I have worried about my weight for as long as I can remember. Probably from middle school on. When I look back on my school pictures though, I see a normal girl who went through her thick before shooting up phase and later on, in high school, a fit and athletic girl who looked super cute in a bikini. What the heck was I worrying about my weight for??
Who knows really. Yes, family drama and divorce and responsibilities far beyond a 14 year old’s capacity probably contributed to emotional eating and the beginning of bad habits. We can finger point and dissect it a million different ways, but at the end of the day, we all have our battles and my longest-lasting battle definitely comes in the form of food.
Fast forward many moons and 4 kids and I continue to battle those demons. My Hubby is amazing and supportive and certainly loves me whether I’m fluffier or more fit and I am grateful for that. The truth is, I have seasons where I do better and others where I don’t give a rat’s a** and just give into the yoga pants on the daily. In spite of the support and encouragement of family and friends. There is always a battle present and it is exhausting.
At this time in my life, it’s not about being a size 2, I mean my skeleton isn’t designed for that. And I’m OK with that. What IS true is that I’m just uncomfortable. I’m tired. All those years of taking care of patients who tell me “don’t get old” and “I wish I would have taken better care of myself when I was younger”, well, that is getting to me. I see friends and patients who are fighting cancer and I know that we fight our best fight when we are at our strongest: mentally, physically, spiritually. Most days I’m 2 out of 3, I want 3 of 3. That is not too much to ask and the time has come to put these beasts down. For good.
So. Here I go again. Changing things up. While I won’t say it’s a “diet” so much, mostly because I don’t do well on diets, but certainly changing my eating up. More Paleo. Ish. A friend introduced me to Mark’s Daily Apple and I really like his approach. So for me, the focus is more FOOD food, less processed food and keeping my carbs under 100g a day. I’m using myFitnesspal to track my choices and my fitbit to track my moving.
Technically I’m on week 2, however, week 1 got sidetracked by Hurricane Matthew and you just go on with your bad self if you can stick to cleaner eating while stuck in a 2 Br/2 Ba house with 7 people, 1 dog, 1 cat and the uncertainty of a massive storm potentially getting ready to wipe out your city and flood your neighborhood. As for me, well…….I did my best, but I won’t lie; hte candy corn and the iced cookies, they went down. Timber. This week, however, power back up. Home good. Debris mostly cleaned. Closing in on “normal” and it was a good strong week. Slight “cheating” today, but not horrific and verdict is: down 3 pounds total since I started. I’ll take it. It’s time to put this battle to rest.
making the trek 