Progress on my weight loss journey

On January 1st, 2012, I wrote about using my culinary talents and skills to lose weight once and for all and pledged to post healthy recipes in this blog.  My original intent was to post daily but I didn't make that happen.
I posted a lot of recipes in the beginning but then after a long business trip in March living in a hotel room for two weeks I stopped posting for a while.  During that time period I tried eating a plant based, fat free diet and managed to last for about a month.  I struggled to find recipes for beans, vegetables, and tofu that were interesting enough to post, but without any fat and no fish or meat I didn't get inspired.  I'll admit it was pretty depressing to me, so eventually I started eating fish and poultry again. I am following a very low fat, mostly plant based diet now.  I use very little fat in my cooking and keep fat grams down to under 30 a day, but would like that number to be 20.  If you look at the photos starting from the top you will see the difference between weighing what I did when I started and 25 pounds less by May 2012.  I plan to continue to lose a few more pounds, and I continue to work out with Sandra Kidd 3 days a week.  I won't stop until I lose another 10 pounds, then reduce to once or twice a week and work out on my own.  I have a treadmill at home and do cardio the days I don't lift weights.  From a health standpoint my blood pressure is 120/70, cholesterol level is normal, and I can run a mile and a half in a little over 14 minutes.  I hate that I waited so long to get into shape.   But then again, I recently saw photos of a 75 year old woman, Ernestine Shepherd, who is a serious weight lifter/runner and she looks fantastic.
 

On Italy trip March 2011--one of the photos that inspired me to sign up for personal training with Sandra Kidd in April 2011

July 2008

September 2006

May 2012

May 2012