Day 19: Closing in on a Goal

There has been a great discussion going on at the Body for Life forum about how often one should weigh himself.  I wholeheartedly agree with those who say that the scale can deceive and that we should look to other signs of progress, like measurements and how our clothes fit.  And yet, even though I believe that, I can not shake my habit of checking the scale first thing every morning.  I may be a wee bit obsessive/compulsive.

Argh.  Today it was back at 130.  Whyyyy can't I break through this number??  I make it to 128 but then it goes to 130.  Before I was stuck at 131/130/132.  I want it to be 120.  That's do-a-dance-down-Main Street level of happiness.  But I'd be delighted to be stuck around 125.  It's been months and I can not consistently get lower than 129.  Do you see what I mean about obsessive?

There could be all sorts of good reasons why the scale isn't budging.  It could be muscle growth.  That's a good thing!  I may need to tighten up the eating plan a bit.  It could be PMS (for months on end?!).

So today I decided that maybe the folks at the Body for Life forum know what they're talking about and I decided to check my progress in other ways.  I couldn't find the measuring tape so I decided to try on a size 8 dress that I knew didn't fit.  This was going to be depressing because I just know that I haven't changed sizes.  But I wanted to see if maybe instead of not being able to zip it up at all, maybe I could get it partially zipped.

Wow, I got it zipped all the way up!  Now, it was tight and not what I would call a good fit, so I'm not really a true size 8 yet... but I'm closing in on it.  That was my goal by the end of 12 weeks.  I may just get there at the end of four weeks.  Ain't no way I'll ever be a size 6, though.

Here is my Dream List from the Body for Life journal.  You are supposed to write down what you'd love to achieve.  In the past I would write down all sorts of lofty goals... and then never reach them.  This time I decided to be more modest in my dreams in the hope that they were more reasonable than before.

It's tough to read but my goals are as follows:
* Wear a size 8
* Do 4.2 on the treadmill for 10 minutes
* Develop good posture - No sore neck
* Build a strong core
* Lose 8 pounds, maybe reach 121
* Be able to see abdominals
* Get my cholesterol down to 200