I am two weeks into my new life as a thin person! I have seen positive progress and, at this juncture, remain motivated and aware that the benefits outweigh the disadvantages. I've made it through my birthday and two football games and still stayed within my calorie goals. These are good signs, right?!
Over the last few days, I discovered some patterns of thought and behaviors that have contributed to my weight gain over the years and others that will carry me into my thin future successfully.
1) "I might as well finish that and get the container out of the fridge!"
Last week I made healthful mousaka. I had it for lunch a few times this week. It was low cal, high protein, and, well, YUMMY! Yesterday, I planned to have it for lunch and realized that it was almost gone. However, the remaining amount was more than I had planned to eat. Two weeks ago, I would have just schlopped it onto my plate to get the container out of the fridge. Yesterday I told myself that I could have 1/2 a serving another day with something else to make a lunch with a nice variety!
2) "Coffee and tea really don't impact my calorie count!"
Coffee and tea have no calories in their own right, right? Clearly my basic intelligence and logic chose to ignore that sugar and cream are not innately calorie free! I would often have three or four cups of tea in the morning while doing schoolwork. Those cups of tea would each have three teaspoons of sugar and lemon in them! And not just level teaspoons, BIG, FAT, HEAPING teaspoons. Probably 66 calories a cup. So on some chilly winter mornings, I consumed 264 unconsidered calories BEFORE BREAKFAST! I don't even want to consider how many summer days were made up of the time between my three or four Dunkin Donuts medium iced coffees with cream and sugar. These provided me a whopping 360 to 480 unconsidered calories. Even when I was watching my food intake, I had consumed a third to almost a half of my daily caloric intake without eating a drop of food!
3) "Let me just finish this. There isn't enough to be worth putting away!"
I love to cook! Let me restate that more accurately. I LOVE to cook. I like to find recipes and play with them by altering ingredients until I am perfectly happy with the result. However, it is easier for me to tailor recipe measurements to even numbers of servings rather than the three servings I actually need. After I made a recipe for four to serve three, the three would likely take more than a serving but often not enough to finish the food. After eating, even if I were full, I would dread having to put the leftovers into containers in the fridge, especially since my significant other has this wierd hang-up about a crowded fridge. So, I would just eat the leftovers, EVEN IF I WEREN"T HUNGRY! Well, now I view those leftovers as part of the next day's lunch and my significant other can seek psychological help to get over his full fridge issue. I'd rather have him complaining about a full fridge than have to see my butt fill a larger jeans size!
4) "What should I have with that?"
This might be one of the most deadly questions in the world for my hips. In fact, I think my hips should seek a restraining order against this sentence! I think this might be a societally induced absurdity but I embraced the absurdity and made it a part of me. I would run out to grab lunch. Whether I was being calorie conscious or not, I would make my choice of an "entree" and immediately think, "What should I have with that?" For example, I'd grab a cottage cheese but accompany that with a bag of grapes. Oh, wait, that's not so terrible. Let me apply that thought to a more hip-threatening scenario. I order a ham and cheese hoagie (planning to eat the whole thing) and then seek a bag of chips to "have with that". Then there is the "let's grab a beer." Of course, I have to order the fried pickles to "have with that". Then there's the cheese and crackers that I have to "have with" my glass of red wine. My personal list of "have with that's" goes on ad inifinitum and I do take responsibility for allowing the mindset to take hold. However, I will not take full responsibility for this absurd practice. Society's contribution to this is? "Would you like fries with that?"
These are just a few of the negative behavior patterns that I will be working to restructure in my new thin life. What positives did I learn about myself in the last two weeks?
1) I am willing to evaluate my food choices and behaviors. Actually evaluating my food choices, rather than carelessly consuming, has made it possible to recognize and begin to replace my negative behavior patterns.
2) I want what I want! I've realized that I'd rather have one medium Dunkin Donuts Iced Coffee with cream and sugar than one medium Dunkin Donuts coffee with Splenda (which I hate) and skim milk (which has no right entering good coffee). Therefore, the days of three and four coffees a day are gone. In fact, there have been quite a few days that contained no coffee at all! Yet on the days that I do have one medium Dunkin Donuts coffee with cream and sugar, I recognize it for the treat that it is and enjoy every sip even more than I did when I could have limitless cups. That part of me that is unwavering in its demands has served me well over the past two weeks.
3) Other than a limited number of "must haves", I am generally flexible and adventurous when it comes to restructuring foods to eliminate wasted calories. I have played with using fat free Greek yogurt to replace sour cream in crockpot chicken stroganoff and used brownulated brown sugar to replace regular sugar in a peach blueberry cobbler to cut calories. The peach blueberry cobbler was amazing. Admittedly, I should have used half fat free Greek yogurt and half fat free sour cream but I can alter that next time. The point is, I was willing to consider options for each high calorie ingredient. I don't want to alter my diet to consist solely of fresh fruits and vegetables, tofu, and bulgar wheat. However, I do want to evaluate what I do eat and alter it to meet my goals. This flexibility has made my limited number of "must haves" sacrosanct and possible!
4) I am able to envision my future! For a long time, I have been aware that I am goal driven in my work life. More recently I ascertained that I had a keenly developed respect for delayed gratification. I was willing to give up many things that I loved in order to successfully complete the remaining three years of my Bachelor's degree in two years.
Despite these personal characteristics, I was never able to apply these concepts to weight loss. Work and school are incredibly impersonal. Weight loss is a terribly personal battle filled with emotional minefields at every turn. Fat people are viewed differently, treated differently. A resentment develops. Thin people often treat fat people as though they are lazy and sloppy. Those thin people who actually address the weight issue act as though weight gain is a level playing field and simply showing some self-restraint would eliminate the weight problem. Some of these thin people are the same thin people scarfing cheesesteaks and buffalo wings at will.
This negative fat people view is even more true between thin men and fat women. Hey! Men start with an advantage because they are less likely to amass fat. In addition, the social stigma of being overweight does not apply nearly so severely to men!
I spent years resenting these narrow minded evaluations of fat people! I resented them so much that I did not want to lose weight just to make other people happy with me! Way to teach them a lesson, right? In proving to them that I wouldn't bow to their glorification of thin, I did not act in my own best interest or acknowledge my own choices. I want to learn how to have what I want! I want to eat and enjoy it and be able to buy clothes that are not covered in horrible floral patters and produced by a tent maker! I still have good taste in clothing, fat or not!
Suddenly, I am able to apply my personal characteristics of being goal driven and embracing delayed gratification to my new thin future. I can see myself wearing what I want and going to the beach when I look at an ice cream sundae or a big, beautiful pile of buffalo wings on football day. I can choose to have a little bit of fat free frozen yogurt (especially if its Turkey Hill PomBlueberry Chocolate Truffle!). I can promise myself wings on Superbowl Day and stick to popcorn and zucchini chips throughout the season. I can envision myself thin. Not just less fat, but thin! I never could before. I could only try to remember what it was like to be the less fat girl in old pictures. Now, I have a clear vision of the thin woman whose future is mine!
5) I love myself and can forgive myself. About ten years ago I met this guy. While no real romantic relationship can or will develop, he and I became friends. He finds me attractive, intelligent, fun, and talented. When I look at him looking at me, I see this amazing woman, the very best me. Over the last ten years, I came to believe in that amazing, very best me that he initially showed me. I began to truly believe in my abilities and my positive qualities. I am not just that smart fat chick who tries. I am a personally successful, complex human being who is capable in many areas, who has children who love her, who is talented, intelligent, and giving, who has a good sense of humor, and who I happen to like a hell of a lot! I don't want this awesome woman to be burdened by the feeling that she is physically unattractive and therefore less than another person. So, its time to add this new goal to my future, This woman I love will be thin in the future and any "slips" along the way can be forgiven. The future is long and bright and there will be diversions on the road but the goal is clear in my mind and I will give this wonderful woman - me - the body that she deserves to have in her future!
I've included a horrible beach picture from last summer. This is NOT who I am and I will not allow this outer packaging to remain the same and continue to define me. I will evaluate my thoughts on food and the food itself to make food my friend and a happy and valued part of my thin future. Eye on prize!
