Stuffed to the Gills

Affirmation: Do overs count - even on the road to health

Ugh! I am so full and stuffed and I can't believe that I have eaten so much. But amazingly it is far less than years past, so that is progress right? But I do not like the way that I feel right now. And the sad part of it - I could continue to eat more. That is what scares me. I don't want to loose all the ground that I have gained. Now this is only emotional ground and breaking habits, I haven't really lost any weight to speak of. But I am convinced that changing the habits, confronting the issues behind why I eat and how I use food will result in eventually making the kinds of decisions around food that will result in weight loss.

This month has been terrible in terms of trying to get up at 6. I am finding it very difficult to get to bed by 10. It is more comfortable to get to bed by 10:30 or 11. And getting up at 6:30 or 7. But that doesn't leave time for exercise or any of the other stuff I do in the mornings. Getting up at 6 is ok, but moving and exercising is just not in the cards. Sometimes you just have to accept the body clock you are given. I am disappointed and feel like I am giving up, but this exercising in the mornings I don't think will work. The good news is that I have backed out of some of the evening commitments that I have so I think that I can exercise in the evenings. I am going to try doing it while I watch one TV program. I am trying to give up on TV, it sucks me in and encourages me to be a couch potato. But if I make a deal with myself to only watch my one TV program a night if I do it while exercising it will work. Besides after feeling so icky this week after eating so much I am ready to start moving again. I really don't like the way that I feel. Heavy on my feet, achy, and dull.

A new year and 365 days full of possibility. My prayer is that this will be the last year that I have to deal with this issue. I am so ready to let go of it. I really like what Kerstin said in the comments from my last post about the difference between the goals of thin and heavy people being that the only goal being to loose weight. I think that is so true. Kerstin I may have to have the name of that book you are reading. (Please tell me that it isn't in German - my German is not that good anymore!) In fact as I have been thinking about my intentions for next year I had been thinking that it would be better to not put loosing weight on that list at all. To only put the things on the list that I want to live and achieve. This doesn't mean that I am giving up, just not putting it at the forefront and focus of my life. This past year has been all about that, and in many ways I have made a lot of progress, but in many ways I am still where I was when I started this journey last October. My weight is the same, I fight the same food/eating battles, I am back on my B/P med. Maybe it is about putting more effort and concentration on finding my way to a new career that brings fulfillment and the flexibility to do what I will soon have to do for my mom. Making more time to create art and taking the risk and next step of trying to sell it. To learn more about and to create more jewelry and sell it. To connect with people here in the city I live and create a social life. I have been so disconnected socially since moving back here I have lived almost a solitary life.

And all of this goes back to the quote Kerstin made about overweight people feeling that life doesn't start until after they loose weight. For me that has and hasn't been true. In the past I have had a social life, it has been harder to meet and connect with people since moving back here. But I have to say that energy level has made it so much easier to just stay home evenings after work. I don't have the energy or in some cases the physical strength to do things that I used to do. All this weight to lug around limits what I can do physically. It is kind of a vicious circle. The heavier you are the less you want to move the less you want to move the heavier you become. So break the cycle. Focus on other things.

At group this past week I said that I am so ready for food to not be the center point of my life, my thoughts, my time and energy. This past year it has; planning menus, shopping, cooking, exercising, reading about nutrition and food disorders, going to group, the message board, almost constantly thinking about food. And it has been good and necessary - to a point. Now I really do think that it is time to just live a normal life. To let go of all the focus being only on this issue of my life, to accept that the decisions on food, exercise, etc. must just become the fabric of my life, not the focus. It is time to create the rest of my life, for it to be healthy and balanced.

In light of this I am seriously contemplating how to change how I cook and eat. I have got to get out of the kitchen, and the grocery store. Eating healthy, using fresh produce, cooking nightly, shopping weekly (minimum) takes hours. There is no way around it. And I think that I have found and used every short cut that I can find and still do the healthy food bit. I don't know if I have answers yet. I have been looking at some of the newer healthier TV dinner choices. Some look ok, although they have a lot of unpronounceable ingredients. But to come home from work, put a frozen dinner in the oven or micro and make a salad and in 10 minutes have supper....not having to handle food. Sounds like heaven to me right now. I have also thought about keeping supper very simple. Good bread, a bit of cheese, fruit and a salad or soup. Lunches at work are a challenge. I don't do well in the mornings and I have to bring my lunch or do fast food drive through. Well all of this is just excuses. I could, and have just planned and fixed a whole weeks worth of lunches on Sunday so that all I did was grab out of the fridge as I rushed out the door. Well I am just rambling on and on...I know that when all is said and done I have the answers inside and just have to accept that I have admit that in the end discipline figures into it too.

Well off to bed to dream up solutions.

Merry Food-mas!!

Affirmation: Just get through the season of too much food with as little damage as possible!!

Ok...be gentle with yourself, I keep repeating this over and over. This too will pass. Too much food, to many temptations, and I am eating too much. Who's idea was it to have food brought into work every day the month of December?? Not I, she says, but partaking in the eat-fest anyway. Well I have to say that I haven't done as bad as I have in years past. I have, for the most part kept the eating to only eating when hungry and stopping when full...but with so many tastes, aromas, sights, I am not sure that I could trust my body enough to even know when it was hungry or full. On the day's when fruit and veggie platters were available I chose those, but most days it was full of cheese, sausage, candy, cookies, pie, cheesecakes, and a whole variety of various yummy dips for crackers, breads and potato chips. Sigh, it is almost over...she says waddling down the hall, wondering if her clothes will fit in a day or two!

Seriously though, I did learn something from all this. Seeing, smelling food is a huge trigger for me. And I am not using food during stress and comfort as much lately, but I am eating because I just like the taste of it all. So there you go...back to breaking habits. I am so sick of food I don't even want to be around it, cook, or eat for a while. I am looking at options in the new year to simplify my food prep/eating. I am seriously even looking at some of the new healthy frozen food options. I just don't want to spend my time in the kitchen around food, chopping, cooking, storing, eating, planning; everything is still about food, even though it is about choosing healthy options. I just want food to not be the center point of my life. And I can see that, in a way, it is getting to that. The more time I spend in the art studio, the more time I am involved with people at church, the closer I get to actually living the life I have dreamed of for most of my life, the less interested I am in food. I can see glimmers of the "I eat to live, not live to eat"...for brief seconds at a time.

It does work to deal with my inner demons to help battle my issues with food. Well, actually as I deal with how I use food to cope with those, and realize that it really doesn't work anyway and begin to deal with those little devils, food begins to hold less interest for me. And I find that freedom is within reach. Thank you God for the miracles you are working in my life. Here it is, it is yours, take it (again) and give me strength to fight this battle.

Bleeech...Holiday food fest at work

Affirmation: I go to bed at 10; I get up at 6

Oh the joys of office unity. Someone decided that every day between December 1 and the 24th someone should bring food to work. And what good food it has been. But I am miserable! I have been allowing myself to eat, but I have been attempting to wait until I am hungry and stop when I am full. Doing pretty well, and have been amazed at how fast full happens. Also am surprised that I feel find just tasting things and not eating a lot. But it has brought up all those "eat eat eat" feelings. I feel like I am in a food induced coma, but it has taken waaay less food to make that happen. But with all that said, I am still eating way to much. And it is making me feel icky (yes that is a word). This is a good thing I guess. Now if I can just use it to help not eat as much the rest of the month.

Getting out of bed in December at 6 am. Not doing so well. Weekends especially. But that is because I stayed up too late. I have about decided to start "going - moving in the direction of" bed around 9. I seem to not really be able to actual do toes up at 10 with out doing some reading and/or journaling. If I "go to bed" at 10 it is 11 before lights go out. But doing so at 9 makes me feel so much like I have no evening. Especially since I don't get off of work until 5:30. And on nights I have meetings it is worse. But I know that this is something I need to do so I will.

I have decided to try to give up TV watching this month. I have so much to do, and truth be told it is why I don't get to going to bed until 10...I am usually watching something that started at 9.

Monthly Progress Report:

• No inches lost
• 1 lb lost
• successfully eating when hungry/stopping when full
• generally successful food choices
• Successful at getting to bed by 10 - most nights.

Not much to celebrate in the weight loss, but until I get back to the exercise I know that it will be slow going. But changes are happening. And as Ms. Maatha says...That's a good thing

"Inch by Inch life's a cinch;Yard by yard life is hard"