I am not my weight

I admit that my weight is rather closely linked to my confidence on any given day.  However, my weight has nothing to do with who I am.  I find that I am liking myself more and more as I age; and while my weight rises and dips, my sense of who I am and what I can accomplish steadily increases.  Why is this?  I think it's because the more I try, the more I learn about myself.  I have tried many things.  Some have been a success, some an utter failure, but each time I find I understand myself better. 

"There are a number of very important irreversibles to be discovered in our universe.  One of them is that every time you make an experiment you learn more;  quite literally, you cannot learn less."

Buckminster Fuller

  I just read an article in Runner's World magazine (A Thin Line by Peter Sagal) about a guy who was fat as a kid, and still feels fat now, even though he is a marathoner.  One of the most compelling parts of the article is this:

The obsession with weight—far, far more common than you might suppose among amateur athletes—is a curse. "I run to eat," we say, but we're not so much taking pleasure in the food our running earns us but in the immunity it grants us. We hit the box of doughnuts at work or the side of fries with lunch, telling ourselves, "I did my six this morning," and we feel, for a moment, that we are Normal People, able to indulge in sweets and fats without suffering the kind of inner guilt and recrimination usually reserved for embezzlers.

I think we tend to look at skinny people, athletes in particular, and think that they never have to worry about what they eat.   It looks so effortless for them, and we wonder why we can't just flip a switch and be like that.  After all my reading and research on this topic, I conclude that there are actually only about five people in the world who don't struggle with their weight in some way.  We're all in the same boat, people.  That thought brings me a great deal of comfort.  

Remind me, again, why I'm doing this?

Four days without Diet DP.  I have a mild headache, which is my body's way of saying "something's missing here.  Shouldn't we usually have about 40 milligrams of caffeine in here by now?"  (40 milligrams just sounded good, I actually have no idea how much caffeine is in the average soft drink).  The headache I can deal with.  The cravings are driving me crazy.  I like water, but I'm not sure how much more of it I can take right now.  So I have been drinking lemonade and milk.  Can we say "calories"?  Arrgh.  Which makes me really start to question the wisdom of going off soft drinks at all.  I know they're not good for me, but gaining back thirty pounds isn't going to be good for me either.  Neither is eating half a package of Chips Ahoy cookies and a glass of milk.  (Ahem.  Monday night.)  I don't know if I can handle eating fewer treats/snacks AND giving up my DP.  I feel like I can only really focus on changing one thing at a time.   If I have to have a vice, wouldn't a non-caloric one be better?  Should I keep going and see if it gets better?  Should I fall off the wagon in favor of focusing on another health issue?   I really don't know what to do here.  I'm open to any and all opinions and advice.   

Saying Good-bye to an Old Friend

No, nobody died.  Just clearing that up right away.

Have you seen the movie "Mr. Mom"?  The little kid has a security blanket that he calls his "woobie".  I have had many "woobies" in my life, but none so consistent as Dr. Pepper.  You may laugh, I give permission, but hear me out as well.  I'm not sure when I started drinking DP on a regular basis, but I know I was probably a teenager when it became my woobie.  Anytime I was sad, lonely, depressed, whatever, a cold, sweet, fizzy cup of happiness was just a drive-through away.  Even when I was on Weight Watchers I found I could switch to Diet and still keep my woobie.  (I actually think it helped keep me on track, because it was the only thing left, that I loved, that I could still partake of with reckless abandon.)

Well, the time has come to finally grow up and burn the woobie.  Sigh.  I have stuck with Diet since WW, so it's not directly contributing to my weight issues.  But.  I know it is sooo not good for me.  Especially the Diet stuff.  There's nothing in it that hasn't been chemically created in a lab.  I have tried many, many times to cut back.  I have tried only having X amount per day, I have tried drinking a glass of water for every Diet DP, I have tried giving it up for a week.  All of those work for a little while, then I'm right back onto drinking nothing but the fizzy stuff.  I'm afraid nothing but cold turkey is gonna cut it.

You may ask "why?" or at least "why now?"  It's been a long time coming.  I'm trying really hard now to focus on developing habits that will help me be healthy for the long term, not just to get some poundage off.  This major hurdle feels like a huge step in the right direction.  Plus, I find that a fresh, cold Diet DP goes just perfectly with a snack.  If I don't have the DP, I don't crave the snack as much.  Funny how that works, huh?
This is, officially, day THREE of no woobie (or any soft drinks whatsoever).  I don't know how long it will take until I don't crave it anymore, we'll just have to take it one day at a time.

After a While

I realize this poem was not written about weight loss.  Nevertheless, it applies to just about anything we're struggling with.  I'm not sure when it came to me, or where it came from, but I love it.  It speaks to my soul when I'm down.

After a While
by Veronica Shoffstau

After a while you learn
the subtle difference between
holding a hand
and chaining a soul.
And you learn that love doesn't
mean leaning
and company doesn't
always mean security.
And you begin to learn
that kisses aren't contracts
and presents aren't promises.
And you begin to accept your defeats
with your head up and eyes ahead
with the grace of a woman
not the grief of a child.
And you learn
to build all your roads on today
because tomorrow's ground
is too uncertain for plans
and futures have a way
of falling down in mid flight.
After a while you learn
that even sunshine burns
if you get too much.
So you plant your own garden
and decorate your own soul
instead of waiting
for someone to bring you flowers.
And you learn
that you really can endure
that you really are strong
and you really do have worth.
And you learn
And you learn
with every good-bye, you learn.

The siren song of not caring

Cut loose.  Relax.  Chill out.  Loosen up.  We humans just love to let our hair down, throw caution to the winds and let it all hang out.  It feels so good to say "who cares?" and just do what we want.  And, why is this a bad thing?  I don't think it always is.  Sometimes we need a little down time.  But, I find that the more my hair is down, the less content and satisfied I am.  We thrive on structure.  We need boundaries, if only to have something to push against.

I did so great this morning.  My hubby was working from home today, and at about 9:00 I decided to go out anr run some errands, and bring him home some breakfast (in the form of a greasy, buttery honey chicken biscuit from Whataburger).  I had already had my breakfast (two pieces of whole wheat toast with blackberry jam), so I didn't get myself anything to eat.  It made me feel so confident and powerful to not eat when I had the chance.  Fast forward to this evening, after an extremely stressful afternoon consisting (among other things) of our babysitter canceling so we didn't get to go on our date, my nine-year old failing yet another math test, and the same nine-year-old not turning in a month long project that was due today.  Add to that the sink full of dirty dishes, the huge fort of blankets in the living room and the fact that I have gained yet another two pounds (now 12 pounds above my goal weight), and what did I feel like doing?  That's right- giving up and eating two apple pies from McDonalds.  That doesn't sound like much, but after doing so well this morning, thinking that maybe, finally, I'm getting it again, two apple pies feels like a major defeat.

The question is:  what am I going to do now?  I've eaten the pies, I can't change that.  I'm still depressed and stressed, eating didn't help that.  Well, I guess the only thing to do is try again.  And again.  And again.  I will go to bed and try to make better decisions tomorrow.  I need to remember that as wonderful as it sounds to just let go, it really doesn't make life better.  No matter how much I try to not care, eventually caring happens.  Then, I wish I had cared.  Just a little.   

What if I do it wrong?

One of my very favorite books is Book of a Thousand Days by Shannon Hale.  It's about a ladies' maid who gets locked, with her lady, in a tower for seven years.  In one of my favorite parts, the maid decides to teach her lady how to cook.  The rest goes like this:

She said, "I don't know how, Dashti."
"That's why I'll teach you."
"I'll do it wrong."
"Of course you will, everyone does wrong when learning something new."
Then she started to cry.  "But I'll do it wrong."


Confession:  I hate getting things wrong.  I like to be good at things, and if I'm not good at them almost right away, I quit.  This tendency has kept me from many experiences that would have been very good for me.  So, I am working on overcoming this.  I am currently in Massage Therapy school.  I have loved it so far, but I had my first major check the other day.  I was practicing on my hubby's shoulders, and I twisted his head to the side a little too fast and gave him a cramp in one muscle.  I felt the all-too-familiar despair (maybe I can't do this after all, what if I screw up like that for real?  etc).  I refuse to give in to those thoughts this time.  I will try again, I will learn, and I will get better.
Everyone does wrong when trying something new.  Don't be afraid of being wrong.  The only way to fail is to not try at all.

Rome Wasn't Built in a Day

Learning to eat only when you're hungry is HARD.  I knew this before.  I'm sure many of you know this.  But, I feel the need to say it again:  eating only when you're hungry is HARD.   Okay, I'm better now.

That being said, I actually think I did fairly well this week.  Remember, I'm developing a habit that I plan to keep the rest of my life.  And, I'm breaking habits that I have had for the past 30 years.   So I don't expect to have it down anytime soon. I don't ever expect to be perfect with this.  I'm simply shooting for "more often than not".

I managed to put down my fork and be done before the food was gone many times.  I have discovered I have a bad habit of piling waaay too much onto my plate, then I feel the need to finish everything in front of me.  Have to work on that one.  I'm not sure if I want to start using smaller plates, or teaching myself to get smaller portions.  I think I'll go with the smaller portions.  Using smaller plates would just be a temporary measure, it wouldn't teach me anything about true portion size.  And how many restaurants/grandma's houses are going to serve you your dinner on a saucer?  Exactly. 

I did my weekly weigh-in yesterday and I was down by about half a pound.  I'm not focusing on the numbers, but it does help to know that I am on the right track.  I also went running a couple of times this week.  (Before the bottom dropped out of our weather; anybody ever gone running in -15 degree wind chills?  Me neither.)  It felt soo good to run again.  I have lost my pedometer somewhere, so I couldn't use the stopwatch on it to keep track of my time.  And, you know what?  I enjoyed my runs so much better when I wasn't able to care how fast I was going!  I didn't worry about distance.  I didn't worry about time.  I don't really care if I ever get faster or able to go longer, I just enjoy the run!  How liberating.   So that is my message to you this week:  enjoy the journey.  Don't worry about how far you will go, or how long it will take you to get there.  Learn to love yourself and learn to love the journey!