Changes
On January 31st I added calisthenics and some light weight training to my daily exercise routine. Last week I started seeing the effects of my weight training.
I also decided to change my diet last week. I was getting bored. I was satisfied with the foods I was eating, but I wasn't getting enough variety each day. Instead of eating just a sandwich or a salad for lunch, I wanted to add a piece of fruit. And I was tired of eating just a salad or stir fry, etc. for dinner. I wanted to eat a larger dinner with a salad, side dish, main dish, and fruit for desert.
I'm also emotionally ready slow my weight loss down. I feel much better than I did last October, and I look a lot better too. My goal hasn't changed, but I can wait a few extra months to reach it. Right now I want to get more fit so I can be more active this spring and summer. I want to start playing tennis, riding bikes, and swimming with my family. That is stuff that I've waited eight years to do again.
Diet
My daily calorie target is now 2000 calories. This is double what it was. My total energy expenditure is about 3300 calories per day. I should lose about 2 to 2 1/2 pounds per week for the next couple of months on a 2000 calorie diet.
Weight Loss
Last week I lost 1.23 pounds overall. But when I look at my body fat percentage I see that I lost 1.69 pounds of fat and I gained 0.46 pounds of lean body mass. As far as I know that is the first time I've gained lean body mass since I started my diet. But I now suspect my December plateau might have been caused by some weight training that I did in the first couple weeks of December. I didn't have a body fat analyzer at the time so I wasn't able to see whether my body composition was changing. That is the reason I finally bought an Omron body fat analyzer.
I'm still gaining muscle mass because I can still feel and see the changes in my upper body. I'm not sure how long these major changes will continue, but I'm prepared to wait a few more weeks for my weight loss to settle in at about 2 pounds per week. If that doesn't happen by the first of March I may consider cutting my calories a bit then. But I probably won't go below 1500 calories per day. And depending on how I feel then, I may not make any changes.
Here's my weight hart from January 1, 2006 to February 12, 2006.
The slope of my average weight (the blue line) changed dramatically last week. Also, you can see how misleading the black best fit line is now. Since the "Weekly loss" and "Daily deficit" are based on the slope of the black best fit line, I have to ignore them right now. When my weight loss stabilizes again, the black best fit line will eventually tell a useful store again. But until then I just have to watch my average weight to see how I'm doing.
Body Fat Changes
Here is my body fat chart from January 1, 2006 to February 12, 2006.
The change in my average body fat (the blue line) is not quite as dramatic as the change to my average weight. But it is definitely noticeable.