Hi Bekka!
First, I want to congratulate you on your FIFTY POUND weight loss!
You made a smart move to leave when you thought you would be tempted! Good goin' Girl!
I have indeed been right where you were with the spaghetti thing! It seems that sometimes my resolve is ironclad, and sometimes I am a marshmallow that gives in without even a thought!
I used to think that weight loss was all physical, that it was just a matter of eating less and exercising more. I am finding that it is SOOOOO much more MENTAL than it is physical!
I had a long talk with my future daughter-in-law the other day. She's a distance runner who has run five marathons and is currently training for a 100 mile Ultra. I asked her how she could possibly run 100 miles! She said that she increases her distance gradually and stays at that distance until it feels easy. Then she increases her distance again. She then said something that completely shocked me. She said, after knowing that she was training properly, eating and drinking all the right foods and energy drinks,weaing the right clothing, and remembering NOT to overtrain, the MOST IMPORTANT THING was to have a solid MENTAL attitude! I said, "WHAT?!" She said, "The physical training gets you through to about mile 20. After that, it is SHEAR MENTAL TOUGHNESS that gets you to the finish line!"
I have been thinking about what she said, and I think that this advice can help us all with our weight loss, too! Yes, we need to eat the right foods and drink water and exercise, but we also need to have the right mental atttitude. That's the TOUGH PART!
What helps me the most is thinking about how stupid I would be to eat the pie that is 450 calories WITHOUT the whipped cream AFTER I just worked out sweating for an hour! It would put me back as if I hadn't even worked out at all! I try to look at the pie, smell it, watch my family of skinny men enjoying it, and congratulate myself for NOT having any! I also TRY to tell myself, "Cheryl! You KNOW what that pie tastes like! You have had pie just like that before. You don't need to taste it again." That helps, too.
This has taken awhile for me to practice, but it is getting easier. I know I must always be on guard, though, because my fat cells are just itching to plump up again!
Something else that helps me is to eat something nutritious every three hours. I even eat something BEFORE we go out to eat so that I won't be tempted to annialate the whole breadbasket by myself!
Cheryl