1.6 pounds per month = 2.8 YEARS to lose 50 pounds

Yikes. I have lost a pathetic 3.2 pounds since January 1, 2012. How can this be? I lost 6.6 in the first two weeks of the year. I was convinced that I would exceed my goal to lose 50 pounds in 50 weeks. Not so. The tyranny of a decades-old habit caught up with me. I left for the cruise on Jan. 25, down almost 10 pounds. The well-documented hedonism aboard the floating Xanadu led to a 3-pound gain. On a roll, so to speak (pun intended), I proceeded to gain a couple of pounds each ensuing week. Argh.

So it’s back to tracking every morsel (even the pastel Easter M & Ms in the bunny bowl my colleague put out today). I went to a weight lifting class at Gold’s Gym yesterday. Endless squats. It was fun lifting the barbell to Joan Jett belting out “I love rock ‘n roll” until I realized that I was shaking and might drop it.

I hired a certified health coach last week. A lovely, earnest woman who gave me cherry tea (quite good, even though I generally detest tea) and told me to eat kale. My soul longs for cheese, but my body doesn’t.

So I don’t want to take almost 3 years to lose the 50 pounds. That means facing up to three things:

1) It ain’t going to be easy.

2) I can’t let ‘er rip on the weekends, or it takes a whole week to shed what I gain after indulging.

3) exercise is magic – annnd it’s super hard to get out of bed or out of the office to get to the gym consistently.

Weigh-in is in 3 days and I’ve lost a couple of pounds since Saturday.  Here’s hoping.