Hi. My name is Thomas, and I am a Foodaholic! I have now lost 95 lbs. I am also a 100% Member of The Blue Dot Club with 33 straight Challenge/Round wins as of 10/17/15. (Note: The Blue Dot Club is not an official Club of Dietbet. It only refers to the Blue Dots earned on a DietBet Profile Page. You are a Blue Dot Club member at your win percentage if you have ANY DietBet Wins!)
I have wanted to lose those extra pounds ever since midway through college when I weighed about 220 lbs. I am now 48 and have slowly packed on the pounds. On Feb. 13, 2015 I weighed 306, and bending over to tie my shoes had become an effort in of itself. I've tried over and over to lose the weight, but each time I was successful in losing a little, quit, and then packed on even more pounds. Each time I'd probably lost no more than 30 lbs. before the ensuing weight gain to an even higher weight.
Through the years cycling has been my weight loss exercise of choice. Other activities included volleyball (hard court and sand), basketball, & Nordic Track. The latest physical activity had become thumb exercises as I played Xbox with my boys, between handfuls of snack foods; Yeah, not too many calories being burned there!
My 1st Blog, "I vow to be a Loser!" discussed my attitude when I first started DietBet. After a classmate, Lisa, posted on Facebook a Jillian Michaels challenge, I thought I'd give DietBet a try. Why not? What else did I have to gain besides more pounds if I didn't?
My wife decided to sign up for a year membership at the local fitness center. I told my wife to only get me a 3 month membership in February, because I knew I'd be back outside on my bicycle (just like every other year) and wouldn't need to spend the money. She went ahead and purchased me a year membership. I was infuriated. I said only 3 months and I made her go back and change the membership. So I started swimming for exercise right before my first DietBet Challenge. Well, guess what? After 3 months of swimming, I finally admitted to my wife that, “I was WRONG!” There I admitted it! I was wrong, and I went back to the fitness center to go ahead and pay the full year membership fee.
Why? Well, I had crushed the first challenge, in fact by the end of the first week I had also signed up for a Transformer for a longer term commitment to lose the weight. After my first 38 days of being in DietBet I had 2 blue dots on my profile graph. What a Great Motivation – Blue Dots! I never signed up to win money, my goal was to lose weight. So I was only going to do 1 Kickstart a month along with a Transformer. After my first Kickstart win, I determined all my winnings over my money spent would be given to charity. So I made plan to get more Blue Dots and thereby fuel my motivation to continue on, lose the weight, and get to my life goal of 200 lbs. (Refer to my 3rd Blog, “Did you just call me Blob?” for insight into my plan.) To summarize I max out challenges by staggering Kickstarts every 10 days and Transformer Challenges every 2 months. I always use a weigh out as the next weigh in, so I am pushed to lose more from the last challenge.
Since I was losing at a high rate, I became concerned about disqualifying myself if I lost too much in a Transformer (lose 10% but no more than 30% in 6 months). So, I developed a Spreadsheet that I use to track all my challenges, wins and goals. Well, I came within 12.2 lbs. to reaching the maximum limit in my first Transformer. It is even better to have the spreadsheet to see my progress, and plan for my upcoming challenges, including getting into a Maintainer Game once I do reach my Life Goal Weight. Oh, and I did move my Life Goal Weight to 190 lbs. We will see how I look and feel once I get there. (Spreadsheet is available to those that want it. Send me a Cheer with the location of the Challenge that we share. Then send me a Private Message within that Challenge with your email address, so I can send you the spreadsheet. I don’t believe in displaying my email to the general public, that is why I like to use the Messages. IF you are reading this and we don’t share a challenge, send me a Cheer anyway and I will work with you to get you the spreadsheet.)
One major concern for me was the issue of saggy skin. We have all seen the videos or pictures of the results of losing weight quickly, or we have experienced to some degree this for ourselves. I alluded to this concern in my 2nd Blog, “AntiGravity Cream: What is it?” I have done some research on this issue, and located a lotion that I am currently using. I won’t testify that it is the cure all solution, but it seems to be helping. The product is called “Skin Tight” and can be found at http://www.skinenergizer.com/Skin-Tight-Body-Firming-Lotion-p/seskti008.htm Other solutions to saggy skin include, weight lifting for toning, laser treatment by a dermatologist, or excess skin removal surgery. The last two options are what I’d consider last resorts and I may not need to choose either of those options. For now I plan to continue to use the lotion for up to a year after I meet my life goal weight.
So, how have I been able to continue to be successful in losing weight? The Motivation factor comes from those little Blue Dots. How do I get there? I try very hard to eat right. I drink a lot more water and eat a lot less than I used to, and when I do eat I try to focus on getting lots of fruits, vegetables and less of fatty meats, starches, and bread. I also try very hard to cut sugar completely, which has caused me to stop drinking pop, but it is worth it. That being said I do snack from time to time. The killer is the grazing I do when my body craves something and I don’t get enough water in my system soon enough, so I fill up on stuff I shouldn’t. I look forward to being able to enjoy in moderation some of the foods I have cut from my diet once I reach my life goal weight.
Exercise is also a key ingredient to my dieting plan. I am blessed to have a wonderful supportive wife, who tends to everything at home while I put in 3 and up to 4 hours of exercise a day. I am also blessed to be self-employed, which allows me the freedom to set my schedule. I like to use cardio daily. I will cycle (outside or spinning) for 1:30:00 to 2:00:00 (h:mm:ss) and get 20 to 30 miles in, followed by swimming for 1:30:00 to 2:15:00 getting 2 to 3 miles a day. It did take time to build up my endurance to be able to work out at this level, but how I feel now has been worth it. My plan is to back it off to 1 hour per day once I get to my life goal weight. The highest levels of exercise I have ever done are 5 mile swims, once in Aug 2015 and twice in Sept 2015, and a century (100 miles) bike ride while riding in Biking Across Kansas www.bak.org in 2009.
If everything continues as planned I should be able to be at my Life Goal Weight of 190 lbs. by Thanksgiving 2015 or the week after. At that point I will still be active in 2 Transformer Challenges, one ending on 1/7/2016 and one ending on 3/26/2016. Before that I would like to enter a Maintainer game once I reach 195 lbs. pending on how I look and feel at that weight. I am planning on being in a Maintainer for at least 1 year if not 2 years. I will always use a DietBet Kickstart if I ever get 4% over my Life Goal Weight. I don’t ever want to go back to how I felt when I was obese, when I got winded just tying my shoes and didn’t even like seeing myself in photos.
Yes, it can be Done! Whenever people tell me I’ll just gain it back or that I can’t do it. I just tell them, “Just Watch Me!”
Lifetime Member of DietBet, Thomas A.