No Weigh May---No Way!

We just completed week 5, and this is a beautiful start to week 6. The sun has been shining, the birds have been chirping, and Lance and I have been...stuck in an overly air conditioned building for 8+ hours a day. I can't complain too much, we manage to get outside and walk on our breaks and lunches and when we have off days, we have been pretty good at taking full advantage of them and enjoying the weather. Once we get into our new place we will be working slightly less and enjoying more summer fitness.

This week, I'm using progress comparison from week two instead of week one, because in week one photos we hadn't quite figured out the way we were going to take the pictures.

I'm proud of my own progress because I've come a long way in the things I eat and how much better I feel overall. I am thoroughly impressed with Lance's progress, though. I mean, I don't think I even need to use words there; It's all right there in the photo. Look at that stud. He's come a long way, not to stay he wasn't studly before, but Wow! 

When we first started attempting to lose weight, I kept seeing "I'm not on a diet. This is a lifestyle change." I didn't think much about it at the time. My mindset was "Eat better, exercise, get this goop off my body." It's definitely changed since then. We spend a lot of our spare time at home now looking up what certain vitamins do for our bodies, what foods hold those vitamins, and healthy new ideas. When we go to the grocery store, we don't buy a single item without first pulling it down and looking at the nutritional information to see how bad it might be for us. We talk about what work-outs we intend to do each evening and walk places that we would have driven before if we have the spare time (usually on our off days). When don't generally have full on cheat "days" (although I can't say we haven't had one or two), but instead cheat meals. We both have a real sweet tooth a few days back and wanted some ice cream. We walked nearly a mile and a half to General Custards and got the smallest ice creams available, then walked another mile and a half home. When we "cheat," we do our best to work-out twice as hard or twice as long to make up for it. 

Since the beginning of this month, I've heard a few things about "No Weigh May" on the web. Apparently in May, you're supposed to step on the scale at the beginning of the month and not let your toes touch the scale again until the 1st of June with the intention of never seeing that dreaded number on the scale ever again. Personally, I think these people are insane. Then again, I think I may have an addiction to my scale. I've begun weighing myself multiple times a day. Once in the morning, once at night, and sometimes a few other times throughout the day if I'm home. I suppose it would have been nice. At the beginning of the month I weighed in at 154.8 and Lance weighed in at 193.4. Since then I have lost 7 lbs, with my current low being 147.8 lbs and Lance has lost a total 4.2 lbs so far this month leaving him a low of 189.4. We still have nearly two weeks left of the month to go down still, and I suppose it would be nice to step on the scale on June 1st knowing I've lost the weight I have....but it still seems like an impossible idea to me. 

People keep asking Lance and I, "How are you guys losing all the weight?" It's simple, folks. Diet and Exercise. It drives us up a wall when someone says "I've tried everything to lose weight, except diet and exercise."There is no magical way to just lift the weight off of you and let it drift into the sea. You can take diet pills and spend all your spare time eating potato chips and drinking Coca-Cola, but you're not going to lose any weight. You need to eat to get vitamins and nutrients and exercise until you sweat so bad that your clothes are soaked. It's not easy; No one ever said it was easy. Getting rid of the love handles and thigh fat you grab in the mirror when you're checking yourself out before your shower does not simply melt away. If you want something, you have to work your ass of for it. 

Many of you that are reading this know one or both of us personally and have seen the results right in front of your eyes. I want you to keep in mind here that these pictures were taken barely a month apart. The first set of photos (not even at our highest weights, just when we finally got around to thinking "Hey, we should take pictures to log our progress") were taken on April 16, 2013 and the second sets were taken today (May 19, 2013).

Here is a photo of Lance and I last October. You can't really tell much of his weight since he wears baggy clothes anyway, but look at how far my belly is sticking out there!

Do you know why we look so sad? We look like that because we were unhappy, because we were fat and our bodies hated us for feeding it nothing but Taco Bell, soda, and other loads of junk food non-stop. Okay, fine, you caught me. That's not really why we had those faces on, but it should have been.  I never want to have to not put a picture up because I'm ashamed of my body, again. I'm working towards that goal now and I don't plan to fall from it.