Sticking to the basic tenets of good nutrition and discipline is getting me exactly what I hope for and expected based on past experience: I’m down over 8 lbs in as many days. My hope was for 5 lbs the first week and 2.5 lbs each additional week. So far, I’m ahead of that in my progress, and I can’t say I’m surprised. Happy? Definitely. Surprised? No. Here’s why.

I’ve been there and done that. I lost 130 lbs in one year and an additional 20 lbs in the following year. The difference in those two years is that for the first year, my body started morbidly obese, and when I started eating properly, my body eventually worked its way down to the weight it was comfortable being. Then, I continued to eat properly and added regular exercise into the mix and was able to get down to 165 lbs (and actually, I was able to get to 160.1 lbs as an all-time low).

I wrote about how I allowed my weight to rise because I know how easy it is to lose weight when I really want to. That worked against me because I just put off the work that needed to be done to keep my weight at a good level instead of spreading the work out and doing a little bit every day. Well, last Tuesday, it was time to pay the piper, and here I am.

I trust in the process, and I’m doing the work. The net result is I’ve lost over 8 lbs in that time, exactly according to plan. After the next 5 lbs, that’s when the real work begins. Getting below 170 lbs for me is where things start getting really slow, and it’s where I have to be 100% perfect with my diet and exercise to get down to the lower 160’s. I’ll get there, though, and I’ll work hard to keep my weight there.