I Have a Stupid Idea That Might Help Me Lose the Next 43 Pounds

I’m thinking about filming what I eat every single day until I reach my goal weight of 150 pounds, and I’m still trying to decide whether this is accountability or a terrible idea.

I have been thinking about doing something that might either be incredibly helpful or become one of those ideas I look back on in a few weeks and wonder why nobody stopped me.

I’m considering filming a What I Eat in a Day video every single day until I reach my goal weight of 150 pounds. At my current weight of 193 pounds, that means documenting the next 43 pounds of my journey, however long that takes, and putting myself in the slightly ridiculous position of having to remember to film my meals every single day.

The more I think about it, though, the less ridiculous it seems.

I’ve lost 95 pounds from my highest weight. That is still a sentence that occasionally catches me off guard because, for a long time, losing that much weight felt like something that belonged to other people. It represented some imaginary future version of me who had figured everything out, stayed perfectly consistent, and probably enjoyed going to the gym at 5:00 in the morning for reasons I will never understand.

Instead, I am still very much myself.

I am just 95 pounds lighter than I was at my highest weight, and I am still trying to figure out what this part of the journey requires from me.

Because I have 43 pounds left to lose.

And somewhere between losing a significant amount of weight and realizing that I still wasn’t finished, the journey changed.

I Don’t Actually Need More Information

At this point, I don’t think my biggest problem is that I don’t know what to do.

I know what foods help me feel full. I know that protein matters for me. I know the habits that tend to make me feel better and more in control of my eating. I also know what tends to happen when I’m stressed, tired, distracted, bored, or standing in my kitchen looking for an experience that apparently cannot be found inside the refrigerator.

Knowing what to do and consistently doing it, however, are two completely different things.

After losing 95 pounds, I don’t think I need more information. I think I might need a better way to stay connected to the goal I still have.

That is the part of weight loss I think we don’t talk about enough. When you first begin, there is so much to learn that the learning itself can carry you for a while. You’re figuring out what works for you, discovering new foods, watching the scale change, taking progress pictures, and experiencing all of those early moments where you realize that maybe this time really could be different.

Eventually, though, the newness wears off.

Your life is still busy. Your responsibilities don’t disappear because you lost weight. You still have stressful weeks, holidays, social events, tired afternoons, and all of the other ordinary moments where food can become something you reach for without really thinking about it.

And after a while, the question becomes less about whether you know how to lose weight and more about how you continue doing something long after it stops feeling new.

That is the question I’m trying to answer right now.

What If Filming My Food Made Me Pay Attention Again?

The idea isn’t that I need to turn every meal into content because I think the world has been waiting to see what I eat for lunch on a random Tuesday.

I promise you, some days would be deeply underwhelming.

But I keep wondering whether knowing that I’m going to document what I eat might change the way I move through my day. Not because I would be afraid of showing something I ate, and not because I want strangers on the internet to monitor my food choices, but because there is something different about making a choice when you have to consciously acknowledge that you’re making it.

When food becomes automatic, it’s very easy to stop noticing it.

You grab something while you’re making dinner. You finish something your kid didn’t eat. You have a snack while you’re scrolling. You go back into the kitchen because you’re bored, even though you were just there twenty minutes ago. None of those moments necessarily feel important by themselves, which is exactly why they can become so easy to overlook.

Maybe I don’t need more pressure around food. Maybe I just need more opportunities to pay attention.

That distinction matters to me because I don’t want this project to become about creating rules around food that make me feel like I’m being watched. I have absolutely no interest in handing over my relationship with food to the comment section.

The purpose would be almost the opposite.

I don’t need the internet to police my food. I might just need a reason to be more honest with myself about it.

Could filming my meals create a natural pause before I mindlessly eat something? Could looking back at the videos help me notice patterns that I wouldn’t otherwise see? Could I start recognizing that I tend to snack more on certain days, at certain times, or when I’m feeling a certain way?

I honestly don’t know.

But I think that is why I’m interested in trying it.

The Last 43 Pounds Are Going To Require Something Different

I don’t mean that I need some dramatic new diet or a completely different version of myself.

Honestly, I think I’ve spent enough years believing that every new goal required me to become a brand-new person, and I’m not particularly interested in doing that anymore.

The woman who lost the first 95 pounds is the same woman sitting here at 193 pounds.

I haven’t suddenly forgotten how to lose weight.

But I also don’t think I can pretend that every stage of a long journey feels the same.

The things that help you begin a journey aren’t always the same things that help you stay engaged when you’ve been doing it for years.

There was a time when seeing the scale move was enough to keep me excited. There was a time when every pound lost felt like a huge milestone because I had spent so long wanting to see that number go down.

Now, I’m in a different place.

I’ve already experienced the big transformation that people can see.

I’ve already had the before-and-after moment.

I’ve already lost enough weight that people sometimes look at me as though I have finished, while I am still standing here looking at another 43 pounds between where I am and where I want to be.

And that part feels surprisingly quiet.

There is less excitement around it because there is no dramatic beginning anymore. It’s just me deciding whether I am willing to continue doing the ordinary things that eventually create an extraordinary result.

That is probably the least glamorous part of weight loss, but it might also be the most important.

I Might Learn Something From You Guys

Another reason I keep coming back to this idea is because I have learned a lot from watching other people eat.

Not in a weird, “Let me analyze every bite you take” way. Please relax.

But sometimes someone shares a meal that gives me an idea I genuinely would not have thought of on my own. Sometimes someone mentions a product or recipe that works really well for them. Sometimes people in the comments have suggestions that make me think, “Wait. Why have I never tried that?”

And I think there is something valuable about admitting that losing 95 pounds does not mean I have somehow graduated from learning.

I am still figuring out what works for me at this stage.

I’m still learning how to manage my hunger, my habits, my environment, and the very normal reality that I am a person who enjoys food and would prefer not to spend the rest of my life pretending otherwise.

I have lost 95 pounds, but I have not reached the point where I know everything about maintaining a healthy relationship with food. Honestly, I’m not sure anyone has.

Maybe sharing this part of my journey would give me some new ideas.

Maybe you would see something I’m eating and suggest an alternative that I actually end up loving.

Maybe someone else watching would realize that they aren’t the only person who has lost a significant amount of weight and still occasionally struggles with overeating.

Because I think that is another thing worth saying out loud.

Losing weight doesn’t remove your humanity.

You can lose 20 pounds, 50 pounds, 95 pounds, or more and still have a day where you eat more than you intended.

You can understand your habits and still occasionally fall back into them.

You can be proud of your progress while also admitting that you haven’t reached your goal yet.

Those things are allowed to exist together.

I Don’t Know If I’ll Actually Last Until 150

This is probably the part that makes me laugh the most.

Because I could make some big announcement and confidently declare that I am going to film every single thing I eat until I reach 150 pounds, and it would sound very impressive.

Then I would have to actually do it.

Every day.

For the next 43 pounds.

That is where the confidence gets a little quieter.

Because depending on how long it takes me to lose those 43 pounds, this could mean filming a lot of meals. There will undoubtedly be days when I forget until halfway through eating, days when I don’t feel like filming anything, and days when my dinner consists of whatever I could throw together while trying to survive the rest of my life.

Consistency is always a fantastic idea when you’re sitting on the couch planning it. It becomes significantly less glamorous when it’s Wednesday night and you realize you haven’t filmed your lunch.

Still, I don’t think I need to know with complete certainty that I can do this before I start.

I don’t have to guarantee that I will perfectly complete the experiment before I give myself permission to find out whether it helps me.

That is something I wish more of us remembered when we are trying to change something in our lives.

We often want guarantees before we begin. We want to know that the plan will work, that we will stay motivated, that we won’t quit, and that the thing we’re trying won’t make us feel silly later.

But most of the things that change us don’t come with guarantees.

You try something.

You pay attention.

You learn from it.

You decide whether it is helping.

And if it isn’t, you adjust.

That doesn’t mean you failed.

It means you learned.

So, Should I Actually Do This?

That is where I need your opinion.

I am seriously considering starting a daily What I Eat in a Day series and continuing it as I work toward my goal weight of 150 pounds.

The purpose wouldn’t be perfection.

It wouldn’t be restriction.

It wouldn’t be creating a public food diary where I feel like I need to defend every choice I make.

The goal would simply be to see whether documenting my food helps me stay more aware of what I’m doing, keeps me connected to the goal I still care about, and possibly gives me the opportunity to learn from all of you along the way.

I have 43 pounds left to lose.

When I focus on that entire number, it can feel like a lot. But I didn’t lose 95 pounds by waking up every morning and somehow carrying the weight of all 95 pounds I needed to lose.

I lost it one day at a time.

One meal at a time.

One decision at a time.

With plenty of imperfect days somewhere in the middle.

Maybe the next 43 pounds don’t require me to become more disciplined, more perfect, or more motivated. Maybe they simply require me to become more present again.

And if filming what I eat every day helps me do that, then maybe this stupid idea isn’t actually so stupid.

Or maybe I will be back here in two weeks, surrounded by half-filmed meals and forgotten camera footage, admitting that this was one of my more ambitious plans.

Either way, I think I’m curious enough to find out.

Would you watch a daily What I Eat in a Day series until I reach 150 pounds? And more importantly, do you think publicly documenting my food could help me stay accountable, or do you think this is exactly the kind of idea that sounds good until you actually have to do it every single day?

Nyk