weight loss

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.

What slows you down?

/ lafbatblog / Leave a comment

WW talked about fuel vs. friction a few weeks ago. Then it was your circle of friends. All of it has been about momentum this month. How to get it and keep it. So, how do I keep going?

I have adopted the idea that no food is bad. If I try to deny myself something, I just end up eating everything trying to cover that urge. Instead, I am trying to eat like a thin person. Have you ever noticed how they can take 2 or 3 bites and consider themselves sated? It blows my mind that such a thing is possible, but I am working hard to develop the habit. I am adapting a life style, not a diet.

So, how to eat less and be satisfied? I am focusing on eating mindfully. This means slowing down and actually tasting your food. If you eat more slowly, you will realize you are full before you devour the entire thing. So, eating like a thin person. I have to focus and be very deliberate to make this work. I strive to be present with the food, not letting my attention wander. It is making a big difference. I’m down 40 pounds, now. Instead of eating 3 cheeseburgers, I’m eating most of 1, and finding myself satisfied.

I’ve stopped using food to self soothe. I am doing other things like reading, taking a bubble bath, crafting, gardening, cleaning. Yes, I know, cleaning is not considered relaxing and soothing to most people, but I find it builds my peace, sense of control, and calms my mind. So, it is important to figure out what makes you feel good, that doesn’t involve food. Make a list. Look up a list of self soothing strategies on line. Think about what you did as a child to feel happy. Those things will work today, too. Keep your list with you until you have made it second nature. Your stress levels will drop and so will your weight.

It is Dog Wood Winter. I dislike these cold snaps in the spring, but they are normal. I find myself itching to get into my garden and make things grow. I grow a lot of herbs, flowers, and a few vegetables. I don’t have a huge garden plot. I grow most of my veggies in containers. Last year, my garden suffered from neglect because I was at my mom’s so much, watching her die. This summer, I hope nothing happens to bring me back down to that place. At that time, it was all I could do not to eat the entire house. I don’t feel as guilty about her death, now, but it has taken a lot of journaling and reflection to get here.

My journal is my favorite tool to develop mental health. It even helps me maintain physical health. I work through my feelings and figure out what is bothering me. I make a list of all the things I think could be bothering me. Next, for each item, I list the facts of the situation and my feelings/perceptions. Finally, I come up with what I can really do about each problem. This creates resolution in my mind and gives me a feeling of more control and guides me in what action to take. I often color code it to make it easy to see what goes with what. You don’t have to do it in a journal, just a plain old piece of paper will do. Give it a try. It’s far superior to just emoting and complaining in your journal.

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.

Time for growth

/ lafbatblog / Leave a comment

It is that in-between season, not quite Spring and not quite Winter. Plants are waking up from their rest. Trees are pumping pollen into the air as quickly as possible. Flowers are beginning to spread across the land. And for me, it’s time to decide. Will I keep working on myself or will I give up?

Time for some wise mind. Emotional mind says give it up, you aren’t good enough to succeed. Suspiciously, the voice of emotional mind sounds very much like my mother. Rational mind points out that I have managed to be healthier in the past. I have lost weight and worked out and felt good about myself. So, what is the middle ground? Accept that most of my life I was told I was not pretty or smart or worthy. That a lot of the time I was told I was fat, ugly, stupid, and a major mistake. I can’t change those facts. I can let them go and stop giving my abusers so much power. It isn’t easy. It requires hard effort and determination. But, to succeed and love myself and care for myself, I have to rise above it and let go. The lotus flower rises above the mud and water to show its beauty. I will be a lotus flower. I will keep trying to eat healthy. I will work out. I will be compassionate with myself. I will be better. I will stop judging myself against an impossible standard. No two flowers bloom exactly alike. All of them are beautiful in their own way. People are like that, too. We shouldn’t cause each other pain with judgments and unrealistic expectations. Being mindful means we should look for the positive in the moment, not expect things to be different than they are. Adding wise mind to that, we pair acceptance of ourselves with an ongoing effort to take better care of ourselves. Accepting the past and feelings, then letting them pass like dandelion seeds on the wind.

Learning not to hate myself

/ lafbatblog / Leave a comment

Why is it so hard to love yourself? I know I was told all my life that there was nothing good or useful about me. It worked very well at making me doubt my worth in any sense of the word. Good job Mom, Dad, and family!

I have been fighting with this problem in particular for the past couple of weeks. I haven’t been taking good care of myself, and I feel it. Forget wise mind or mindfulness. I’ve been on a self-destruct pathway that is leading me straight to an inner hell. I feel so totally empty and unhappy with myself. I know that if I start taking better care of myself I’ll be happier and healthier. I need to use my wise mind and balance the feelings with the things I need to do. It is OK to feel unsure, or sad. For my best life, I need to let them pass and move on after acknowledging them. I need to use them to locate the cause(s) of my stress and negative behaviors. Once I’ve done that, I can be mindful and present in the moment. Addressing the issues and doing something about them to improve my life. For example, my boss has been really stressed about changes at work. I have allowed her feelings to become my feelings, even though I don’t need to do so. As a result, I’ve felt hopeless and powerless, which lead to poor choices in what and how much I have eaten and how active I’ve been. That caused me to gain back some of the weight I’ve lost. That made me feel like a failure and angry at myself. So, now that I’ve unraveled the feelings to their source, I can act upon them and improve things.

  1. Let go of the stress. It isn’t even mine.
  2. Plan for better eating. Shop for healthy food, not junk.
  3. Start walking, again.
  4. Keep journaling. The thoughts in my head need an outlet, or else they fester and make things worse.
  5. Reach out to friends. Know that they see me as a worthwhile person, worthy of good things.
  6. Stop letting the scale dictate my self worth.
  7. Focus on the good that I have done. Let go of the bad.

So, be mindful. Use wise mind and self soothing strategies. Move ahead and let go of the bad.

‘Tis the time of the year when everything is dear.

/ lafbatblog / Leave a comment

So, I survived Thanksgiving. Of course, it was only my husband, my dog, and me. That definitely helped minimize the stress. Now, it’s time to worry about Christmas.

So far, I’m staying on my plateau. Not gaining. Not losing. Of course, I still have to bake cookies and make candy. So, how to do it, when everyone expects it, and not gain a ton? I think the key is to NOT totally deny yourself the treats of the season. If you want something, savor it. Enjoy it. Embrace it. Be mindful as you eat it. Notice the scent, the texture, the weight, the sweetness, the saltiness, the memories. Take time to enjoy it and you won’t inhale the whole batch.

Yes, I have to bake. I could refuse, but then several people would be disappointed. My husband’s work place is used to him bringing in a big spread of homemade goodness. It makes me feel good to brighten up their holiday; retail work really sucks this time of year. I bring some in to my coworkers. I make some for my husband’s family. For some of these people, my gifts are the only homemade goodies they get. I think that is kind of sad. It makes me appreciate the childhood Christmases.

As a child, I learned to bake and make candy. My mom supervised, and often wasn’t very happy about the situation. I didn’t realize then, how lucky I was. So many kids today don’t ever get to decorate a cookie or make fudge. They don’t get to taste goodies made with love. It is sad. Enjoy it while it lasts!