February

February is my least favorite month.

The area I live in only gets 1 – 2 dustings of snow per winter. We get ice, we get barren trees, brown grass, cold air and the bleakness of frozen concrete urban sprawl zones. In short all of the ugliness of winter without much of the beauty.

By the time February rolls around I am done with the bleakness of winter. The bleakness in the current news doesn’t help either.

I’m thinking about this favorite quote of mine from concentration camp survivor, psychologist and inventor of logotherapy ( a form of cognitive therapy ) Viktor Frankel:

Between stimulus and response there is a space. In that space is our power to choose our response. In our response lies our growth and our freedom.

Okay, time to pump things up.

February is my least favorite month, but is also the shortest month and we are already 10 days into it.

The news is bleak, but I have new hope with our new President. I can’t imagine another person with a mix of qualifications better to tackle the problems at hand. Good grief, just imagine if the opposition won.

It is starting to get light out when I wake up and stay light for about 10 minutes after work.

In a few weeks it will be that weird in between time, not winter and not spring with a sense of foreshadowing in the air. Soon after that those ephemeral flowers you see on bushes that only last a few weeks in spring will come out. Then buttercups, then those blue chicory flowers, then dandelions. Squirrels, rabbits, birds. Cats lazily sleeping on porches.

Now, I feel better.

Good night! 🙂

Still here, after 1 year

picture of a scale at 178 poundsOn 2007 January 21st I weighed 223.8 pounds.

On 2008 January 21st I weighed 178 pounds.

On 2009 January 19th I weighed 181.22 pounds.

In other words, I more or less maintained the weight loss I wrote about in Stick a fork in me I’m done for one year.

I don’t have statistics handy, but I’ve seen many articles over the years to the effect that only a very small percentage of people stay slimmed down after they lose excess weight. The figures get even more dim after 5 years.

Knowing this, I decided to keep adding serial goals to my weight control program even after I achieved my goal weight of 178 lbs. The first of these goals was to maintain my weight loss for 1 year, which would make me eligible to join the National Weight Control Registry. I sent away for my application two days ago!

My next goal is to go from 181.22 lbs back down to 178 lbs.

After that, my goal is to maintain 178 lbs for another year in increments of monthly goals. My ultimate goal is to maintain the weight loss for a full 5 years.

To help myself along I decided to open up this new category on my blog for periodic reports on my maintenance efforts. Stick a fork in me I’m done will answer all of your questions about my initial weight loss. No gimmicks, just regular tracking.

BTW, I had a frozen vegan lasagna and tofu knish tonight for dinner. Combined, just under a slim 500 calories, but very filling and satisfying. Life can be sweet! 🙂