Day 25: The Switch To Black Coffee

Update: 239.0 lbs, 19.2 lbs so far, 18.8 left to reach goal.

Couple of encouraging things about todays weigh in -- 1) I'm now over halfway to my goal...just barely, but I have crossed the halfway mark...whoo! and 2) I'm now less than a pound away from losing 20 pounds....very exciting! I'm feeling pretty good that I'll hit 20 within the 1st month.

I type up my morning posts after weigh in, and while sipping my black coffee in my favorite chair, and watching either Good Day Oregon (it's snowing in Portland this morning, everyone's got snow crazy!) or some DVR'd show that my wife and I don't watch together. Anyway, back to the coffee...I've been drinking it black now for 25 days and can actually say I'm really enjoying it this way, for the most part. When I started drinking coffee in my late teens, I had to doctor it up with sugar and cream, and moved to just cream or milk in my mid twenties...always hoping to move to just black. I always envied those who could just order up coffee, and not need to find a bunch of accessories to make it drinkable, just toss it back straight up! I feel like I've finally reached manhood in my coffeedom.

What's the big deal about the black coffee in my weight loss effort? Typically, I'd have to dump a little milk or cream into it, and if you're counting along, a quarter cup of non-fat milk is between 20-25 calories. 3-4 cups of coffee in a day means 80-100 calories of just milk...not bad, but given the choice, with a 1500 calorie limit, I'd rather use that 100 calories somewhere else!

The other side benefit of drinking black coffee is that I feel like I'm getting to really taste the coffee and not milk or creamer, and it makes lattes more of a treat when I allocate some calories for one as a snack.

On another note, props to my mother, brother and sister in-law who've informed me they've started using The Daily Plate for tracking their calories too! And props to team member and buddy John Kelly for my favorite Starbucks mug.

Hasta Luego