Flip-flopping Priorities?
 

Hi everyone.

I just rejoined Weight Watchers again after taking a year off. I was doing well, lost 15 pounds in 6 weeks, but got frustrated over the summer when trying to calculate (or avoid!) barbeques, parties, etc. Just gave up :/ Anyway, I'm back now and have lost 3 pounds in my first week. Hooray!

My concern is that I'm a student in graduate school.. my biggest struggle is that my priorities change almost every week. One week I'm focused on getting healthy, the next week I might get overwhelmed with school and say "Screw WW. I have to focus on my paper, not my food."

It's hard to have so many "top priorities" all at once and find a balance that doesn't make me feel rundown and exhausted. Does anyone else struggle with this? How do you handle it?

I hope you don't take this in a bad way, but you just gave a good definition of what becoming an adult meant to me! Lol! Most of us have a lot on our plates and weight loss is one of the manny important things we are involved with. I have sort of a simple life due to some choices i've made but sometimes i feel like i'm juggling plates. When i was in college and even for a few years after, weight loss seemed nearly impossible because i was still learning how to balance all the stuff i wanted to do. I used to obsess over something and i'd spend almost all of my energy only on that specific subject and leave everything on hold. Maybe that's not what happens to you, but it was a pattern in my life.

Losing weight is something that may have an end, but maintenace doesn't. That means you'll need to figure out a way to implement new habits that you can follow everyday or most of the time. It doesn't need to be an all or nothing deal so you'll just say "screw WW" when you feel you don't have enough energy, time or whatever or you'll be so obsessed about it that you'll never ever allow yourself some flexibility. Must be something you can live with, even when you're tired or having a bad day. Maybe you can say "screw it" every now and then for a few hours or even a day or two, but the trick, in my opinion, is not to let it become a colapse, not to give up. Not sure if this is helpful or if i'm hitting the spot, though... it's just that i relate a lot with what you wrote and it could easily be me 6 years ago.

What helps me a lot is to accept the fact that i'll lose slower than i would if i had all the time, energy and structure in the world to lose weight. I don't, so i might as well cut me some slack. On the other hand, i must keep myself accountable and not screw up too much, so i try to only screw up a little. Also, i try to pay atention to my body's hunger cues, which i didn't do in the past. This helps me a lot and i usually find i need a small amount of food to keep me satisfied. Also, having healthy food that's practical to prepare helps me a lot. I work full time at a very demanding position and i don't have much time to cook or anything. My standard meal is a green salad with some protein and a carb of choice. Easy to do and healthy. Also, sugar free jello is a life saver when i need to do work related stuff all through the night.

Thank you, that was a big help! I like that you said we don't have all the time in the world so we should cut ourselves some slack and accept that it may be a slow and difficult process. You nailed my personality by saying that. I'm an over-achieving, perfectionist, school nerd. Everyone I'm close to says I stress myself out and I demand way too much of myself with unnecessarily high expectations... I didn't even realize I do that with Weight Watchers too! If I'm not doing it perfectly, why am I doing it at all... that's a terrible mentality to have, I'm working on changing it in all areas of my life.

Thanks for your feedback. I was looking at this as a "too busy" issue when, actually, it's more of a perspective issue. I need to change the way I look at everything.

And by the way, I didn't take that first statement in a bad way at all, but if this is what being an adult means... I want to go back to my teens! I'm 30, if I haven't figured out how to be an adult yet I may be doomed, hahaha :D

HA! You are not alone. I tend to feel the same way about how I can juggle everything while keeping my health a priority! I don't give myself much slack when I act "human". I don't like to straddle the fence.

I really need to not stress so much about trying to make sure I do everything perfectly...since I am imperfectly perfect.

Here's to all of us still trying to figure it out! One pound at a time, one day at a time!