Wednesday, March 21, 2007

What I learned from a gain...

Rather than re-invent the wheel, I'm just going to cut/paste the email I sent to my WW Yahoo group this morning....

Okay, it's official. I'm actually learning something being on this program. I don't know if I've mentioned it before, but I am in recovery from an eating disorder - because you are never completely OVER one. Anyway, for a very long time, my metabolism was completely screwed up from it and I had a lot of trouble losing weight except for on very, very little food or very strict low-carb. I finally gave up on dieting because I decided (erroneously, as it turns out) I would never lose the weight I needed to and it was just making me crazy to try. Before, if I gained even part of a pound, I'd give up and eat the house. Or, if I "cheated" I'd figure that, since I'd blown it, I might as well blow off the rest of the day (which turned, inevitably into the week, month... you get the picture). Well, then a very dear friend (*waves at Cindy*) told me she was going on WW. I watched her progress from a far, then decided that I would give this one last program an honest shot...

The first week's weigh in, I lost 4 pounds. The second, 3. Last week, 8.4. Yeah, it was working great! In the midst of this, I discovered that my scale at home was weighing me 15 pounds lighter than my doctor's scale was. That would have, not long ago, freaked me out and caused me to give up then and there. But, not this time. This time, I just went out and got a new scale that weighs me at nearly the same (give or take 2 or 3 tenths of a pound) and re-set my weights to account for the 15-pound discrepency.

Then, this week was TOM. I'm retaining fluid and am tired. The old me would have used this week as an excuse to eat whatever, no matter the consequences. She would have decided she was too tired to exercise. She would have stayed home from work today because of the migraine I have (always get one the day before I start). Not the new me. I've planned for chocolate "binges" and have counted the points for them when I have had them. I exercised both Monday and Tuesday of this week and have my gym bag with me to go tonight after work. I came to work with a headache because I knew that getting off of my routine would cause more problems than it solved.

Yes, with my WI this morning, I did gain. But it was only 0.4 pounds. That means I'm still down 23 pounds overall. I've decided that I've got to focus on the bigger picture and focusing on the bigger picture is what is gonna get me smaller. That's what I learned from a gain.

I'm staying OP and I know that I'll have that 0.4 pounds off, plus a few of it's friends, at my next WI.

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