The Mirror Lies

First of all, I'm excited to announce that I've been awarded top prize in the contest for World's Worst Blogger.  Okay, so it's not official, but I do realize I've been absent for a very long time.

The truth is that I had a really difficult year and gained back a lot of my weight, got depressed about it, came out of my funk and got back on track, then got back off track, blah-blah-blah.  So here I am again, after a weigh-in today that reinforced my need to get back on track.

I do have happy news though.  My friend Mandy (I've mentioned her before) reached her LIFETIME goal at Weight Watchers today!  Yay, Mandy!  I wish I had known it would  be today, because I had planned to make her a sash and crown for the occasion.  Since I missed it, she'll just have to settle for this sad little substitute. Here you go, Mandy, a crown for your achievement!

Ta-Daaaa!!

I've been thinking about how we let our thinking mess us up so often.  Mandy just returned from the beach, and she mentioned that even though she was at goal weight and thinner and healthier than she has been in a very long time, she still looked in the mirror and saw a fat girl in a bathing suit looking back at her.  (I might add that when I saw her at the meeting today, I immediately noticed how thin she looked.)  We discussed this quite a bit in our meeting, and as expected, most of us confessed to feeling this way even when, in reality, we're looking our best.

I thought of that discussion when I saw this:

Source: http://themetapicture.com/page/42/

How true is that!?  I wonder why it's sometimes so hard for us to see the reality of our achievements rather than the  tiny so-called flaws that make us human.  My hope is that I will be able to look at myself in the mirror and see someone who can do this, once and for all, realizing that goal weight is not the end by any means.  I think that accepting my looks - good and bad - is a large part of loving and accepting myself as a whole, even if I'm nowhere near my healthy weight.  And my hope is the same for all of us, that we can see our own beauty without comparing ourselves to the images of perfection that are impossible to attain, whether we're at our best size or not.

Weekly Weigh-In

As I've mentioned, I weighed in yesterday (Tuesday) rather than on my usual Thursday due to the Thanksgiving holiday.

Good news!  I had a loss.  Got a couple of little tokens at my meeting.

A new 5-pound star AND my 25-pound magnet

My total loss as of yesterday?  That would be a big ol' 26.2 pounds, thank you very much!

I wasn't going to weigh until next week, but after the bad week I had before, I thought I'd better go ahead and do it.  So glad I did!  Obviously, it was fun to hit a milestone, but I think even more than that, it was good for me to have that anchor before the holiday.  It reminds me of how far I've come, and in some ways of how far I still have to go.  But most importantly, it reminds me of what I already know: I can do this!  

Oh, and I pulled the bossy card yesterday on my Weight Watchers buddy, Mandy.  She felt she'd had an overeating weekend and wasn't going to weigh in until next week.  Mandy is one of those rare Weight Watchers who does not own a scale!  So each week she weighs in, she gets a total surprise.  I weigh every day, and think I'd freak out under the pressure, but it works for her.

So since she didn't want to go and see a gain, I badgered her and pushed her until she finally just agreed to go weigh.  And guess what?  She LOST almost 2 pounds since Thursday!  Mandy got a 5-pound star too.

Even if we had gained weight, I think it would have been good to go.  Whatever you're doing regularly in your weight loss journey, I hope you'll engage in that before the holiday, just to keep you centered.  If you decide that Thanksgiving comes around once a year, so you're going to eat with abandon for the big meal, then go right ahead.  But let me just remind you that it's Thanksgiving DAY, and there's really no reason to blow the whole week just because you go a little crazy with one meal.  Don't let that lead to an entire week of overindulgence.  Because you really don't want to have to go into the Christmas season with an extra 3, 5, 8 pounds to lose.  You know that's no exaggeration.  I could easily gain that in a week.

So enjoy your Thanksgiving feast, or stay on your usual program.  I'm not telling you what your own plan should be.  But I am encouraging you to stay in control of your own efforts in the days that follow.  Believe me, you'll have another chance to eat that stuff again in a few weeks, so just relax already!

I'm really going to focus this year on the reason for this holiday -- giving thanks.  I have so many things to be thankful for.  We all have difficulties, but when we focus on the blessings in our own lives, it's easy to see that life is good and that there are wonderful aspects of just being alive.

Happy Thanksgiving, everyone!

My Absence Explained

I've been a little lax about posting the last couple of weeks.  Sorry about that!

I mentioned one day that I was having a hard time sleeping due to some stressful things going on.  Well, I thought I'd share that with you today.

My main concern had to do with one of my best friends, Marla.  She has three kids, and the middle child is in 8th grade.  That's Katie.  Katie was diagnosed with a kind of cancer called AML when she was 11 years old, went through treatment, and had been done with all that for about a year and a half.  Two weeks ago the family learned that it's back.

A few days after that, she was back in the hospital getting chemo.  She'll need a bone marrow transplant this time around, and she will be living in the hospital pretty much full-time for several months to come.  It's just hard on Katie and on the whole family, as well as those of us who love them.

So to make myself feel like I was doing something -- anything -- I set up a blog for support of the family.  It was a little time-consuming doing that and working on fundraising ideas in my community.  You're free to check it out if you'd like to know more at www.katieskrowd.blogspot.com.

In addition to that, my father-in-law had heart surgery during this time (he came through it fine), and I found out that someone I've tried to help in the past is probably back on drugs again (not so fine).

In the meantime, however, I have overcome that little binge setback I had and am still back on track.  I'm trying not to confuse food with a security blanket.  That will just make it worse.

My usual weigh-in day is on Thursdays.  Since Thanksgiving is Thursday we will have no meeting, so I'm going to weigh today.  Fingers crossed!  I'll update that in the morning.

Everybody ready for Thanksgiving?  Whatever you plan to do, whether it's strict dieting, moderation, or allowing for an indulgence, I hope you're able to stick with your plan!

Halloween Happenings

Friday was the "Pumpkin Parade" at my daughter's elementary school.  The kids bring decorated pumpkins to school, display them on stage, then form a parade to view the pumpkins and show off their costumes.
Some of my favorite pumpkins:

Because we'd been in such a hurry to get to the Pumpkin Parade, my 3-year-old son missed his breakfast at home.  We had some errands to do, so we stopped to get him a kolache.  What did I get?  Black coffee and nothing else!  (Had a protein bar in my purse, so I was all set.)

Later we took the kids to Fiesta Texas (Six Flags) for Fright Fest.  It was lots of fun, and the weather was perfect!

Giant Ferris Wheel

Despite my efforts to avoid buying candy for trick-or-treaters, I freaked out at the last minute and remembered the last couple of years when they came in droves and cleared out all the candy.  My next-door neighbor even had to come over to get some more because she ran out so early.  I knew I wouldn't have enough non-candy items to give out if we had the usual army of tots.

No, this is not the extent of the non-candy items I purchased for trick-or-treaters.

I went and bought several bags of candy just before dark.  Yes, some of it was chocolate, but I was confident I could resist the lure of binge eating it by the fistful.  Mostly, however, I was excited to solve a Halloween mystery:  It DOES exist!  A candy that doesn't call my name, that is.  Kids love 'em, but these are completely safe in my presence - Sour Patch Kids.

Sour Patch Kids Candy

I'm not saying I didn't sample a little candy.  I did.  I wish I hadn't, but I did.  What I didn't do was go nuts.  I wrote down EVERYTHING I ate too.

At one point the bell rang, and I could see through the window on my door that there was a tall figure standing alone on my porch.  Here's what greeted me when I opened the door.

My (normally) perky blonde neighbor

Took me a minute to recognize her!

I haven't gotten in nearly enough exercise this week, unless you count walking the kids down the street and up the hill.  Um, probably not.  So tonight I had not one, but TWO friends asking if I wanted to go walk.  So the three of us (me, Denise and Mandy) went for a walk.  Denise has a great little trail all mapped out.  It's 3.5 miles, and it's got some nice little hills along the way.  It was still really warm, even with the sun going down.  It certainly wasn't the November evening I see in the movies.

I'm wondering how everyone did with temptations this weekend.  For those of us who were less than perfect, just turn it around now.  Go work out, plan out your day's meals, whatever works for you.  We are about to be bombarded with two full months of opportunities to mess up our healthy plans.  How will you deal with it?

Tough Love

People often tout the virtues of tough love.  We say how great it is to have someone to tell it to us straight, someone who won't give up on us.  But really, when I don't want to do something, I'd much rather avoid it and live in denial than face it head-on.  But today I got a dose of tough love.

Here's what started it.

My friend Denise and I used to get up and do the P90X workout at 5:30 every morning at her house, which is conveniently located across the street from mine.  It is described this way:

See that? It says "Our Most Extreme Home Fitness Training System Ever!" And they're not kidding. We did this workout for the 90 days in the plan. I got stronger and in better shape, but I didn't really lose any weight.  Maybe 5 pounds. Why? I continued to eat junk, and lots of it. In fact, I think I ate even more while doing P90X because I thought I was somehow burning off everything I crammed into my mouth.

I finally mentioned this blog to her today, and she checked it out.  Then she realized my foot was no longer injured like it was before (which was my excuse at the time not to continue with another round of the workout program).  And guess what she wants to do?  P90X, Round 2.

I tried and tried to get out of it. It went something like this:

Me: I don't wanna.
Denise: We're gonna.
Me: I'm too out of shape.
Denise: I saw on your blog you're walking 45 minutes at a time.
Me: My foot will hurt.
Denise: You don't have to jump around.
Me: 5:30 is too early.
Denise: We'll do it after you drop your kiddo off at school.
Me: Crap.
Denise: We'll start on Friday.
Me: I don't wanna!
Denise: Okay, good.  See you then!

I'm so lucky to have someone who will give me a kick in the pants when I need it.  And I did need it.  Lucky for me, I have a few friends who aren't afraid to set me straight from time to time.

We've all been there.  There is fear of discomfort or pain or failure, so rather than tackling the obstacle, we run from it.  That's the safe thing to do, but it's not always the best thing to do.  And once in awhile, someone will be brave enough to slap us with a little tough love, and we'll be better for it.

S

Se