One Month Into My 100-Pound Weight Loss Journey: 15.3 Pounds Down and I'm Waking Up

Four weeks ago, I stepped on the scale at 283.1 pounds and decided it was time.

Not time to start another diet. God knows I've done enough of those in my lifetime. Not time to punish myself for gaining weight or spend the next year obsessing over every number on the scale. It was simply time to start taking my life back.

If you've been following Comeback Over 50, you know that losing weight is only one part of my comeback. I have 100 pounds I want to lose before my daughter's wedding on November 5, 2027, and yes, I would LOVE to walk into that wedding wearing a fabulous Mother-of-the-Bride dress instead of something resembling a beautifully beaded tent.

But there is a much bigger reason I'm doing this. I want to do things again.

I want to hike. I want to travel. I want to walk for miles through a new city without wondering where the next bench is. I want to get stronger. I want to get outside. I want to say YES to an adventure without first calculating whether my body can handle it.

I don't want the size of my body determining the size of my life. F-that!

So I decided to share this journey publicly, exactly as it happens. The good weeks, the hard weeks, the things that work, the things that don't, the scale victories and, maybe even more importantly, everything that's changing that has absolutely nothing to do with the scale.

And after my first four weeks, I'm down 15.3 pounds. Woo hoo! You heard me!

I started on July 20 at 283.1 pounds, and today I weigh 267.8. That means I have 84.7 pounds left to reach my 100-pound goal. That's still a big number, but instead of looking at those 84.7 pounds and thinking about how far I have to go, I'm looking at the first 15.3 and thinking, Holy crap. I'm doing it.

What I've Been Eating

I started my first week with a very low-carb reset. I wanted to get the sugar and junk out, get rid of some of the water and bloat I was carrying, and give myself a very clear starting line. I kept things incredibly simple with mostly beef, bacon, butter and eggs, along with my coffee with heavy cream, stevia and collagen. It was not meant to become some extreme forever diet. It was my reset.

And boy, did I reset.

A lot of that first week's dramatic drop was obviously water and bloat, and I knew that going in. But I could physically feel the difference. The swelling in my ankles disappeared. The bloating went down. I felt less puffy and uncomfortable, and that alone made me want to keep going.

Since then, I've moved into the way I intend to eat for the long haul: high protein, very low carb, moderate fat and mostly simple, whole foods. I'm eating things like eggs, beef, chicken, turkey, fish, cottage cheese and other dairy that works for me. I'm not trying to make food complicated, and I'm definitely not trying to survive on dry chicken breasts and broccoli for the next year and a half. I want enough variety that I can enjoy what I'm eating while still remembering one of the pillars of Comeback Over 50: Food as Fuel.

I'm also tracking my macros now, which is something I wasn't doing during that first reset week. I've been using AI to help me plan some meals, figure out portions, create grocery lists, come up with new recipes and take some of the constant decision-making out of eating. I realized pretty quickly that I don't have a lack-of-information problem when it comes to weight loss. I've been dieting for decades. I know what protein is. I know what carbs are. I know the difference between a steak and a Snickers bar.

What wears me out is making food decisions over and over and over again.

AI has helped tremendously with that. It isn't losing the weight for me. It's not passing on dessert, tracking my food or dragging my butt to the gym. Trust me, if I can figure out how to get ChatGPT to cattle prod me when I drive past the gym, I will absolutely let you know. What it is doing is helping me make a plan before the week starts so there are fewer decisions left to make when I'm tired, hungry or busy. And making sure that I'm being adventurous with my eating. There are thousands of incredible recipes made by all of you that are there for the taking. Why eat the plain burger over and over?

Four Weeks, Four Very Different Lessons

My first month has already taught me that no two weeks of this journey are going to look exactly the same.

Week One was about starting. I did my carb reset, dropped a tremendous amount of water and bloat, and ended the week down 9.1 pounds. More important than the number was the feeling that came with it. I had drawn a line in the sand and actually followed through.

Week Two was about proving I could do this in real life. I traveled to New York for business, which would've been a perfect excuse to say, "I'll get back to it when I get home." Instead, I kept things simple. At one dinner, our host ordered ten desserts for a table of eighteen people. I quietly passed them along without taking a bite. I skipped the cocktail I would've normally had at a business dinner and ordered club soda with lime instead. I walked all over New York and came home another half pound lighter.

That half pound may have been one of the most important half pounds I've ever lost.

Because it taught me that I don't have to start over every Monday anymore. Week Three was when I got more serious about building a sustainable system. I started tracking my macros, brought AI into my weekly planning and started paying attention to how much I was actually eating compared with how much I was moving. I lost another 1.2 pounds, bringing my total to 12.1 pounds.

But I also hit a wall.

I was tired. I mean dragging-ass tired. My body was adjusting, my energy was low, and for a little while I wondered whether eating this low carb lifestyle was going to work for me long term. I paid attention, made sure I was getting my electrolytes, and gave my body some time rather than assuming every uncomfortable day meant the entire plan was broken.

Then something happened.

My energy came back!

And that brings me to Week Four.

I adjusted my macros because I had to admit something to myself: I'm still more sedentary than I want to be. I can't eat for the activity level I wish I had. I have to eat for the body and activity level I have today while I work on changing both.

So on the days I'm less active, I've adjusted accordingly. I'm continuing to track every bite, keeping my protein high, staying low carb and following a personal rule that has been really helpful for me: the kitchen closes at 6 PM.

And I finally started working out.

This week I lost another 3.2 pounds.

But that's not the biggest thing that happened.

I Feel Like Somebody Turned Me Back On

This is the part I wasn't expecting. My energy isn't just coming back physically.

My brain is on fire.

I have ideas everywhere. I'm writing. I'm creating. I'm thinking about Comeback Over 50. I'm thinking about things I want to build, places I want to go, videos I want to make and adventures I want to have.

It's like somebody flipped a switch.

And suddenly this journey has me asking a completely different question.

Not, "Can I lose 100 pounds?"

But... "What else can I do?"

THAT is exciting to me.

Because isn't that really what a comeback is?

It isn't simply changing the number on the scale. It's waking up parts of yourself that have been sleeping.

It's remembering the woman who used to get excited about things. The woman who made plans. The woman who took chances. The woman who walked into something difficult and thought, I'll figure it out.

She's still in there.

We're Not Done, Ladies

There is something I really want women over 50 to understand, because I'm starting to feel it more strongly with every week of this journey.

We are still here. We are not finished and we are not getting too old to get strong. We're not too old to lose the weight. We're not too old to change careers, start a business, write the book, climb the mountain, travel somewhere alone, fall in love, learn something completely new or reinvent what the next twenty or thirty years of our lives look like.

We can still do the big things, the hard things, the impossible things.

Yes, we can do ALL things.

We've raised children. Built careers. Survived heartbreak. Lost people we love. Taken care of parents. Navigated menopause. Started over. Been knocked down. Gotten back up. Loved people through terrible things and somehow kept putting one foot in front of the other.

And we're supposed to believe we're suddenly too old to take on something big? Oh, please.

We are mighty.

We are alive.

We are strong.

We are kick-ass women, and we are absolutely capable of conquering our comebacks.

That's why Comeback Over 50 isn't a weight-loss site. My weight loss is simply one piece of my own comeback. Everything I'm doing comes back to the four pillars I'm trying to build my life around: Mindset & Identity, Movement & Strength, Food as Fuel, and Passion, Spirit & Joy.

Right now, losing this weight is helping me with all four.

Food as Fuel is teaching me to care about what I'm putting into my body. Movement & Strength is getting me off my butt and reminding me that I want a body capable of doing things. Mindset & Identity is changing the way I think about myself and what I'm capable of. And Passion, Spirit & Joy? That one might be my favorite right now, because the more energy I get back, the more I want to LIVE.

I'm only four weeks in.

I still have 84.7 pounds to lose.

There will be weeks when the scale doesn't cooperate. There will be vacations, holidays, weddings, business trips, bad days and probably more than a few moments when I wonder why the hell I decided to do this publicly.

But today?

I'm 15.3 pounds lighter than I was 28 days ago.

I'm moving again.

My energy is back.

My brain is on fire.

And instead of wondering what I've lost because I've gotten older, I'm thinking about everything I still have time to gain.

What else can I do?

That's the question I'm taking into Month Two, and maybe it's the question you should ask yourself, too. What do you still want? Have you been telling yourself you're too old, too tire, too heavy, too scared or its just too late?

Maybe it's time to stop asking whether you can.

Maybe it's time to find out.

My comeback is now. How about yours?