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PANIC BUTTON TIME!

You've been cruising along, living the cheapo life, counting all the money you've saved up over the last year and laughing at the chumps who signed up for gym memberships that have already become nothing more than a monthly insult on their credit card statements.

You've been cutting a few corners here, missing some weigh-ins there, kind of keeping a mental track of your calories but still somewhat sticking to your plan. Your schedule has been turned upside down due to life events, and you've lost some of the additional slack in your clothes.

You know your weight is slightly elevated. Your previous "oh crap" weight has become your new normal. However, you're still within spitting distance of your target weight and figure that you can return to glory with a couple of good weeks of cheapo discipline. You figure that once all the upheaval in your life gets sorted out, you'll be back where you want to be.

Then, you step on the scale one morning and....WTF?!?! That's what's happened to ol' Cheapo. Behold the Chart of Doom:



So, let's analyze this ugly thing. Google Fit doesn't let me display the last relative 3 months for some reason, but suffice it to say that I more or less contained the damage over Thanksgiving, Christmas and New Year's. Even though I lost some control over my food choices, I managed to keep my steps elevated around that time.

167-168 pounds was horrible by my old standards but became my "holiday normal". Actually, 163 was around my previous worry threshold, but I've now crossed the 170 pound Rubicon and am freaking out. Mind you, this is not because I had some sodium galore dinner one night, but I'm now consistently hitting 170-171 on the scale every morning. Yikes.

As a federal worker, the government was shut down for most of January, so I lost all my bicycle commuting. In that time, I was keeping plenty busy doing nonstop tasks preparing for our baby arriving in March, but I definitely wasn't hitting my 20,000 step ideal with any regularity. Oh yeah, and the Navy Seal supplemental training program? Long gone.

Also, my calorie tracking had basically fallen off. I was still eating my power breakfast every day and trying getting as many steps in to offset my somewhat careless calorie intake the rest of the day. I wasn't totally overdoing it, but the 80% rule had more or less become a 50% rule. At best.

The last half week of January I was hosting family, going out to eat every night, attending parties and throwing my calorie inhibitions into the wind. I knew the scale was going to be ugly, so I avoided it for a couple of days and recoiled in horror once I did.

Of course, things haven't improved in February with bitter temperatures and snow keeping me off my bike and curtailing my walks for the sake of my dogs. Other baby-related appointments and tasks filled up my evening walking time, and even my work schedule became so jammed that I couldn't even escape for lunch walks. Things got so busy that it even became extremely difficult to hit my step targets even on the treadmill. The good news is that resuming my calorie logging and intake management has pretty much halted the ballooning, but I wasn't chipping away at my new blubbery coat either.

I've got another month or so until the baby arrives and thankfully not a whole lot of tasks left. If the weather cooperates, I should be able to resume all my outdoor activities and get the needle going in the right direction again.

Realistically, the baby's arrival is going to be a major cheapo lifestyle disruption, and I'm going to have a lot less time on my hands to rack up my step count on leisurely walks. It's possible that I may be able to bring the baby along, but it may prove to be more of a production than it's worth - at least for the extended walks that I depend on.

So, I may be forced to start treadmill running in order to max out my step count in as little time as possible. In fact, I think I'm going to do that anyway to try and speed up my weight losses until then. This way if I can be at or near my target by the time the baby arrives, I'll have some pounds to play with while I figure out a new routine.

The one great thing about the cheapo plan is its multifaceted approach which provides several layers of safety checks. While other people decide to just do one thing like fasting one day or running x miles a week, if that one thing falters, you're back to where you started.

When my daily calorie logging stopped and life disruptions prevented me from preparing most of my own meals and hitting my step targets, I was still able to catch myself thanks to my power breakfast keeping my weight from skyrocketing and forcing myself back onto the scale, even if it wasn't every day.

The scale has really proved to be the most indispensable tool in the cheapo's arsenal. You cannot BS it. It will fluctuate a little bit every day, but the weekly average will tell you the truth.

I know that I haven't been updating the blog as much as my millions have fans had hoped for, but I'll at least check in again before baby time to post my progress.


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