I’ve said many times that my autobiography would need to have one of several titles. My two favorites are The Hole in My Pocket and Living 3XL. The first is a testament to how little respect I have for money and how that led to the irony of making a career of running world-class money management businesses while paying little or no attention to the wealth accumulation imperative that drives so many in the world…including most of the clients of my businesses. The second is all about the bulk that I have carried throughout my life (at least since the age of eight, as I recall, when people thought I was twelve). I have never felt anything short of the biggest person in the room. Whenever I have been given clothes (like a promotional t-shirt or some such thing), I was always given an XL or at best a 2XL, which were the upper bounds of most off-the-shelf ready-to-wear. Getting a 3XL or bigger piece of clothing was a challenge and was generally limited to a few merchants. That’s all different now, whether due to more manufacturing technology and flexibility or the more likely enlarging of America that has been underway and making the market for larger sizes more in demand. In many ways, my life for many years was defined by the fact that I lived 3XL in a world meant for 2XL or lesser souls.
At this point, I’ve moved squarely into 2XL sizing territory. I’ve given away all my 4XL clothes and have started to do likewise with my 3XL shirts and pants. I’ve even moved from the “Relaxed” fit to the “Standard” fit as things have started to hang on my frame. Now my wardrobe is getting populated with more and more 2XL pants and t-shirts (my custom tailored shirts are staying put exactly where they are). When I wear the slightly older clothes that are a bit larger, I feel like I’m swimming in the clothes and I see it in the mirror. For years, whenever I lost weight, I would downplay it by saying that I was just taking a few bags off the Queen Mary. The expression always made people smile and put them at ease that I was comfortable in my own skin. And I guess that’s the point. This weight loss into new territory has started to take me out of my normal 3XL comfort zone and into a new place for me.
As I’ve mentioned, I have started a workout program and am now into my second week of that. As I’ve progressed in that, spending up to two hours a day in my home gym and walking through the neighborhood, I’ve wondered why I haven’t been dropping weight even faster. In fact, the losses seemed to have stalled. I figured it was about adding back muscle or some such physiological effect. I was feeling lighter and sensing a reduction in my size, but it wasn’t showing up on the scale. That was until this morning. This morning, I suddenly had a quantum drop in my weight…as though my body was telling me, “Just kidding!” I knew it … and now the scale was agreeing with me. They say not to look at the scale every day, but now its a force of habit that I don’t want to break. I would rather force myself to reconcile with the fact that sometimes the body does what it wants to do and that it will all work out in the end.
I’m feeling bones sticking out where I never noticed them before…particularly my hip bones, which have had an inordinate amount of excess tissue over them. Now that all the core exercises are tightening things up at the margin, I feel like things might droop less and firm up more. I’ve started to use the dumbbells and medicine ball more as well to add back some upper body strength in my chest and arms. While I could probably figure out a weight program by myself, it so happens that my main Stretch-U kinesiologist is a guy named Albert. Albert is about 25 years old and is a big guy of about 225 pounds. He was a competitive weight lifter and is now a weight trainer and coach as he goes on for his Physical Therapy certificate with added course work. I really like Albert and he certainly knows my body and its strengths and weaknesses from over two years of stretching me every week. I have asked him to design a weight program for me and he will be coming over at the end of the week to spend an hour with me in my home garage gym to give me a routine that I can work through two or three times a week to do this all right.
I have kept my L.A. Fitness membership for $29.95/month just in case I want to expand my weight training repertoire beyond what I can do in my garage or perhaps to use the pool if I get back into the swimming habit. Right now, I think the weight-bearing nature of walking (on the treadmill and/or in the neighborhood), combined with the 3-4 times/week core exercises and now the Albert weight training routine is what I need. What I really don’t seem to need at the moment is an expensive trainer to keep me on my game. Whatever brain chemistry I naturally have going for me plus that increasing dose weekly Zepbound boost, seems to be doing the trick just fine. I haven’t broken training with my eating for 76 days and if you figure that my increased exercise began on my trip (with all the added walking), I have not broken stride with the exercise for 21 days. I see no need to cut myself any slack on either front. I don’t feel inclined to take a day off or have a go-crazy day. Such is the resolve I have created for myself. I still don’t know where all this has come from all of a sudden, but I must admit that I’m happy with it.
For the first time in my life, when I look into the mirror, I find myself thinking that I am feeling small. I know everything is relative and I note for the record that my BMI would still categorize me as obese (but not morbidly obese, which is an unfriendly moniker that has hung around my neck for a long time). I have a ways to go yet before my BMI gets generically categorized as “normal” and not even “overweight” (the designation below obese). I have read that for various reasons, gerontologists have suggested that achieving a BMI of about 27 may be optimal. Those health experts now recognize that slightly higher BMI ranges may actually be healthier for people over 65. Some research suggests that a BMI in the 25-27 range (technically “overweight”) may be associated with lower mortality risk in older adults compared to the “normal” range. This is because muscle mass naturally declines with age, so some extra weight can be protective, a bit of reserve can help during illness or recovery, and a very low BMI in older adults is often more concerning (associated with frailty, malnutrition, and bone density issues). So feeling smaller, while a good thing, has its limitations, and I will get myself another 60-70 pounds lighter and smaller until my BMI gets into the optimal zone. That’s my feeling smaller plan and I’m sticking to it.