Prescription drugs (PCT d - 76)

I may have already mentioned that I had only briefly considered, and quickly dismissed the possibility of laparascopic gastric band surgery. For me, there are simply too many risks of complications. Far better to do it "naturally". "But what about drugs?", I hear you ask. Well, people who know me know that I dislike taking prescription drugs. There are a couple that I have to take simply to make my life better: warfarin for an inherited blood clotting disorder, and a proton-pump inhibitor, omeprazole, for persistent heartburn.

My long-term blood sugar level, measured by my A1c, had crept up to 6.4% when I was 405 pounds heavy. 

For people without diabetes, the normal range for the hemoglobin A1c test is between 4% and 5.6%. Hemoglobin A1c levels between 5.7% and 6.4% indicate increased risk of diabetes, and levels of 6.5% or higher indicate diabetes

As I started adopting a healthier lifestyle and losing weight, that value dropped to 6.2%, then 6.1%. I have avoided the diabetes precipice that I was staring into. But I'm still 320 pounds. I still have 16 months to go before I reach my 178 pound target. So, I was reluctantly persuaded to try metformin, at the lowest dose available. Hailed as the next "wonder drug", it helps people, particularly overweight people, lower their blood sugar levels. I really can't tell if it's the metformin that has helped bring my A1c down, or if it's the diet and exercise regime, but I'm going to continue to take it for the time being, especially since it's available for zero cost on my current health plan!

BP is back to normal again now.

I also recently started taking a low dose of an ACE inhibitor, lisinopril, to try to reduce my blood pressure. Having had really good blood pressure (120/80 mmHg) for most of my life, it had started to creep up to 130/85 or 135/90 - not terrible, but too high. After just two doses I could see a difference already. Now I've been taking it for a couple of months, and my readings are consistently good again.

First experience of hanging in my hammock (PCT d - 79)

After the strong and chilly wind didn't let up at all on Saturday, I finally managed to get out for a 2.4 mile walk on Sunday morning (thanks, Traci!) It was just in my own little neighborhood but it was up and down some steepish hills, including the once-intimidating Buttercup Hill (200 feet tall) at the end of my street. It was hard going, so I know that I'll have to spend several of the next 79 days working on climbing steep hills. I had my backpack on, with about half the stuff that I'll be taking with me to Oregon in May. It weighed nearly 14 pounds.

First time putting up the hammock, lessons learned

On a different tack, I finally got to try out my hammock at the Vigilante campground near York today. It took a couple of goes to get the angle of the dangle correct. The big takeaway from the whole experience was that I need to practice tying proper knots. Evidently, all those YouTube videos I watched didn't help enough. I need to tie so many of them myself, using real rope or cord, that it becomes second nature.

The whole hammock setup was much smaller than I had imagined but, once I'd made some adjustments, it was pretty comfortable. Getting in to it was amusing. Getting out again was like something from a slapstick movie.

Now (on Wednesday) to order the last major piece of gear, my down quilt, and I'll be all set.

February target reached! 321 lbs (PCT d - 80)

Back in early February (http://blog.ergoob.org/2016/02/revised-targets-new-end-date-but-it.html) I published a list of revised goals, or target weights that I wanted to achieve in the coming 16 months.

Date	Target	Actual
2/27/2016	321	321 **
3/30/2016	312
4/30/2016	303
5/11/2016	300
5/31/2016	294

 

I was a day late (hence the ** in the table above) but I DID IT!! 

320.6 lbs (145.4 kg)

Dotted line is my actual values

 

Now, onwards and downwards to the next target - 312 pounds by the end of March, then 303 pounds by the end of April, breaking through 300 before my hiking trip to Oregon.  

As you can see from the chart, the dotted line shows the ups and downs of the last month, including a couple of weeks when little progress was made, but I continued to do the things that have been successful for me for the past eight months: a low-carb diet, more modest portion sizes, more exercise - in short, the very title of this blog, "Eat Right, Get Out Of Breath". 

I also came to the realization, recently, of something that I kind of knew already, which is the important role that drinking water plays in a successful weight loss regime. I had been trying to avoid the "sucralose and acesulfame potassium" in the water flavor enhancers, so I had stopped buying them. There being so few other tasty but calorie-free alternatives, I had inevitably as a side-effect, reduced my water intake. Once I started using the flavor enhancers again, and my water consumption reached "new normal" levels, the weight started to come off again. I'll have to do a separate post about water consumption. 

 

322 lbs (PCT d - 81)

322.6 lbs (146.3 kg)

At this morning's weigh in I tipped the scales at 322.6 pounds, another recent new low. Onward and downward! 

Almost got all my gear for the hike in May (PCT d - 82)

With my new Osprey Aether 60
backpack

My new backpack arrived on Tuesday morning, so I went (walked!) to pick it up after work that day. I will be test driving it with extra weight inside over the next few weeks, trying to simulate hiking conditions, and getting used to the adjustments and fine tuning. There are lots of straps and loops and such. There are some that I'm not even sure of their purpose.

I put my sleep system (hammock/bug net/rain tarp) in the bottom of the pack, and added some extra bulk and weight to the top part to give it a better shape and more realistic weight. Then I tried it while walking to work. It wasn't bad - pretty comfortable. Since I'll be carrying it all 100 miles of the hike, I've got to get used to carrying it when I'm walking around town too.

Now, the only two things missing are my down quilt to keep me warm at night, and a DeLorme inReach Explorer GPS locator and communicator for use in an emergency and to help send our location on the trail to our friends and family back home who will be able to track us on a special website.

Between us, Birdie and I have pretty much everything else we need now. So, the challenge in the next 12 weeks will be to test ourselves and our kit as much as possible before we go, so that there as few bad surprises as possible, and we can enjoy the beautiful scenery (trees, trees, and more trees; and a few mountains, and lakes) of southern Oregon.

No longer a prisoner of my own mind (PCT d - 85)

I've spoken, in this blog and elsewhere, of the fact that I'm tackling my 100-mile hike in May "because no-on told me I couldn't". So, evidently, I had already grasped the concept that one's own mind can trap one, or set one free. Thus it was that I had a revelation recently. After comfortably walking 10 miles a few days ago, and six miles last Saturday, there's really no need for me to think of my radius of operation, or my circle of influence, being so small (only as wide as the distance I walk to work each day - 0.75 miles). 

Freeing myself from that stinkin' thinkin', I can see now that practically ANYWHERE in town is within my reach. From the South Hills, I can walk to East Helena, I can walk to the west side, or to the north valley. With this new freedom, I decided to skip my usual ride to the swimming pool last night, and walked there instead. It's only 2.0 miles from my apartment, but I would never have thought about walking there before. In my head, it was always too far away. I didn't walk home, though (come on! It's uphill). In between, I swam for a solid hour, which felt really good. As I was doing so, it occurred to me that it's now possible to get up earlier, walk to the pool, swim for 30-40 minutes in the morning, and still walk to work. Nice! I used to go to the pool at 05:00 every weekday morning anyway, back in 2014 and early 2015. 

I even contemplated how I had allowed myself NOT to climb the hillock outside my apartment ("Buttercup Hill", I think it has been called, back in the 1970s). It's a 200 foot, very steep hill, which I was somehow frightened to climb until three months after I'd moved in. As soon as the snow/ice and soft mud are no longer a problem I will be climbing it on a regular basis now. 

So, it goes to show, if we impose limits on ourselves we can be pretty effective prison warders. We can hold ourselves back from reaching out and trying, from pushing ourselves to our boundaries and beyond. Without these self-imposed walls, the anything is possible!

My life - in text messages (PCT d - 88)

It occurred to me recently that if I ever fell over and banged my head, losing all of my recent memories, one would easily be able to recreate my life by looking at the text messages from my phone. Unfortunately, the messages are all to different people, so no one individual gets the whole story, but between them all, they all get pieces of it. So, when I say to you, dear reader, "I can't remember if I've told you this before or not", it's true. I probably can't.

Saturday was a great day. Apart from not having to go to work (always a bonus), my English football team - Reading FC - won their FA Cup 5th Round match, which means they get to play in the next round in the second week of March. I shouldn't entrust my happiness to the fortunes of a soccer team, I know, especially a team with such crappy league form (16th out of 24 teams, having won only 9 of 31 league matches this season). But, today they beat a Premier League club by 3-1, finally reaching their full potential and playing together really well.

I had recently had success, too, with a little computing hobby thing that I was working on. At https://flightaware.com/adsb/stats/user/janesdaddy you can see the results. I bought a new Raspberry Pi recently. It's a low-powered, single-board computer for $35 that can be used for learning programming, or for cool home automation projects (which is what my first Pi is doing), or this new one is taking the transponder signals from airplanes that are flying above Helena and feeding them into a huge database (ADS-B flight tracking), so that I and others can see the call sign, origin, destination, height speed and direction of planes in our area.

Yesterday (Friday evening) I went to a Helena Bighorns ice hockey game, which was exciting (even though the team from Helena lost 2-3 in the LAST SECOND of the game). Beforehand, I had dinner at a local 24-hour restaurant (Shellie's Country Cafe) without realizing that Friday and Saturday evenings are their Prime Rib evenings. I hadn't had prime rib in ages, so I treated myself. The plate was as large as a car tire, and the steak was massive. Having, therefore, pushed the boat out so far, I figured I would treat myself and have some lemon meringue pie too. I haven't had anything like lemon meringue pie in eight months now, and it tasted pretty good, but I was WAY TOO FULL afterwards, and it was reflected on the weighing scales this morning 😢 .

Nearly 13,000 steps walked,
or 7 miles

After last Friday's successful 10 mile walk, I know I have to keep up the momentum before I go hiking 100 miles in seven days in May, so I arranged to go on a long walk with my friend Traci. I walked to her house (3 miles) then walked 3 miles more in her neighborhood. It was good, but my legs were tired after I sat down at the end of it. Also, she's a bundle of energy who is capable of walking at a much faster pace than my dawdling 2.6 miles per hour. Still, I did it. Now I just need to keep challenging myself to do more of these 5 and 6 mile walks, and eventually some more 8 and 10 mile walks, until they become almost second nature. There are 88 days until we leave for Oregon, so there's time to build up my strength and endurance.

If I walk to work and back on any given day (0.75 miles each way) and do an hour on the treadmill at the gym (2.5 miles, let's say), that's about 4 miles or so. After throwing in a mile more for other incidentals, I can sometimes manage 10,000 steps per day, but only on a couple of days per week. My objective now is to regularly exceed 12,000 steps in a day, like I did today.

It's all A LOT better than a year ago, when I was such a slug that I could barely reach the end of the driveway without being out of breath. Walking just one city block was a major ordeal at the time. I remember not wanting to go to Helena's fantastic annual Symphony Under The Stars because it involved walking a few blocks. Now, I have so much more energy.

I keep saying to myself, now that I'm getting fitter, "I wish I'd started doing something about my health sooner than I did". More than that, too, I wish I had never allowed myself to get into the shape I was in the first place. But, it is what it is. I'm doing it now - one small step at a time. I have the support and encouragement of a great team of friends who all help and support me in different ways. If you are reading this blog, there's a good chance you are one of those, and I sincerely Thank You for all that you have done.

Some of you who are reading this blog are on your own journey to better health. I salute you for grasping the nettle and doing it, even when you're tired or hungry and simply don't want to. Don't give up! It's worth it! You're worth it! It's worth the fantastic feeling that you get when you can wearing clothing that's "normal"-sized. It's worth it when you can bend over to tie your shoelaces. It's worth it when you can walk or swim or do other exercises that you haven't been able to do for years before.It's worth it when you catch yourself checking yourself out in the mirror.

Self checkout

I know that I personally still have a long journey ahead of me. I've been living this new lifestyle for eight months now, and it'll be another 16 months before the transformation is complete. I'm still morbidly obese at 324 lbs (well, 329 pounds after that pie yesterday!), but I'm definitely headed in the right direction.

Meal Measure portion control tool

My sister, living in Singapore at the moment, recently pointed out this product to me: a Meal Measure portion control tool (http://smile.amazon.com/gp/product/B004Z0SDXC).

Within each of the three smaller holes are graduation marks to indicate a half cup measure of food. Filling the hole up to the top is a full cup. One is designated for fruit, vegetables and starch, and the bottom, open hole is for protein, all according the USDA My Pyramid suggestions. I'm going to give it a go and see how useful it is. 

I was reminded of a blog post I'd made a few weeks ago in which I was talking about the need for cosmetic surgery after losing substantial amounts of weight, when a friend pointed out that the TLC network has a TV show called Skin Tight, that deals with exactly that (http://www.tlc.com/tv-shows/skin-tight/).  OMG! That's some scary sh*t right there! I knew it was a real problem, and it may be one that I'll be facing, myself, in a year or two's time. Before I contemplate any kind of surgery though, I would want to prove to myself, and a potential surgeon, that I can keep the weight off for a year or more (although I'm sure some cosmetic surgeons [not all] are probably more interested in the income than in a patient's welfare). 

I had spoken in this blog before about having a couple of opportunities in April to test my hiking gear in real-world situations. One of those will be here in Montana, but our state doesn't lend itself too well to outdoor sleeping above 38 °F in April. Few other nearby states do (not Washington or Oregon or Idaho, nor Wyoming or Colorado or the Dakotas). Really, the best bet is going to be in Utah. I was e-mailing another friend recently who has been to some of the national parks in Utah, and it sounds like that might work - except for the obvious logistical problem of getting there! That might be solved now too. Since I deliberately took time off work during National Park Week (http://www.nps.gov/findapark/feefreeparks.htm) when the usual entrance fees ($30-40) are waived, it's a great opportunity to see some spectacular countryside (iconic stone arches, for example) as well as stress test my backpack, hammock and down quilt, cooking equipment, shoes (and feet) and other clothing, and everything else that I'll be using four weeks later near Crater Lake. I haven't really looked at Arches or Canyonland National Parks fully yet, or any of the other state and national parks in southern Utah, but it'll be a great experience, I'm sure. I just hope there are places to hang a hammock! 

I'm sure there was more to tell, but that'll do for now. 

324 lbs (PCT d - 90)

324.2 lbs on Thursday

At this morning's weigh in I tipped the scales at 324 pounds, another recent new low. Onward and downward!

80 pounds lost in 8 months (PCT d - 92)

324.8 lbs, a new low,
the app on my phone says

It was on June 16th, 2015, exactly eight months ago, that I signed the lease on my current apartment. I had mixed emotions about it at the time (it's a long story that some of my supporters know). Since then, I've chosen to follow a very low carb diet, and I've been walking increasingly further distances. Last Friday I walked 10 miles in one go, something I hadn't done in the previous 10 years. In May of this year, I'm going to be walking 100 miles in seven days, down by Crater Lake in southern Oregon together with my daughter. It's a huge adventure, involving months of planning and preparation. I'm feeling really good right now about our prospects for success.

When I first moved in to the new place, I weighed 405 lbs. I had a hard time walking up the hill from work to meet the landlord and get the keys to the apartment. These days, the ¾ mile walk is much easier. As we look forward to the spring/summer and the warmer weather, things will only get easier and better from here. At this morning's weigh-in, I tipped the scales at 324.8 lbs (147.3 kg), 80 lbs less than eight months ago.

There's still a long way to go - probably another 17 months - but I'm going to do it! I will succeed!

First test of shoes and feet and legs ** PASSED ** (PCT d -95)

I took Friday off work in order to do the first significant test of my readiness for the long hike in May. I had planned to walk 15 miles from my apartment in the South Hills to Sierra Rd in the north valley (7.5 miles away) and back again. In the end, I managed 10.3 miles in four and a half hours, which was okay.

10.3 miles in four and a half hours

Knowing a week beforehand that the weather was going to cooperate, I waited until the sun came out to melt any traces of black ice that might make conditions slippery. I set off at 09:00. The first break came at 4 miles, when I stopped at the Natural Grocer to buy some bananas (for energy and potassium), chocolate macaroons (tasty and no too carb-laden) and a couple of flavored drinks. I already had a couple of bottles of water with me, plus a few Mozzarella sticks.

Averaging about 2.5 miles per hour until lunchtime, I made it to Sierra Road in three hours. A leisurely lunch followed, then a slow start to the journey back. As the bright sunshine came out, and with a couple of short breaks, I made it to the area around Custer and Montana Avenue before deciding to stop.

Physically, I felt like I'd managed well. My thighs could tell that I'd just walked ten miles. My feet felt good - no rubbing, no hot spots, no blisters, no aches, no discomfort. The shoes and socks performed well. First test ** PASSED **!

It was also a test of the longevity of my phone's battery and the performance of the UnderArmor MapMyHike+ Android app. With the Wi-Fi and cellular data turned off, only GPS was still on. I did play music non-stop for nearly three hours and the battery went from 100% down to 62%. I took my Anker Astro E5 battery pack with me and re-charged the phone to 75% while eating lunch. On the way back into town I listened to an Audible audiobook (a biography of Albert Einstein, which was serendipitous given the science news about the confirmation of gravitational waves, something that Einstein had predicted in 1916).

325.2 lbs - lowest in a long time!

On Saturday morning, I'm doing okay. The muscles can still tell that they've had a good workout, but no trauma, no strains, nothing adverse. Stepping on the scales this morning, I was at 325.2 pounds, the lowest I've been in a very long time.

Hammock arrived in just two days

Eagle's Nest Outfitters Reactor hammock kit

Wow, my hammock arrived just two days after being ordered! It came via FedEx Ground from Colorado. All the pieces together weigh just 5 lbs. Now I just need to pick up my backpack (rucksack) when it gets here, and buy the down quilt and I'll be ready for the coming backpacking/hiking season. Cool!

Ordered my "sleep system" today for the big hike in May (PCT d - 99)

ENO Reactor hammock system

I've been eyeing up the Eagles Nest Outfitters (ENO) OneLink Reactor Hammock System ($245), but that includes the Reactor hammock (with a 20" wide pocket for your insulated sleeping pad), Atlas straps, ProFly rain tarp, Guardian bug net and stakes. I ordered mine today. It should be here next Tuesday. I'll be testing it at the next opportunity. 

Given the location that we'll be hiking in (state and national forests in southern Oregon) in May, there should be LOTS of trees to use, and lots of mosquitoes..

First test of PCT readiness will be this Friday

I'm looking forward to the warmer weather this week (high 40s °F and into the 50s°F on Friday), and my first chance to test myself with a long-distance walk in Helena to see how intensive my next three months of preparation have to be. I've taken the day off on Friday so that I can do 15 miles in one (long) day. I won't have my 25 lb backpack on. It probably won't be here on time (being ordered from the Base Camp in Helena). Still, it'll be a good test of how my legs and feet stand up (!) to the pressure. 

I'm also looking forward to getting some more gear; a new backpack (rucksack) is on its way, and a can of bear spray to deter the black bears (although ground shipping will cause that to arrive a few days later). A couple of backcountry practice runs in April will be a full "dress rehearsal" for the real thing which starts with a two-day train journey on May 18th. The next thing for me to acquire will be my "sleep system" (hammock, bug net, rain fly, tree straps and pegs), followed by a lightweight down quilt (only 1.7 lbs!), and then the train tickets. Then it'll just be a few small things ("Kleinigkeiten" as they say in Germany) and I'll be ready. 

Now I really need to start stepping up my muscle-building (weight lifting) exercises to shape and tone the muscles that are hidden under my slowly-diminishing rolls of fat. I want to be able to close that Gore-Tex jacket before I leave! 

326.4 pounds (PCT d - 100)

326.4 lbs today

326.4 pounds (148.0 kg) after a good weekend. Onward and downward! 

I saw an interesting YouTube video yesterday (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ztiHRiFXtoc) which suggested that diet was more important than exercise in reducing weight, on the grounds that a single candy (chocolate) bar is 200+ calories, but the effort required to burn 200 calories through exercise is really high. It's far easier to NOT eat the chocolate than it is to run vigorously for 30 minutes. 

Revised targets, new "end date" (but it never really ends)

I was writing in an e-mail to a friend recently: "...another 120 pounds in 418 days (twice the weight in twice the number of days) would still will put me at 208 pounds by the end of March 2017. That's okay - I'll take that. That pace would put me at my ultimate target (178 lbs) by the middle of July 2017, eight months later than I wanted, but still a LOT better than if I didn't do anything except sit on the couch all the time, and eat the way I was doing before."

Having previously published some target weights, and failed to hit the latter ones, I have revised my aims and come up with a new path to success; one that is more realistic, if somewhat longer.

2/27/2016	321
3/30/2016	312
4/30/2016	303
5/11/2016	300
5/31/2016	294
6/28/2016	286
7/30/2016	277
8/30/2016	268
9/30/2016	259
10/28/2016	251
11/29/2016	242
12/30/2016	233
1/30/2017	224
2/27/2017	216
3/31/2017	207
4/27/2017	199
5/29/2016	190
6/29/2017	181
7/10/2017	178

My new Gore-Tex jacket, doesn't quite fit 

Under this new plan, I should be below 300 pounds by the time we leave for Oregon at the end of May. I'll be approximately 242 pounds by my 50th birthday at the end of November, and I'll reach my ultimate goal by mid-July, 2017. The transformation will have lasted two years at that point.

Even when I was at my lowest in recent times, when I was living in England for the year from 2006 to 2007, I was only ever at 280 pounds (having started that 10 month period at 360+ pounds).

I bought a new lightweight Gore-Tex jacket recently which is just a tad too small for me at the moment. My plan is to fit in to it properly before the big hike.

The title of this blog post includes the phrase, "...but it never really ends", which is an acknowledgement that this lifestyle change is going to have to become a new permanent way of life if I'm going to keep the weight off once I've lost it. I never again want to be in a position where I can't walk 100 yards down the road, or can't bend over to tie my shoe laces, or don't have the energy to get up off the couch after work to dig weeds in the garden or the myriad of other things which I am slowly regaining the ability to do.

Checking out locations for my April gear test

Being so inexperienced in the ways of hiking and backpacking, I really appreciate my friends who have done it before and are prepared to make suggestions for me. One such idea was a venue to go at the end of April when I have a few days off work and I want to test all of my gear (and my physical body) before tackling the 100-mile section of the PCT in Oregon the following month. It's the Bear Trap Canyon wilderness, on BLM land near Ennis, Montana (about 8 miles from Norris).

http://alltrails.com/trail/us/montana/bear-trap-canyon-trail
http://www.blm.gov/mt/st/en/fo/dillon_field_office/recreation/bear_trap.html
https://www.trails.com/tcatalog_trail.aspx?trailid=HGR027-110
http://www.bozeman-magpie.com/visitors-guide-detail.php?id=45
http://southwestmt.com/listings/897.htm
http://www.visitmt.com/listings/general/b-l-m-trail/bear-trap-national-recreation-trail.html

It is reputed to have very mild weather, so the third week of April should be fine. It's well before the busy fly-fishing and whitewater rafting season, and before the warmer weather that allows too many rattlesnakes to come out. I guess I'd better get myself a snakebite kit, just in case. The route itself is about 9 miles long but can only be accessed from the northern end by hikers (access from the south was closed to all but rafters), so the round trip could be up to 18 miles long. With Norris Hot Springs being so close, this is looking pretty attractive.

329.2 pounds (PCT d - 104)

329.2 lbs (149.3 kg) today

After a couple of weeks of bobbing up and down between 332 and 335 lbs, I've finally broken through the 330 pound barrier. Onward and downward!

331.6 - back on the wagon (PCT d - 105)

331.6 lbs, a new low (recently)

After a month of bobbing up and down, the 'losing' trend is finally continuing. I'm down to 331.6 lbs now. I missed my end of month goal, but I'm okay with it, since I am still losing weight overall.

There are only 105 days to go until we leave on our Pacific Crest Trail adventure. As weather and road/trail conditions permit in my neighborhood, I'm trying to transition from working out at the gym to walking/hiking "in the real world". At the end of March I will drop my gym membership altogether (which will save some money). I'm trying to increase the amount of muscle and strength-building that I do, using the elastic resistance bands that I already have at home. I wake up earlier now to do that. 

We are also slowly acquiring more and more of the gear that we'll need for a successful adventure. Earlier this week we ordered new backpacks (rucksacks) and my daughter got her own head lamp. I also have a new lightweight rain jacket coming, since it was on sale for $40 less than the normal price. Holy cow! That stuff is still really expensive though! My "sleep system" (hammock, bug net, fly sheet to keep the rain off, tree straps and ground pegs) will be $245. A lightweight duck or goose down sleep bag or quilt will be c. $200. The train tickets to Klamath Falls are about $140 each, each way! But, it's going to be an epic adventure, and worth every penny! 

I'm still largely avoiding excess carbohydrates, but not cutting them out altogether. I had my first slices of pizza in seven months yesterday. Today's lunch was a baked potato with chili. The portion sizes are much more moderate then before. I've found it really difficult to keep an up-to-date food journal. Maybe I'll try an electronic one instead of a paper one soon. I'm getting plenty of protein and green vegetables. I'm avoiding peas and corn. I'm temporarily given up on giving up stevia as my sweetener of choice. Using raw honey as a natural alternative to artificial sweeteners wasn't working for me (I stopped losing weight when I did that). 

As soon as I can, I want to take a whole day to walk 10 or 15 miles, just to see where I'm at in my preparations, and see if I need to step up my training. Then, in a month or two, I'll do it again but with a 30 lb backpack on. I've got a couple of Fridays booked off work in April so that I can go further afield and test the rest of my gear before we set off on May 18th. More details about the 100-mile hike can be found here: http://www.ergoob.org/pct2016 

Good workout last night

I had a really good workout last night, walking almost two and a half miles:

A whole hour at an average of 2.4 mph

and swimming for a long time. Not all of it was vigorous swimming but sometimes I like to relax and simply float in the warm water. I can get a lot of good-quality thinking time in while I'm floating, almost weightless, in the pool, with the water blocking the noise out.

This morning I had some positive affirmation from one of my fitness apps on my phone: 12,249 steps. After a bit of a blip, the weight is coming down again too. 333.2 lbs this morning. I should be below 330 this weekend.

The weather is going to be slightly warmer this week (i.e. above freezing during the day), so the roads outside should be mostly free of snow and ice soon (well, until the next snow at the weekend). That should enable me to get outside and walk "in the real world", where there are undulation and varied terrain. On a treadmill, the speed is relentlessly constant, and the point at which your heel strikes the ground is the same every time. In the real world, that same spot on your foot gets a reprieve from time to time.

I'm really looking forward to the day (in the next week or two) when I can do a 10-15 mile test walk, just to see how I manage with that now, and whether or not I need to step up the intensity of my exercises. If that works out okay then the next thing will be to repeat the feat with a loaded backpack.

Learning about bears and knots

When I go on my big hike in 115 days (!!) there is a very small possibility that we'll encounter a black bear. I'm not a fan of that. I want to be prepared, with noise makers (whistles and bells) and bear spray. When I posted a question online about strategies to minimize the chances of bear encounters, someone kindly pointed me towards this great graphic:

Never have ANY food where you sleep, not even an empty candy wrapper

The website that it's from, http://theultimatehang.com, looks pretty interesting too, if you are into using a hammock when you backpack or go hiking a lot.

Looking at that website, and remembering all the YouTube videos that I've watched lately made me think: I really need to start learning about and practicing tying knots.

You need to pant!

When I first created the ERGOOB website, 10 years ago now, I had tried to distill what I knew I had to do into a concise title. "Eat Right, Get Out Of Breath" was born. I was just reminded of that earlier this week when I read this:

When you lose weight, where does it go? It turns out, most of it is exhaled. Our body stores the excess protein or carbs in a person's diet in the form of fat, specifically, as triglyceride molecules, which consist of just three kinds of atoms: carbon, hydrogen and oxygen. For people to lose weight, their triglycerides must break up into building blocks, which happens in a process known as oxidation.  

When a triglyceride is oxidized (or "burned up"), the process consumes many molecules of oxygen while producing carbon dioxide (CO₂) and water (H₂O) as waste products. To burn 10 kilograms (22 pounds) of fat, a person needs to inhale 29 kg (64 lbs) of oxygen. The chemical process of burning that fat will produce 28 kg (62 lbs) of carbon dioxide and 11 kg (24 lbs) of water, the researchers calculated. That's a LOT of heavy breathing. 

Results of my experimental cooking

Last week I made a couple of experimental recipes, some fortified hard tack to take on a backcountry hike and a 'good for you' chocolate pudding. The hard tack wasn't cooked quite long enough. At the relatively low temperature (250 °F) it needed more then 90 minutes to eliminate all the moisture.

The chocolate pudding turned out pretty well. 

Low carb chocolate dessert

The consistency was good. The flavor was not bad. It could have done with being slightly sweeter, so perhaps an extra teaspoon of honey, or one extra packet of stevia. I used unsweetened almond milk, so maybe regular almond milk would have been better? It smelled very chocolatey. A garnish of fresh berries would have been good (raspberries!)

Today, I have a couple of avocados that are ripe enough to try my other chocolate pudding recipe. I don't have a blender or food processor, so it'll be fun trying to get the avocados to be a smooth paste by hand.

A couple of rough days, back on track now

A couple of rough days

Last week was very tough at work. A long-running problem turned even worse, and became very stressful. On Thursday and Friday evenings, when I came home, I was starving (like, a lot more than normal). Instead of sticking to my healthy eating plan, which I had followed in the morning for breakfast and at lunchtime, I just dived straight into the first thing that was readily available; and I kept eating, and kept eating, even when I knew (in my head) that I wasn't hungry any more. What I was eating wasn't intrinsically bad food, but I was just eating WAY too much of it, and I felt almost powerless to stop myself. As a result there was a steep upward tick in my weight.

It was really a little bit depressing. I don't really know if it was work-related, or what the problem was. Maybe my body is telling me I'm missing a key nutrient (I've heard, for example, that some anemic people have cravings for red meat)? I totally skipped writing anything in my new food journal for those two days. I'm not going to go back and try to recreate them. I'll just write a comment that says "bad days" and move on to today's entries.

Back on track now

I went to the health center this morning to get some blood tests done and to check in with them. I'll get the results of those tests in a couple of days. The main one for me, obviously, is my weight.

332.2 lbs this morning

After peaking at 428 lbs back in June 2014, I was down to 405 by mid-June of 2015. Since then I've been able to sustain about 10-12 lbs of weight loss a month, with just a small blips in October last year. After my two days of ... insecurity at the end of last week, I'm back on track. 332.2 lbs is the lowest I've been in about three years.

Super grains - fortified hard tack

Last weekend I posted about the idea of making hard tack but adding some quinoa and amaranth for extra protein and other nutrients. Tonight I made some.

Ingredients

• 2 cups whole wheat flour
• ½ cup quinoa
• ½ cup amaranth
• 1 cup water
• Pinch of salt (I used pink Himalayan, but I'm sure any kind would do)

Add caption

Instructions

1. Mix the flour and grains in a bowl
2. Add water and mix together
3. Roll out on a floured surface until about ¼" thick
4. Transfer to a baking sheet, score in squares (perhaps 1" or 2" squares), and prick with a fork
5. Bake in a 250 °F oven for 90 minutes

The idea is to find a balance of ingredients that will taste good, keep for a long time without going rancid, and that will have nutrients that will keep us going on our 100-mile hike in May.

In 2015, no-one succeeded in climbing to the top of Mount Everest

In another one of my 'influential moments' that I have from time to time, I spent a chunk of time today reading a story about a rich guy (probably a merchant banker, or something that rhymes with it ["wanker" for those not familiar with the English vernacular]) who is about my height and weighs 210 lbs. By his own admission he is out of shape. Apparently, he just paid some company $15,000 to take him to Mount Everest in May so that he can climb it, having absolutely NO previous mountain climbing experience. All the comments from other people are, like, "don't do it. You're going to die!", or "don't do it, you're going to cause other people to die" when they have to rescue him.

My interest was piqued by the Mental Floss story that in 2015, for the first time since 1974, no-one succeeded in climbing to the top of Mount Everest (http://mentalfloss.com/uk/nature/37508/nobody-reached-the-top-of-mount-everest-in-2015). Wow! Knowing how popular that has become recently, I couldn't believe it, but they had a bad earthquake there in April and another one in May. Since then, only one man attempted to reach the summit, and he "missed it by that much" to quote Maxwell Smart (well, this young Japanese guy missed it by 700 meters).

So, reading all the other comments about the out of shape guy's death wish made me think about my own recently published list of ambitious projects (http://blog.ergoob.org/2016/01/ambitious-plans.html). Unwittingly, I may have planned things so that the order makes perfect sense. Working towards being able to hike 100 miles in seven days will help build up my strength and help me lose weight.

Afterwards, and assuming the weight loss continues, I'll train towards a long bicycle ride, which will help with endurance conditioning and improving my cardiovascular fitness. I did decide that it would be more sensible to go from Portland to Helena, rather than the other way round. That way, the 'finish line' will be my home town, and I won't have a day or two of travelling back to do before I can celebrate or relax. It's also going to be a great psychological boost to see Helena from the top of McDonald Pass, and the final 18 miles will be aided by the thought of being home soon. My quick back-of-an-envelope calculation says that I should be able to do the 700 miles at an average of 10 miles per hour (including breaks) in 70 hours, and that six hours per day would make about 11½ days, plus a couple of rest days along the way. I should be able to do the whole thing in two weeks.

Then I had a bright idea! Just as my daughter is going to be with me to do the PCT hike in May of this year, why can't I find someone to accompany me on the bike ride next year - and do it on a tandem? Yeah! I really like that idea. And, as I'm writing this just now, it occurred to me that it doesn't even have to be the same person accompanying me at the end as at the beginning. I could have two companions, in case one can't get more than a week off work at a time.

Then I thought about some of the things I'd need to be doing before climbing Mount Hood. I'd need to be able to carry a 40 lb backpack for several hours a day (check!) I'd need to have experience of substantially ascending and descending roads/paths (by then, check!) I will need to have built up my cardiovascular endurance, my muscular strength and my flexibility. Hiking steep outdoor trails with a weighted pack will be important, as will practicing on a few smaller and easier climbs (Mount Rainier, perhaps). There's no problem finding small mountains in and around western Montana, or in Washington or Oregon.

I have a plan now to start doing some weight/resistance training at home. It starts off very easily, and will build up in time and intensity as my strength increases. Eventually, I will make a short video of some of those exercises, so that other people can watch and learn, and maybe be inspired.

337 lbs - a disappointing week, but tomorrow is a new day!

Well, that was a disappointing week in the end. After walking 50,000 steps in the week (counting from last Sunday to yesterday) I actually GAINED three pounds! I know what did it. My usual problem lately - overeating. I'm sure I've got the composition of my diet mostly correct, I am still prone to simply eating too much. I did so well over the recent holidays, mostly avoiding the temptation to eat to excess. There were too many time in the last week when I know I didn't stop when I felt full, and carried on putting food in my mouth when my stomach was saying, "You can stop now!"

I know that this technique works. Health professionals recommend it all the time, and for a good reason. I shall start to keep a written food journal (not published and not online, but an actual handwritten diary). I will use it to record not only what I eat but also any comments about the time of day and how I feel about it, and any other relevant notes. The discipline of having to account (to myself) for everything I eat will force me to eat less. I will also be able to go back, after I've weighed myself, and see if I can actually spot patterns when I lose or gain weight. Are potatoes really evil? Is a low carb diet really the answer? Does increasing the amount of fiber have any effect? At the moment I have no way to tell but, in the future, I will be able to go back and find out.

Super grains for making hiking/trail snacks

In the context of lightweight food that might be suitable to take on a long-distance hike, I was reading about hard tack recently, in an online backpacking forum, when I was reminded that five years ago I made my own kind of long-lasting basic "survival" food.

Sesame wheat crackers, easy to make

My daughter, Birdie, and I made our own sesame wheat crackers, using flour and water and salt and sesame seeds, with some baking powder added, I'm sure. Usually, hard tack is made with just flour and water and salt, and it is slow baked at a low temperature for a long time (like, 200 °F for four hours, or something like that). Anyway, that much wheat flour is not consistent with my low-carb diet at the moment and, honestly, doesn't sound that appealing on the palette. If we're taking sustenance with us on our 100-mile Pacific Crest Trail section hike in May, we want it to actually taste good, and be nutritious too, right?

So, I looked up some alternatives online that were still easy to make, but had more protein and other micro-nutrients, yet would still make a light, flavorful snack. The addition of amaranth and quinoa, both gluten-free pseudo grains with essential amino acids, seems to be the most popular idea for adding flavor and texture and nutrients. Other good things you can add to the mix include spelt, Kamut, chia seeds and teff. Look online for phrases like "fortified hard tack" and you'll find more details.

This site: http://www.foodnavigator-usa.com/Markets/10-ancient-grains-to-watch-from-kamut-to-quinoa has some info on the health benefits of "super grains". It also reminded me that the US Department of Health and Human Services and the US Department of Agriculture recently published their new, updated 2015-2020 Dietary Guidelines for Americans. (http://health.gov/dietaryguidelines/2015/guidelines/ ). Check out this link, from the same site: http://www.foodnavigator-usa.com/Ingredients/Cereals-and-bakery-preparations/Seeds-avocados-and-clean-eating-will-gain-traction-in-2016-RDNs-say

So, when I get my supply of amaranth and quinoa, in a few days time, I will be doing some baking and I'll share the results here.

An alternative 'good for you' chocolate pudding

Ingredients

• 1 ripe peeled avocado
• ½ to ¾ cup water (start with a ½ cup and add more if needed to blend)
• 3 tablespoons raw unsweetened cacao powder
• 8 chopped pitted dates
• Dash of vanilla extract

Instructions

1. Blend all ingredients in a blender.
2. Serve chilled.

The avocado has excellent fats, the dates add some natural sweetness and fiber. The raw unsweetened cacao is packed with vitamins, minerals and antioxidants. 

For a change, you could substitute blended coconut milk or almond milk for the water, or add a pinch of ground cinnamon. You could also top it with pistachio or other nuts.

Experimenting with a 'good for you' chocolate pudding

Back in the summer of 2014 I had an opportunity to learn first-hand how chia seeds will swell up and thicken any liquids into which they are poured. They are high in protein, and an excellent way to thicken your shakes and smoothies, or to make puddings. They have other nutritional benefits. A one ounce (28 grams) serving (two tablespoons) of chia seeds contains: 11 grams of fiber, 4 grams of protein, and 9 grams of fat (5 g of which are Omega-3). They're also packed with vitamins, minerals and antioxidants.

When I was drinking freshly squeezed vegetable juices, my diabetic partner at the time would add chia seeds to our drinks so that she'd get the extra protein she needed. It's really a good thing, hence the name Superfood in this recipe.

Chocolate Chia Seed Superfood Pudding

Chocolate chia pudding

Ingredients:

• 1¼ cup unsweetened non-dairy milk (almond or coconut)
• ¼ cup chia seeds
• 3 tablespoons unsweetened cacao powder
• Dash of pink Himalayan sea salt
• 1 tablespoon organic raw honey
• Dark chocolate shavings for garnish

Instructions:

1. Add all of the ingredients to a large glass jar with a lid, give it a quick stir, then put the lid on.
2. Shake it like crazy to mix it all up.
3. Refrigerate until very thick and pudding-like, at least 4 hours or overnight, shaking or stirring occasionally.
4. Serve the pudding chilled with whatever topping you’d like.

Other optional toppings: crystallized ginger, goji berries, nut butter, coconut, fresh citrus, bananas, nuts, pomegranate seeds, whipped coconut cream.

Ambitious plans

Having asked myself the question, "What am I going to do after I finish my 100-mile hike on a section of the Pacific Crest Trail this May?", I have been thinking about other ambitious projects that I can work towards. I already mentioned Nordic or cross-country skiing in another post (http://blog.ergoob.org/2015/12/trying-to-like-snow-never-say-never.html). That'll be something for next winter (2016/17).

Here is the list I came up with so far:

• cross country or Nordic skiing (winter of 2016/17)
• 600 miles bicycle ride from Helena to Portland (spring/summer of 2017)
• climb Mount Hood in Oregon (spring/summer of 2018)

Mount Hood is a technical climb, I know, but it's only 11,250 feet high, and only three miles away from Timberline Lodge. I couldn't possibly climb it now, but in 30 months time, with the right equipment, and the right skills and training, could I do it? Absolutely! 

Could I cycle all the way to Portland today - no way! Could I in 18 months time? Absolutely! I would need about two weeks off work to do it, maybe more, but it's certainly possible. 

In the meantime, there are other sections of the PCT to hike, plus the whole of the Continental Divide Trail (which is closer to where I live anyway). I should also think up some sort of swimming challenge, since I enjoy swimming so much, and that would be a good thing to do in the winter months. 

Finally, and this might be a total pipe dream, I was inspired by this Sara Bareilles video, "Brave", that is on YouTube:

It made me want to contact her to see if I could be a dancer in one of her future music videos. She's starring in a Broadway musical, "Waitress", at the moment but I'm sure she'll be writing and performing more songs in the future and making music promotion videos. She has a great voice, and having the confidence and ability to dance like the performers in her Brave video would be fantastic for me.

Third visit to the gym in three days - two more scheduled this week!

This is going to be a real post-holiday step buster week. I made the mistake on Sunday and Monday of eating too many beans (I'd made a Brazilian-style black bean and pork stew on Sunday), with predictable results. On Monday evening my stomach felt really bloated and walking was not comfortable, so I stopped after just 1.5 miles.

1.5 miles in 41:21 minutes on Monday

Tuesday evening I felt much better. I was easily able to complete a whole hour again, clocking up 2.23 miles. Including my walk to work and back, today I walked over 11,000 steps (44,200 in the last seven days)!

2.23 miles in 1 hour on Tuesday

I have been using the "Interval Training" setting on the treadmill, so that the incline goes up and down every few minutes. That makes the workout more intense. And, today for the first time, I even picked up the pace a bit and ran for a minute (literally). I normally have the thing going at 2.2 or 2.3 miles per hour, sometimes up to 2.5 mph, with an incline of about 1.0%. Today, after I'd hit the 2 mile mark, I cranked it up to 5 mph and ran for a whole minute. Now, compared to the fit people around me, who regularly run at 6, 7 or 8 mph, my little effort was nothing; but for me it was HUGE.

I'd like to think that I stopped running to spare the machine from being pounded to death by my weight, but I couldn't manage a whole lot more, perhaps another 30 seconds at that pace. Slowly, I'll built up my speed and strength. I told a friend that I'd tried the "Weight Loss" setting on the treadmill, but it didn't work. When I got off, I was still fat!

Slowly, slowly, I can tell that I'm improving. From day to day it's difficult to see, but every now and then I'll notice that my shirts are looser, or the drawstring on my sweatpants needs to be tightened. OMG, I even bought my first two pairs of NON-sweatpants in ages recently. I no longer have to feel like white trash because I'm too fat to fit into anything else. I no longer have to buy 4X clothing from a Wisconsin-based trading company because that's all that fits. I can now wear 2X and 3X clothes. Once you get down to 2X there's no longer a "big and tall" premium price to pay, woohoo!

Next time I go to the Civic Center to watch a music concert, I'll actually be able to get my ass in and out of the narrow seats without a crane or a crowbar. I'm looking forward to the day (soon) when I can take my daughter contra dancing, like we used to five years ago, and I can do more than one dance without gasping for breath. Having lost 70 pounds in six and a half months, I know I've still got a way to go (more than 12 months), but there's nothing in this world that will stop me now. To paraphrase a certain Dr Martin Luther King (thanks for the holiday in two weeks!), "I have seen the Promised Land. I WILL get there."

First post-holiday visit to the gym

With Christmas and the New Year holidays out of the way now, today was my first visit to the gym in two weeks. I managed a whole hour of walking (2.25 miles) and half an hour's worth of swimming, which felt great. 

2.25 miles (3.6 km) in one hour

I'm scheduled to go at least two more times this week, more if I can manage it. 

The last couple of times I was at the gym, I was watching a movie while I walked. This time I was listening to one of my Audible audio books. I figured I'd try that, since I have so little time for reading, normally. It was pretty good. I'm listening to "Einstein: His Life and Universe" by Walter Isaacson. The whole thing is 21+ hours long, so it'll be good for a couple of weeks, at least.

334.2 lbs - the progress continues

334.2 lbs (151.6 kg)

The progress continues. At this morning's weigh-in I was 334.2 lbs (151.6 kg).

336.2 pounds today, and my staple breakfast

336.2 lbs (152.5 kg)

The progress continues. At this morning's weigh-in I was 336.2 lbs (152.5 kg). That will be my 'marker', my reference point at the beginning of the new year. This is the point from which all of this year's progress will be measured. 

Monthly targets for next year

Based on the progress I've made in the first six months of this journey, and bearing in mind my goal of reaching 178 pounds by my 50th birthday, I'd drawn up a back-of-an-envelope quick table of monthly targets.

• Oct 2015      356       Actual: 356.2
• Nov 2015      341       Actual: 345.4
• Dec 2015      327       Actual: 336.2
• Jan 2016      312     
• Feb 2016      298     
• Mar 2016      283     
• Apr 2016      269     
• May 2016      254     
• Jun 2016      240     
• Jul 2016      226     
• Aug 2016      211     
• Sep 2016      197     
• Oct 2016      185     
• Nov 2016      178     

Even if I don't hit every target, or I'm not at exactly 178 lbs by next November 28th, I'll still be a heck of a lot closer than I would have been if I'd just sat on the couch and not changed any of my behaviors! As long as I'm below 200 lbs, I don't mind taking an extra month or two to reach my target. 

What's really funny is that even at 178 lbs, my BMI will be 24.9, borderline overweight. According to the chart, I should be aiming for 149 lbs. That's not going to happen! 

Wilted spinach with eggs

Wilted spinach and eggs, my
"breakfast of champions"

My "go-to breakfast" these days is a very simple wilted spinach with eggs, soft yolk of course. I start with a couple of large knobs (2 tbsp) of good quality butter. Kerrygold butter is tasty and has a great natural yellow color. Then I fill the pan with as much spinach as will fit in it. Initially the lid might not fit very well, but the spinach soon cooks down. After a few minutes, I'll turn the semi-wilted spinach over so that the other side gets a chance to cook. 
In the meantime, I have cracked my three large eggs into a small dish, ready to add to the pan. An extra knob (1 tsp) of butter is added to an empty circle that I have created in the pan. The eggs are quickly added, with seasoning (usually just salt and pepper), and the lid is placed back on. This cooks over a low to medium  heat for several minutes, until the egg whites have set and the yolks are the desired consistency. I like mine runny. Depending on what I have in the fridge, I'll sometimes add a small sprinkling of Parmesan cheese, or some salsa or picante sauce.