I’m feeling more sure-footed as the week goes on, and this is day three of being back to normal and in control of my food budget. The whole episode last week has had quite a profound effect on me, in the way that I imagine a near-death experience might. And before you tell me to get over myself and stop being a drama queen (good luck with that) I’m serious.
I felt myself hurtling towards disaster with the first mouthful of naughty on day two, when I could no longer pretend I was making proper grown-up decisions from a vantage point of control. Pretty much the whole of day one was accompanied by the Asshole voice, doing what he does best. Surely you deserve a treat, you’re working so hard in fact I’m sure you can pretty much eat as much as you like because if you hadn’t ever joined the Kingdom of Pain you’d never have accrued all these exercise points, so even if you ate every extra point you’ve earned over the last two months you’re still only where you would have been otherwise…it’s practically not cheating at all…
I’d fallen asleep after Thursday’s free-for-all muttering it’s just one day to myself in a vain attempt to try and do a bit of damage limitation…my self-esteem had taken a bit of a battering like it always does when you realise that you’re not as good as you think you are. But obviously tomorrow was going to be better, right? Only it wasn’t, and that’s what shocked me the most.
Friday was like groundhog day, you know? Same tables, same set up. I remember looking around and observing with interest how all the edible goodies seemed almost like wallpaper to most of the people in the room. Unnoticed. Not everyone was salivating , or distracted from the agenda by all those individual foil-wrapped pieces of heaven…just me then. I felt like a freak as I tried to wrestle my head out of the goodies and focus on the job in hand.
I’m still not sure what miracle fished me out of the naughty pond at the weekend. In past times, breaking the diet always meant the end of the diet…just another failed attempt lining up with all the others. One bad day always led to two, then to five, then a week and a month…I caught a hold of this one two and a bit days in. Miracles do happen.
Picking over the bones of it all and trying to analyse why it happened has led me to a couple of things. Firstly, I need to accept that my relationship with food is different to that of normal folk. It’s not normal, to be so distracted by the promise of chocolate that you shut out the life that’s going on around you. But it’s my normal. And I will learn how to deal with it…that, or I’ll die trying.
Secondly, you lot were front and centre of my mind as I clawed my way back from the edge. I could almost hear the collective sigh of relief on Saturday when I hooked up with my friends and started walking away from the slippery slope. I imagined Fleury fist-pumping the air, and Susan cheering, and Mimi doing her happy dance…Tracey and Autumn and Jo and Natalie and Margaret high-fiving each other as the fuck-up fairy left town and life returned to normal. It makes more difference to me than I can tell you, knowing that you’re all in my corner. And I’m accountable to you…you’re my support system.
It’s probably three months until the next conference-style meeting…I’m thinking of hanging a sign around my neck like the one at the top of the page. Either that or accessorising my outfit with a little duct tape over my chops…what do you reckon? 🙂
High five is right! You pulled yourself back up and THAT makes this whole ordeal a victory. I have had a rough time lately with some personal things that have just been so upsetting to me. I found myself binge eating ice cream because it was there. If it wasn’t there, I went out and bought it because I deserved it. I wanted it. I needed it. I told myself, “I’ll only have one serving size. I can manage that.” The thing of it is with ice cream and me…I can’t have 1/2 cup of ice cream and say, “That’s enough.” No, I want the whole container. And that’s what I did. I ate 1/2 a container one night and the other 1/2 the next. Was it a surprise when I got on the scale and had gained 10 lbs.? No. Because I wasn’t just eating ice cream, I was cheating in other areas too.
You are so right that our relationship with food is not like other people’s. What we have to do is catch ourselves before derailing completely. Recognize that 3 lb. gain (or 10 lbs. in my case) is temporary. We have learned SOOOO many skills and we have developed such a tool kit of good habits. There’s no reason why we need to let these kinds of set backs send us off track completely.
I realize that this is a journey. It’s not a “I did it! I got to Skinny Town!” thing where all of a sudden you’ve accomplished your goals and you can just let go. No, you have to commit to it for the rest of your life.
When things like this happen, be glad you caught it. Be super glad!!!! Because you won’t be back to the “Old Dee” in three months or a year. You will still be the new you!
Love you!!
Catching it is another lesson on how to maintain in the long term…I see that and I’m trying to accept that it’s part of my journey, a very important part actually. I’m in a good place this week, and I’m determined to make the bitch in my bathroom eat humble pie this week ?
Thanks for sharing, Dee, it really is inspiring.
The last dream to die is the one where the day will come and we will be thin and we can eat anything and everything we want “just like normal people” and not be fat. It has to die because there aren’t normal weight people who eat like that–I see that clearly. Not because they have excellent self-restraint, but because they don’t want to.
I see that it’s not the fear/danger of obesity and all it entails curtailing their appetite, nor points, nor any sort of program. I wonder what is. I hope that if I can get this part sussed, then the danger of slips (which I still almost routinely suffer) will finally be done.
PS HIGH FIVE!!
It’s very true Margaret. I spent years resenting the hell out of the fact that I wasn’t one of those people, and the penny only dropped in the early days of writing the blog that such people didn’t exist…skinny folk are skinny on purpose, I see that now!
Yes! I’m here, & jumpin up & down! This is a hell of a support network – it is a big help to me, I tell you.
Hey, that point about knowing your way back from the brink…. That’s important, yeah?
For a congenital Fat Girl, maintaining a weight loss is the grail. (We have proven to ourselves & to incredulous friends & family we’ll leap into a Diet to strip off the fat suit). Getting comfortable in our Skinny persona, is one of the important aims of this attempt. You said it, you know, Dee: Plan and practice, & believe in the behavior changes – INPUT is the side of the ledger we are on, it’s the only side of the equation I can strive to affect.
Hhah! Wallpaper flowers, all of us – “cabbage roses” in antiquing circles.
Fleury
Ha yes I know what you mean…and if we have to work a little harder than others in pulling back from the brink, well that’s just what we have to do. Deal with it, and move on is our mantra!
It is quite beyond me why conference organisers think it is necessary to put all that food out anyway. No-one should really be eating that stuff regardless of weight. How about bottles of water and bowls of fruit instead. (I can dream can’t I?)
You know what Moira, I’ve already suggested to the lady who organises it that next time I’ll be throwing myself at her mercy and asking for at least one healthy table!
Yes, i’m doing the Happy Snoopy Dance that you caught the slip and are back on track! Is there any way you could suggest to the conference people that they don’t have to have food everywhere all of the time?
Hmm..maybe. Problem is I work for a food retailer so it’s sort of par for the course!
The important thing (and I think the difference between folks who are making a lifestyle change, rather than just wanting to see the numbers on the scale go down) is that you treated this as a ‘slip.’ For me, a slip means that someplace within me, I understand that all the effort that came before is not negated by one or two days of relapse. A slip reminds me that my relationship with food that is different from others’ relationship with food, and while that feels totally unfair, I have to work with what’s true. A slip is my body (and the lizard-part of my brain) reminding me that I have to take Very Good Care of myself– physically and mentally. In the early days of weight loss, and even in maintenance, a slip is a message to me that I’m tired, stressed, lonely, angry, etc. The fact is, even as a loss-maintainer, slips happen. But I try to think of my response to them as good practice for taking extreme care of myself– and as an opportunity to know myself better.
For what it’s worth: you’re letting yourself learn from this– and that is amazing.
A slip…yes, that’s what it was. I’ll feel like it’s done and gone when I’ve undone the damage…thanks it’s always good to hear from another perspective ?
3 months is plenty of time to figure out what you will do differently when faced with this situation again. Your right all of us that are over weight or who have been over weight are different biologically, emotionally, around that kind of food situation from people who have never had this struggle they don’t understand this but those of us in your readership we get the struggle it is real!
I’m glad our support helped you get back up after your fall off the wagon.
It is a new day/week time to put this slip in your rear view mirror and move on! Forward we go!
Absolutely…onwards ?
Haha, yes we were all high fiving after the f-up fairy left town. She saw me though and decided to have a go at me too! I have been on track for 10 weeks and had no plans or desire to go off track. On Sunday my son invited me over for pizza that he was cooking on the grill and a banana, mango and yogurt shake. After only losing .8 of a pound in the last 2 weeks I was expecting a decent loss on Monday so in order to not do too much damage I only ate half my lunch calories. I estimate I went over by 400 calories so not bad. On Monday’s weigh in I had gained 1.4lbs!!! So yesterday I was under my calories by 200 calories and still the scale is stuck. I’m so ticked off. I just don’t want to be bothered any more. Intellectually I know I haven’t really gained but that damn scale is screwing with me. I couldn’t make myself go walking this morning so I need to nip this in the bud or else it will all be downhill from here. I really needed to hear how you are recovering from you little slip to keep me going.
So I’m going to hang in there and hopefully get my arse out the door and get back in the game.
Jo.
Isn’t it ridiculous Jo how we let the scale tempt us into throwing the towel in? I feel your frustration, you’ll know I faced down my own plateau not so long ago. What I do know is that if you keep on focusing on the input, eventually it’ll show up in the numbers. Have faith lovely lady…all we can do is keep on marching forward ?
That’s right sistah! I’ve got my marching boots on. I know the weight will have to come off eventually, I just need to stick it out.
I was reading back about what you said about the food being like wallpaper to everyone else. I’m the same way. I have such a messed up relationship with food. When I go babysitting for my son they tell me to help myself to whatever food I want. I feel like a kid in a candy store. My cupboards and fridge are full of real food, no treats but they have all the naughty stuff (I know I shouldn’t call it that) and I have a really difficult time setting limitations with it. I don’t know how they can be surrounded by it and not be snacking every 5 minutes. Whenever they call me to babysit I have a Pavlovian response – woohoo, treats for me! So I get it. I don’t think food will ever be wallpaper to me, sigh…………