Day 37: Leaner and Hungrier

During the later stages of a serious diet, body vanity can do a bit of good, even if it's basically a distraction during the early stages of an extended diet. (After all, if you look good when fat, then why get thin? Apart from medical reasons, I don't know.)

I still have a reasonably thick layer of insulation under my skin, but I'm beginning to see subtle signs of genuine thinness emerge. With my shirt off and looking at myself in the mirror, I can see 'shadows' where my most protrubent lower ribs are. If I look closely, I can see hints of my floating right rib. I can almost tell where my rib cage ends through sight. I can't see my belt-buckle spot on my pants, but if I stand up straight I can see what colour my pants are, even below the belly-button level. With slouch all gone in profile, my stomach only protrudes out to the level of my breastbone. (Okay, my nipples.)

The candidate technique for plateau-busting is still working, but I've discovered a real side effect to it: a lot more hunger, once back to the same old calorie level for a couple of days. My hunger pangs had largely disappeared recently, but that's because I fell into a habit. The big-breakfast technique, especially when combined with temporarily going off the diet completely, does jolt out of habit to the point where the stifled hunger feelings come back full force. It was a bit of a chore for me today to stay with the calorie ration.

In retrospect, I should have reminded myself that the hunger travails were a good sign, that my body expects more food and thus hasn't gone into diet-hibernation mode. If all goes with expectation, my metabolism won't be in low/slow mode, which would facilitate the loss process.

The weight level I'm at now is the same one I bounced off a week ago. Given this round trip, I could brag about losing "thirty in thirty" or admit to losing thirty in thirty-seven. A three-time weighing at the top of the hour has confirmed that I'm at the 230 lb. level once again, so this current session of me using myself as my own experimental animal may continue tomorrow.


Weight as of approx. 6 PM today: 230 pounds.