Archive | December 2015

One Day More

Dec31

For those about to embark on changing your lifestyle, I salute you. It is, after all, that time of year where so many assess where they’ve been, where they are, and where they want to be. Even though I’ve been on this journey for over two years, I still find myself assessing, looking to see what needs to be corrected.

Please note… this isn’t me!

I started my weight loss journey at a different time of year, but possibly for the same reasons many do — I was disgusted with myself, I knew I could feel and look better, and although I had absolutely no faith that I could succeed, I knew I had to do something. Although I’m a big believer that you have to be in the right place, mentally, to succeed at anything, there are times where faking it until you make it works. Dieting is one of them.

If I have one piece of advice to offer, it’s this: give yourself time in small increments. Don’t look a month, a year, a hundred pounds down the line; set your sites on getting through today only. Make your plan, and do your best to stick to it for today; worry about tomorrow when you wake up in the morning. For now, anyway. Make it through the next meal. Make it through the afternoon. Go to sleep, tonight, satisfied that you’ve done all you could to be successful, just for today.

A change in lifestyle isn’t just one choice; it’s a string of little choices, mostly good and some bad, that connect and produce a larger change. It’s not embarking on a 100-day workout program; it’s making the choice to roll out of bed and go to the gym. It’s not buying a month’s meal plan from some diet company; it’s making the choice to not eat that chocolate cupcake.

So if you’re looking to start changing yourself, start small. Take the first step and don’t worry about whether that first step will result in a marathon. Do that enough times, and you’ll look back to discover you’ve surpassed the marathon.

 

Have Yourself A Merry Little Christmas

Dec24

After a 4 day early Christmas celebration this past weekend, I have no new loss to report, but I remain dedicated to getting that niggling 1.4 pounds off before the end of the year — one week to go!

Every holiday meal ever.

This will be my third holiday season on this journey, so I thought I’d take a look back to see what I was dealing with one and two years ago. Truly, stressing over 1.4 pounds is nothing, in comparison. And I admit I’m stressing over it, which I also know does no good. I have not been as strong as I planned on being this season; I planned on having that weight off already, and I’m struggling with forgiving myself for taking a small food holiday. I truly wish I’d waited until after losing the 1.4 pounds, but timing didn’t work out that way.

This time last year (December, 2014), I wanted to meet a 60-pound goal by the end of the year, and 100 pounds down… by my Cozumel vacation in June. I didn’t meet either of those goals, but I did finish the year at 58.4 pounds down, but backslid during the holidays and allowed a gain of 17 pounds. That was a bit of a mountain to climb, right at the beginning of the year.

Considering that my total weight loss for 2014 was about 30 pounds, I’ve done exceptionally well this year — having lost over 40 pounds since 2014’s low, much of that in the second half of the year.

In 2013, I was dealing with a bit of pain, since I had stomach issues related to NSAID use and had to drop off of them for a bit; since I have severe arthritis, that meant chronic pain, which can be quite depressing. I was near the beginning of my journey and in pain, anyway, from the weight I was carrying, but seeing some improvements. By the end of the year, I was down just under 32 pounds — better than 2014’s total.

Both years, I faced temptation during the holidays; I face that this year, as well. I imagine I will every year. We’ve done some things, though, that minimize the damage, including things like planning for holiday meal desserts by buying single servings, and limiting what’s in the house. We ate out a lot this past weekend, and I started each meal, assuming I’d be taking half of my meal with me in a to-go box. (Portions at some restaurants are outrageously large.)

To put things in perspective, I have seen my greatest improvements this year, particularly in the past few months. My eyes have been focused on that 100-pound mark, and it’s a worthy goal; if I were mountain climbing, I’d be just a few steps away. Sometimes, though, it pays to turn around and look at where I’ve been; a reminder of just how far I’ve come, and how much my life has changed in the previous two years.

This is the biggest gift I can continue to give myself, and it’s my wish that next year, and this time, I’ll be even further up that mountain, and grinning over having met that 100-pound goal, and surpassing it by a good margin.

Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays!

 

Hips Don’t Lie

Dec18

98.6 pounds down! That’s right — the average body temperature.

I will absolutely admit that I’d really hoped to be 100 pounds down at the end of this week, but I have to remind myself of a couple of important matters.

First — every pound — heck, every ounce I lose matters. Every loss gets me closer to my goal. Being disappointed to be at 98.6 pounds down instead of 100 pounds down is like being upset someone gave me $98,600 instead of $100,000! That’s crazy. This weight loss is a true gift, and I need to appreciate every step along the way.

Miley Cyrus at 98 pounds. Who can’t stand to lose Miley?

It’s not that I don’t… but I have a competitive nature that comes out around goals. I am confident I will still reach my goal and surpass it; I’m not far from it, after all, and there are still almost two weeks left in the year to lose 1.4 pounds.

The second, and perhaps more important: while giving out a number is a great indicator of success, it’s certainly not the only indicator. I’m at a point in my weight loss where just about everything has changed, and there are indicators everywhere of success without ever looking at the number on the scale.

Last week, I talked about the frustration of having injured my knee; this week, it feels like that never happened, and earlier this week, I had a really great day — one of those days where I was absolutely happy and thankful for having taken the first initial step to lose weight. I had a business meeting and then time with a friend, then some time out with my husband.

It was a long day! And a busy one. What made it so much easier and so much more enjoyable for me was that I felt good and didn’t worry. I tend to worry a lot, especially about mobility; when my knee hurt so badly, I canceled out of going to a movie with my husband, because of fear of pain during the movie, as well as being able to walk to and from the theater (inside the movie complex). This Tuesday, I went out to a movie with a friend and had absolutely no problems or concerns with the same situation. (Bonus: comfy with extra room in the seat!)

One of the funnier things about the day: since I work from home, I don’t often worry about dressing up — but I had a business meeting to attend, and it suddenly hit me the day before that I had no clothes that would be considered appropriate business attire. Everything was too big, and since I’ve been trying to reuse my old clothing as much as I can while moving down in size, I was at a loss. Good thing the office I visited is casual; I ended up finding something that would work, and the fun part of it was wearing a top (and boots) that I haven’t been able to wear for a couple of years — because I outgrew both. The black jeans I wore are bordering on being too big.

It’s been a shock to me to pull out clothing that I imagine is still going to be too small, and it fits! I’ve had to say goodbye to some clothing that’s simply too big to be serviceable, now — and looking back on it, there’s very little I wear, these days, that I wore regularly at 98.6 pounds heavier. (And I think people truly start to notice weight loss when you start wearing different clothing.)

It’s a fun thing to do; shopping in your own closet and drawers, finding things that fit, that you already love, and you don’t have to pay for — because you already own them. 🙂 Wearing those smaller things is also a concrete indicator of progress.

Hips don’t lie — especially when you can fit them in smaller jeans. 😉

 

Upside Down

Dec11

I’m always thrilled to see a new, lower number on the scale! I’m 96.8 pounds down, now, and just 3.2 more pounds until I meet my end-of-year goal of 100 pounds. Realistically, that’s the equivalent of a squirrel’s weight!

And none too soon, either. I had an experience last weekend that left me worried.

Thank goodness — I’ve lost Snooki! I can’t help but think that’s a good thing!

While I’ve seen improvement in nearly every physical way, my biggest health concern is my knees. I have severe arthritis in both; much more severe in my right knee. The damage in that knee is bad enough that the joint has degraded and become misaligned. I was told at least six years ago, probably longer, that I’d need total knee replacement surgery; likely on both knees, eventually, because of the brutal combination of osteoarthritis and extreme weight.

I’ve done a lot of things to delay the inevitable, from arthroscopic surgery to remove bone spurs (and trim a torn meniscus), orthovisc injections in both knees to replace synovial fluid (and provide a cushion to my knees), to custom-made braces to help correct the misalignment issue and powerful NSAIDs to reduce pain and inflammation.

Without a doubt, the absolute best thing I have done for my knees is to lose weight. Although I still cannot stand for long or walk extended distances, losing weight has reduced the amount of chronic pain I deal with. It really does help to “take a load off”! Whodathunkit?!

That was… until last weekend, when I finally realized that the pain I was experiencing wasn’t the normal fluctuation of good/bad days that you deal with when you have arthritis. No, the pain was excruciating enough to restrict my movement to a point where I feared I’d need to visit my knee doc. And I know what he’d suggest, because his staff has been telling me every time I go in that I need to (a) lose the weight and (b) get that nifty new knee. Clearly, I’ve done one of the two.

The level of pain scared me. I have known for a long time that if I continued down the course I was headed, I would reach a point where I wouldn’t be able to function at all — and I was in no shape to have major surgery; the risk factors for the morbidly obese are a concern, as well as recovery. I have worked hard to get the weight off, and my goal is to get as much of as I can — a minimum of 60 more pounds, at the very least — before I consider surgery. I have planned how I want to approach this, and I feared that choice was about to be taken away from me.

The good news is that after a few days of nursing the knee to reduce inflammation and treating it more like an injury instead of standard arthritis, my knee feels as good as it did before it was injured. (I’m not sure what I did to injure it; the pain was different, but I assumed it was an arthritis flare-up.)

In addition to this, I’ve needed the reminder that I need to stay focused on doing everything I can for my body; not just for me, but for others, as well. Getting healthy is a gift; not just to myself but to people I love and care for, because they are affected when I am not doing well. I’m fortunate to have a large support group of friends and family who are pulling for me, and I owe it to them to keep my head in the game and keep pushing as hard as I can toward my real goal: gaining health.

I know it’s against the odds, but I plan to turn that upside down.

 

Already Gone

Dec4

I’m down 93.6 pounds; a slight decrease, but considering I had large gains from Thanksgiving during the past week, I’ll take it! It’s not enough to tip the ticker to the next pound, but every ounce counts.

A friend of mine recently posted an interesting article titled “Food and Emotions: 90 percent overlook key to weight loss, survey finds”. (Shout-out to Moxie, if she’s reading.)  From the article:

Only 1 in 10, however, thought psychological well-being was a factor. “That may explain why so many of us struggle,” said Robinson. “In order to lose weight and keep it off long term, we need to do more than just think about what we eat, we also need to understand why we’re eating.”

It’s only hell if you make it that way.

Although I’m convinced that there are no universal rules to successful weight loss, I’ve come to believe through my own experience that my mind is my biggest hindrance to losing weight and keeping it off. If your mind isn’t in the right place, you will not lose weight.

The article touches on exploring the emotional ties we have to food, including as a reward, celebration, and comfort. For those with varying degrees of food issues, this becomes doubly important to solve, because the jump from food-as-reward to diet-as-punishment is a very narrow gap.

The odds are stacked against losing weight and keeping it off. “Studies show nearly 2 out of 3 people who lose 5 percent of their total weight will gain it back, and the more weight you lose, the less your chances of keeping it off.” And yet, when surveyed, respondents listed psychological factors as the smallest barrier to losing weight, rather than, as I believe, the largest one.

Food issues aside, I believe the reason losing weight becomes so overwhelmingly difficult for most people is because it takes a lot of mental work and dedication to make it successful. This is one of the chief reasons I don’t believe in fad diets or diet pills; they detract from the learning and adapting that must take place in order for weight loss to be sustained. And that’s a hell of a hard lesson; for all of the times I’ve lost weight in the past, with some pretty big efforts, I have yet to learn and adapt in ways that will sustain my new body.

I live in hope that this time, I’ll get it.

Even this last weekend, after months of successful weight loss, I overate — knowing it would take me at least a week of losing just to get back where I started. I could list any number of reasons for why I was distracted, but the fact was that I was distracted, and allowed myself to backslide. I had intended to enjoy a few treats and was willing to pay the price for them, but ended up enjoying much more and not limiting myself as originally planned.

No, I’m not flogging myself over it, because that’s as much an emotionally volatile issue as overeating itself. Forcing myself to feel badly over an error in judgment can start a cascade of self-punishment that builds enough resentment to flip that switch; the one where I let that little voice that tells me I’m not good or deserving enough to succeed, win. So instead, I recognize what I’ve done, I adjust, I correct, and I go on.

I wouldn’t call it hell as the meme suggests; more like a never-ending learning curve, but the biggest thing I’ve learned about weight loss is that it’s as much a mental battle as a physical one. Accept that, and the battle becomes a bit easier, and success a little bit more sure.

After all, 93 pounds of me is already gone.