Since my last weigh-in, I’ve gained 3 pounds, and now weigh 305.

At the urging of my overworked plumber, I’ve decided it’s time to take my weight loss seriously. Ok, that was a joke. The first part, not number two.

*cheers, laughs, and cries of encore, encore*

Everyone likes a jolly fat man.  Especially coroners and morticians. Which is why I’m writing this post, quite frankly. I just turned forty-five, I’ve had a small scare recently with some very odd heartburn that’s lasted way too long, and I’m worried about my health. The doctor says the heartburn is probably some damage at the bottom of my esophagus, so any amount of acid (even normal) is probably the cause of it, and I just need to heal. But here’s the scary part: if it doesn’t heal, he’s asked that I come back to find “other causes.”

Yeah. Scary.

How I Got Here

A few years ago, after my wife, Dot, quit her job and got serious about her weight loss, I got serious too and did the low-carb thing with her. We both lost a lot of weight right off. She lost like fifty pounds and I lost about the same.  Then she kept losing, and for two years I stayed right around three hundred pounds.

There are a few reasons for this. One, I work in an office, and however well I ate at home, when nobody was around to tell me “no!” and swat me with a rolled-up newspaper, I’d go to town on pizza, cakes, catered sandwiches, cookies, chips, and doughnuts. Sometimes I’d resist and eat what I’d packed for lunch that day. Other times I’d eat what I packed that day and go to town anyway. Still other times I’d go out and pay for lunch.

“But isn’t going out to eat super expensive?” you hypothetically ask.

“Not usually,” I reply to the suppositional you.

At the office I work at, there are always vendors or staffing reps to take me out for free, or team-building outings to all-you-can-eat places, or vendor-paid happy hours with both drinks and appetizers. And yeah, sometimes I’d just go out on my own, rather than stick to the lifestyle I’d turned into a diet.

So basically, what I’m saying is: I can’t be trusted.  And that’s where you, gentle Dot-2-Trot blog reader, come in.

Confessing My Three-chin Sins

For the next however-many months, years, whatever, I plan to show up here every Monday and confess my eating sins (if any) and successes (if any). I don’t plan on going into a lot of sciency stuff, like Dot, but I may post something I find once in a while. I like the science too, but before I start with the talking, I’d like to pack a little success under this overstrained belt of mine … kind of thing.

Each week, I’ll post my current weight and maybe talk a little about the challenges I overcame, or the positive things I’m doing. For example, I plan to join the free gym at my job—not to lose weight, but to gain health. I’ve noticed in the past that when I work out, I’m more likely to pay attention to my eating, and that results in positive change.

By confessing on my wife’s blog like this, I hope to keep myself honest and add a little public pressure/shame to my daily grind. Dot can’t watch me all the time, but I know you guys will be there the following Monday to give me grief if I screw up, because that’s what anonymous friends on the internet are for.

I’m really looking forward to it…