August 30, 2009--221 Pounds

Food Saturday: bagel(330)--pizza(720)--popcorn(250)--Wendy's Jr CB Deluxe(350)--4 light beers(400)--bagel(330) = 2,390 calories

That last bagel came at 3 in the morning. Since that came before the Sunday morning weigh-in, I put it on the Saturday list.

The difference created by keeping the food journal and therefore being accountable is amazing. Saturday during the day was mostly spent at the computer. Without accountability there probably would have been 3 bags of popcorn. Saturday night I was at a singer/artist show here in town, hence the 4 light beers. Knowing that I would probably have a few beers, I only got the burger when stopping at Wendy's. It was enough and it kept the calorie total in a reasonable range for the day.

The real place where the food journal came into play was at the singer/artist show. There was a charge at the door and a "suggested donation" for alcohol so they technically weren't selling the alcohol, but there was also a free food table. Chips and dips, cheese and crackers, big chocolate chip cookies--adding 1,000 calories here would have been very easy. Heck, I probably would have grabbed a cookie with each beer so adding 2,000 calories was very doable. Because of the accountability, I skipped the food.

That's what it will take. Not for 1 day, or 1 week, or just 1 month. That's what it will take for the remainder of my lifetime. I showed in 2006 that losing the weight is simply the start of the process. The process ends when you die, not when you hit a magic number on the bathroom scales. Not that there will never be cookies in the future or a day with 4,000 calories. Those days will come. At this time they need to be a very seldom occurrence since I'm well over my target weight. When I've reached my goal and am maintaining a weight there will be more flexibility possible with the diet. It's just that the diet can never really end if I want to keep my weight under control.