Normally, I have chicken, and sometimes fish, but today, I had roast beef which had some stewed potatoes and onions.  There was also the cabbage which is very flavorful and the greens with some chopped onions.  I only had one broccoli floret today.

I will normally follow this up with dessert which I put in a soup bowl.  I had 3 ripe strawberries, a slice of Bartlett pear, some chopped walnuts & sun flower seeds, raisins, dried cranberries, some sweet chocolate bits and sweetened, shredded coconut.

I’ve lost about 30 lbs. since January 1st and here is my current pants size.  These are tighter than the other two pair of pants I bought at the same time at J.C. Penny’s.

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[ADDENDUM 01/03/25]: I see from the above photos that this was May of 2012. I would have been 58 years old at the time, and this would have been near the end of my second “stretch of losing a lot of weight,” at which time I would start gaining most of it back again. I made a note that I lost weight at about 2 or 3 pounds a week, and that created a weight loss chart at about a 45 degrees angle downward. But when I started to regain the weight again, I would gain at about half the rate upward (about 22.5 degrees angle upward).

There must have been some kind of psychological barrier for me to get below a weight of about 230 lbs. A few pounds on either side of this, and all that “easy loss” was out the door. And, it was easy loss. Once I had the mindset, and my metabolism had kicked in gear I had no problem losing weight. I wasn’t hungry, or starving myself. In fact I could eat a bunch of the “right things” and even splurge (or cheat) at times, and still come back to the right path and keep losing weight.

The first great weight loss, I wasn’t diagnosed as a Type 2 Diabetic and that meant I ate almost every vegetable literally from A to Z. Asparagus, avocado, beans (black/butter,/green/kidney/lima/pinto), beets, broccoli, cabbage (chinese/green/red), carrots, cauliflower, celery, corn, cucumbers, egg plant, garlic, leaks, lettuce, mushrooms, okra, olives, onions, peas (garden/sugar snaps/snow), peppers (sweet & hot) potatoes (red/white/yellow/sweet), pumpkin, radishes, ramps, rutabagas, spinach, squash, tomatillos, tomatoes, turnips, and zucchini. I don’t recall eating brussels sprouts at that time, but I now love them. I don’t think I got to Dandelion, Romaine Lettuce and Red & Swiss Chard until later, and two of these went into soups. What I am saying is that there are very few fruits, vegetables, beans, peas or other edible items that I don’t like or would be afraid to try.

Two splurges I recall were: Eating a whole quart of ice cream. Eating a large plate of spaghetti. With each of these “cheats” I would gain a couple of pounds the next day, but once I came back to the right path, by the end of the week I would have lost the normal 2 or 3 pounds. I wasn’t eating bread, and I was drinking a lot of water.

I think I was about 49 years old the first time I lost about 60 pounds over a three month period. And both times, I easily lost the first 30 lbs. or so, but then “foundered” over a couple of weeks and then started gaining the weight back again. These pants appear to be “chocolate” in color, and at the time there I also had a couple of medium blue pairs of pants. *At some point in my life, I started buying two of everything, in clothing, that I bought. Exactly two of the same shirts or pants.

I said I would start to regain the weight each time. Well, this last time I had already bought the next pairs of pants in the next size down. It might have even been a size 34. Amazing. But, I never got a chance to wear them. Within a few weeks it would have been impossible to fit in them, and that possibility got even further away with time. I may still have a brown pair, from that time, that I never wore.

I don’t recall if this memory is from my first severe weight loss period or the second, but I was up at Biltmore… The logic returned to me. If I was at Biltmore, this would have been when I was about 50 years old (2004). The year 2004 was the first time I visited the Biltmore Estate, and because I had just missed the spring planting of flowers, I purchased an annual ticket, and then returned to Biltmore four times that year. I think I paid extra for the Christmas tour. I’ve always thought that I was about 49 the first time.

But, I was at Biltmore and it was a sunny afternoon, and I was about to head out to my car to leave the Estate. But, I went over to the bakery and bought a giant bear claw (an odd shaped sprawling cinnamon & sugar concoction) and some other sickeningly sweet baked good with white sugary icing, and I ate them both on the drive back home. And with that, I started my uncontrolled weight gain.

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I’ve been hanging around 250 lbs. for at least a year now. Losing weight is much more difficult now because of all the starchy veggies that turn into sugar quickly. I had been on Trulicity (once a week injection) for several years and then “they” just couldn’t replenish my supply. Dr. Norem first switched me to Rybelsus (a daily tablet), and when that wasn’t effective, she changed me to Ozempic. Ozempic has worked well. I don’t notice much hunger loss, but it has brought my blood sugar back down. Hopefully my next visit to Dr. Norem and my A1C will be back below 7.

One difference between Trulicity and Ozempic? The Trulicity was in a one time injection system and you never saw the syringe. Give the shot and throw away that used pen. With Ozempic each pen provides four injections. You switch out the syringe each time (screw on/screw off) and with the final dose, you throw that pen away. But, you do see the little syringe and for me that always provides a little angst. Not enough to not give myself the shot, and it doesn’t hurt, but enough for me to keep putting it off through the day.

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