Diet At Home

Like many people, I have been at home for several weeks now. I’m fortunate enough that my day job allows me to work at home. However, that has allowed for some bad habits to proliferate. Namely, snacking. And I had really started snacking and that is not a good diet to have.

I eat when stressed, and over the last couple of years, I have added more weight than I really cared to admit. The weight went on slowly and it would usually level off, but my home office has reduced my step count and the long hours in front of the computer (and TV to unwind) had allowed for additional weight gain the first couple weeks of staying at home.  I never went over 200 pounds, but I have a fairly small frame and if I follow the BMI, I should be high school skinny at 155 (not a realistic value in my mind).

What I’m changing

So, just over a week ago at the grocery store, I decided I would put myself back onto a calorie counted diet. I did it almost two decades ago and got myself down to that high school skinny weight. Then I just kind of let off and stopped paying attention to my activity and what I was eating.  It took a few years to add ten pounds back and then the ten became twenty and that turned into thirty.

Today I weighed in at 188.2, which is about 23 over my what I have considered as my target number of: 165.  The 155 is just too skinny … though I always wanted to do a 10th Doctor cosplay … David  Tennant was one of my favorite Doctors …

I digress.  Anyway, I’m not doing anything fancy. I am using the Lose It! app on my phone to track my calories with a goal of losing 1.5 pounds per week.  I’ve owned the app (lifetime subscription) for years. Where does my willpower to stick with it come from? I don’t know. I’ve only been back on the diet for a week, so time will tell if I have the needed strength to get to my goal.

However, 2 years and 317 days ago, I gave up drinking Coke. (I also have a countdown app on my phone.) Just before I gave it up, I would drink two or three 20 once bottles a day. Something in my head flipped and I stopped. In fact, I gave up all soda at that time. (I fell off the all soda wagon about 16 months ago for a few weeks, but have not had any now for 448 days.) This no soda decision has stuck, even when my wife has a case of Coke in the house.

I’m hoping that the willpower that allowed me to give up soda will allow me to stay on the diet. Part of it is I have a backpacking trip planned for August, so I need to get back into shape for that. I think that might be the big motivator, but I also just want to feel better, and I do feel better when I weigh less and when I am more active.

I want to turn my time at home into a positive. Therefore, between meetings, I pick up some weights and do a few reps. I mix in pushups and situps when I can. I need to add in walking around the house when on conference calls, but that is harder since I often need to be on the computer at the same time.

Either way, my goal right is to take full advantage of the time I am at home. When I eventually go back to the office, I won’t have these luxuries and don’t want to regret not starting to improve myself when I had the opportunity to do so.

Stay safe out there.