Lessons Learned
Well I've learned some things since my last post. First, you gain weight far faster than you lose it! Second, you carry 3 or 4 pounds extra when you're eating a normal diet. Third, as you get close to your "ideal" weight the actual number isn't that important.
Just before Christmas I was just about 162lbs. Then Christmas vacation back in Ireland happened. My worries about being surrounded by food proved well founded. I find it very difficult to resist grazing. Add to that not having a daily weigh-in and a certain amount of rebound after 6 months dieting and you have all perfect conditions for a big weight gain. First day back and I weighed-in at 175lbs, that dropped quickly as soon as I got back on the diet so I think I gained around 8lbs of actual fat, the rest was just "water weight". An 8lb gain in just two and half weeks is a lot. Its much faster than you can lose it and it really woke me up. Sometimes you need to experience something to really understand it - this was not a pleasant experience and I'm not planning a repeat. I spent January and February getting back to where I was in December.
In February I spent nearly 3 weeks on a cruise vacation to South America. Fantastic place - everyone should see Rio at least once in their lives! Before I left I resolved to try and maintain my weight at around 162lbs over the vacation. Still, a big part of a cruise is the food, its all paid for in the ticket. The ship restaurants typically serve 5-star food and there is as much of it as you want. I am delighted to say, I didn't gain any weight, once I was back home and back on my regular diet I pretty much weighed in at 162lbs. I didn't feel that I denied myself anything - we ate five course meals almost every night and I didn't always pick the low calorie options. But I didn't go crazy. I ate lightly during the day to leave room for the big evening meal. I avoided fried food almost completely and a lot of (but not all) the sweet stuff. I worked out pretty regularly - in fact I tried use the opportunity of eating an unrestricted diet to build some extra muscle. In the end it worked, It was a great confidence boost to see that I can maintain my weight in that kind of environment.
The second thing I learned was what that extra "water weight" really is. I think most people notice a very dramatic (3~4lbs) loss within the first few days of starting a diet. I've seen this three times so far. This cannot possibly be fat loss - you just can't shed it that fast. It has to be "consumables" - that is the extra food passing through, maybe some extra water that goes with that. What this means is that on the way down you have to really undershoot your target by maybe 4~5lbs to be sure that once you ramp you calorie intake back up to a maintainence mode that you don't overshoot your hard won goal. In hindsight this is obvious, but it took me a while to get it.
The third thing I realized is that at this point of the game its really only about vanity. I'm now under 160lbs. My body mass index is in the "normal" range. My blood pressure and resting heart rate are both excellent. From a health benefits point of view - the weight loss has done the job. Losing a few more pounds won't significantly change that. This is great - I'm in better physical shape now than I've been since I was a teenager. So what now? Where to from here?
Your answer may vary, I've decided I'm going to have fun and see how good I can look. I'm not going to become a body builder or a marathon runner. But I am going try to attain that lean six-pack goodness you see on every billboard advertising aftershave. Perhaps a frivolous goal to many, but you've got to have some of those alongside all the serious stuff. So this goal is all about how lean I can get, rather than aim at a specific weight, although you can be sure that the weight will be nearer the low end of the BMI range than the high end unless I build a huge amount of muscle (which is not the plan). I don't want to look muscle bound, just lean.
So the plan right now is continue what I'm doing down to at least 150lbs. I've still got a little paunch to lose. My body fat% at 162lbs was 17%, if I reach 150lbs without significant muscle loss (say lose 2lbs muscle and 10lbs fat), then my fat% will be around 12%. I expect that I'll need to get down to 10% or less to show a six pack. It can vary quite a lot person to person so I'm just going to wait and see how this looks and then decide the next step.