The Line System

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Sara's post reminded me of Duncan's post which reminded me that I wanted to blog on my own New Years resolution.  Yes, the weight thing.

I thought about all the popular diets out there or joining a health club but I have a very busy life and an exercise program which involved me driving a significant distance or causing me to regularly get home even later in the day then I currently do will not do.  I have to exercise at home.  Also, I have a boat load of kids (actually 2 boat loads) and they are running to activities so significant meal planning in that chaos just isn't going to work (I've tried).  Unfortunately we feed largely on convenience foods and I don't plan on taking activities that my kids love away from them in order to cook to meet my particular dietary needs.  So here is where I go with the Line System.  BTW: I'm not a doctor and this was not created with any sort of sound nutritional knowledge.

The Line System: I taped a table on my bathroom wall.  The X axis is the days from 1/1/04 to 6/1/04 (for the europeans reading this that is June 1, not Jan 6).  The Y axis is weight.  I then added a red line (this is The Line System) to the table from my rough weight on 1/1/04 (235 lbs) to my goal weight on 6/1/04 (190 lbs).  I then plot my weight daily on this chart.  So far I have been under the line (I've lost about 10 pounds already!).  The idea is that if my weight starts approaching the line or goes over it, I start concentrating harder on eating less.  If I'm well under the line, then I can go ahead and have dessert that day or basically not worry too much about the inevitable temptation that might pop up.

Sometime soon a regular exercise routine will enter the picture.

I've never had much of a problem losing weight (at least some weight).  My problem is that I lose the focus at some point on sticking with the diet and I'm back up to that 230 pound level.  I believe my line system will be the daily reminder I need.  I'll let you know how it goes.  If it goes well, I'll write a book and make millions.  Of course my book will only have 1 page.