160 I have lost 80 pounds!

We slogged a mile in a foot of snow yesterday with the dogs trying all the time to run after other dogs. We both agree that walking in snow is like walking six times farther without snow. We were both sore and needed to sit for an hour when we got home!

Scott took this picture of me yesterday before our walk. I am wearing my University of California Golden Bears T shirt. This shirt used to confuse my students, because it doesn't say UC Berkeley on it like my other college T shirts do. They thought it was a different school. I explained Berkeley was the first UC campus, so students and alumni call UC Berkeley Cal, short for California.

These size 12 jeans are downright baggy in the seat now, but still fit in the waist. I have been doing crunches to try and reduce my waist more. In this picture you can also see that my ankles are swollen a little still (especially my left ankle), but not nearly so much as they were when I was carrying 80 more pounds around.

Here is what I ate yesterday and lost .4 pounds, along with slogging a mile in a foot of snow:

Small bowl of Special K, blueberries and soy milk
Half a 10 oz Tony's Crispy Crust Supreme Pizza, handful of raw carrot sticks
1/3 of a brown sugar cinnamon Pop Tart
Half a hamburger patty, 1/4 of a salmon patty and steamed broccoli and cauliflower

161.4 Diet Day 11 of 14

I lost 1.2 pounds yesterday! That is more like it! I now weigh 161.4. I walked twice yesterday, one mile in the morning and one mile in the afternoon. It looks like walking twice a day is more effective than walking two miles in the afternoon, so on days I don't teach that is how I will walk now.


This picture is my 1989 graduation from UC Berkeley. I was not weighing myself at the time, but I was a size 8.



Unfortunately, in my twenties I controlled my weight largely by smoking instead of eating. I really am learning for the first time how much I can eat and maintain my weight without gaining, let alone lose weight.



I quit smoking in 1995, a year after I got married. Like losing weight, quitting smoking was relatively easy to do once I made up my mind to do it. However, I substituted eating for smoking back then, and that is when the weight started to pile on.



Weight started to pile on me even faster in 1998 when I left teaching and got a desk job at Farmers Insurance. I was on salary and forced to work 70 to 80 hours per week, just to keep my job. I had no time for a personal life, let alone exercise. Eating was my comfort, sitting at my desk all that time. Losing that job in 2007 was devastating at the time, but now I am glad I woke up from that desk job trance. I only regret it took me until 2011 to realize I needed to lose the extra 100 pounds that had piled on while I did that desk job.



I walked two miles yesterday. Here is what I ate and still lost 1.2 pounds:



3/4 cup Special K, 3/4 cup strawberries, 3/4 cup soy milk

1/4 cup ham, 1 cup steamed broccoli and cauliflower

3/4 cup baked chicken, 1 cup baked onions and carrots