It's just the beginning

After my long, soul-searching post yesterday, I feel about a million times better about my life. I know it's only been a couple of days, but I feel so different that it's hard to put it into words. <br /><br />For the first time in my life, I'm not consumed by thoughts of food. When will I eat? What will I eat? How much will I eat? Will I eat too much? Will I eat the wrong thing? Will I gain weight if I eat that? Will I have a binge today? Will I lose control? <br /><br />It's like I've been under an evil spell for over forty years. A spell that was cast on me to always make me worry about what I eat. To always be fearful of food. To always have food be in control of me and not me in control of it.<br /><br />It's like I found the source of my pain, which was actually compounded by how I've handled the pain, discomfort, sadness, and loneliness in my life. I avoided it. I ate to stop the feelings. I refused to face the pain because it just hurt too much. Instead, it was better to eat away the pain. The only problem with that little theory is that it doesn't work.<br />Today I canceled my Weight Watcher membership. I've only been going to about one meeting a month and honestly, I've lost interest in it. It's served it's purpose for me. I know what to eat, and how much to eat. I understand portion size and the Weight Watcher healthy eating guidelines. Now it's time for me to move on, to try something different. Not another diet. Not another weight loss plan. Instead, I want to stop my war with food. <br /><br />Still, it's scary to leave Weight Watchers after almost three  years. I can always rejoin, however, I don't think I'll ever want to. <br /><br />I weighed this morning on my scales here at home. 174.0 pounds. Afterwards I placed the scales on the top shelf in the back of my closet. I need a step stool to get to them. <br /><br />I have weighed myself every day for the last 42 years. I've made myself crazy with those weighins. It's time to stop it. At least for now. I need to give the daily weighins a break. I'll weigh again next Saturday.<br /><br />Today I followed Geneen's seven eating guidelines. It was not easy, but it made a huge difference. I bought her CD where she explains the eating guidelines in depth. She said it's all or nothing. You can't say you don't like doing one thing and then decide to just not do it. It doesn't work that way. <br /><br />I know that's true because that's what I tried last summer when I read the book. I didn't like #3, Eat without distractions. Distractions include radio, television, newspapers, books, intense or anxiety-producing conversations or music. This one is the hardest for me. I'm getting use to it now, but it was very odd the first couple of times. It really makes me focus on what I'm eating, because well, there's just nothing else to focus on. Surprisingly, it makes me feel a lot more satisfied with my meal.<br /><br />Today I ate what my body wanted. I didn't weigh or measure most of my food, except the oatmeal. I didn't write down what I ate or figure out the calories or the Points. I didn't worry about it. You can't even begin to imagine how this made me feel. It was very difficult, but it also felt like freedom. <br /><br />In case you're wondering, here's what I had to eat today and all of this food is really what I felt like my body wanted. I won't be posting my food every day, because that bores me pieces to write about what I eat. I just wanted to show you what I ate when trying to not be totally restrictive with my food.<br /><br /><em>1 cup of coffee with Stevia and 1% milk (maybe 1/4 cup -?)</em><br /><em>1/2 cup oatmeal, microwaved with a cup of water</em><br /><em>some dried cranberries, maybe 20 (?)</em><br /><em>a few walnuts, maybe 6 halves (?)</em><br /><em>a splash of 1% milk</em><br /><em>1 tablespoon of Splenda/brown sugar mix. I would have used honey but we didn't have any.</em><br /><em>1 small banana</em><br /><br />I savored every bite and it was delicious.<br /><br />I somehow missed lunch and found myself at the gym at 4pm starving to death. That was a total accident because I was running errands and forgot to eat. I had some Kashi bars in my car, some new <em>pumpkin pecan bars.</em> I ate two. I checked the label because I still do that, and they were 120 calories each. This was the only time I didn't follow the not eating in the car guideline, but I was parked at the gym and not listening to the radio.<br /><br />I worked out doing cardio for an hour at the gym. <br /><br />When I walked in the door at home, I was once again starving. I'd burned over 500 calories during my workout. <br /><br />I decided to have another snack before I made dinner.<br /><br /><em>1 small banana</em><br /><em>about 1/2 a glass of 1% milk maybe 3/4 cup</em><br /><br />I sat at the table, slowly eating the banana, drinking the milk. I really wanted to shove it in my mouth and drink the milk in one big gulp, but I took the time to taste the banana and enjoy my snack.<br /><br />Dinner was simple and it really was what I wanted, which is oddly what I eat quite often.<br /><br /><em>A large chicken breast, much larger than my normal 4 ounces, but I didn't weigh it. It was broiled with the Costco Sweet Mesquite Seasoning (love that stuff), and served with a little barbecue sauce</em><br /><em>Brussels Sprouts, more than my normal serving, maybe 1 1/2 cups</em><br /><em>Cherry tomatoes</em><br /><em>A big glass of water</em><br /><br />About an hour after dinner I had a <em>KozyShack tapioca cup</em>. It was not sugar-free. Topped with a squirt (a large one) of <em>non-fat Redi-whip</em>, which I won't be eating again. The pudding was wonderful, the Redi-whip was gross. <br /><br />I'm cutting back on the sugar-free junk I've been eating. I'll still use Stevia because I don't mind the taste of it. I won't be eating a lot of sugar because it doesn't make me feel good. When I eat a lot of it, I get night sweats really bad. A small amount is okay, a lot is bad for me. <br /><br />It's almost 9:30pm, and I'm going to eat a <em>smallish Honeycrisp apple</em> before I go to bed. <br /><br />This is a lot more food than I normally eat, but I don't think I'll be getting up and gorging myself on a 500 to a 1,000 midnight snack tonight<br /><br />I'm really curious if a week of eating like this will make a difference. Am I being stupid thinking I don't need to count every calorie I put in my mouth? Is this a mistake? Yes, it's that voice talking to me again, telling me I'm going to screw this up and gain a hundred pounds. <br /><br />It needs to shut up.

It's just the beginning

After my long, soul-searching post yesterday, I feel about a million times better about my life. I know it's only been a couple of days,...

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