Declare Counter With Value Outside For Loop

Is it possible to declare a counter with a value outside of a for loop?

I have a counter that will end prematurely in a while loop during various iterations and I want to pick it back up in a catch all for loop at the end

Let's say I have a while loop

while(something) {
total++
}

then after I have a for loop that I want to start at total but would rather do that then make a new counter variable.

for(total;total < 20;total++)

Is something like this possible or is this a horrible thing to want anyways?