Reality

I have become a little complacent.�



I am not gaining weight, but I am no longer losing weight and have not been in quite some time and I am fairly certain of the reasons why. I have been messing around with losing and gaining the same five pounds.� It is so easy, not to necessarily fall back into old habits, but to bend the rules just enough to make a difference in the opposite direction than desired.�



Some of my eating habits are less than stellar.� I have weaknesses and though my weakness where food is concerned is nowhere near what it was 26 months ago, it still exists.� I am not eating regular candy bars, or snack cakes or donuts.� I do weekly eat Twizzlers, have dessert at a meal out, eat bread more than once a day�or pick a less than brilliant selection when we go out to dinner, even when there are better selections present.� Weekends are hard for me.� Eating on weekends is hard for me.� The schedule changes up on those two glorious days when we aren't working.� I don't cook on Saturdays; it is a�treasured and much coveted meal out at a restaurant.� Restaurants have good choices and I don't always make them.�



I need to do better.



I am going to do better.



Though I am so much happier at a size 18 than at a size 28, I am not ready to�be done my weight loss journey.



But I think I strive to want to be normal.� I want to be able to eat like people who have never had a weight problem.� People who can order pizza, or have dessert or drink diet soda.�



But I am not one of those people and will never be.� Those things, for me, lead to failure.� They open the door for even more bad choices.� They are an entryway into a past I have no desire to return to.�



But there are still days when I think "Why can't it just get easier?"



But it doesn't.� Anyone who has ever lost weight will tell you that.� We have to remain ever vigilant.� Dropping the ball is not an option because it is too easy to return to that place of failure and it happens when we are not paying attention.� It happens when we pretend to be someone we are not; when we pretend to be people who do not have food issues.� No one gets to be obese "just because."� We get obese because we have issues with food for some reason or another. We use it in unhealthy ways.� We eat when we are not hungry because we don't take the time to ask ourselves if what we are doing is out of hunger or habit.� Thinking "I could eat" is not the same as thinking "I need to eat because I have not in several hours and I am hungry." "I could eat" can usually be concluded with "because I am bored, stressed, upset, happy, sad..." I have always been an emotional eater and I am not going to rid my life of my emotions, so I have to learn how to not eat my feelings and it is a lifetime process.



I dare say that if it were not for my newfound desire for exercise that I could have done some damage in the last few months as opposed to simply maintaining.



And it simply isn't good enough.



So I return to basics.� Cutting out the bad stuff.



Bread, I love you and though I have learned to make far better choices with you, such as deli rounds and multigrains, you must go back to being an occasional treat.



Twizzlers, we must part ways.� My intense need for chewy foods must be replaced with gum.�



Dessert at a dinner out,� you must go back to being a taste only.� Not a half, not a whole, a taste or two.� Satisfy the craving and move on.



Pretzels, I have to cut you back or out altogether.� I don't need to be snacking nearly as much as I do.



I don't always know what to snack on, which is a problem.� There are times I want to snack.� Generally cukes and dip (FF sour cream with ranch powdered dip) is my choice, but I need options.� If anyone has any, please leave them in the comments and I will love you forever.



Water, we are still friends, but I need more of you in my life.� I have slacked a little bit lately.



Wine.� Beloved, wine.� You must go back to Fridays only. Not that I drink it much more than that but when it was just me and the kids and a non-working medication that week, I had a glass each night as a stress release.� There is a treadmill in the corner of my downstairs and it can release stress every bit as well.



Weight is all about choices.



I need to learn about my cross training.� I need to research and do better.� I need to work out my training for running as I have just been doing what comes.� A half marathon in September of 2011 is on my radar.� I can't just wing it.



Choices.� Making the right ones.� Being accountable.� Today it begins again.�