I love that word: penultimate. As a child, it was one of my favorite words to use, and I was always happy when the opportunity presented itself. If I’m being honest, I have to admit I was a little giddy at having the opportunity to use it here.

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My penultimate (aka second to last) goal to reach is 175 lbs. Initially, I wanted to reach that goal by my birthday which is in three weeks, but I now see that I won’t make it. However, as I stated in an earlier blog post, I’ve accepted that I made a very aggressive goal early on, and while I’m still targeting 175 lbs as my next goal, I’ve allowed myself to not put a time limit on it. I am, however, closing in. My most recent weigh-in was 194.0 lbs which is just 19 lbs over my goal. I’m expecting to be able to hit that goal sometime in August if things go as they have been.

I’ve begun doing some push-ups as well as some swimming now that the water is warm enough (I’ve always hated cold water, even as a swimmer). I haven’t had the time to walk as I did a few weeks ago, but I’m going to try to reincorporate walking after work as soon as tomorrow.

Emotionally, it’s been one giant ball of happiness with a few doses of weird. 90% of the time, I find myself amazed, happy, and pleased to be doing as well as I have been with my weight loss and getting healthy. The other 10% of the time, it’s weird. A year ago, I thought I would never be able to lose any weight. A year ago, I was searching for ways to lose weight including surgery. I felt I had run out of options. Thank goodness for my cousin Sarah and my friend Matt.

It’s still weird for me to be able to cross my legs in my computer chair, sit comfortably in airplanes or even in my car seat, or have extra room in the seat at a movie theater. I can sit in booths in restaurants (something I haven’t done comfortably in years before). The face that looks back at me in the mirror is someone I don’t recognize. It’s not quite my “before fat” face. This one is quite different. Maybe I forgot what I used to look like?  I feel like all these things are gifts, rewards for all the work in staying dedicated to my eating plan and not allowing myself to succumb to sabotage for short-term gratification.

I look forward to hitting my penultimate goal as I punch that clock and head toward the ultimate goal of 165 lbs. I’m hoping to hit that by September 1, making my total weight loss for 12 months a grand total of 125 lbs lost.

Current stats:
Weight: 194.0 lbs (Started 289.9 lbs on 9/1/15)
Body fat: 21.8% (Started 47% on 9/1/15)
BMI: 30.4 (Started 45.4 on 9/1/15)