Isn’t the start supposed to be the easy part? Isn’t the war of ounces supposed to start in a couple of months?

I weighed in today at WW.

I gained.

I am extremely discouraged.

Now, admittedly, I only gained 0.4lb, so theoretically it could be noise, or water retention (although I am not “retaining water” right now, if you know what I mean). But it would take a heck of a lot of noise to turn a loss into a gain.

People get frustrated with maintaining weight loss? I’m getting frustrated trying to make it happen.

I’ve been following the program. I have. Working out 5-6 days a week, lifting, running, ellipticalling. Watching what I eat. Measuring everything, dammit. I’ve drunk a gallon of water the past two days. Today I cut way back—to only about 8 glasses of water—because, after all, what’s the point?

The weigh-in woman at WW suggested that maybe I’m working out too hard and I should cut back. My muscles could be retaining water while they rebuild. (Um, okay.) She recommended two things: I take measurements (true, I haven’t checked to see what my current measurements are, but my pants still feel pretty much the same as always) and I eat a little bit of protein in the morning with my oatmeal—a hardboiled egg, say.

Okay, I’ll try it. As I write this, I am boiling some eggs to have on hand.

But that little voice is whispering to me: I told you this wouldn’t work.

Intellectually I understand that 3500 calories is a pound of fat and weight loss is not about specific gimmicks but about eating less and doing more.

Emotionally, however, I’ve always been a bit dubious that it would work. Don’t ask me why. I’ve noticed I have a tendency to be a bit dubious about anything I’ve never done before until I actually do it. Don’t know why that is, you’d think I’d have noticed a pattern my actually accomplishing things, I’m sure some therapist could have a field day with this. But I’ve always suspected that doing something simple and non-drastic like exercising more and eating less wouldn’t work. And voila:

I don’t work out, I eat like a pig, I get huge.

I do work out, I watch what I eat, I stay huge.

Like I’ve said in the past, I’ve never gone about trying to lose weight except for the liquid diet. At my most frustrated today (which was probably the drive from WW to the Y, where I went ahead and did my workout anyhow), I wondered if I could possibly do the liquid diet again, maybe just do shakes during the day and eat dinners with the family at night.

It was a low moment. I’ve since snapped out of it.

I didn’t go nuts today, although I definitely had an inner voice telling me, So what’s the point? Go have a mocha already! I want to stick with this program. Maybe I’ll try eating under my given points or something and see if that gets me going.

At Thanksgiving we stayed at my in-laws’ house for the night. In the morning I stepped on their scale, which was a fancy-schmancy doctor’s scale with the movable weight and everything. And I went, Whoa.

I mean: Whoa.

While I was well aware that I was not the slender young thing I used to be, seeing that number (hereafter referred to as SW, for “Starting Weight”—or, more accurately, “Startling Weight”) shocked me. And instead of using the opportunity to call myself all sorts of names, I asked myself, “What are you going to do about it?”

Well, nothing, right away: after all, this was Thanksgiving with Darin’s clan, which translates into “giant piles of tasty food 24/7.”

But I knew I wanted to do something, because I’m unhappy with the way I look and the way I feel. I’m tired of my uniform of t-shirt and jeans. I’m really tired of the looks I get when I mention that pre-Sophia I was a size 6 (I was too, dammit!).

So despite the fact that I’d be starting in December, which everyone seems to regard as the month in which no restraint is possible, I decided that it was time to start cleaning up my act. After all, December is just one month, and this was more about the rest of my life.

The following Monday (December 1, in fact) I restarted my gym program. On Tuesday I went to Weight Watchers, because several friends (Tamar, Mary, Mo Pie) report success with their program. I went to Weight Watchers once before, when Sophia was almost a year old, because a few other moms I knew went to the WW near my house and I wanted to hang out with them. But I wasn’t that interested in the program and I think I stopped after 3 or 4 visits or something.

I went in and began the process. Got all the forms and slide rules (which help you figure out “points,” which is WW-speak for “calories”). I was a little weirded out by the meeting I walked in on, which was primarily discussing what had happened at the previous week’s meeting—a member died, right in the meeting! (“I knew this was the wrong week to start a diet.”) The Campbell WW center has since started a “family meeting,” which is WW-speak for “other moms with babies,” and that’s the meeting I try to get to.

Anyhow: I started the whole “write down everything you eat” thing. I became extremely dedicated to going to the gym and concentrating on each exercise. I got a Fitness Evaluation at the YMCA, which included a body fat analysis (35%!!! Augh!), VO2 capacity, flexibility, et cetera. As a Christmas present, the trainer who does the Fitness Evaluation gave me a free personal training session, which was great because it got me back on to the free weights.

I managed to lose 6 pounds in December. Of course, Christmas/trip to LA/my father’s death have combined to knock me off my plan a little bit. I haven’t measured myself yet to see how many inches I’ve lost. I’m still in the same pants.

But what I’ve done so far is a start. And the hour to an hour and a half I spend in the gym every day is valuable both as time alone as it is for a fitness regime.

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I love using free weights. I love working really hard to do the movement correctly and controlling my body so I lift through the proper range of motion. On almost all the exercises I’ve increased weights and I can really feel the difference, even if I can’t see it yet.

The one exercise I’m completely frustrated with is the Gravitron (which is in the free weights room, even though it’s a machine). The Gravitron allows you to use a percentage of your body weight when doing dips and pull-ups, instead of having to struggle through using your entire body weight.

I set the Gravitron to 110 and I can barely struggle through one set of 10 reps for dips and pull-ups. (However the Gravitron works, I’m actually lifting my weight minus whatever I set the Gravitron to. So the goal is for the weight to go down instead of up.) I guess I have to add more weight, which is somewhat disheartening. But I feel so weak doing the exercise I don’t even think lowering the weight would help any.

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The one dietary change I’ve been working hard on is drinking the vast quantity of water that every book in the world says I should drink. I have two 32 ounce pitchers in the refrigerator, cleverly labeled “1” and “2,” which I use to remind me to drink. (Of course, English measurements mess me up every time: turns out 64 ounces of water is a half-gallon, whereas I’d been thinking it was a gallon. Can we hurry up and get on metric now? Or I have to go out and buy “3” and “4.”)

The embarrassing thing about drinking that much water is the obvious effect it has. Does my body eventually adjust to increased fluid intake, or do I simply have to memorize the location of every public bathroom in the Greater Bay Area? (Since I have two little kids, that’s not the worst idea in the world in the first place.)

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I’ve been trying very hard not to make a big deal out of this whole process. I especially don’t want to get histrionic in front of Sophia. If I had a dime for every time I’ve heard a mother belittle her appearance or her weight in front of her daughter, I’d buy a Hummer and the Saratoga estate to go with it. I want to eat better and look better and feel better, not flagellate myself for not looking like Lara Flynn Boyle. (I wish I could find the link to the ultra-scary picture of LFB I found on the web one day—this woman is a year away from dying.)

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One of the reasons I’m posting about this here is that, at Tamar’s, Mo Pie mentioned how having her weight loss journal was a great way to reinforce the committment. People are watching!

So, forthwith, my current stats:

Weight: SW-6.
Goal weight: SW-50.
Body fat: 35%

Workout regimen, MWF:
Leg Press 100×10 100×10
Leg Curl 25×10 25×10 (each leg)
Bench Press 30×10 30×10 (15lb. each hand)
Bent Over Barbell Rows 24×10 24×10
Gravitron Dips 110×10
Gravitron Pull Up Parallel Bar 110×10
Military Press 24×10 24×10
Lateral Raise 16×10 16×10
Alternating Curls 20×10 20×10
Overhead Arm Extension 20×10 20×10
Back Hyperextension 10 (I hate these. I usually skip them.)
Seated Calf Raise 35×10 35×10
Crunches 35

Other days: 40-60 min. of cardio.

I’ve shown the greatest increase in weights in the leg press (I used to do 150 on the Cybex leg press and I clearly want to get in that range again) and the seated calf raise (it took until I put 35 pounds on to really feel it). I hope all this iron will have the intended effects soon enough!

I am totally not killing myself with this workout. It’s hard but I can still walk the next day. I used to do workouts with a personal trainer that made me walk funny the next day, so I’m not at that level.

After I do this for a while and am comfortable doing these workouts, then I’m going to hire another personal trainer. Might as well work every angle!

I am never mentioning a damn thing on this page about my workout plans, ‘kay?

I talk about getting up early to do The Firm…and I never get up again.

I talk about going jogging with the jogging stroller while Sophia’s in preschool…and I never go jogging again.

I talk about how I’m beginning a fitness program at the Y and I’ve gone three days in a row and everything’s superfantastic…and Simon gets sick (he’s had a recurring fever since Friday, po’ thing) and I can’t go to the Y. Okay, until he gets better, true, but I was in a groove here, people.

I will never start a blog documenting weight loss. I would clearly immediately balloon to 573 pounds.