I am on day one of a new diet - a place I am definitely used to after years and years of trying to lose weight. The difference this time is that I have actually been on a diet for the last year and two months and am switching plans. This is a bit… odd. Truthfully, my crutch is gone I am a bit scared.
History: In August of 2008, I joined Jenny Craig. A perpetual dieter, I had “dieted” myself up to an all-time high of 253 pounds at age 37. Lured by the convenience of the JC program and those fabulous Valerie Bertinelli commercials, I signed up. Up until that point, the most success I had ever had on a diet was a medical liquid fast that allowed me to shed 35 pounds in just over a month. 800 calories a day and an hour a day of strenuous cardio will tend to do that, but is an impossible way to live.
Jenny was everything it promised - easy, convenient, and quite tasty. It allowed me to eat everything I loved - pizza, deserts, fish & chips, Chinese food, burgers… and I lost just over 50 pounds on the program, but by June of 2009, I hit a 50 lb road block when the scale hit 199. Up one week, down the next. At 1200 calories a day, nothing was happening and I started feeling like I was banging my head against a wall. To quote Einstein: “The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.”
By September, I was really frustrated. I started seeking advice on a diet and exercise forum where I spilled my diet history and expressed my dismay. One of the replies I received hit a nerve, but then made a lot of sense.
“… I also think your lack of success in the past is that you’ve learned to rely on doing it the “easy” way as you said .. and relying on someone else to do the legwork. All that does it teach you how NOT to do something on your own, and puts the accountability on someone else .. thus leaving you high and dry when it comes to going off the plan and trying to manage it on your own. I think that’s exactly why you haven’t been able to sustain or achieve weight loss prior .. you haven’t learned how to eat properly without someone holding your hand and doing it for you…”
This advice coincided with the nagging feeling that though my caloric intake was perfect, what I was ingesting was probably not the best thing I could be feeding my body. Now, I will say that the Jenny food is VERY good and is planned by nutritionists. However, it also contained stuff that I knew could cause weight loss mayhem for me - high fructose corn syrup, sugar, and processed carbs.
In some respects, the decision to make a change was made for me last week. My husband’s projects at work had slowed and then stopped. Without his income, the financial burden to keep both of us on Jenny Craig didn’t make sense and this was the kick in the ass I needed to do this on my own. We decided that he would stay on the program and I would leave.
So, here I sit. Day one all over again… sort of. While day one of any diet plan is generally met with excitement and anticipation, mine is overshadowed with a little fear. I no longer have a freezer full of little boxes to rely on at meal time. No five minute prep time, nothing to just grab and go. I have to shop, weigh, measure, track calories, and prepare and package my own food. I have to trust that I will not fall prey to old habits or OD on peanut butter (also known as Garber crack). I have to make sure I have lunch with me every day so that I don’t succumb to easy, fast and caloric. I have to rethink, refocus, and move forward.
In short, I have to pull up those big girl pants and start eating like an adult. Thank you crappy economy and the author responsible for that forum post (niclyf) for my tough love. I am ready to do this.
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