Daily Maintenance Weigh In - TGIF 7/26/2013

Good morning!

Road trip to TN this weekend to take my Mom back home to my sisters. I always pack the healthy stuff but allow myself a little more wiggle room on road trips. Seems to work out fine as long as I track and don't go wild.

Today's weight 138.0 I seem to hover right around there, up and down a little, for the most part.

Happy Friday!

Good morning everyone:

Not doing too well.  Still 5 pounds above goal, although yesterday was 7 pounds above goal so have lost two pounds.  Not much consolation in that.

I thought I was doing a good job logging everything but obviously am forgetting some things.     Back to brisk walking for an hour a day.  Drinking water could improve.

Ever onward.

I will NOT give in to the food calls.  I will NOT give in to the food calls.  ( repeating a 100 times )

Have the best day.

155.9 - down a little. Whatever.

[insert *****y whiny woe-is-me verbiage here]

101.6 lbs today.

Climbing in Tahoe this weekend - yay!

Have a good weekend, everybody!

f

161.4 - ah, oh well....

Slept like absolute doodoo last night then this morning I realized I had not taken my medication that is supposed to help with my other medication induced hot flashes - I had taken it out of the bottle and set it on the bathroom counter and forgot to take it.  At least I know what contributed to my crappy sleep. With the summer heat and increased exercise it is really challenging to get enough hydration which also adds to the HF. I still have more than 3 years on this medication - really wish I didn't have to take one med for another's side effects. That being said at my age I may have had the hot flashes anyway - ugh! I just want to sleep through the night once in awhile!

119 and feeling good. the sun is already out here in the fog belt. its gonna be a good day except for icky meeting i have to attend.   diane

152.4 - food is on track.

I have an...interesting...WLS meeting yesterday. It pretty much went the way I thought it would. One woman always monopolizes the meeting, a few others talk. I haven't gone to a meeting since May, so I forced into the conversation a few times.

Then there was this young man who has lost 130 lbs in 7 months. I've never seen him at a meeting (I've only missed 2 meeting in the last year). His mom was there, also - newly sleeved. He's still losing and he is a little worried. I told him that there are easy-ish ways to stall the loss when he gets to a place that he feels comfortable. He and everyone in the meeting looked at me like I was crazy. Mind you, I know exactly how I've stayed in a 3-5 lbs range for the last 8 months (sort of like a maintenance weight?) He said, "well, I don't want to eat crap again." I went on to say that any Nutritionist should be able to explain the healthy ways to put your body into a maintenance weight. Again, I got the crazy-***** look from everyone. He said "I'm eating tons of protein." I said, "that won't do it, but if you add in..." He interrupted me and said, "I don't need to know. What I worry about the most is that we are all broken people. I want to know what made me fat in my thinking and fix it or I will never be successful at this."

The question I never got to ask was "what if the problem is not what you think? What if the reason you ate isn't some earth shattering thing? What if it's just a coping mechanism? What if the reason why you ate is something simple?"

I know why I use food for more than nourishment.

Kudos to him for trying to figure himself out. His speech had a lot of victim-mentality undertones, imo. I've always felt that victims don't have a choice in being the victim, but STAYING the victim IS their choice. I hope he is able to get out of the victim mentality.

His mom also asked for him how to handle people that comment on how much weight a person has lost--things like "are you sick? How much more weight are you going to lose? I'm worried that you are losing too much." I suggested that they create parameters for their friends and family. Here's what is okay for you to say to me. Here's what's not. I've always felt that our friends and family sometimes need us to guide them in what they can and can't say to us. The young man responded that a lot of his friends say these types of things to him and he chooses a more compassionate response. He says to them "do I really look sick?" or "do you really think I look bad or too thin?"

Another thing I never got to ask him was at what point does he choose to turn his compassion inward? When will he have compassion for himself? When will he take care of his own needs and start setting up guidelines for his friends? Things like "Look, while I'm figuring this all out, I need you to stop commenting on my weight."

The counselor running the meeting also explained to everyone (the topic was Mindful Eating) that we should get to enjoy are our food. We deserve to enjoy our food. We are allowed to love food. It got to the point that I had to force myself not to laugh. Honestly, that type of thinking is what I battle every single day. I NEED food to just be nourishment because I already attach too much value to it. I know it's different for everyone, but it was hard to listen to a counselor say this.

I won't be going back to the meetings for awhile. This meeting isn't going well.  

What if food never becomes just nourishment.  It seems unlikely at this point since we've all been overweight and more.  I can't imagine a world that looks that different from my entire life.  Clearly it's more and bigger for me which i do feel is the difference in people who are small and never have weight issues.  I never forget to eat, never, even now when I'm told i hve diminished hunger.  I know for me that is something that is an impossibility, since i know the power and it hasn't gone away with 2 weight loss surgeries.

104

And i do love food.  Evwn though i spent a ton of my life hating it because i could not control it, i clearly love it and i don't know that i would change that.  would i like to be one of those people who could take it or leave it?  Absoluteyl.  But i'm not one of those people, I know that, everything has sown me that. 

Thinking like that seems on par with trying to believe your straight if your gay.  It's just so out of whack for  me. 

Do i need to find ways to deal with this love?  for sure but i sure don't see it turning into a non issue in my life ever.  It's just one more thing i have to build a boundary around and stick to it with the best of my ability at any given time.

It's an interesting subject.  I'd love to know how others feel about it.

It was interesting at times (in between the woman monopolizing the conversation). I too will always love food. But, I also strive for a nourishment attitude because the power I give to food scares me. Maybe that's what throws me into the "food addict" category--although I'm still not sure that I consider myself a food addict. I definitely consider myself a carb addict. You and I have talked a lot about this and I would have to say that I sometimes envy the way you handle food. I wish I had some of ability you have to just taste and then walk away.

A lot of times I feel like the addict that is trying to prove to everyone that I'm not addicted and I can handle this.

I think what bothered me was the way the counselor was handling the issue. She focused too much on the loving food part of the mindful eating and spent almost no time on strategies for how to handle food when it takes control.  

My relationship with food will be a lifelong journey. Last night at that meeting, I felt like I'd learned absolutely nothing since surgery. That kind of scares me, too.