Countdown to 165: Week 8-9 - Halfway There

I missed my deadline last week, but I hope most of you caught Craig Harper's excellent article, The Psychology of Weight Loss. More of my articles in this series have focused on psychological aspects of weight-loss than on the physical, and that's not an accident. While research and observation convinced me that a low-carb, low-calorie plan would be fast, effective, and safe, most people who fail to lose weight fail because they quit, not because they've chosen the wrong level of calories.

Psychological Preparation

I prepared myself by spending nearly a week getting "psyched up," ready for anything, and committed to the end... or so I thought. Last week I encountered a subtle temptation I did not expect: the lure of success. A few weeks ago I dealt with the temptation of failure. "Why work so hard for such meager results?" is the question, and "Because I've committed to do so, and short-term setbacks don't affect my long-term goal" is the answer. The temptation of success is different.

I started with 85 pounds to lose, and that's a lot of weight. Head to your local butcher's counter and try to count out how much meat it takes to reach 85 pounds! Though many people have much more than that to lose, any reasonably large number can seem overwhelming. I didn't know if I could lose all of the weight by November (it now looks like I probably won't, quite), so I focused on other things. I focused on a date, resolved to keep going until that date, no matter how much or how little I lost. But then I realized I had lost 40 pounds, and that's also a lot of weight. It's a big accomplishment, something worth celebrating.

Not with dessert.

Strangely, that's the temptation I faced. To celebrate my weight-loss success by eating things guaranteed to push my body out of ketosis, so I would have to start all over again! Rationally, I knew that splurging would be counter-productive, but irrationally I thought that I could easily lose the weight again. In the end, reminding myself of my commitment kept me on track, but it was a tough couple of days.

Are you prepared to deal with the unexpected? Today I found out that the can of tuna in my desk drawer wasn't tuna at all, but crab meat. I opened the can, then threw it away. Crab meat, at least that can of crab meat, is clearly not meant to be eaten straight. That left me with nothing to eat for lunch! At that point, if you're thinking a coworker could provide sandwich supplies, or Taco Bueno is cheap, you're in trouble. I was planning to drive to a grocery store to buy canned tuna, but my wife mentioned that she had mixed up some chicken salad, so I drove home for that instead. Although I've skipped only one meal in the nine weeks I've been on this diet, and not on purpose, I would rather skip a meal than cheat. I believe that is where you need to be to succeed at losing weight.

Article Author: Phillip Winn

Phillip Winn was the Chief Geek for Blogcritics, and a blogger since 1995. He may currently be found and followed as @pwinn on Twitter.

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