mindfulness

What do you do when your mojo has left you behind?

/ lafbatblog / Leave a comment

We’ve all been there. The honeymoon phase of the diet is over. You’re struggling to keep yourself going. So, how do you get past this fork in the road and keep moving toward success?

I have been slowing down the past few weeks. Longing for “forbidden fruit.” I have given in a couple of times, and my progress has slowed down. I have been trouble remembering why it is more important to reach my goal than to treat myself in the short term. So what am I going to do about it?

First, I’m going to remind myself that I am a long way from where I started. I am down 86 lbs. That is not a small achievement. In fact, my doctor said it is extremely rare for someone to lose so much without surgery. I can log onto my WW account and see a graph of my progress. That is encouraging me to keep it up. I’ve come this far, I don’t want to stop now.

Second, I’m going to practice self love. I am making progress. I don’t have to be perfect. No one is perfect. I am doing the best I can with the tools I have. That is all I can ask of myself. It is all anyone can reasonably ask of me.

Third, I’m going to remember what my WW leader says. You have to be able to keep up the changes you make for the rest of your life. So, is it really going to be possible for me to never eat cake or a cheeseburger? Give up bread? Stop drinking fruit smoothies? No more chocolate? Nope. That would be the kind of life that would be long, but not satisfying. I deserve to be healthy, but I also deserve to be happy.

Lastly, I’m going to look at myself. There is room between my belly and the steering wheel now. I am wearing pants that I haven’t worn in 20 years. I’m feeling brave enough to buy lingerie for the first time in 30 years. I am sleeping better. I am moving more, and it doesn’t hurt! I am enjoying life for the first time in as long as I can remember.

So, do I have my motivation back? Yes, I do. I will be mindful and see the beauty and happiness in my life. I will know I am worth the extra time I spend walking and working out and taking care of my body. I will accept that I love cheeseburgers, bread, cake, and chocolate, and that life would be much sadder without them. Can I keep losing weight and still enjoy things that make me happy? Yes, I can.

I’ll keep walking more and more every day. I’ll keep getting the dumbbells out and strengthening my body. I’ll keep moisturizing my skin. I’ll keep eating smaller portions than I used to. I’ll pay attention to my progress and how good I am feeling. I will keep going!

Why is it important to lose weight?

/ lafbatblog / Leave a comment

The answer varies from person to person, but in general it comes down to feeling better and living better, doesn’t it? I am working hard to lose weight because; 1) I’m tired of not fitting into chairs in public, 2) I am tired of having to buy my clothes online, 3) I’m tired of feeling incompetent, and 4) I’m tired of being ashamed. Sadly, my health is well down the line in my list of whys. I bet I’m not alone in that.

We live in a world that tells us if we aren’t a size 0 we’re worthless. I grew up hearing how disgusting I was because I was fat. All that negativity haunts me to this day. Some times I can actually feel pretty for a minute or two. Then, I look in the mirror and see myself and realize I am just a fat blob and that trying to look good is like putting lipstick on a pig.

I used to envy anorexics. I used to think they were the only pretty people. Then one day, I actually looked at them. They never look happy. They don’t look healthy. And they aren’t any prettier than anyone else. So I realized, I can look good and feel good about myself without being a size 0. I’ll never reach that size, even if I starve myself.

I have to have a different why. WW says your why is the key to your success. I think that is true. You have to have something to keep you motivated to take good care of yourself and be healthier. My new why is to feel good about myself, no matter what anyone else says. I am important. I do matter. I can be as happy as I make up my mind to be. Taking good care of myself makes me feel better and gives me a better life. No more punishing myself because I was taught that you have to make yourself miserable to deserve anything good in your life. What a screwy way of thinking!

So what do I mean by taking good care of myself? Eat healthy. Watch the way your food is prepared and how much of it you eat. Drink a lot of water every day. Be more active (my current goal is 30 minutes a day, 5 days a week). Actually clean and moisturize your skin and hair. Meditate and be mindful. Live in the moment and let go of the past and its pain (I journal a lot to accomplish this one).

What is your why? How do you achieve your goal?

Oh no, the binge monster won a round.

/ lafbatblog / Leave a comment

I lost to the binge monster earlier this week. I have been trying not to give in to the might-as-wells and the you-suck-you-losers every since. I am having to consciously stop and remind myself, I am human. I don’t have to be perfect to succeed. I can start, again. And one mistake doesn’t ruin all the work I have done. Being mindful, accepting, and nonjudgemental of myself is hard. I still hear my parents telling me how fat and disgusting I was/am. Sometimes it is hard to quiet those voices.

I have to write my feelings out and respond to them as I would respond to someone else that I value. Putting it in writing takes it out of my head and allows me to reflect and analyze my thoughts and impulses. It stops my self destruction.

But, why did I lose in the first place? I think it was a combination of things. Missing my mom (first Mother’s Day after her death), feeling like a fraud (praised by my new doctor for losing so much weight), and being at home alone for a week (between semesters at work). My mind can be quite the toxic swamp. I have thought about those things.

Missing mom — I don’t really remember getting support or validation from her. She taught me that I was inferior in every way. I guess when you’re used to being put down, it feels more comfortable and safer than having someone place real expectations on you. I have to remind my hurt inner child (Lorie Ann) that it is OK. It is OK to love and care for myself. I can succeed. I will succeed.

Feeling like a fraud — one of those self-fulfilling prophecies. My new doctor complimented me. She said that it was very rare for someone to lose so much weight (70 lbs) without surgery. I know I’ve worked hard to achieve this goal. I know I can get to my ultimate goal if I just keep going. I’m always afraid that people will find out that I’m not as good at things as they think I am. I find it hard to accept that I can do anything right or well. I have to consciously tell Lorie Ann that we are good at doing things and we are not frauds.

Being alone– With no one to distract me, I get lost in the swamp of my negative thoughts. I didn’t spend time reading or even watching TV. I just sat there and marinated in my quagmire. I know better than that. I’ve had way too much therapy not to realize that it is the worst thing I can possibly do to myself. I need to reach out to others. Write letters to my pen pals. Check out friends on Facebook. Text or call someone I can depend on. Accept that I need help from others to see the positives, and ask for it, take it, and move on.

So, even WW was about getting more results being gentle, kind, and compassionate with yourself than beating up/belittling yourself. It is true. More flies with honey after all. So how to do it. Well, build mastery and focus on what you do well. Strengthen your problem spots by work and patient effort. Remind yourself, you are a wonderful creation and it doesn’t matter if others are too blind to see your worth. Don’t let them define you. You are your own person. It is up to you to decide what you are and what you are worth.

Stuffing your feelings

/ lafbatblog / 1 Comment

Emotional eating. The bane of my dieting existence. Why do I do it? To avoid my feelings? To have an illusion of control? Both of them?

This month Weight Watchers is talking about eating (when/where/what/why). Emotional eating definitely has been discussed. It helps to hear others’ ways of dealing with the problems and urges. Get busy doing a craft. Go for a walk. Talk to a friend. Journal. Most of them are strategies that distract you from the urge. I find that doesn’t work for me. I have to take the urge by the horns, break it down, and deal with it. If you can distract yourself until it passes, great! I just can’t when I’m really in the throes of a binge.

We all eat based on emotions to some extent. Some of us handle it well. Being in the mood for nachos and eating 3 or 4 chips and being satisfied. Then there are people like me, who eat the whole platter intended to serve 4 and want more. I am applying the lesson I learned early in life. Food makes you feel better. It keeps you from being sad or lonely. It gives you the feeling that you are in control of something in your life. All are misleading. The feelings are still there. You are just as powerless to control things when you’re eating. In fact, you are even more out of control, thanks to the power of food.

I’ve been struggling the past few days. It was a year ago that my mother fell, broke her hip and went into rehab. She never came out. I spent May watching her slow, painful death. I think it was her MS ultimately. At the end, she couldn’t see, speak, eat, or anything. I still feel like I should have been able to do more. So of course, I’ve been eating things left and right. Anything that isn’t tied down looks appetizing. I’m trying to stop feeling bad and start feeling like I do have some power to exert control over the world. It isn’t working. 😦

I needed to stop and think. Reflect. Be mindful. I sat down with my journal, and listed all the things that I think are making me feel bad and powerless. Once I had that list, for each item I wrote the facts of the situation. Next, I wrote my feelings and irrational thoughts for each thing. Then, I wrote what I could actually do and how to do it for each thing. Finally, I made a plan of action, acknowledged my feelings and accepted that I cannot control everything or fix everything for my loved ones.

And you know what? I actually stopped eating everything in sight. I know I’m not the one in total control, but I noted my abilities to affect change or improvement. I told myself it’s OK to be grieving my mom. It’s OK to want to help everyone. It’s also OK to do what I can and then let the rest go. It isn’t easy. It took lots of work for me to reach this point. Meditation. Reflection. Journaling. Therapy. Hard work. I have earned my peace of mind and I have learned how to develop it for myself. You see, you can’t rely on someone else to soothe the pain or lessen the fear. You have to do it for yourself.

Once you’ve taken care of your thoughts, letting them go like clouds scuttling across the sky, you find contentment and inner joy in life. The need to eat everything dissipates. You can use your lifestyle tools to eat sensibly and feel satisfied. You can go on with life and love yourself.

So, how do you know if you’re really hungry?

/ lafbatblog / Leave a comment

Weight Watchers (WW) last week was all about distinguishing internal hunger cues from external hunger cues. For example, watching a commercial and suddenly craving the food it shows is definitely external. Everyone has different internal cues. My personal ones are a headache, shaky hands, and I start to feel nauseous (which makes it a little weird when I’m eating sometimes). It’s important that you figure out your own signals. The best way would be to keep a food journal, listing when/what/how you feel/time/place for each time you eat. I like to keep mine in a diet journal. It helps you understand your body and mind. Knowing which one is calling the shots is very helpful.

What do you so when you are craving something? I find I need to give in and eat a little of it or I’ll eat the whole house trying to satisfy the urge. I am getting better at distracting myself from the urge, though. I use IMPROVE from DBT and “vacations”. Both come down to creating a different setting for yourself, away from the influences that are fooling you into the craving. Go to your happy place. Let’s face it, most of the time when I get cravings it’s because I am NOT in a good place. Someone has said something mean about my size. When my mom was dying was a terrible one. When the scale goes up and I know I didn’t eat that poorly. Or when the scale just doesn’t go down. Maybe your significant other brought home some baked goodies (my personal weakness). No matter what it is, you have to find a way to separate yourself from the current situation. Go on that mental vacation. Picture clouds moving across the sky or waves on the beach or a rainy storm, wiping away the urge. Meditate on it. Once you stop the squirrel mind, you can get back into a good place, and not give in to the urges.

So far, I’m down 40 pounds. Only 130 pounds to go. I’ve been on the dreaded plataue for the past couple of weeks. That has not helped my frame of mind. I’m working hard not to give in to the you-might-as-well-eat-everything-because-you’re-a weak failure state of mind. Lots of meditating and journaling. Self soothing without food. I hope to have broken through the plataue this week. Cross your fingers for me.

Perfectionism and losing weight

/ lafbatblog / Leave a comment

Last week the WW workshop was about perfectionism and how it can hinder weight loss. The consensus in the group was that being a perfectionist definitely complicates the process and limits success. This idea that you must always do the exactly correct thing at the correct time and in the correct way or you have failed, is guaranteed to make you unhappy and frustrate you in reaching your goals. In DBT, the emphasis is on progress, not perfection. A much more sensible way to approach any goal, in my opinion. It encourages you to move on with what is, so you aren’t creating more misery and suffering for yourself by expecting things that just aren’t reasonable.

A classic example, you’ve been tracking your food, weighing and measuring all your portions, keeping under your daily points/calories goal, then you eat a piece of cake. The perfectionist in you says “Aha, I knew you couldn’t do it! May as well give up and go back to the old way of doing things!” So, you proceed to undo all the good things you have done. You minimize your success and focus instead on the one mistake. You keep on eating and stop tracking. In the end, you are worse off than when you started or even if you’d just forgiven yourself and gotten back on track after the cake. One piece of cake does not equal a gluttinous life.

The better thing to do, would be to forgive yourself and resume your good behaviors. Focus on all that you have done well. How far you’ve come. Accept that you are human, and from time to time you will slip off the straight and narrow. It’s OK. You don’t lose the path unless you keep going down the food addiction trail. You can get back to making progress and improving your life and reaching your goals.

Last Saturday, I earned my 25 lb. charm at WW. I admit I’ve gotten some help from my doctor. She put me on Ozempic, and it is starting to work. I find it hard to eat as much at a sitting as I used to. It actually feels like my stomach starts turning flips. I needed the help to learn not to hoover up all the food on the table, like someone is going to take it away from me. My mom isn’t here to take the food away any more. No one in my house is going to tell me to stop eating, except for me. Also, I’m not a high school science teacher any more. We only had 20 minutes to eat lunch, and do any paperwork or phone calls that had to be done. Now, I can take my time and eat and actually taste and enjoy the food. I try to eat mindfully. I’m getting better and better at it. I actually taste my food now, and savor it. I find I’m more satisfied with less food, but I do want better quality (butter not margarine, for example).

My ultimate goal is to lose 200 pounds. I have to see each step I take as success. Perfection is NOT an option. I am human. It took me 53 years to get here. I have the habits of a lifetime to unlearn. I have new tools and help in my journey. I have a mantra that I use “Progress, not perfection; accept, don’t expect.”

Another year of trials and tribulations

/ lafbatblog / Leave a comment

It has been quite a while since I’ve written anything here. I just felt too empty to write. This year has continued the stresses of Covid and loneliness. And of course, my mother died almost 3 months ago. Not of Covid.

Handling loneliness required a lot of self soothing. I’ve spent hours decluttering and organizing. It really did make me feel better and more in control. I know, control is an illusion. I should accept, not expect. But the feeling that I was in control of something, even if it was just organizing my desk in my craft room/office, soothed my soul and my mind. Getting rid of junk was empowering. I was removing its hold on me and showing my own strength. I decluttered the whole house. I didn’t go minimalist. I love my butterflies and cozy feeling house just fine the way they are. But it was good to know that my possessions don’t necessarily control me.

I’ve worked from home, used contactless delivery, and all the other tricks to avoid Covid. I am fully vaccinated, even already got my flu shot. I keep watching people refusing to do things to improve the public health. Complaining that no one has the right to tell them to get a shot or wear a mask. It infringes on their freedom and they don’t believe the science or doctors. Then, when they get sick, they expect to be treated with all the skills of science and the doctors. They’ve created such a burden on our resources and stretched this pandemic out far longer than it should have been. I keep reminding myself, don’t judge. Tolerate and accept all. I just don’t understand how their minds work. I need to stop trying. I can’t change anything they think or do. I just need to accept it, do my best, and move on.

Mom died of MS. She fell and broke her hip. They put her in the hospital, did surgery, and she seemed to be recovering just fine. Then, she was placed in a nursing home for rehab. At first she was OK. I could talk to her on the phone and she was strong and lucid and understood me and made sense and was planning for me to come stay with her once she was out of there. Then, she started getting weaker. She wasn’t eating. Her MS was keeping her from swallowing correctly, and affecting her sight and causing her constant pain. She stopped making sense when I talked to her. I took lots of time off work to go see her. To try to get the house ready so she could come home. The hoarding of my stepfather and brother saw to it that I was unable to fix the house. In the space of a month, mom had lost 50 lbs. They put her on morphine for the pain. The last time I saw her, I don’t think she even knew I was there. She couldn’t talk or move or even swallow her saliva. She died at 4AM that night. All alone. They were supposed to call us and make sure we got there in time, but they didn’t. She died all alone. I think they just walked in and found her already dead. I feel so much guilt about this. I failed her. She didn’t get to come home. She didn’t get to eat the food she liked. I keep thinking I don’t deserve to eat since she couldn’t and I didn’t give her what she wanted. I’ve got 250 lbs. to lose before it would even be a beginning of an issue. I need to remind myself, she loved my brother and nephews more than me. They were the ones she asked for, not me. She always chose my stepfather over me, even when he threatened to kill me, she took his side. She always had to be better than me at everything I did. She always had to be prettier than me. Smarter than me. Why did I want her to love me? I guess it’s because she was my mom.

I am trying to lose weight for me. I am working out again. I am doing WW. I asked my doctor for help, and got it. I deserve to feel good and be healthy and enjoy life. I am taking care of myself because no one else ever has or will. I am working hard to stay in Wise Mind in this situation. My emotions want to punish me on mom’s behalf. My logic tells me I need to lose weight to be healthy. The middle path says use mom’s treatment of me as fuel to become healthier. So, that is what I am doing.

Being non-judgmental

/ lafbatblog / Leave a comment

“Be non-judgmental in your own thoughts, feelings and beliefs.” – Mindfulness, T. Rowan ed.

Such a simple statement, yet so hard to do. We naturally judge everything at all times. It is part of being human. Most of us are harder on ourselves than others, on top of that. It can really build up over the course of a day, much less a lifetime.

We are taught early on to determine the worth and worthiness of everything and everyone we encounter. We are taught the values of our role models, for better or worse. We watch how they react to and treat other people. That is a new set of rules to include in the young mind. We watch what they consider worth having/doing. We were taught what to pursue and what to do to be worthwhile.

Sometimes judging is good. Picking the good bread instead of the moldy piece. The good milk instead of the sour. The person who will validate and support you instead of the one who weakens and hurts you. These decisions help us function and thrive.

Other judgements cause pain and undue suffering. They weigh us down with negativity. Racism is an obvious example of this sort of judging. Valuing the pursuit of money or promotion in a prestigious career can also add to the weight carried by the soul. People have valued these things, but in reality they do not help the person grow or thrive. Most people are particularly severe in the judging of self — thoughts, dreams, hopes, goals, work, endeavors.

Learning not to value yourself, judging yourself to be less than others, is a hard lesson to unlearn. Even harder than learning not to judge others. If your parent or care giver does not validate you, instead they belittle you and every effort you make, it is welded into your psyche that you are unworthy and you must strive to become worthy of love and respect. I was taught that I was ugly, stupid, a burden. My father’s favorite words to me were “you’re so stupid you could make a saint curse,” even as I earned academic awards for highest grades and test taking skills. When I made something, my parents rarely even bothered to keep it. They usually threw it away, often in front of me. These things taught me to devalue myself and anything I did or made. They taught me I had no right to expect anything and that I would never be good enough.

Those lessons weighed me down. Made me a victim that allowed myself to be hurt and abused. They told me it was both my fault and my job to let my grandfather sexually abuse me. I didn’t have friends. I didn’t think I was good enough for anyone to want to be around. Anything I could do well wasn’t worth doing, because I could do it. More links in a heavy chain around my heart and soul. I lived with those and thought I didn’t even deserve to live. I used to hope to die so I wouldn’t keep disappointing everyone and bothering them by being alive. I didn’t think I could be a success at anything worth doing.

I first stopped judging others. Learning to accept and love people as they are, not as I think they should be. Now, I’m even reaching the point that I don’t have preconceived notions of what a person should be. That has taken a lot of work. Miles of ink on paper written to get ideas and “rules” out of my head, where they were cemented by my early experiences. I would catch myself (still do sometimes, I’m not perfect) and stop and say “They are just as they should be and need to be.” Radical acceptance and love for everyone are key to ending the judging cycle. Letting go of those judgements was very freeing. It feels good to love people.

Next, came the hardest part. Learning not to judge myself. My thoughts, feelings, actions, beliefs. I still hear my parents’ voices telling me terrible things about myself (“you’re so stupid”) or what I had done (“you ruined my life”). I have to fight those voices. I am slowly learning that I am worthy. I am enough. I am a success. No, I don’t make millions or lead a large group or influence everyone. I have a cozy little house, a good marriage, a cute dog, a job I enjoy, and crafts to make and things to bake and a garden to grow. I am learning not to punish myself for being myself. It is hard. Every day I get a little better at it. Sometimes I can go entire hours without hearing that mean little voice in my head. I am learning to accept myself as I am and know that I am a human being.

Is it summer, yet?

/ lafbatblog / Leave a comment

It is hot enough. It is sunny enough. The storms have begun. But, I always think of summer as a happy time, and I don’t think people are very happy at the moment. I see lots of fear. Fear of sickness. Fear of others. Fear of government. Fear of the economy. Fear of the unknown. Lets face it, this year has been a real doozy of a year. So many things have happened to hurt people. What could be coming now?

I don’t know. But, I do know that if we work together, we can make it through. Most people are so busy reacting to things they don’t understand, know, or control, that they are missing all the good things in life. Mindfulness would work wonders on the people of this world. I know it’s hard, but try to accept what is. Live intentionally. Prepare for your best. Don’t react wildly and out of control. You can’t change things or other people, but you can change how you react.

Fear is a feeling. It is a warning that there might be something to deal with. But that is all it is, unless you give it the power to control you. Fear without your strength, dwindles to nothing and passes you by, wiser, but not weaker. Imagine standing out side your home. A rain cloud is coming. You have to get things done outside. You have a choice. Curse the rain and put things off; hate the rain and be miserable while doing what needs doing; or sing in the rain and enjoy the feeling of the cool water running down your face while you do your thing. Not matter what you choose, the rain will stop. The difference is whether or not you have accomplished anything and how you’ve made yourself feel. The rain is not there to harm you. In fact, without rain we wouldn’t have food to eat, water to drink or wash with, or swim and play in. We need the rain. It us up to each of us to decide how to deal with the rain. Fear is like that, too. Fear has a purpose, to alert you to the conditions and lack of knowledge. It is up to you how you react to the fear. Do you let it ruin your day? Make you do things you later regret? Do you let it make you take your pain/uncertainty out on others? Or do you accept the notification that something needs your attention and you need to react to it, and let the negative go? It is hard, but once you learn to let the fear pass by, it is amazingly empowering. You are in control. No one else. Not the fear, the weather, the economy, other people. You are. No, this doesn’t make you all powerful, but it does make you stronger and better.

So, check out a guided meditation. Read a book on mindfulness. Take a yoga class. Write in a journal. Think before you act. Aim for goodness and love, not darkness and hate. And remember, your feelings are not who you are or what you are. They are simply little wisps of thought passing through your mind. They only have power if you give it to them.

Broken Means Beautiful

/ lafbatblog / Leave a comment

This is a meme that I really like.

It tells me that feeling broken isn’t necessarily a bad thing. In fact, it adds to your beauty. Think about the butterfly. It doesn’t exist until the caterpillar is totally broken apart and recycled into a whole new creature. Most people think the butterfly is far more beautiful than the caterpillar. But, you can’t have one without the other. The organism has to be a caterpillar. It has to be completely broken. It has to be recycled and rebuilt. Then, and only then, does it become the butterfly. The butterfly doesn’t last for long. Maybe as a reminder that all things, good and bad, will come to an end. So enjoy them while they are here, and let them go when it is time for them to pass into the past.

I often feel broken. Many people do. I am learning though, to change how I view the nature of being broken. There are many uplifting quotes (broken to let the light in, broken crayons still color, etc.). All of them have their own truth. Breaking is painful, but necessary to grow and develop. You can’t become unless you let go of what was and the old you that held you down. Be the butterfly! Come back stronger and even more beautiful from the breaking than you were before the breaking!