Weigh In and Continuing with The Plan

The good: I did not gain any weight over the last six weeks. I lost a little gained a little and it evened out.

The bad is of course that in July and August I gained between 10 and 15 pounds, putting me at 180-183.

I also barely worked out. Literally every Jewish holiday fell on a Tuesday night this fall, Tuesday is my night with my gym buddy, where we see the great instructor in the great class where we strength training and power dance for two straight hours. So for basically five out of six weeks I could not go to class and I stupidly or whatever did not make the effort to go a different night. My gym buddy and I both dropped the ball. I'm of course not happy she's struggling, but I'm happy to know someone who understands.

But now all the holidays are over. I know for most people this is kind of the start of the holiday season, but for me it is actually, finally, the end. Thanksgiving might be hard, Hanukkah might be hard, there might be a few holiday parties. But they will either be just one day or one meal in the evening in the middle of a mostly normal workweek. 

This is quite contrary to the recent Jewish holidays. For those who don't know that means, it means that I don't go to work, I don't use electricity at all, no car, no subway. No writing or drawing. What do we do? Eat, pray, board games, read, walk, nap. Emphasis on eat. I liked spending so much time

with family as friends, but I am honesty thrilled to be getting back to a normal schedule.

The last time I tried my eat small meals plan, I did it for just four or five days. Then it was part 2 of 7: Jewish holiday edition, and I gave up. Now I need to try again. Yay for maintaining, but at 181.8 pounds as of this morning, that's not even close to good enough.

I'm also thinking of getting rid of the scale. Maybe just weigh in once a month, or maybe not at all. Why? I think it's hurt more than helped over the last few years. Because the truth is that if I'm tracking, whether calories or weight watchers points, I know how I'm doing, good or bad.

When I was consistently tracking for that year or so, John had helped me make numerous graphs where we overlayed my calorie intake over my weight.

The result? They matched up pretty perfectly. So the point is that the scale won't be telling me anything I don't know. Either it will validate my efforts, efforts of which I'm all too aware. Or, it will show me a gain that I can blame on bloat or "bodies are weird sometimes" syndrome. In fact, perhaps the real times I need the scale are when I'm not tracking, not doing well, so that I don't get into denial about gaining like I'm want to do.

Bottom line is, maybe the scale isn't a useful tool right now. It makes me mad more often than not. As of yesterday morning I'm at 181.8 and 38.7 body fat. I'll decide next month if I feel like looking at the scale.

To anyone reading this: I hope you have not given up on me because I have not given up on me.

Insert cliche about weight loss being a journey and success being a crazy squiggly line. End with super clever, topical joke.

Beyonce Pad Thai vs. Liz Lemon - Feeling Food Conflicts

       I despise saying this, but... this is not working. If you're just tuning in, last week I decided to take the choice and planning out of weight loss and temporarily restrict my meals to just a few that I know I like and are easy to prepare. No sweets, either. For a month. This plan came about after a several week long screw-it-all where I ate everything. I'd reduced my 30 pound loss to more like 25 pounds.

He's safe though, right?

       In the past, when I've been all "Let's nail this thing down for a while," it's been great. Temporarily swinging to a stricter eating plan has always been a great way to jump start my work. This time is different though. It doesn't help that I've been feeling like my insides are rebelling, and demanding ransoms of any/all of the Ben & Jerry's Core flavors. (Hilarious dramatization here.) It's pretty bad actually. 

       The past week or two, all I've been feeling is conflicted. On the one side I have the confident part of me, who's probably named Beyonce Pad Thai, the one that knows I will reach my goal, that's encouraging and gentle and enthusiastic. It reminds me that I have done this, and I can do it again. This part of me is also really excited at the awesome future it knows will happen, and lets me fantasize about running into my old torturers while looking all svelte and hot. 

       On the other side, I have this self-destructive, do-what-feels-good-right-now baby, probably called Liz Lemon, who either doesn't care about the future, or has no confidence in my ability to change it. 

       And somehow, both of these sets of feelings exist completely simultaneously and strongly inside my head, so all I want to do is buy that ice cream, but all I want to do, at the same time, is NOT buy that ice cream. So what ends up happening is like today - I didn't buy the 600-calorie cookie, but I did buy a 300-calorie Frappechino. Better, but still not ideal. 

       I'm not sure what to do. For this week, I'm trying really hard to not go crazy, still do my gym workouts, and remember that I'm not always going to feel like this. I could even fit in a candy bar every day and still eat at maintenance levels. That's about a thousand times better than letting loose again and having to re-lose that weight too. I may also weigh myself, because the reasons I had for avoiding the scale don't apply when I'm not really trying. At this point, I actually should know where I really am. Then maybe I can regroup and try this plan again. Because overall I do think it's a good one, and one that I need. 

       Usually one voice is much stronger than the other, allowing me to eat or not eat the brownie, or maybe to eat the brownie but then stop at just one.  Or the actual me is able to take control, not be passive, and show them who's boss. 

       The kind of good thing about all of this though, is that I haven't given up. It's more like I'm in hibernation, and trying to do as little damage as possible while waiting for the weather to warm up. Okay, not a perfect comparison, but you get the idea.

       TL;DR - food monster winning, need to stick it out

Do you have your own Beyonce Pad Thai, or Liz Lemon?