Stepping On The Scale

Tonight is the night. I am going to step on the scale and see how I have done over the past three weeks since I "restarted" a healthier approach to eating.

I am really tempted to step on a scale right now but I am going out for lunch today and I know if I step on a scale this morning and use that as my weight for the three weeks I will feel like "all is done", which means I have a free pass to eat at lunch.

So, I am going to weigh in on a Wednesday night like I am supposed to, and hope that the knowledge of this will get me though lunch safely.

It really is a mind game isn't it? The things we do to ourselves to either attain success or destroy our success.

One of the hardest things I struggle with is weighing in every week no matter what. I really have to force myself to do this EVERY week and I have often "skipped" the weigh-in (please note I am weighing in for the first time in three weeks today). It is easy on days like today when I know I am down, but when I know the scale is tilting in the wrong direction it is so easy to skip that week's weigh-in.

When the scale is heading upward I tend to think: "I know what the scale is going to say so why bother right?" Wrong. Not facing it just leads you down the wrong path.

So...I am going to work on this. I am going to work on weighing in EVERY week no matter what the scale might say.

It is a lot harder than it sounds.

Will let you know what the scales say tonight when I blog tomorrow.

Be healthy!

Alan

I feel pretty, and witty, and...

Have you ever noticed that after just a couple of days of eating well you feel SOOOOOO much better?

That is how I feel now. My eating habits have not been perfect but have been reasonably good for about three weeks now and it feels like yet another major corner has been turned on this road to health.

My stomach looks like someone has finally punctured the tire and I am not walking around like a total zombie.

I have taken the back support brace I was wearing off and I feel great!

The most exciting thing is that my clothes fit again!

There is and old saying that goes something along the lines of "nothing tastes as good as slim feels". It has been altered over the years as it has been interpreted to be a bad message to those with eating disorders and I think the most common version of the expression now is "nothing feels as good as being healthy feels". The new version isn't quite as catchy, so, unless you have, or are at risk of developing, an eating disorder, I say go with the first.

I am feeling slim for the first time in a long time and want to dance around singing "Feeling Good" along with Jennifer Hudson.

I won't dance around to "that other song" but I do feel "pretty and witty and...." yes... gay :-)

Be healthy!

Alan

Boredom Eating

I'm trying to be aware of the head space I am in right now.

Things are pretty quiet and when they are quiet it is so easy for me to gravitate toward food. Who am I kidding?...if anything happens it is easy for me to gravitate toward food.

I can find almost any reason to eat and eating simply because it is "something to do" I am capable of doing on autopilot....this means I need to be particularly aware.

I am making sure I write about this today for one reason and one reason only...and that is to make myself aware for the next 24 hours.

I think I am getting good at knowing the various phases I go through. I know the signals...it is whether I choose to listen to them or not that is the big question.

The "boredom" signal is a particularly dangerous one. Once I get it I think I have about a 24 hour window to fight it. If I can keep myself on track for 24 hours the desire to eat in order to "fill time" will subside, but if I start eating the wrong foods, the road will start going steeply downhill and it will get more and more difficult to stop.

I have been reasonably good lately. I did have a take out chicken dinner last night but in the scheme of my recent overall eating patterns it isn't an issue.

If I remain on track today I consider myself to have always been on track. I am allowed to have a bit of an indulgence occasionally.

Today is critical though. I must...and will...be good.

Be healthy!

Alan

Doing The Best We Can

The experience with my back injury is humbling me a bit.

As most of you know I exercise a lot and am always encouraging others to do the same.

I guess I am getting a taste of what it is like when one has limited ability to exercise.

I refuse to say an inability to exercise because I think that unless you are a vegetable there is always something you can do.

Still...having limited ability to exercise places a whole different spin on things. If you can't do much, you start to wonder what the point of doing anything is.

Yesterday I went for a two hour walk. It is the only thing I am allowed to do right now. I quite liked it but it seemed to take up so much of the day...I started to wonder if it was really worth it.

Surprisingly, however, it was. I still felt like I had done something when I was finished and I just felt refreshed and revitalized.

I also just realized that my statement that it "seemed" to take forever was just that...a statement that is not based on reality. Although it took two hours out of my day, that two hours started the second I walked out my door.

When I go to the gym by the time I get there, work out, shower, change, get back home, I have easily consumed two hours and yet I don't perceive that to be a problem time-wise at all.

So, I have been humbled into realizing that the exercise I continually propose isn't easy to accomplish for many, but I have also realized that no matter how little one can do, what you can do is still worthwhile.

Like everything else in life, we can only do the best we can do.

Had another great day of nutritious eating yesterday.

Be healthy!

Alan

I Need You

My friend Joni has convinced me of something. I need you.

Some bloggers have kindly let me know that perhaps they need me too and you have no idea how good that makes me feel.

I need you to keep things "right".

Things have been challenging at times lately and I haven't alway been in control of what I am eating (ok..here we go...that is a lie right there...we are ALWAYS in control of what we are eating unless we are being force fed in a hospital bed) as a lot of time has been spent with my mother-in-law visiting from Singapore and she cooks great food. The thing is, however, is that it almost always involves some form of white rice whether it be breakfast, lunch, or dinner. Not only is too much white rice bad for me I think that it triggers further carb cravings.

I really can't blame it on the mother-in-law though. We always have a choice about what we eat, and, if I ONLY ate what she made I would probably be fine.

The good news is I have been quite good the last 11 days and I am quite sure I have lost weight. I am hoping for five pounds but will let you know when I step on a scale Wednesday. I have decided to be strict about stepping on a scale only one day a week.

The bad news is that exercise is impossible for me right now. I was dumb enough to flip over a coffee table in a shopping mall, and now I get to wear this supportive brace thing and can't exercise. I am actually at the point where I feel 95% recovered but the brace can't come off (except for showering) until this Wednesday. It appears there will not be any permanent damage though so I am a lucky man :-). I really believe that the fact that I have exercised a lot gave me a stronger core which is resulting in less damage and a quick recovery.

Anyway, back to needing you.

I was pretty faithful at blogging for about a year, and then I started to pull back. I guess it was partly because I was faltering, party because the daily excitement of doing it had faded, and partly because I felt like I was starting to sound pretty damn self righteous.

I always kind of knew the blogs could sound a bit self righteous but, when I was doing well, I was able to find, in my mind, a level of comfort with it. When I was  doing poorly 80% of the time and still sounding self righteous it kind of made me uncomfortable.

So what is the point? The point is that somewhere along the road I began to miss the point of my own blog. It was supposed to be about group support as we work through our successes and set-backs together with full knowledge that there would be set-backs...and sometimes set-backs are extreme.

I had an extreme set-back and, in retrospect, I can see that I ran away from the very support system that was in place for me. That support system is you.

So I thank Joni for making me realize that I need to blog. I also thank my blogger friends for telling me that my blog actually added value to their journey at times. If it helps someone else along the way that will make me SOOOO happy, but even if it doesn't help a single person I really appreciate you putting up with my throwing it in your face from time to time and reading it once in a while because it keeps me on track.

As Martha Stuart would say: "It's a good thing" :-)

Love you all.

Be healthy!

Alan