Mark

Mark recently posted this on the family website, and I thought I'd post it here as well.  Thanks for sharing your goals with us, Mark.  Good luck!

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I, as a member of the Anderson family, have a serious problem. I have allowed my weight to move slowly and gradually upwards from190 at marriage (age 26, 1984) to almost 300 (age 51, 2009). In 1996,I hit an allttime high (up til then) of 273. I used Phen-phen and lost almost 30 pounds. That, of course,was not a long term solution. I have hovered in the 275 range for many years since then and have had an occassional loss due to a spurt of focused efforts (255 in 2000). I ws regularly playing racquetball upuntil aout 2 years ago and that activity stoppage has conributed to me moving from the under 280 range to over 290.

When i was in my 20s,I was so active sportswise, that i never really thought much about it. In my 30s,as I gained into the 235-245 range,I thought that was fairly normal and acceptable. I have "lived with it" for the pastt 10 years into these higher ranges and just shrugged it off.

Part of the problem is understanding the difference between lifelong maintenance and attention to living and eating habits and short spurts of determined activity which is not sustainable because we lack the knowledge and experience of how to live and eat long term.

Anyway, I recently went topurchase more life insurance and even though I am in the business, I was shocked at whatt it would cost for my age and weight. I can not afford to let my family not have enough insurance on me so this, among other motives (comfortable daily living, fitting into attracttive clothing, avoiding or forestalling diabetes, being able to have more physical activity stamina) is moving me to do something meaningful and hopefully longlasting about my weight.

At the beginning of September, I was pushing 300 pounds. I weighed in this morning at 285. I am in the process of actually writing an activity goal plan for the balance of 2009 so that i can increase my physical activity from driving and sitting in an office all day to at least walking and reintroducing gym activity which formerly for me was routine.

The most I have ever lost in a 'dieting" effort is about 30pounds and I think I did it twice--once with phen-phen and once primarily using Atkins. My biggest problem in the past has been to coordinate my eating habits with my excercize efforts. It seems thatt i have never been able to do both at the same time. This time,my focus will be on including both simultaneously.

I am making these goals public and allowing my family to help hold me accountable.

My immediate weight loss goal is to be at 250 pounds. I will time myself on walking/running a mile and 2 miles and then post the time results and then come up with an improvement goal for that.

So, do not let me off the hook until I have reported to you all that my weight is 250.

When I am at 275, that will be an important milestone, ahving lost almost 25 pounds in 4 months.
I will then work on getting to

September 1, 2009-----297
October 9 (today)--------285
November 1--------------280
December 1-------------275
January 1-----------------27­5
February 1----------------270
March 1,2010------------26­5
April 1-------------------­---260
May 1-------------------­----255
June 1-------------------­--250

Mark