Here it is, March 1.

I figure once or twice a month to actually jot down my "official" progress will be fine. I do succumb to the temptation to weigh myself each morning, but I watch the overall trend, not the daily variances, and I'm fine.

I started LC in the first week of February. Caitlin and I went for about a week without a lot of real preparation; we "eyeballed" our food portions and didn't really keep track of our carb intake. After a week, we didn't see a lot of progress so I found a good PDA-based carb-tracking software package and installed it on both of our handhelds.



We now both consider ourselves to have really started around the 15th or so. We were doing well with changing our eating habits, but up until that point we found we needed better discipline about keeping track.

When I started on this, I weighed 270. I wear size 40 jeans and they were tight on me, and 2X shirts didn't do much for the belly. I'm not planning to obsess about short-term goals; I'm in it for the long haul. All these years of damage to my body aren't going to be erased in weeks, or even months.

But it's a start. This morning's "official" weigh-in shows me at 254.5. That's up a half from yesterday, but a pound or two has always been my daily fluctuation so I'm not worried. My clothes are looser, I'm not tired every day, and I'm eating better than I have in years. Chronic little nagging issues like a persistent cough, acid stomach (which I've been on medication for in the past couple years), chronic gas, knee and back pain, all diminished or gone entirely. Some of that may just be mental; I've found a new reserve of self-confidence that I have been lacking for a long time. That's a side effect I wasn't expecting, and I hope it sticks around for a long time.

My weight loss trend has been rather flat for the past week, which I understand is normal after the initial plunge during induction. As long as the moving average doesn't start back up, I figure I'm succeeding.

This month will likely include my first on-the-road contract since starting this WOL, and sometime during the next five weeks I'll decide when and how to move from induction to OWL. One thing to be certain of; you'll all be seeing more (or is that less ...) of me!

Congratulations, not only on your weight loss but also the loss of other symptoms. I too had a persistant cough that has gone. I just realized it afer reading yr post. Always look forward to your posts so will look forward to seeing less of you or was that more with less (ha, ha!!) Once again congrats
Jan
MAKE MINE LOW CARB!!!

Way to go. I had some similar symptoms that you described, including heartburn. ALL of the symptoms are gone. It's real, not mental.

Have a GREAT day!