The past two months have not been the best months for me, healthy-living-wise. I quit Weight Watchers. I stopped writing my #cbdiet posts. And I generally just took a break from all the tracking and struggling and disappointment. This is going to sound backward, I know, but there was this relief once I decided to stop worrying about eating healthy. I think I needed to take the pressure off of struggling so much to live a healthy lifestyle and just live my life without the structure of a meal plan or tracking book.
And while it helped me get through the mess that has been my life for the past two months, it also lead to a nice 10-lb weight gain and all my pants being tight as hell. I’m having back pain and sleep comes fitfully.
But the past two months have been a growing (ha!) experience for me. I don’t want to eat healthily and exercise a lot only because I think my body is disgusting and needs to be skinnier. I want to eat healthily because it’s good for me and makes me feel awesome about myself. I want the extrinsic rewards definitely. I want to be thinner and proud of my body. But I also want the intrinsic because that’s going to carry so much farther than any extrinsic reward.
What I’ve started realizing is that my worth is not determined by the size of my pants. I think this was the biggest part of my downfall before: I was measuring my awesomeness by how well I was following a healthy living plan and losing weight. If I was struggling, it meant there was something fundamentally wrong with me as a person. Which is silly and ridiculous and I am just as amazing, no matter what the scale says.
And, above all, I need to discover what I need to make this healthy living journey a success — and something I can do in the long run. There is nothing wrong with me if I’m not running marathons or drinking daily green smoothies or going on crazy juicing fasts. All of those things are awesome but if they don’t interest me? That’s okay. We don’t all have to take the same path to health and I need to recognize what foods and behaviors and activities that I need to keep me on a path to being healthy and fit.
Losing weight and maintaining a healthy lifestyle have always been a struggle for me. I don’t have the best relationship with food and use it as comfort and reward, instead of something that simply fuels my body. I never want to lose my love for food and the joy it brings me, but I also want to heal this part of me and recognize the ways I sabotage myself in my quest to be a more healthy individual. With every failed journey comes new lessons learned and habits formed. I’ve become a more regular exerciser and I make healthier decisions than I did a year ago. Maybe not every day and maybe I make more unhealthy ones, but I’m doing better.
I’ve learned that, in order for me to stick with this long-term, I have to make small changes. I have to take baby steps and gradually work out the unhealthy stuff and work in the healthy stuff. I know I need to kick my soda habit. (And not replace it with a diet habit. Sorry, but you can’t convince me that diet soda is better than regular stuff. They are both terrible for you.) I need to follow a low-sugar diet. I need to meal plan and stock my fridge with stuff that won’t tempt me to nibble and snack away.
I also know I do better when I’m working towards something and have accountability and community. And so this is my “official” announcement that I am joining this round of the Biggest Blogging Loser. I’m really excited to join in and have something big to work toward because I think this will really help my motivation and keep me pushing when I’m struggling. You can find out all the details here (there’s a $20 fee to join but this goes towards prizes). This round starts on Monday so email Regan if you want to join in, too! I think it is just what I need to stop messing around and get serious.
I’m going to keep chasing after this healthy living thing until I get it right. The option of just completely giving up is not even on the table. I’m not going to let my discouragement of failing again and again keep me from picking myself back up and trying again.
Great post! You’re so right, everyones journey to health is different and different things work for different people. A lot of the things I read on blogs don’t work for me (I hate salads, for example, and I can’t run multiple marathons in a month). But I’ve learned that that’s okay and to stop comparing myself to them.
Also, in the past five months or so I overcame a serious emotional eating habit that I had developed at my last job. Eating when you feel like shit is sooooo awesome and I seriously believed (still believe) it makes me feel better (in the short term). What worked best for me was finding other things I loved to do when I felt like I wanted to eat. I started painting, reading, blog designing, etc, and I was shocked by how well it actually worked!
I believe that emotional eating DOES help me in the short term. Totally. But it also just covers up how I’m actually feeling and doesn’t allow me to properly process through my emotions. So I have to find better outlets when I feel like crap other than gorging.
I’m starting to recognize what I need in my life to help me stick to a healthy lifestyle and with every failure comes more lessons learned.
Stephany, it sounds like you have the right mentality in realizing it can’t just be a diet, it needs to be a lifestyle change, and it needs to be permanent. I’ve lost 75 pounds since January, and still have about 75 pounds to go, but I know that if I can do it, anyone can, especially you. I have similar issues in that I just really love food. I’ve tried to realize I should use it just as body fuel, but even after eight months, I still love it and don’t see it in just that way. That’s okay though! I also have not eliminated any foods from my diet. If I had to do that, I would have failed. There are certain things I can’t and won’t give up, but instead, I just cut back and made a few switches. Now, I try to eat wheat pasta and wheat bread, for example. I also log my calories and exercise through MyFitnessPal which is a website and phone app that I always recommend but I understand you might not be into the counting thing after doing Weight Watchers. All I have left to say is BELIEVE IN YOU! The second you start believing in yourself, it all gets much easier. I tried many times to lose weight, but I stuck with it this time because I believed I could. I believe in you! 🙂 E-mail me ANYTIME if you want to talk or need support and motivation. Cheering you on and wishing you all the best!
WOW! Steph, that’s amazing! 75 lbs!! I’m proud of you. 🙂 Thank you SO much for the pep talk and I love the “believe in you” line because it’s so true. I think I can get caught up in knowing how many times I’ve failed before but not realizing I just have to believe I can do it and trust in my own abilities to get this done.
I do plan on using MFP this time around, because I think it’s good to have a way to track what you’re eating! Thanks for all the encouragement, friend.
Oh, I hear you so much on this. It’s taken me two years and a ton of time to feel like I’m even remotely used to living “healthfully.” I think you’re right that it has to come in baby steps. I also found that for me, doing a really strict cleanse a few times helped me see that a) I COULD do it and b) results right away which I found motivating. I didn’t stick to it forever, but that early success helped me when I felt weak.
Ultimately, there’s no “right” way and I know you’ll find your path when you’re ready.
You really are an inspiration, Amy. It’s been amazing to watch how your whole mindset has changed and the way it has touched every part of your life. I hope to be where you are someday but I know it took so much hard work & dedication to the cause of being healthy. Thanks for the encouraging words. They mean so much!
I agree with everything you said. I’ve noticed that a lot of people jump on these bandwagons, but a lot of them are unsustainable for a lot of people. Or at least when it’s rushed. All the goals are great, but I think a lot of people go through that deprivation phase and then quit, so it’s good to slowly work it out of your system so you don’t rebel. It looks like you have a good plan and don’t be so hard on yourself when a day isn’t perfect. This is a marathon (pardon the pun!), not a sprint and you have to pace yourself or you’ll burn out.
I think what’s helped me is the realization that there’s nothing wrong with being fat. I am just as awesome and amazing, no matter how much I weigh. But I want to be healthy and active and fit because I need to for my own well-being. But if I have a bad day? If I screw up one week? It’s not the end of the world. It’s just one week or one day and I have to stop beating myself up over these little mistakes.
Good luck with the competition! I had not heard of it before. I think we all fall off the wagon, even if we don’t admit to it and it takes time to get back on the horse/wagon and figure out how to stay on it. It’s different for everyone and I commend you for figuring out how to make it work for you.
Thanks, Nora! I feel like such a broken record with these posts and I hate that… but I also want to be real and I want to look back when I finally DO conquer this and be able to see my journey. It’ll be a long road to that place, but I’m determined to find it. 🙂
Good luck with the competition! You clearly learned alot in the last year about what works for you, what doesn’t, and what approach to take going forward. We are all so different and have to find what works for each individual. For me, it was WW but that is not a one size fits all solution for everyone! I am glad that you are coming to terms with the fact that you are beautiful no matter what your pant size is as that is an important truth for us to all understand!
I absolutely adore WW and I might go back to it, once I can afford the $42 a month again because the one time I did lose weight was with WW. I think it’s a fabulous program and it absolutely works. So I do hope to go back, once I know I will put my whole heart & focus into it.
Have you tried counting calories before? I know it sounds really tedious, but once you get used to it, it’s easy and becomes routine. I started using the My Fitness Pal app a week ago and it’s really put in perspective how many calories I intake a day. Also, since I’ve started using the app, I’ve been able to stick to 1200 calories a day and have already lost a few pounds! Along with exercise, of course. 🙂
Hope this helps!
I have tried calorie counting and that’s what I’m doing this time around. I like using the WW points system more because it gives a better value of a food (aside from just calories) but I also think just writing down what you eat is a big MUST for weight loss, at least in the beginning.
Yay for the weight loss! I think MFP is a GREAT tool and I’m using it now. Hopefully, it’s what I need to finally conquer this thing!
I know you’re going to get this right for YOU, no matter how long it takes. I’ve tried the whole tracking food and eating some ridiculous diet, and like you, that just does NOT work for me. I’m so much happier eating foods that make me happy but being careful not to overindulge. Being happy in this way and not overindulging seems to be working for my body, now I need to find a way to make time for exercising and make THAT part of my day to day life. We’ve got opposite problems! We should help each other out. Ha 🙂
We really do have the opposite problem, except I’m not exercising as much as I need to thanks to my bum ankle. It really makes me appreciate all those times I *could* exercise! I miss it a lot, but I’m just trying to focus on eating real foods and not overindulging on the sweet stuff. More water, less calorie-ridden drinks. It’s actually not difficult to be healthy… it’s just sticking to it and not going overboard.
Healthy living is such a process. One that’s really 90% mental. I hope you continue to feel better and better about the place you are in!
Thanks, lady! I just want to readjust the way I view food – and my body. It’s a process and I just have to be patient with myself!
Good luck! I am rooting for you. I think you can do it, it just needs to be in a way that is good for you, physically AND mentally. It is very hard to find a balance at times! It is also hard to create new habits when you have been doing things one way for so long! I know you can do it, but take it slow and don’t be too hard on yourself!
Thank you for such a sweet comment, Kyria! It means a lot and it helps knowing I have people rooting for me. 🙂 I’m going to figure this out someday. Just gotta keep believing I will!