Almost 8 Years Later…

It’s been nearly 8 years since I started this blog and a very long time since I’ve updated. I can hardly believe it’s been so long.

Over the past couple of years, I haven’t abandoned fitness altogether, but I did start having negative associations with blogging about my journey, since it seemed like I would have a “come to Jesus” day or two every couple of months and then throw in the towel without accomplishing much. Last year, I actually downloaded My Fitness Pal and really buckled down for a stretch. We were going on a cruise and I wanted to feel better about myself in a swimsuit…and although I was not perfectly consistent, I did manage to hit a number on the scale that I hadn’t seen in at least a few years. I started being able to run further and faster again. I was able to fit into my better clothes.

And then we went on that vacation, and I basically threw off all restraints. I did work out in the ship’s fitness center several times, which was quite fun. Here was my view from my favorite elliptical machine:

And here I was, not looking too terrible in my swimsuit…although as you can clearly see, that is a plate of DELICIOUS French fries on my lap:

It was a great trip and I really don’t regret indulging in what I felt like eating.

What I do regret is what I did (and didn’t do) once we returned home. Instead of making more positive choices, I fell into what basically turned into very unhealthy habits. I (once again) quit incorporating vegetables into my diet. Instead, I slipped back into the mindset of looking to food for entertainment, feeling cheated unless I had unlimited amounts of whatever I wanted. I also quit viewing exercise as something enjoyable, probably due to a couple of factors. My weight was inching back up, which made exercise feel more like a chore, which made me avoid it, which made my weight keep creeping up.

Anyway, I’m here again because I once again feel like blogging about the journey. We don’t have another cruise on the horizon – yet – but I am going to be seeing an old friend in a few months, a friend I haven’t seen in decades, someone who was always very size-ist and shallow. And I know this makes ME sound size-ist and shallow, but I REALLY don’t want to see her again if I can’t fit into better clothes.

And the truth is, right now, I am at the upper end of my wardrobe. Just about all of my clothes are not exactly comfortable anymore. So I will be blogging about my progress. I also like keeping a food diary here. It just feels more interesting than My Fitness Pal, which got kind of burdensome after awhile.

Right now, I have to prepare myself for the inevitable mind battle that is going to arise, between the part of my brain that knows what I want to do and the part that is controlled by Crazed Addict Fatgirl. I’ve been sticking to my plan for three days, and I know it’s always on day three or four that I hit my first wall. I was thinking last night about all the reasons I want to stick with this, and how I would write them out and force myself to read them when I felt weak.

My biggest reason is that I just don’t feel good about myself when I’m bigger. It’s not even the shallow vanity of wanting to avoid my old friend’s judgment when she sees me in April – it’s the way I feel when I can’t find anything to wear. It’s how I feel when I have to face the consequences of not taking care of myself. I am also getting older, and I want to improve my health. Moreover, I CAN remember how good it feels to distance myself from the disordered use of food as entertainment. I love the feeling of not feeling like food is controlling me. I would like to have a healthier relationship with food, particularly as I get older and face the potential health consequences of not taking care of myself.

Anyway – I’m here and I’m still going. It’s going to be good.

Still here

I’m still plugging along.

In case anyone was wondering.

My weight stays around 158, give or take a couple of pounds.  And it only stays in that range because I continue to renew my commitment to this lifestyle every single day.

It’s not easy.  In fact, lately, I’ve become plagued by Crazed Addict Fatgirl even on days when I make up my mind to refrain from over-indulging.  It’s almost hard to remember what it was like to be so committed to my new ways that I did not WANT to eat junk food or pig out with no restraint. 

I do know that after I got going and stayed committed for several days in a row, Crazed Addict Fatgirl’s lying voice got much fainter, much less powerful.  But it’s been several weeks since I’ve had more than one “good day” in a row.  I think that’s definitely part of the problem.  My old mindset of using food for entertainment – of deliberately seeking out unlimited amounts of the fattening foods I enjoy – is so easily resurrected.  All it takes is a few days of caving to Crazed Addict Fatgirl, and I start to absolutely CHAFFE at any sort of restriction when I try to “get back in the saddle.”

Yesterday was a great case in point.

My resolve is the strongest throughout the morning.  It tends to wane as the day wears on.  Yesterday afternoon, I found myself sitting around, toying with the idea of going to Chick-Fil-A for lunch.  I actually prayed that I’d be able to resist the temptation.  I needed to go out to the store, and it’d be way too easy to swing on over to where Chick-Fil-A is located.

I went ahead and had a Slim-Fast instead.  I knew that I’d feel too full to be enticed by large amounts of fast food once I’d had my shake.

I went to the store, did my errand.  As I was getting back into my car, I realized that I was NOT satisfied with just the Slim-Fast.  I still was not going to go to Chick-Fil-A, but I suddenly remembered the bag of barbecue potato chips that I’d bought a week or two ago.  Immediately, I knew what I was going to do.

And this is where Crazed Addict Fatgirl comes in.

A part of me really did NOT want to eat a bunch of chips.  But then a larger part of me totally did, and Crazed Addict Fatgirl came and took possession of my thoughts.  When Crazed Addict Fatgirl is in residence, she has me convinced that wolfing down as many potato chips as I can stand will not hurt me.  I actually get this weird giddy rush of excitement as I contemplate how much fun the over-indulgence is going to be.  I feel a sort of bizarre “high” about it.  I’m carefree and full of anticipation, and at that moment, I utterly do not care about eating healthy foods, eating well, keeping my weight within a good range, or fitting into my clothes.

It’s really strange.

So I came home and ripped open the chip bag, poured a huge glass of Diet Coke, and sat down to zone out and eat.  I think I put away half the bag before getting sick of the taste.  At one point, I realized that I was almost not able to eat the chips fast enough, so great was my weird urgency to keep the barbecue flavor inside my mouth.

Strange strange strange.

I didn’t really feel too bad afterward.  Sometimes, especially after having too many potato chips, I actually feel sick, but not yesterday.  Later, I felt regret.  But in the moment – it’s crazy. 

It’s Crazed Addict Fatgirl.

I’m pretty sure I will always be plagued by this…CREATURE.  I do know that her voice gets fainter if I don’t indulge her bizarre whims.  I do know that if I could just resist her possession, if I could just distract myself from her lures, she does lose power over me.

These days, I have a much more heartfelt sympathy for those “loser” alcoholics or drug addicts who keep falling off the wagon.  I know what it’s like.  My thoughts lie to me…and I choose to believe their lies.  I eat the foods that trigger more lying thoughts…which puts me right back into the out-of-control cycle, where I feel powerless to resist food.  It’s definitely an addiction.

I’ve been cleaning out my closet, and I am NOT tossing all my fat-chick clothes.  Instead, I’m putting them in clear plastic bins down in the basement.  I hope that with my daily renewed commitment, I never will need them again.  I do continue to eat my fruits and vegetables, and I do exercise intensely just about every day.  But my addictive personality – the part of me that slips so easily into the habit of using an over-indulgence of fattening foods for entertainment – puts me at real risk of being fat again.

I need to quit lying to myself.

I need to put Crazed Addict Fatgirl in her place.

I need to remember that once I get past the first couple of days, it’s REALLY NOT THAT HARD to exercise portion control.

I’m heading out to my parents’ place for a two-week vacation, and in a bizarre way, I’m actually thinking that it will be easier to get back into a groove over there.  My mom and dad have been complaining greatly of money woes and aren’t doing nearly the dining out and the self-indulgent eating that they’ve done in the past.  When I was out there last time, it was easy to fend for myself and just have a Lean Cuisine for dinner, and dinner is when I struggle the most.  Dinner, and stupid junk food snacks like potato chips.

So I’m still here.  Still committed.  Still plugging along.  With a renewed commitment to quit listening to lying Crazed Addict Fatgirl.

Doing better

After I wrote the last post, I really had it out with myself.  What was my problem?  Why was I almost purposely derailing myself, lapsing into the old habits that I don’t really like?

I’m still not sure of the answers to those questions.  But I decided not to think about it too much.  Instead, a better tactic for me is to just DO what I should do, rather than try to over-analyze.  And in this case, doing the right thing is simply AVOIDING the foods that derail me. 

It’s actually pretty simple.  If I quit having cake every afternoon (like I’d gotten into the habit of doing after my birthday, when I’d carefully sliced and froze the rest of my delicious birthday cake), I’ll soon quit craving cake.  The first couple of afternoons were a little rough, as I thought about how there was cake in the freezer and how easy it’d be to have some.  But after the third day, I didn’t even really think about it any more.

Same with the garlic bread and wine.  Quite honestly, after the last time, when I gave myself tremendous heartburn and a 3-pound gain, I wasn’t so keen on the idea.  Even so, though, I did start obsessing about it in the evening, as we were watching TV Monday night.  But then I decided to just push through those obsessive cravings.  I forced myself to remember how miserable I was in the middle of the night…and how much I hated seeing the scale numbers creeping up.  That 165-pound range does almost put me into a different size range, and I really, REALLY do not want to “outgrow” my new clothes, particularly my new swimsuits.

This morning when I weighed in, I was back down to 161.5.  What a relief.

I’ve been running on the treadmill lately, mostly because the intensity seems to help my weight loss more than the other exercises do.  I’ve worked my way into being able to run at a level 6.2 (which is a 9:40 mile on my particular treadmill) for 10 minutes straight.  After a quick 30-second break of brisk walking, so I can swig some water, I put the speed back up and run another mile.  It feels like such an achievement.

Since recording my food choices did seem to help me and keep me honest, I thought I’d do that again.  Here is what I ate today (calories are in parentheses):

South Beach bar (140); yogurt (100); grapefruit (140); broccoli (100); Slim-Fast Optima shake (190); green beans (100); Lean Cuisine Teriyaki Steak bowl (270); milk (90); prunes (160).

Total:  1,290.

Pulling it together…yet again

So the past week has been pretty bad for me and my diet plan. 

For whatever reason, Crazed Addict Fatgirl took up residence in my thinking for several days.  I got into this weird obsession with garlic bread and white wine, to the point where I deliberately went to the store and bought several loaves of the best frozen “cabatta bread” that I’d found.  My mindset at that moment was, “Oh, I’m here now, the bread is here, I’ll buy it for those moments – few and far between – when I really ‘need’ to have some bread.”

But the truth was, knowing that it’s in the freezer has been pretty much all it’s taken to make popping a loaf in the oven something of a nightly ritual.

My weight numbers have reflected this indulgance, too.  I was appalled this morning when I stepped on the scale and saw 164.5.  That is a 3 pound gain since my original low of 161.5.

The truth of the matter is, I deserve every one of those pounds.  Like I said, I’ve hit that Crazed Addict Fatgirl mentality, where I keep lying to myself.  Yesterday, I thought I was thoroughly recommitted to getting back on track after a couple of days of late-night garlic bread binges (I don’t just eat one small piece – I tend to eat the entire loaf, or everything but the little portion that my husband takes).

But then last night, I had a particularly disturbing phone conversation with my mom.  I love my mother with all my heart, but she’s definitely got her issues, one of which is a broken relationship with one of her brothers.  In her defense, I’d say way more than half of the conflict is not her fault.  Her brother – my uncle – has mistreated my mom since their childhood.

But he’s pretty much blown her off over the past few years, deliberately ignoring her and seeming to treat her as though she doesn’t exist.  Last night my mom announced her plan to write her brother a letter and “tell him her side.”  My mom has no sense of how to communicate, and the letters she’s written to other people have been simply horrible, seemingly abusive as she lashes out with some bizarrely irrational thought that her letter’s target is going to sit back and say to himself, “Aw, gee, she really IS right after all.”

That will never happen.

So anyway, last night my mom launched into this whole thing about how she was going to write my uncle a letter.  She was really into it, completely fired up with fresh anger over the mistreatment she’s suffered from him, even things that happened 20 years ago or more.

I was trying to reason with her, asking her if this really was the legacy that she wanted to leave for her grandchildren?  All these ranting letters to people?  Why write letters if you truly don’t care about the person anymore, as she claims with respect to my uncle?  Why?

She was totally irrational last night, and in the end, she turned her anger on me, accusing me of wanting to silence her and not let her express herself.  This is simply not true.  I’m actually only wanting to protect her from herself – from revealing to her brother that she actually cares enough about him, mean as he’s been to her over the years, to try to provoke a reaction out of him by antagonizing him with an angry rant.

When I hung up the phone, I was so upset that I could feel my heart racing.  I felt completely frustrated by my mother’s bizarre insistance on her right to “tell her side,” and by her total refusal to see how fruitless this whole thing was going to be…in addition to the fact that it would only make HER look like the crazy one.

I got off the phone and immediately turned on the oven.  Then I poured a half glass of wine and proceeded to bake and eat an entire loaf of cabatta bread.

Quite honestly, I deliberately CHOSE not to stop and think.  I knew what I was doing was foolish and self-defeating, but I didn’t care.  For the half hour or so that the bread and wine lasted, I felt just a little loopy and found some relief from the total stress of watching my mother try to destroy herself.

But then last night I felt terrible.  After my glass of wine wore off, my stomach was really upset.  I woke up a couple of times in the night with heartburn, and like I said, this morning I had a 3-pound weight gain.

So today I regrouped and thought about just what is going on.  Why am I reverting to these crazy old habits, using food as a stress reliever or boredom reliever or whatever, and then LYING TO MYSELF that it’s not going to affect my weight?  I seriously sat here and ate that bread last night while telling myself that it wouldn’t affect me.

But of course, it did.

Today I made a point to exercise before taking the kids to their 9 a.m. swim lesson.  After their lesson, I swam a little with them.  When I got home, I decided to run an extra mile, just because.  That was an excellent run – I did the mile in less than 11 minutes and didn’t feel much strain or discomfort.

I stuck with my plan, even though I was once again tempted by those slices of birthday cake in the freezer.

I am determined, BOUND AND DETERMINED, that I am not going to let this slide.  I am too happy with my smaller size, too happy with how good I look and feel, to allow Crazed Addict Fatgirl to dominate and control my thinking.  I am sickened by the week of lies, by the week of telling myself that 1,000 calories (or more, last night I think it was closer to 2,000 calories) of garlic bread isn’t going to make a difference.  What parallel universe am I living in, anyway, if I continue to do these kinds of things?  It’s crazy.

It’s Crazed Addict Fatgirl.  I thought I’d vanquished her, but she reared her ugly head.  Gotta get rid of her again.

I can do it.  I did it today, and it wasn’t that bad.  I’m going to do it again tomorrow, too.

Regrets

I have to say, I really REALLY regretted indulging in that garlic bread last night!

Almost more than any of the rest of my “binge moments,” last night’s garlic bread fiasco made me miserable.  I really overdid it, to the point where the bread sat like a brick in my stomach.  Twice in the night I woke up with a heartburn feeling, almost enough to make me nauseous.

To top it off, when I forced myself to weigh in this morning, I was back to 163.  I’d gained almost 2 pounds from that over-indulgance.

Definitely not worth it!

I really need to remember this feeling the next time I am tempted by the desire to binge. 

It’s been so great to go to the swimming pool and feel like I look reasonably good in my swimsuit.  Today when a bunch of the snooty moms showed up at our neighborhood pool, I suddenly realized that I looked just as good as any of them.  For years, I’ve struggled with intense feelings of inferiority, bogged down by those extra 25 pounds I used to carry around with me.  I used to feel so ashamed of myself.  But now, although I’ll probably never be what I’d consider “model thin,” to where I’d want to wear a bikini, I at least feel like I don’t stand out horribly.  My figure is OK enough.  I’d say I probably look as fit as most of the other moms, perhaps better than some, definitely worse than others.

(And yes, I realize how “high school” this sounds.  But hey, it’s the truth, the reality of where I live.  I can’t change the fact that these other women are like this – but at least I COULD change the fact that I used to be fat.  And now, despite how juvenile and immature it is for a middle-aged woman to be concerned about being judged based on her appearance, at least I’m feeling like I can participate in the world around me.  I feel like I’ve managed to put myself on the playing field.  So, “high school” or not, it’s still an accomplishment!)

I don’t want to lose this accomplishment.  I don’t want to slide back into old habits which will eventually lead me to being out of shape and fat again.  Binging on garlic bread is simply not worth the price.

Cake-less but full o’garlic bread

Well, making a commitment to giving up the birthday cake really did help me to resist the temptation today when I started thinking about all those pieces left over in the freezer.  I knew I’d promised my (anonymous, for the most part) audience that I wouldn’t cave and have cake, so I didn’t.  I was motivated by my desire to come back and report that I’d indeed resisted the cake.

But in addition to the cake, garlic bread has also been on my mind.  Specifically, the Kroger’s grocery store brand of garlic bread, the one seasoned with olive oil and rosemary.

So what did I do? 

I actually contemplated, tonight, after dinner, making a special trip to the store, just to buy some frozen garlic bread.  But I didn’t.  I withstood that temptation.

But then later, I started rumaging around in the freezer again, and I found a long-forgotten loaf of sourdough.  I thawed it in the microwave, then split it in half, marinated each half with a combination of softened butter and olive oil, and sort of winged it with the spices (Italian seasoning, garlic powder, a light dusting of cracked sea salt, a tiny sprinkling of fresh-grated parmesan).  Then I baked it, wrapped loosely in foil, with a couple of ice cubes thrown in to add steam and soften the crust where microwaving might have toughened it. 

It was delicious.

I ate three large pieces, and had a good-sized glass of white wine.

A part of me absolutely does not care.  I think that would be Crazed Addict Fatgirl, actually, even though she’s been mostly vanquished and her counterpart, Fitgirl, has taken residence in my body.

Yes, despite the fact that I look better than I have in years and am at the lowest weight I’ve been since my last successful attempt at Jenny Craig, Crazed Addict Fatgirl still rears her ugly head once in awhile.

Quite honestly, I’m not sure what to do about it.  I don’t want to see the numbers on the scale go up.  I don’t want to slip into lying to myself, as I said in my last post.  I want to be over that bad habit.

And yet – what possessed me with the garlic bread?

It was tasty, yes.  Very enjoyable.  I loved relaxing with a glass of wine and the bread as we watched a movie my husband had ordered from Netflix.  A part of me simply did not care about losing any more weight.

But there’s a part of me that knows that I simply cannot let this continue.  First the cake, and now the bread.  It’s simply stupid.

I think a huge part of my problem is what the Bible would call, “Making provisions for the flesh.”  Since bread and wine seem to be my weak spots right now, when there’s good wine on hand and I know it’s there, I’ve already practically committed in my thoughts to indulge myself.  I need to quit having the wine around, and I need to quit obsessing about the garlic bread.

I’d like to think that I’m over the bread.  In fact, I think I kind of am, since I had so much of it tonight.  I’m not going to be making any special trips to the grocery store to buy the “olive oil and rosemary” bread.  I’ve had my fill.

And now that the wine is gone, I’m not going to be replenishing that anytime soon, either.

I’ve made too much progress, come too far, to let things slip now.  Why should I allow Crazed Addict Fatgirl to take possession now, when I look good and feel good?

It’d be stupid.

Still going

I haven’t been updating on a daily basis any more, because it started to feel like I was repeating myself.  Things have been plugging along.  I weighed in this morning at 162.3, another low.  I’m still following my food plan, basically, although I did have a few bad moments over the past few days.  And I’m working out just about every day.  I feel great and am very pleased that I managed to make changes.  It hasn’t seemed that terribly difficult to just keep going.  I actually enjoy eating reasonable portions and not stuffing myself.

The other day was my birthday.  There were quite a few food temptations that went with the special day.  We had a great cake, my favorite kind – extremely fresh white cake with white buttercream frosting.  It was even round.  (Something about a round cake just seems so traditionally “birthday-ish,” making it more appetizing for whatever reason!)  My husband also offered to take me out to dinner, anywhere I wanted.

But the odd thing was, I didn’t really want to go out for a big restaurant meal.  The night before that, I’d really over-indulged, making my favorite Caesar salad (something I continue to crave at least every few days) and having two large plates of it, along with multiple pieces of garlic bread.  My husband grilled steak, too, and I also had a generous portion of that as well.

When I woke up on my birthday, I honestly didn’t feel like going out for another large meal.  I actually WANTED to stay home and just focus on the cake.  So that’s what we did.  My dinner was a Lean Cuisine Chicken Fettucini with some cracked pepper and parmesan cheese stirred into it.  Some steamed green beans, seasoned with a bit of dill and a tiny flip of butter, rounded out the meal.  It was delicious.

I was proud of myself for making those choices.  And after we’d all had cake, I cut up the rest and wrapped the pieces individually.  Then I put them in the freezer.

Of course, the cake has been haunting me ever since.  It really was that good.  And unfortunately, the small pieces thaw quickly enough.  I confess that I had another piece the day after my birthday, and another piece today.  It’s not a good trend.  I can feel the self-deception coming on…I see the numbers on the scale dropping – albeit not that dramatically – and I tell myself that a piece of cake isn’t hurting my progress.

But I know that if I make this a habit, which it could easily become again, it’s going to start me on a downhill slide, away from the good changes that I’ve made.  I really don’t want that to happen.

Likewise, I’ve had another problem with craving garlic bread.  I’m not sure why, but over the past several days, I’ve basically emptied the freezer of all the bread we’d accumulated.  It just makes such a great snack, with a little glass of white wine.  I know it’s another bad habit, another thing that could undo all my progress if I let it continue.

And like I said, I continue to lose weight, just not quite as quickly as before.

I need to keep my focus.  I’d love, love, LOVE to see the 150s on the scale.  I haven’t been there in 10 years or longer.  I’m already at a lower number than I can remember, at least since having kids.  It’d be fun to get into the 150s, just to prove that I can.  I need to maintain a clear vision of what it is I’m wanting out of this.

I want to keep working out.  I want to hold onto the good habits I’ve managed to cobble out over the past couple of months.  I want to keep eating fruit and vegetables, keep eating the smaller (NORMAL!) portions instead of wolfing down huge burritos the size of a rolled-up newspaper.

All of those things seem relatively easy at the moment.  I’ve always enjoyed working out and have been able to keep up that habit for several years, only slacking off for the few months just prior to starting this plan.  So the exercise componant isn’t a huge obstacle.

And eating fruits and vegetables hasn’t been hard either.  Neither has portion control, after the first few weeks.

But the thing I worry about is this “lying to myself” problem.  I don’t want to slip into self-deception, telling myself, for instance, that a daily piece of birthday cake isn’t going to change anything.  It’s not a good habit.

So tomorrow, I’m committing to not having cake.  I’ll check in at the end of the day and verify that I stuck with my commitment.

 

Thursday

I think I’m going to make an effort to really alternate my workouts.  I sort of got into a jogging thing, where I was running a couple of miles every day for the past two weeks.  At first, it seemed like this change in my routine (I’d been in the habit of doing my eliptical machine or else the stairstepper) really bumped up the calories I was burning – I was constantly hungry, eating a lot more, and yet still losing weight after having stalled out at 167 for weeks.

But today, it was pretty hot out, so I decided to use the eliptical machine again, since it’s in my nice cool basement.  I was really surprised at what a strain it seemed to be!  I thought that running would have built up my stamina even more, but instead, it was almost like I’d taken a couple of steps backward.  It was really hard to go for the full 25 minutes, and I even slowed down a few more times than usual to drink some water. 

So I’m thinking that in order to maintain my “eliptical abilities,” I’m going to have to switch off a lot more regularly.  I enjoy the eliptical machine quite a lot more than running, although running outside has been more fun than having to focus on keeping my balance on the treadmill.  I also feel like the eliptical is a better workout in some ways.  I probably need to do both, just switching off days.

When I weighed myself this morning, I was at something like 163.2.  That is the smallest number I’ve seen on the scale in at least 5 years…matter of fact, because we bought our newest scale only about four and a half years ago, I don’t think this particular scale has EVER shown me that number.  Heh. 

It feels REALLY GOOD to put on clothes and like the way I look in them.  Today I had to go to an end-of-year school party for one of the kids.  In the past, I would have felt terrible about the whole thing, having to show up there and hobnob with all the other skinny stylish moms.  I honestly do not believe it’s my imagination that a lot of them are quite snooty and only choose to hang with other skinny stylish moms.  It’s sort of funny how it’s like high school all over again!  They look each other up and down and assess each other by the size of their diamond rings and the precision of their haircuts.  I’m really not into that, but at least today I didn’t feel quite so totally “defeated before I even started,” if that makes sense.  In the past, I would have felt so ashamed of my extremely lackluster clothes, especially among that crowd.  I hated shopping for clothes 25 pounds ago.  Nothing cute fit, and the things that did fit made me feel big and frumpy.  I always ended up buying one particular style of blouse and then going back and getting one in every color.  Last year I had literally ONE pair of capris that weren’t too tight.

I am SO THANKFUL that I somehow managed to turn the tide!

I keep thinking about the old Jenny Craig slogan, from way back in the 90s:

Nothing tastes as good as being thin feels!

Really, that about sums it up.  Yes, especially during the first few weeks, when it seemed like I had so far to go, it was HARD to make changes.  It was hard to feel like I could stick with it.  Matter of fact, there were times when I honestly thought I could not do it.  There were times when Crazed Addict Fatgirl told me I simply did not WANT to do it.  But somehow, some way, I pressed on.

The other day, when I was jogging around the neighborhood and hit the particularly difficult uphill stretch, I didn’t feel like continuing.  I didn’t know whether I could continue.  I was tempted to slow down and walk it, but I started looking down at my feet instead of way up the hill.  I was running on the sidewalk at that moment, and as I watched my feet, I thought, “I can keep this pace for at least 5 more squares of sidewalk.”  Those went by in no time at all, of course.  So then I thought, “I can do at least 10 more squares.”  And I did.  Soon, I found myself more than halfway up the hill.  I kept my eyes focused only on the step immediately in front of me, and that really helped me to keep going.

I think sometimes dieting is like that.  We’re always being told to “keep our eyes on the prize,” to hold up our heads and look far into the future.  But especially when a diet is hard, like during the early weeks, I found it a lot better to just focus on making it through a single DAY, rather than trying to envision what I’d look like as a skinny person, or allowing myself to think about how much weight I really wanted to lose.  When I got to looking too far down the road, the whole thing seemed so impossible that it just made me want to throw in the towel and order a pizza.

But focusing on a single day – well, I know I can do anything for a single DAY, right?  And if you get enough days together, that makes a week.  After a few weeks…I started to see significant changes, and I started to feel better and enjoy a lot of aspects of my eating plan.

It’s like the Alcoholics Anonymous posters from the 1970s – “One Day At A Time.”

Or like the Chinese proverb/cliche:  “A journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step.”

Some people are motivated by long-term goals.  Me personally?  I need something that requires a much smaller commitment of self-discipline.  Sometimes, a day was all I could do.  Sometimes, it was just an hour.

But the time did go by very quickly, and now here it is, not quite 3 months since I started, and I’m SO HAPPY that I stuck with it!  I can’t say that enough.

In case you’re reading this, and you’re facing a similar struggle, I would encourage you to figure out whether perhaps you’re like me.  Maybe thinking of the entire process all at once is way too overwhelming and too discouraging.  If that’s the case, try breaking it down into more manageable pieces.  It worked for me.  It could work for you.  And it’s SO WORTH IT!  🙂

Wednesday update

The last few days have been pretty good. 

I had a particularly striking moment on Sunday, at Olive Garden.  During the time that I “put myself in food prison” (through the use of Lean Cuisines and a strict sense that I need to stick PRECISELY to the Jenny Craig-esque plan that I developed), I simply would not go to any restaurant that didn’t have some sort of low fat, low calorie option.  Olive Garden is good in that way – in one respect.  You can order soup and salad, and if you order the minestrone, and limit yourself to one breadstick, you’ll do pretty well.  I think the minestrone soup is quite good.  I enjoy it enough that it at least somewhat feels like a treat.

So Olive Garden is a pretty decent choice when you’re in food prison.  At least there is something reasonably good to order…unlike Red Robin’s menu, where the ONLY thing under 500 calories is a cup of their chicken tortilla soup.  A CUP of soup.  Hardly enough to sustain a person while everyone else is chowing down on French fries and burgers.

But…on the other hand…if you’re not in the mood for soup and salad, Olive Garden has few other menu choices.  I think I’ve mentioned before how I’m not a huge salad fan.  And Olive Garden’s salad can be all over the map in terms of quality.  Sometimes they barely put any dressing on it, and it will seem like mostly just huge, unwieldy chunks of iceberg lettuce mixed with onion slices.

On Sunday, I faced a dilemma.  As we were sitting with our menus at Olive Garden, I just wasn’t feeling the soup and salad.  I wanted something hot, a REAL entree, not just minestrone soup.  I noticed an item on their “For a limited time…” menu insert, something called “Chicken Milanese,” and when my husband urged me to just go for it, I weakened. 

The entire time before our food arrived, I was sitting there, sort of kicking myself.  How was I going to handle this issue?  I remember from my Jenny Craig episodes that one trick is to ask for half the entree to be boxed even before it arrives at the table, but I hadn’t done that.  I would have to just mentally split the plate in half and control myself.

Olive Garden’s Chicken Milanese comes with two chicken breasts, coated with Italian bread crumbs and then (I’m guessing) pan-fried.  Obviously not a very low-fat or low-calorie choice.  It also comes with tortellini stuffed with asiago cheese and covered in cream sauce.  Again, not a very good choice. 

And, it was very delicious.  After my first bite of the tortellini, especially, I wasn’t sure I could exert any self-control.

But that’s when I took a deep breath and decided that I simply was NOT going to eat more than one of the chicken breast pieces, and I’d only have half the tortellini, if that.  I reminded myself to slow down.  Actually TASTE the food.  Set my fork and knife down between bites.  Chew more slowly.

It sounds so silly, but I do need these reminders.  And as I made a conscious effort to actually taste what I was eating, to SAVOR it, I realized that it was taking me longer to eat the half that I was allowing myself.

And you know what?  By the time I finished one piece of the chicken, and perhaps less than half of the tortellini, I started to feel full.  I set down my fork and thought about the rest of the tortellini.  (That was the best part of the meal.)  In the old days, I would easily have polished off the entire plate, but now…honestly?  Half was MORE than enough.  I was happy to ask the server for a “to go” container.  Happy.

It was one of those moments when food ceased to have power over me.  I was not – somehow – obligated to finish everything on my plate.  I’ve always known this, and I’ve never been one to compulsively eat something that I don’t enjoy.  But when I do enjoy something, I’ve always had a problem with wanting the pleasure to continue until I feel sick.  That has always been why I gain weight – I have a weird mindset where I want no limits.  It’s why I would automatically order the large fries and always finish them.

But on Sunday, as we left Olive Garden, I realized that I did not have to live like that.  I could do this.  I could actually eat like a thin person, and do so with some honesty.  By the time I’d consciously tasted half the food on my plate, I truly did not want any more of it. 

It was quite freeing.  Maybe in the future, I’d be able to continue to order normal menu items, instead of keep myself in “food prison” by limiting myself only to the low calorie options.  Maybe.

I don’t know how I would ever handle a hamburger, though.  I doubt I could eat only half of it, and I still think it’s better to just stay away from places like Red Robin unless I simply can’t avoid them.

But that’s another struggle for another day.

Monday, the day after my Olive Garden triumph, I went shopping for some new clothes.  I have not had that much fun trying on things in simply YEARS.  I can’t remember the last time I felt so good about myself.  I’m very, very close to my goal.  That day, all the weeks of “food prison” and all the limits I’ve put on myself seemed like a tiny price to pay for being able to look stylish and normal-sized…for being able to feel like I was almost at my best, or as Oprah and Bob Greene would say, “Living my best life.”

 

Forging ahead

I think I’ve mentioned this before, but part of my struggle recently has been coming to terms with what I want out of this.

I’ve lost 22 pounds.  I’m not “dangerously close to being obese” any more.  I can fit into my old clothes, and I don’t feel all big and huge like I used to.  I also feel better, and if I were to go shopping for new clothes, I’d probably be either a size 14 or perhaps even a size 12.

I found an old journal entry that I’d made back in October, and in it I expressed that my goal was to lose 20 pounds and be a size 12.  Well, I’ve reached that goal.

But…the truth of this weight is that it’s fine, it’s healthy, but I still do not look my best.  (By the way, these are NOT the musings of a potentially anorexic person!  I’m just being honest here.)  I still do not feel completely at ease with myself in a swimsuit.  I’m much better than I was, but I still have noticeable hip and thigh bulges.  Also, I’m still not at a place where I’d feel confident that I could wear ANY fashion I want – I still am limited to things that hide my less-than-flat stomach.  I’ve been a lot more confident about my appearance before, and it happens around the 150 pound mark.  Weighing 150 for me – since I’m six feet tall – is a very good weight for fashion.  I’m still not super-thin (I really would not ever WANT to be “super-thin”!), but I can fit nicely into size 10’s and feel like all styles are reasonably flattering.

So my dilemma is, how can I stay focused so that I can lose an additional 17 pounds and reach 150?  I haven’t been there in so many years (I think the last time I was at that size, I’d just turned 30) that I don’t have a clear memory of how good it felt or what it would be like.  It’s very easy right now to be satisfied with where I am.  Yet when I put on my swimsuit the other day, I was surprised at how ill at ease I still felt…and how I know deep down that I’d really still like to look better.

The first 20 pounds were for health and just getting back to reasonably “normal.”  The second 20 pounds would be to truly LOOK good.

I think I really want to soldier on, to forge ahead.  I would really like to be a size 10 and to be able to wear anything I wanted, without worrying about disguising hip bulges.  I would really like to not feel self-conscious in a swimsuit.

I know I’m older, and I will never have a perfectly toned body.  Sheesh, I happened to catch a glimpse of Star magazine at Walmart when I was there several days ago, and they actually had this huge spread about which stars look awful in their swimsuits and which don’t.  I was really appalled at what they considered “looking awful.”  The celebrities that they picked on were far slimmer than any average Joe or Josephine that you’d see at the mall or the airport.  Their “flaws” were things like having cellulite or a flabby stomach or – this one struck me as particularly harsh – “bird legs,” legs that were too skinny.

I know that celebrity perfection isn’t attainable for many people – some of whom are the actual celebrities themselves! – and I’m not looking for that.  Not at all.  I know that I’ll always have cellulite in certain spots, and my stomach, after having kids, will never be all toned and flat.  But I at least would like, as I said, to not have to worry about disguising my hip bulges in a swimsuit.

Yesterday I deliberately chose to eat more than I should, if I’m going to keep pressing on toward losing more weight.  We went to Outback, and I put away a Caesar salad, mashed potatoes, two pieces of bread, a glass of wine, and a steak.  I even picked french fries off my kid’s plate (thinking they somehow didn’t count that way?).

The good news is, I didn’t go off the deep end nearly as bad as I did last time at Outback.  I did not order and eat a bunch of cheesy bacon fries as an appetizer, and I had one glass of wine, a small one, instead of two.

Also, this morning, I realized that even that one small glass of wine had been too much.  I really cannot take drinking anything at all any more.  That wine last night made me feel really sick this morning.  It’s even now lingering in my thoughts in an unpleasant way, where I know I won’t want to have any for quite some time.

Today I have my resolve back.  I’ve really not eaten very much at all today.  I had a South Beach bar this morning (140), a Slim-Fast shake for lunch (180), and an entree from the Weight Watchers menu at Applebee’s for dinner (according to their tally, it was 380 calories).  I’ve actually not eaten enough today, but I’m really not hungry at ALL right now.  I will have a snack later on, if I’m so inclined, probably some grapefruit and/or peaches (which would tally to about 150 calories).  That would make a total today of 850 calories…still not enough…but I suppose it balances out yesterday’s overindulgance at Outback.