And so it begins...

 

Today I stepped on the scale, saw the number and thought nothing of it.  I'm not yet to a place where I am counting down those last few pounds and know exactly how much I weigh.  Far from it.  Really far from it.  The nice Weight Watchers lady tapped on her computer and said to me, "you're up 0.6lbs, were you expecting that?"

Was I expecting that?

I paused before answering, "no."  I say "no," because the question she is really asking is, "did you not follow the plan or did you cheat a bit too much at graduation/Memorial day parties and so you expected to gain weight?"  The answer to that is a resounding, "no!"

I went to the rabbit show all weekend but I chose the baked chicken breast salad at McAlistor's when we ate out, using less than 1/2 of the dressing.  I ate some of the concession's pulled pork (just pork roast baked in a slow cooker, I know, we did the concessions) on a salad with some added bbq, not nachos w/cheese goo and pork and all the rest.  I ate a total of 2 potato chips.  Not 2 servings, not 2 handfuls, 2 actual chips.  The rest of the time I ate what I had packed.  I carefully tracked and logged every single thing I ate all week long.  Yes, all of it.  I did not exceed my daily or weekly allotment, in fact, had left over weekly "points," the Weight Watcher's food counting mechanism.

So, no, I didn't do anything "wrong" that would have led to weight gain.

And yet, I am not surprised.

Because the real answer to "were you expecting that?" is "yes."  I expect to do everything right and fail.  Is this a horrible failure? No.  Is it somehow my fault? Probably not.  Am I disappointed? Most definitely.

You see, I was expecting that, just not so soon.  I thought maybe I could go a few more weeks, or maybe, maybe even a month or two before I saw that backslide that my body does to me.  I wanted more than one success before failure.

This is when I must persevere.  I can't throw in the towel yet.  I must plod along, doing what I know I should, and hope that things will get better.  Hope that this time I won't plateau at an 8lb weight loss and be unable to move forward no matter what I do, no matter what I eat, no matter what supplement the doctor suggests.  I will keep going and going and some day, some day, things will work out.

I must believe that so I will.

The refrigerator clean out

 

This week at the Weight Watcher's meeting, they talked about spring cleaning your fridge.  Their main point being to set yourself up for success.  If you put healthy stuff where you see it and have it ready to go, you'll probably default to that rather than something else.

But that's not what I heard.  I heard, "you can put your veggies and fruits in a basket on a middle shelf and use those crisper drawers for condiments."

This has NOTHING to do with making healthy things available and EVERYTHING to do with getting rid of that annoying top shelf of various things that we almost never use.  Those myriad bottles and jars of differing sizes all shoved up there were almost as horrible as the plastic bowl/lid dilemma, which I solved for myself last year.

So, I spent a good hour and a half, at least, removing everything from my fridge and cleaning, disposing, rinsing, recycling, rearranging the contents.  The results? Spectacular!

Top shelf - yogurt, cottage cheese, other things in small containers
Second shelf - meat/cheese basket, tortillas, eggs (anyone need eggs? We have 6 dozen!)

Third shelf - vegetable basket, jars
Fourth shelf - tall things, leftovers, fruit 

Drawers - condiments!!!

Rest assured, Brian will hate it, much as he hated the absence of plastic bowls/lids from his life.  But I'M happy, and that's all that matters.  For the moment anyway, because he's not home yet ;)

Weighing In

 

The actual act of weighing myself is not one fraught with anxiety for me.  I don't care about the number on the scale, I care about how I feel, how I look.  While I may not like how I look or feel sometimes, I don't think a mere number will change that.

That is until that number is positive, or should I say negative?

That's right, I lost weight my first week.  I know some of it is because it's the first week. Some of it is because when you have more to lose, well, there is more to lose.  Partly it is a change in weather, I didn't have on a sweatshirt and long pants today.  Another part of the weight loss is that I didn't have breakfast before I went this week. I wanted to eat but got distracted because my children were ASLEEP before my weekly meeting and I had time to myself.  Can you blame me for not wasting that precious time with eating? No, I didn't think so.  Still because of or in spite of all that, I lost 7 lbs.

And it feels good.

It's starting now, well, ok, last week

 

I started a new journey.  Ok, it's not new.  It's one I've done so many times I can't count them all anymore.  But I'm calling clean slate and starting anew.

What is this mysterious thing? Nothing that millions don't do every. single. day. Still, as I walk the path, I find thoughts running through my head and I want to write them down, so here I am.

I started Weight Watchers last Wednesday.

Why?

So many reasons.  First, I accepted who I was.  I can't lose the weight as I hate myself.  I have to accept and be happy with the person I am at this weight before I can change things.  May not make sense, but there it is. Second, I am uncomfortable.  Physically uncomfortable in my skin.  Those two things may seem contrary but they aren't.  I can be perfectly happy with who I am AND want to make changes in my life.  Then there are all the small reasons - I don't want to buy bigger clothes, I want to live longer, I want to be able to be more active (once my stupid ankles heal,) etc, etc.

But I'm scared.  Why? Because I've been down this road so many, many times.  So many failures.  I've written about that before so I won't rehash here.  I cannot even guess at the heartache that is ahead of me.  I will do everything right and still things will go wrong (story of my life, really.)  Maybe I'll even succeed, as I did once, losing 70lbs, only to slide back into failure.

Yep, it's scary alright.

Nevertheless, I am going to think that things are going to go right sometimes too.  And the overall net result will be a positive one.  I will continue to be happy.  I will continue to love myself.  I will not take it personally when my body rejects my efforts.  I will soldier on and persevere.

And I will write about it, here on this blog, because while I may sometimes be flippant, that isn't the goal and those who read ChaosEndingSoon may find themselves bored while reading existential musings of a fat lady.  That's ok, you don't have to read it, but I have to write it.