Primarian

So after several days, nearly a week, here's what I have to say about eating Primarian.  I am rarely ravenous.  Mostly I get hungry enough to realize it's dinner time.  This is good.  I don't know if I feel better physically by getting rid of most flour-based carbs.  Stay tuned for that.  What I do know is that it's really, really hard to get enough calories if you're a large person, as I am.

I believe that you should eat at least your BMR.  Mine is around 2600.  If I were in a coma, the hospital would give me 2600 calories of something, just to keep me alive.  This week, I have eaten a lot of protein, fruits, and vegetables.  At least 1.5 ounces of walnuts and/or almonds a day, too.  And frozen yogurt with frozen fruit (so glad to have rediscovered frozen fruit.  I have had a very hard time hitting 2600.  Other than that, I'm good.

I don't want to lose more muscle than necessary on the way down.  That only compromises one's metabolism.  But I do want to lose.  I've seen some movement on the scale.  It's up and down within a week, but it seems to be on the low side.  This is good.  I've sort of revised my goal to losing another 20-25 pounds before the babies come.  I can do that, right?  August?  That would get me solidly in the xxl range.  I would like this.  It opens up a whole new set of options for buying clothes.  Most mainstream places have xxl clothes for men.

The thing I've decided to do is eat more dairy than would constitute a strictly primarian diet.  Milk is part of farm culture, and there's pretty good evidence that adults shouldn't be drinking or eating dairy anyway.  But it's a decent source of decent calories, so I'm going to stick with it.  Low fat versions, of course, to stay away from saturated fats.  But yeah, I'm keeping that. 

This week I've been around 2300 calories a day.   We'll see how that goes.  My fantasy is that all this protein combined with some weight lifting will keep my muscle where it is.  Cross your fingers.

Yay! Thanksgiving!

It is Thanksgiving.  I have some advice (this is really for myself, but if it helps you, great).  First, though, the non-advice.  Last night, on The Biggest Loser, a guy tried to sell everybody on whipping up cauliflower instead of mashed potatoes.  Bullshit.  I've tried that.  It's not the same, it's not that easy to do, and it's not going to help you if you're jonesing for potatoes made with some cream or milk and butter.  Eat the damn potatoes, and enjoy every bit.  Fuck the cauliflower.  (I might put that on a shirt.)

The advice:  It's a day, not a weekend.  Ideally, it's a meal.  Same for Christmas.  Here in America, the Holidays start with Halloween and end with New Year's Day (or even the Superbowl).  It's the wrong approach.  A feast is a historic rarity.  Keep it that way.

A friend has a situation.  First, a little about her.  She is from the south.  Her parents are heavy.  She grew up fat (we have traded stories about what that's like).  Then in high school she lost 130 pounds and started competing in beauty pageants.  She did well.  Later she went to law school, and she works in a big city.  Wow, right?

Her parents are still heavy.  Her mom has some health problems that mean she really can't walk.  Her dad, however, eats.  Thirty years ago, he was a normal-weight guy.  A couple of years ago, however, he was about 580 pounds, and he was having health problems.  He was going to have lapband surgery, but he had to lose weight first (100 pounds, maybe).  Talk about irony.  They told him to keep it below 4000 calories a day.  That's a lot.  Some days I struggle to get 2600.  I am rarely really hungry.

My friend told me yesterday her dad is up to 651.  He has apparently been eating more than 4000 calories a day.  He will not be able to walk her down the aisle next year.  He will not be able to dance with her at her wedding.  He and her mother are visiting her in right now, and they cannot leave her apartment without her help.  By the time they get to the front door of her building, he has to take a rest.

She is both heartbroken and angry.  He is 55.  I ran the numbers.  He could eat about 4900 calories a day and lose weight.  If he gets down to 550, he could have the surgery (though if you could lose 100 pounds without surgery, why do it?).

I've been pretty big (hell, I still am), but I don't know how you get that big without changing something.  If you've read much of this blog, you know that I think this has to do with emotional and addiction-type issues.  But how far does any addiction go before you say, hold on.  I guess I know the answer.  Sometimes people don't say hold on.  Sometimes addictions kill them.

I have no advice for my friend, either.  Enjoy him while he's here, I guess.  I'm losing because I want to, and every time someone tried to talk to me about it out of love, I'd get pissed off anyway.  I don't know how  you get someone to take care of himself if he doesn't want to.  And clearly, someone is helping him get bigger.  I wonder what will happen when he can't leave the house at all.

I say I'm in it for the clothes, and while part of that is shtick, it's also true.  Lots of people talk about losing weight for health, but I have no interest in health when I feel shitty about the way I look.  For me it's all of a piece.  And having a doctor tell me once a year that my cholesterol and triglycerides look great is not enough to get me to the gym.  The linen pants in my closet that I love and have not been able to wear in years will.

What will work for my friend's dad?  No idea.  I hope he will find the maximum of what he's comfortable weighing soon.  I found it a few years ago, and I started dropping weight.  I am now at the lowest I've been in ten years.  I am also at the highest I ever want to be again.

Anyway, Happy Thanksgiving.  Enjoy the food today.  But today only!

Maintenance

Ok, I'm not really in maintenance.  I'm losing very slowly.  I'm ok with this (mostly).  It hit me that I dropped between 35 and 40 pounds in, say four months, from April to July.  This was at least 10% of my body weight.  That's a lot.  Right?  It doesn't feel like enough because I have a ways to go.  But it's a lot.

I also haven't been exercising regularly in the last few weeks.  Part of this is because of my work and sleep schedule.  Part of this is the whole back injury thing (much better, thanks).  Sleep is key to everything for me.  If I don't sleep well, it's easy for me to feel a drive to eat poorly.  It also tends to fuel depression in me.  I know that lack of sleep promotes weight gain.  If I have to make a choice between sleep and working out, sleep will win, and I don't feel bad about it.

But I like working out.  I don't like planning it, but I like it once I'm there, and I like having done it.  Everything hangs better.  I'm going today.  Didn't sleep well, so I'll need a nap, too.

So, I have a confession to Weight Watchers.  I haven't tracked points in almost a month.  I've been tracking calories on Livestrong.  It's got a good food database, and the price is right.  I made the transition because I've been reading about BMR and caloric need, and I decided that WW, which allows a max of 44 points (plus an additional 35 a week) might have been giving me too little.  (Want to eat a lot more without putting on weight?  Gain 100 pounds.  No wait--don't.)  WW's point values vary, but 50 calories per point is a good average.  That makes 44 points about 2200 calories.  Every BMR calculator I looked at puts me 400-500 calories higher than that.  So I decided to track both for a while and see where I was.

As a practical matter, there wasn't much difference.  WW puts more emphasis on fat and fiber than simple calorie counting does.  Livestrong is interesting, because it calculates the percentage of fat, protein, and carbs you're eating.  I tend to eat pretty low fat, but arguably not enough fat or protein.  (I bought some nuts this at the grocery yesterday.  This should help.)

I might stop WW altogether.  Meetings on Sunday morning at 8am are tough (though I'm awake right now.  I could go).  But I've been doing pretty well on my own.  Even yesterday, when I felt a great desire to eat all manner of crappy food, I mostly didn't, and I stayed on target calorically.  So far, I guess, I just want to be healthier than I have been.  Who knew?

Today, I will measure--arms, waist, thigh, calf, neck.  I wish I'd tracked these from the beginning.