Status Report: 1.2 lbs. lost, 60.2 lbs. total

I would like to direct your attention to my weight loss ticker at the bottom right of this blog – it looks like a cute little snail making its way along a very long road.  You will see that it says that I have lost 60.2 lbs. and have 59.8 lbs. to go – which means that I am, officially, closer to my goal than I am to the beginning.  It’s just barely, but I am over the halfway point!

So two things I learned this week:

The first is that if I absolutely, positively have to have a week off – then that’s okay.  I caught a cold nearly two weeks ago and was feeling too weak and sickly to work out.  I also didn’t feel good enough to muster nearly enough care about what I was eating.  So when it came time to get weighed in last Wednesday I knowingly played hooky.  I got right back on the wagon and simply counted the week as a loss.  I don’t know if I put on any weight during my cold week, and I don’t care.  I had too much else going on emotionally to worry about it, so I simply didn’t.

The second thing is that losing weight appears to have affected my ability to recover from illness.  As I mentioned, I caught a cold.  It started Monday morning the 10^th and resolved itself in about seven to ten days afterward just like a normal cold is supposed to.

The thing is, in my lifetime colds have never worked that way.  When I get a cold I’ve always begun coughing within a few days of onset because I have a form of asthma called cough variant asthma (CVA for short) which is set off by getting sick.  The coughing can continue anywhere from a month to a full three months of nonstop misery both for me and the people around me.  I can recall being a kid in school and suffering the disdain and anger of my classmates who were thoroughly tired of hearing my constant barking (although believe me they could not have been as tired of it as I was having to suffer through it).

This time I coughed a bit, nothing serious, and then the cold just went away exactly like it’s supposed to.  Sixteen days later I’m fully recovered and back to normal.

I can’t imagine why a lighter body weight would have such a huge effect on my lungs, so I’m assuming it’s all the exercise that made a difference.  The heart and lungs both grow stronger during cardio-aerobic activity, and that strength must have kept the cough from settling in and making itself at home.

It's an unexpected bonus, and one I am outstandingly grateful for.  Losing an entire quarter of a year to the headache, abdominal aches, lost sleep and negative social ramifications of a constant, nagging cough is beyond miserable.  If this turns out to be a consistent result for me, then it's a life changer.