This is the first assignment in the “Design your own Weight Loss Plan” course at Coursera.

After finishing the first course, I’ve noticed that the courses are a bit on the light side. I will continue to use Coursera for the time being, but have already started using alternate video/audio lecture resources for the additional concentrations added to the study plan.

But for this assignment, here are my answers:

My highest weight ever: 307 lbs
How did I feel about being at this weight?

I absolutely hated it. At the time, I was in an unhappy marriage, miserably employed, and would emotionally binge eat, though, at the time, I had no idea I was doing so.
It was at this time in my life that I was diagnosed as a diabetic, told I had high blood pressure, and high cholesterol.

My lowest weight ever: 170 lbs

This was my last year in high school. I was physically active 3 + nights a week in the Martial Arts, and thought I was immortal. Looking back on it now, I had horrible eating habits and was already laying the groundwork for the eating habits I have now. Exercise, weight control – none of these things mattered to me at the time, though. I could eat whatever I wanted, whenever I wanted, and I kept the same weight.

My stable weight: 270 lbs

I would have to say this is my current stable weight for the last two or three years of dieting. I haven’t been under 200 lbs since I left high school, and I relapsed once back to 300 lbs after going down to 250 lbs. I managed to get back down to 250 lbs again, but then bounced back to 270 lbs, which is where I’ve hovered for about a year or more.

My HAMWI weight: 178 lbs

This is the weight I got from doing their math. Not certain how accurate it is.

Goal weight: 190 lbs

Now, I’ve got a problem with their formula. Maybe I did the assignment wrong. My weight history has been stable at 170-190 lbs for my high school years, roughly. When I left home and went into the military, the next four years of stress cemented the stress binge eating habits that followed into post-military life, into a stress-filled marriage, and then into a stress-full career self employed. From my military time to the height of marriage misery, my weight gradually increased from 170 lbs to 307 lbs. There was no bouncing around, or a weight I always come back to.
Once I’ve started dieting (going on 8 years now), I always come back to 270 lbs. But, the directions here state that my goal weight should be within 10 lbs of my stable weight.

No thank you.

If that were the case, why bother? No, my goal for a long time now has been to get back to my post-high school weight of 190 lbs. This just barely falls into my healthy BMI range of 144-194 lbs.
I am confident, if I get my weight down to this number, it will eradicate my diabetic symptoms, will increase my energy level, and improve my self-image. I also hope this will hedge my longevity (as the medical community seems certain of), and then I hope to branch out and work on cleansing my body to prevent illness, etc, so I can have the longest life possible, with the greatest quality of life possible, and steer clear of costly medical intervention in the future.

My short-term weight loss goal: 2 lbs / wk
My long-term weight loss goal: 80 lbs
My goal weight statement: I commit to losing 80 lbs in 10 months to attain a goal weight of 190 lbs.

This has been my goal for a long time, several years now. As I said above, I was able to get down to 250 lbs, but never could crack that number. I am currently (surprisingly, just got up and weighed myself) at 266.4 lbs. (I believe I’m down almost 4 lbs due to eating a small breakfast and small lunch on my work days).
If I could lose the remaining 76 lbs in 10 months, I believe the sum total of my entire life would be utterly and completely transformed. I think all my diabetic symptoms would vanish overnight, I would be bursting with excess energy, and I would add decades to my lifeline.

So, there you have it. My first assignment for my Weight Loss course on Coursera. I will say, so far, this is a lot different than the previous course I took.

Time to shed a few pounds!

Experience GREAT STORIES you’ll never forget!

Sign Up for Isaac Hunter’s Newsletter, and get one of his books absolutely FREE! Just include your email below, and write in a title from the sidebar. That’s it!