On December 6, 2024, my dear friend Rob Koretz passed away from heart complications. He was just 51 years old.
Three weeks later, I went in for a calcium score test. It’s a medical diagnostic that uses CT imaging to see if plaque is building up in one’s arteries. The results of my test showed up on my phone before I even got home. In the one of the greatest understatements of my life, they scared me straight.
Once I got over the shock, I tried to process it. On the scoring scale, my number was “moderate” and not “high risk,” but that, to me, was nuance. Calcium score progression and its related symptoms are largely genetic, too, and straightforward to overcome. I didn’t know any of that on December 26, though, and the news forced me into a reckoning.
I had been in a roughly two-year slide with my food intake. My weight was high: not egregiously so, as I’d been even heavier in the past, but persistently. I had developed bad habits, like walking the dog to the pizza parlor for lunch, and not paying attention to my snacking.
My reaction to the test was simple—I had to eat better, immediately and permanently. That afternoon, I did extensive homework on how to eat heart-healthy. My diet was already well-rounded, with plenty of fruits, vegetables, nuts and fish, but also loaded with starches and sweets. Those were abruptly put off-limits, along with a lot of other suspect foods. We went grocery shopping and I was a sad mess looking at everything I wanted but wouldn’t buy, convinced that the majority of the stock was going to kill me.
Eating right is not hard if you know what you’re doing. I, obviously, did not. So I booked an appointment with a dietitian associated with my doctor’s office. She was able to look at my calcium score as well as recent bloodwork and give me guidelines on calorie, fat and sugar intake. I also peppered her with dozens of questions about “bad” food, so I knew what I could get away with, as it were: how many eggs in a week, how frequently I can grab that slice of pizza, etc.
With that, I got going. I have been meticulously tracking my food, an exercise that I will drop at some point, but which has done a great job of keeping me honest and feeling empowered. I utilize Google Sheets and literally chronicle my day: I ate this much of that food which has these calories, saturated fat, added sugar and fiber totals. It’s fussy, but it’s also been fascinating. There are notes in there on the aforementioned egg and pizza frequencies as well as other tips. With it, I rarely exceed any of my daily targets.
And, of course, there’s the line diet.
I’ve written about line dieting before; I was doing it before I knew it was a thing, in a simple Excel file, on and off as I saw fit. Somehow, even when I wasn’t dieting, I’ve kept it going for 19 years. (I’m not sure what that says about me, but I think I like it.) The spreadsheet starts in 2006 and now has 14 tabs and an extremely long view on my weight. It was a natural complement to my new focus on dietary health.
My doctor gave me a weight loss goal: 28 pounds lower than where I was before my calcium scoring test. I hadn’t weighed that little since shortly after my wedding. According to my two decades of data, I’d only even gotten within seven pounds of my goal once. I began weighing myself every morning (on the world’s most reliable scale) out of curiosity and to reliably track my progress.
On Monday, 95 days after my test, I hit my target weight.
Eating with my mother-in-law a few weeks ago, she marveled at my meticulousness. “I don’t know how you do it,” she said.
“As far as I’m concerned,” I replied, “I have no choice.”
But I did have a choice, and I chose wisely. I’ve reinvented my diet and have a clear path forward to long-term heart health.
And, of course, losing a lot of weight is fun. I can’t really gain it back, so thin me is here to stay. Which means that when our nephew gets married in September, I’ll be dusting off my own wedding tuxedo for the occasion. L’chaim!