When it comes to weight loss, I am not a person who is motivated by pressure, at all. I've always admired those people who can have total self control when it comes to reaching a goal by a certain period of time - whether that be for a class reunion, wedding, birthday, whatever. They can decline offers of alcoholic beverages, desserts, appetizers - you name it - all without blinking an eye it seems. "I'm sorry, I can't have that - I'm watching my weight for 'X'." My problem? I cannot say that two letter word: no.
I can remember being in various friends' weddings over the years and vowing to lose x-number of pounds by their wedding and I failed...every. single. time. Of course, I've done this to myself many times over the years, not just with weddings. Surely someone can relate to this madness!
Now, I'm not here to make excuses for my failures, I'm just trying/learning to recognize what works/doesn't work for me on this weight loss journey. Case in point - my own wedding! You would think that your own wedding would be enough motivation to "once and for all" remove the weight. Sadly, no. Very sadly, no.
I tend to have a self sabotage approach when things aren't going my way in terms of weight loss. It is almost as though I don't want to let myself be successful. I will completely lose all eating inhibitions and just do what I want when the pressure is on, instead of really cutting back and being extra picky about what I put into my mouth. In some ways, it's an all or nothing mentality. If I cannot do it right 100% of the time,why do it at all. "It" here is staying within my DPT and WPA. While pressure motivates others to focus on their goal and have total self control, pressure for me causes me to unwind and act like I don't care. Anyone else feel this way?
I remember before we got engaged, I told Joel that I'd hoped to be at or near goal before he popped the question so that I wouldn't have to deal with the pressure of losing weight during an engagement. I knew this would happen! Last year around this time I was getting into the zone with weight loss, and feeling good about taking a "slow and steady" approach to it. Slow and steady = no pressure. I was starting to realize that I didn't need to compare my journey to everyone else's - i.e. running races, lifting weights, doing whatever "everyone else" seemed to be doing. No! This is my journey and I was going to proceed how I wanted to, not how "everyone else" was doing it. Repeating a rendition of that mantra over and over really helped me stay focused.
Do I want to be 233 when I'm 30 years old? No. But I have PLENTY of time to meet goal between now and then. Honestly, while I'm not wishing the wedding away, I'll be happy to get back to a sense of normalcy where I won't feel so much pressure about fitting into a wedding dress as well as how I might look in my dress. You could argue that once the "guilt pressure" goes away, I might lose all inhibitions and regain the 30 lbs I lost. I don't believe this will happen though. I'm proud that I've managed to maintain that 30 lbs loss, but I still have a long road ahead of me! Right now my goal is simple and small - to lose another 30 lbs by March 4 of next year. That means I only need to lose 3.3 lbs per month between now and then. Definitely doable as long as I remain focused.
I cannot wait to marry Joel this Saturday, plus size bride or not.
I'm just looking forward to getting back to the "slow and steady" mentality.
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Being a Plus Size Bride - Part 2 Updated at :
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Tuesday, June 5, 2012
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