Well, it's been a week since I felt I had a firm re-committment to losing what I've regained. And, I have to say it has been OK. I stuck to my plan every day, which is a pretty remarkable achievement given how the last year or more has been. I suffered through some hunger, and still am, but it's not unbearable and I have my planned snacks at the appropriate times.
On reflection I realized I did the same thing this time I did when I started my original program 5 1/2 years ago, only in a mini-version. First I spent a lot of time thinking and analyzing and just getting used to the idea. Second, I said "I'm ready" in sort of a public way (first time, joining Jenny Craig; this time, coming here). Third, on one level I "just did it" -- started my plan even though I wasn't 100% committed, but worked on the mental game after I started. That "fake it til you make it" mentality.
Part of gearing myself back up this week has been coming here and reading and making some posts, but also going back and reading some old ones. This is hard to explain briefly, but ... while I had lost a lot of weight and was in the "normal" range, and feeling pretty comfortable about it, I never thought of myself as entirely normal in looks. Most of the time, yes, but it wasn't a neat fit with my self image. Well, in reading some old posts that the *ahem* "skinny me" made, I remembered what that time was like. The clothes I wore, the way I moved in the world. I realized for the first time how very different that time is from where I am now. I am still not huge, but significantly larger than I was back then. And, I act a little different -- not as interested in clothes and girly stuff, not going out as much, etc.
So here's the big insight for the week: I miss the "skinny" me. I miss her. I miss that girl. I want her back.
What a great insight, FunnieGirl. I, too, miss that girl who is me at my thinnest. I like how she looks in clothes, I like how people react to her, and I like the choices she makes every day (every single hour really) about what's important in the long run.
But one thing I've realized only recently is that when I WAS that girl, I didn't know it. I used to spend a lot of time being shocked when people told me that they would have had no idea I'd ever been really heavy (I told them, that's how they knew), or when I tried on a size 12 and found it too big. I was routinely amazed that people didn't still see me as the fat girl I felt like. Way too much time standing in the mirror and pinching the remaining excess flesh on my belly, thighs, and arms. (I never had surgery to remove all my excess skin, and there are lots of places on my body that were "ruined" and saggy by the time I was 16 years old and that never fully snapped back post-weight loss -- although 10 years of maintenance and exercise tightened things up considerably, till I started regaining this current 14 lbs.)
Literally the second night I met my now-husband, when he told me that he loved my bod (we were dancing), I replied -- and I quote: "Not skinny enough. Supposed to be skinnier." He looked confused and said he didn't think so. I weighed about 154 (my lowest adult weight ever -- I used to vacillate between about 155 to 160 in the course of a normal year), wore a size 8, and when I now see pictures of myself from then, I am just amazed at how thin and just NORMAL looking I honestly was and had no idea.
In some ways it makes me sad or even annoyed with myself, but in other ways it has become part of how I stay on track... Sometimes when I feel like overeating, there's a voice in my head that says "Just go ahead and have [whatever]. What difference does it make. You've always been fat and you always will be." Because that is literally how it has always felt to me, even at my thinnest.
But then I think back to the surprise I felt looking at those old pix of the thin version of me, and I think: "In 2 years from now, I don't want to be looking back at pictures of myself from TONIGHT, weighing 50 lbs more than I do now, and thinking how great I looked and didn't even realize it."
Very, very insightful posts ladies. I find myself not appreciating where I'm at now. I know my clothes sizes are smaller but I constantly think "oh, I could do better". I do have a problem with loose skin, saggy breasts and such. I should be more grateful, considering where I started at. I do go back and look at my goal pic's from time to time to help me focus. Just to get a true sense of how I looked to start with. I seem to feel great when I'm dressed but not so great without my clothes on and facing the mirror. I too pinch at my loose skin and wish it wasn't there.
Hollie , you said it all. I also don't want to look back several yrs. from now and several lbs. heavier and wish I had realized how great I looked right now and didn't even realize it.
A Week
