of 10-30 second sprints on the tread mill at 10 mph on an incline of 10-11 degrees then drop the speed down to 2.5 miles per hours and keep the elevation the same while recovering. In all it takes about 12-15 mins. It's brutal but I suck at jogging...so thats what we do.

Yesterday is a good example of how I've been eating. Two eggs for breakfast, 1 cup of my wife's homemade meatball soup. 1 serving protein powder/phytonutrient mix for afternoon snack. 2 chicken enchiladas with rice and beans for dinner. ++ Supplements

Some of you might think that I'm backwards loading my calorie intake, small breakfast, bigger lunch, huge dinner. That's probably true, but I'm staring with protein and that's what all those studies keep saying....breakfast must be protein or else!!!! So that's a start.

In fact, if you look at how I'm eating, you'll probably notice that every meal is high in protein. That's because I'm interested in loosing fat and not muscle.

I'll post tomorrow what that scale says with fresh batteries...hope it isn't worse?

Dr. Chris

The Choice has been made

10 percent? My ambitious attempt to break into the lean and mean numbers.
For the last three-four years, I’ve been going to the gym 3 times a week(with the occasional…I can’t work out tonight because I’m sad message texted to my workout buddy). During that time I’ve lost weight, gained muscle, and improved my cardiovascular fitness. I never really set out with any specific goals in mind for myself, I just knew that exercise has a way of improving everything in your life assuming you’re smart and don’t hurt yourself.
The only real goal I had for myself was to make sure my pants fit. Since college I’ve worn 34 waist pants. The reason for this is that I knew if I got bigger pants, I would get fatter. So no matter how fat I got, I would still squeeze into those 34’s…even until the point that it would be uncomfortable.
I haven’t had problems fitting into that size pants in years.
Until last week. I realized I was slowly but surely putting weight back on. Sure, it didn’t hurt to put on the pants, but it required all kinds of interesting tucks and stretches to make them feel comfortable. Bottom line, I was getting fat again.
Reason: Holiday candy.
About a month before Halloween my wife starts buying candy. She buys it on sale so we can give it to the trick-or-treaters, but that means there is candy in the house for almost a full month before it’s supposed to go to the intended consumer. Unavoidably, I end up raiding the candy stash prematurely and then end up cleaning up the candy left over.
After Halloween comes Thanksgiving and Christmas.
Right about this time of year, M&Ms releases their fabled holiday peppermint chocolate Christmas candy. My wife then buys said candy for “decorative purposes”. It’s funny how decorations turn into a fat gut.
All of this has caused me to refocus my attention with what is going on in my diet. So instead of just eliminating these threats, I’ve decided I’m going to set a goal for myself and let my patients and friends and whoever follow along. The goal: 10 percent body fat.
Do you know how long it’s going to take me to get to 10 percent? Me neither, but I’m going to shoot for a goal of 10-12 weeks. I have no idea if that is realistic or not, but I have a pretty good idea of just how long it takes me to lose weight.
Before I figure this out for sure I need to get some numbers down.
Weight:???
Body Fat:???
If you asked me to guess at how much I weight right now, I would have to guess in the high 190’s or low 200’s. If I had to guess just at a percentage of body fat….I would have to guess about 24-26% body fat.
How do I find out? First I think I should go buy a scale.
That’s right, I don’t have a scale at home. Why? Because I accept myself as I am.
Seriously, if you want to know how I view my body image watch the opening of American Dad. He leaps out of bed, his belly hanging over his underwear, yet he’s smiling and flexing his biceps in self admiration.
Ya, it’s a distorted, unrealistic body image but it’s also easier on my self esteem.
All the more reason to get a scale.
The Scale:
I went out and bought this scale at Bed, Bath and Beyond. It’s supposed to be good, by that I mean the check out girl at Bed, Bath, and Beyond said it was good.
If you don’t like the science behind that inquiry then I don’t blame you.
The gold standards for body fat measurement are body pod and Dexa scan. Let me tell you right now, I’m not going to get a dexa scan.
So, onto the numbers. Previously I guessed my body weight/body fat at high 190’s, low 200’s and my body fat at 24-26%. Let’s see what the scale had to say.
Uh oh.
Ok. So I got on the scale and it said 206. That’s not far from what I was guessing, but I was in for a shocker when I measured my body fat.
33%.
Yikes.
Ok. That’s higher than I last measured. Oh boy.

Dr. Chris