It’s true what they say when it comes to making habits: consistency. I could argue it was a LITTLE more than 2 weeks, but May 15th was my official start for the training schedule.

When it Wasn’t Good: Mar. 2024 – Apr. 2025

I did have some successes weight loss-wise before I even started the schedule. April 1st, 2025, my weight was 211.6 lbs (95.98 kg). By the end of April, I had lost 5 lbs. Of course, I’d been there before and wasn’t holding my breath… many, many, MANY times. Once I made it to a 10-pound loss before I sabotaged myself, but this time felt so different.

When I last weighed myself before giving up, it was March 2024 and I was at my highest weight I can recall: 224.4 lbs (101.7 kg).

I had let depression and stress take over my life by then. I had been scrambling for work because I only had 1 job that let me work 15 hours a week at most and my savings were running out, bills were piling up, and I’d lost so much of my will. I was just going through the motions, started and stopped and re-started workout programs, relied on junk food to get me through the days and had no ability to discern from boredom and true hunger. I was also falling asleep in the middle of the day far too often, prone to migraines, and just had no energy.

I received my diagnosis for iron-deficiency anemia around that month and began to take supplements and focus on what I was putting in my body. I still had my fast-food days because ironically, all the cheap meat I put in me was about the only iron-filled food I was getting… but the rest of what came with it was NOT helping. I had to take time to educate myself, and consulted a nutritionist.

It’s been a bit of a slog, some ups and downs and plenty of backsliding, but after that day in early March 2024, I was working a walking-heavy job and my weight began to drop just because of that. Trying to deal with my anemia and required changes made my energy levels all kinds of crazy. Talking with a nutritionist helped and I spent time trying to cut sugar and dairy out because my lactose intolerance was only getting worse (and THAT was definitely sapping my energy). I just couldn’t make myself exercise because I was working 7 days a week and just trying to keep up with the basics and told myself I didn’t have time.

Cue leaving working out behind for months, which was NOT helpful. But my diet did improve slowly, and that helped the weight drop.

A Happy Accident Led to True Goals

So after nearly a year of not weighing myself at all, I found I’d lost 12.8 lbs in the interim without a determined goal. That startled the hell out of me when I stepped on the scale April 1st, 2025, to see that 211.6. It surprised me in a happy way because somewhere in the past year I’d done something right by complete accident.

Well, the accident was multiple things happening at once. Working over a year without a day off (unless car trouble, illness, or holidays) burned me out and all my exercise came from walking around on shift. I had no time and when tired, I ate whatever was around. Quitting one job to get full time hours at the other helped me avoid fast food easier & freed up most mornings. It helps that my restaurant job had me walking constantly, and I’d been walking on the job for a year, so THAT is where a lot of those pounds disappeared.

My nutrition needed some help, though, and April 1st is when I decided to come up with real plans. It wasn’t until the end of the month that I thought about the physical and mental goals I had and hit upon the idea of running the marathon. When I realized it was possible to train and do it within a year, I went full throttle. I just needed a plan.

So I spent a few weeks making the goals and the plan, and May 15th I was at 206 lbs (93.44 kg).

And Here We Are Today…

I’ve lost 2.2 lbs in the past two weeks, & I am cool with that, considering the amount of mess-ups I’ve done. My work-pants also fit better and I am almost at the point where I HAVE to wear a belt to make sure they stay in place (not quite enough to go a size down yet, but also no money even if I could–hee hee). Pretty good considering I missed several workouts and had to change my exercise schedule again due to timing miscalculations (forgot to add “taper” weeks in my enthusiasm to get in shape for the marathon).

I didn’t do any strength-training for over a week because of a plan overhaul. I planned for strength training 6 days a week, as well as cardio, but some days I needed to change around the cardio. I wasn’t ready to tackle rowing yet after some soreness, but I’m back on that this week (I also had to adjust the reed switch again to record my results).

Getting my proper wake-up time was also difficult because of my late nights at work, but now I’m getting evening chores done quickly as I can, reading til I get sleepy, then going right to bed easier.

Two weeks in and I’m feeling more comfortable with the flexibility I’ve built in with the plans, even if they haven’t worked perfectly. Days like yesterday where I ended up working a “clopen” put those plans in the air because I’d be too tired to exercise (folks in retail or restaurants like Drew was know how much that sucks).

Those suck your energy down. Had 3.5 hours of sleep at most (thanks for confirming, FitBit), but I used the rest of the day buying salad fixings at the store, taking a nap, and doing some reading I needed to finish up.

Looking forward to how the next two weeks goes…