A Bad Weekend

No way to get around it: my weekend was full of unhealthy choices. No exercise, lots of eating. :-( Time to get back up on the wagon today.

Do good to feel good.

My Friday weigh-in was 161, which is a loss of 3 pounds from the previous week, and one pound away from my February goal. The weekend is upon me, and it's not just any weekend, but Valentine's Day. My dear husband, who loves me and knows I love peanut m&m's, gave me a bag of them. He didn't make me abuse them, though. I COULD have limited myself to one serving yesterday and one serving today, and that would have fit in fine with my calorie goals, but that's not what I did. After a pretty darned good day of sticking to my calorie goals yesterday, even including a meal out, I came home and scarfed down half a bag. And the bag is currently almost empty. :-(

My reasoning is so stupid: If it eat them all now, they'll be gone, and then I won't be tempted by them anymore. Maybe there is some sense there. Maybe I so dislike the stress of the temptation that I'll take the quickest route to eliminating it. Never mind that giving the m&m's to my kids would do the same thing. My options, in my own mind, seem limited to eating it or not eating it, sitting in the disequilibrium of temptation or restoring equilibrium by giving in to temptation. The outcome--getting rid of temptation by eating it out of existence--proves that I still believe eating is better than not eating. Somewhere I still believe that deprivation is worse than filling myself with crap, even knowing intellectually as I do that the crap is harmful. I need to settle it in my mind: overeating is NOT a good thing PERIOD. I will feel bad when I'm done. Doing something good is what makes me feel good. So I'm going to go do something good right now and get off this machine.

Stepping up the Planning

At my weigh-in yesterday I was still at 164 pounds. I told myself to not be discouraged about it but to keep on doing what I know I need to do, but in the evening I caved and ate a bunch of chips and a root beer float. Not my best eating day ever. Today was much better. I kept my calories low--1400 calories--and I just really wasn't all that hungry. I think it made a big difference that I consciously chose fruits and vegetables rather than grains or salty snacks. I will try to keep that up throughout the coming week.

I also know that if there is yucky food in the house, I will seek it out, but if good food is readily available, I will eat that. So tonight I made four different crustless quiches chock full of veggies. Those will be my breakfasts this week. My lunches are usually fine--a sandwich or soup with salad and a fruit. It's the after-school snacks and evening munchies that get me, so I will plan those out. I'm also trying to get better about using the food I have in the house instead of letting healthy stuff go to waste because I don't get around to eating it soon enough. Planning should help with that. For some reason, planning stresses me. I agonize over it too much, as if the Planning Police will come and get me if I don't have a perfect plan. I gotta remember that a perfect plan is not the point--a helpful one is, one that will give me some direction and limits and accountability. But planning takes time, so I need to get off here and get to it!

Not feeling very creative here--it must be February

February is my least-favorite month of the year. It seems so dark and gloomy and long with nothing to do but work. Even though it's the shortest month, it feels like one long slog. Usually when I feel draggy I use it as an excuse to give up and take the easy road. In some things that's okay. I don't feel at all guilty that my History class watched Ken Burns today and my theology class played Bible Pictionary because I didn't use my evening last night for elaborate lesson plans.

But health is not something that sails along smoothly with little to no effort. If I don't do the work, I won't reap the rewards. Even if I don't feel like exercising, I still need to do it. And I am. Monday and Tuesday were both very busy days, but I made time for exercise. On Monday it was the treadmill late in the evening, on Tuesday it was an hour-long walk outside after school and before the basketball game, and today it was 3 quick miles in 36 minutes on the treadmill before school. The point is--when I make the time, I have the time, and if I'm tired and gloomy beforehand, I WILL feel better afterwards.

My eating has also been okay. I was lax on the weekend and am trying to make up for it now. Weigh-in is Friday, and I can't expect to get down to 160 this month if I don't lose a pound each week. To lose a pound each week, I have to eat less than I want to, which means saying, "No" sometimes and careful with my "Yes-es." I can do this!

January Round-up

I started January at 169 pounds. I ended it at 164 pounds. That satisfies me. It's progress! I'm not in any big rush, nor am I viewing a certain number on the scale as "success". Success means that I'm living a healthy life and taking care of my body as I should. Even if I weighed 150 pounds today, that still wouldn't mean success if I was eating crap all the time or starving myself or sitting like a lump on the couch.

One month

Tomorrow will be one month from my first weigh-in of the year--January 1, so now it's time to stop and think about how I've done. I'll report on the official weigh-in tomorrow, but for now I can say that I haven't been "perfect" at anything I set out to do. I haven't worked out 6 days every week, I haven't kept all unhealthy foods from my lips, and I haven't even always limited my portions. I also haven't done all the things from the Beck Diet for Life book. But ya know, I really think I'm doing okay. I am exercising, I am eating less, I am eating healthier, and I am losing some weight.

I still haven't found a diet buddy, but I think I could if I would just ask. Part of me hates having anyone know that I'm "dieting" though. I hate that whole diet culture. Or maybe I hate the stereotype of fat or self-absorbed women who are always trying to be thinner because that's what they're supposed to do. Like it's a mark of womanhood to be on a diet. I'd much rather call it "eating healthy." I just all-around have an aversion to telling people what my plans for life are--what I want to accomplish or what I am attempting. A safety-net against the day of failure, maybe. An inability to allow others permission to see or acknowledge that yes I am one of those fat people who needs to lose weight. Or even a not-so-fat person who is obsessed with such a shallow thing as weight and appearance. So, okay, maybe I need to deal with the fact that it matters so much to me what people think or might think or could think. Live out loud, isn't that what I tell myself? Narrate my world--speak back into it. Walk in the light, don't hide in the corner. Easier said than done, for me at least.

But I'm getting there. I am moving forward, making progress. Sing with me now: "Put one foot in front of the other....."

I've still got it...or at least some of it.

Not having run much from October through January, I was afraid I'd be back where I started so long ago--barely able to run a mile. Tonight I ran 1.5 miles, though. Yay! Actually I ran more than that (maybe 2.5 miles of a 4.75 mile workout) but the longest non-stopping-to-walk stretch was 1.5 miles. It wasn't too tough and I know I could have gone on longer by slowing down. I was pretty slow already, between 5.4 and 6.0 mph. I'm not too worried about fast right now. Even though my heart rate was up there in the 160's, it didn't feel like a big exertion. I might be kind of sore tomorrow, but it sure feels good to know that I'm not totally starting over and that it might not be as hard as I think to get back to running 10K.