Just came home from the grocery store and passed by the Valentine candy. You know those little hearts with the sayings on them? The ones from grade school. Well, grade school was over 50 years ago for me, and I doubt if I've missed a single year of getting a package or two or ten of those little hearts. And I'm not talking about one of those little boxes. I'm talking about a whole package of them. My rationalization was that they were only available for about a month every year.

Today when I saw them in the grocery store today, I just walked on by. It's cold here right now and my arthritis is hurting. Plus I know what all that sugar would do to my joints and my skin and my weight. But mainly it was a sense of I wanted to be healthy and continue on this weight loss journey more than I wanted those little hearts.

And I mean to tell you, I feel like I could take on the world. I'm smiling. I'm so proud of myself. I feel like at least this time I have tamed the tiger that has been pawing at me my entire life. What a great feeling.

So, please, share your successes and how you felt. I know when I see the mini-goal before and after pictures, it gives me inspiration. Maybe sharing our successes and how they made us fell will inspire us as well.

Great NSV! Way to go!

Congratulations! How smart to connect the action (eating the candy hearts) now with the bad feeling, skin, joints, etc. later. That's been working for me, too. When I get tempted, I remember how I'd beat myself up at the end of a "bad" day of bingeing. I don't want to feel that bad about myself again. I also tell myself that the food I want now won't disappear from the grocery shelves. If I want it later, I'll be able to find it. It helps to remove the urgency.

That's awesome, Betsy!

I have been having some victories after a fairly long spell of trying really hard to get back on track but never being able to get more than a couple of days free from poor choices. I posted on a low carb board eight days ago that I was having a really hard time staying on track. Since then I have gone eight days sticking to my eating plan.

During that time I've been feeling a fair amount of stress. I'm studying for the california bar (which I have already failed once) and gearing up for a big fight with dh (he really wants me to take the test in february but I know I won't be ready) and I've been spending my days at starbucks (can't concentrate on my work at home) where there's a new loaf cake I don't even want to talk about bc it's so tempting and my old favorites, too. Gah! But somehow I've done really well. I wish that when I had days that worked that way that I could just bottle up that magic somehow and save it for when it's not so doable, yk? I feel like all of the stars have to line up perfectly for me to get through a day eating the way I want to.

So, on the one hand I feel really thrilled that I've had a little success but i also have this feeling of waiting for the other shoe to drop. I think that feeling is itself trouble. It causes a kind of stress that can only be relieved by eating, bc then the other shoe has dropped and I know how things are turning out. Does that make sense?

I'm just so proud that I have been binge free since November 26. And I'm proud of myself for getting the nerve up to sign up for a treatment program. I can't believe what a huge difference it has made in my life already. I'm learning coping skills, dealing with body image, and getting nutritional support.

I still have so far to go before I can say I'm recovered - you don't just recover after 2 months of treatment when you have had the problem for decades. I still struggle with body image, and the foods they want me to practice eating totally go against what I have eaten to lose all my weight. It also seems like they want me to eat a TON of food, even though I am within a pound of where I was in October.

Still, I actually feel positive and confident. Went on my first binge-free vacation in decades and am working on addressing the negative self-talk. I truly have hope that I can break the binge cycle once and for all

I'm proud of myself when I got on the scale after the holiday hoopla when I KNEW I was overeating on top of a couple of months of over eating that I didn't give in to the idea of quitting.

I saw the number. Realized some of it was water (as I know my body by now) and I just realized what I needed to do and where I wanted to go with my body.

I cleaned up my eating - upped my workouts at the gym and I'm already feeling better with just a bit more than a week back at it (the holidays go through Jan. 7th in my family).

I'm proud of me for that - as there was a time in my past where I would have thrown in the towel - saying it was too hard to relose weight and believing I would never be successful at it.

I have more confidence now. I can do it because I have done it. I'm just human and I slipped up. Forgive and move on. WIsh I could have been here mentally LONG ago, but at least I'm here now.

I binged last week after a too rigorous start-of-the-year workout week. I stressed out my body, and my body retaliated.

But, here's the good news. I planned to start eating clean (within calories, no extras, no deviation from prepped meals) on Monday. And I did. I've been back on track - and binge free - for 2 days.

As for my current feelings, I'm jovially cynical. It's my TOM and I want ice cream. The realistic part of me knows that I'm not hungry, so I'm listening to my rational brain for now. My overall feelings are positive because I know 1. I'm full from my allotted calories, 2. It is how I successfully lose weight, and 3. I will be up all night if I eat anything now.

I've stayed under 1300 calories (my daily goal is about 1100, but it's a start) for 15 days! No binging, no horrible regrets. I even had a piece of chocolate and stuck with just that one fun size-I was given two, I saved the other one for another time. I can't remember when, or if that's ever happened. I usually see sugar and all goes blank...om om om...my goal this try around is that I can still keep my favorite foods-just learn to limit them.

And congrats on passing up those hearts, Betsy! I, too, am guilty of the, "But it's only available this time of yeeear!" but the older I get, the more I realize...that's a really stupid excuse because life passes by faster than we expect.

In the past 2 days, I've told members of 3FC, my family dr, and my husband about my binge problem. It went really, really well; everyone has been so supportive. And now that people know, I feel that there is now an accountability that wasn't there before. I feel really good about it.
Betsy, you said in the thread I started, that this might be the biggest step that I take on my journey, and that resonated with me- I believe that you may be right. This is as a major step.

Congratulations everyone on these little victories! They all add up to make us more successful

I'll share too

This is going to sound SO backwards. I am proud of myself, because I had a binge! But it was an entirely different animal this time. I have struggled with binge eating for as far back as I can recall. It always left me feeling dirty, disgusting and guilty. Since I've been doing Intuitive Eating I've been educating myself on the hormones that come into play when you eat certain foods. So: combine a pile of stress (no money, upcoming employment tribunal) with a suicidal depression. What a recipe for bingeing. I chose my mental health over my physical health for a few days. And taking care of my mental health has got me this far, and under the circumstances it absolutely wins. So, I ate all the donuts. And a whole lot more. And I knew I was bingeing. And I knew why. After a few days the depression had passed, and I got up that morning and made myself a mug of hot water with lemon juice and a cheese & onion omelette as if nothing had happened. No guilt, no berating myself, nothing. I've been eating healthily again just like I started doing back in December, because I wanted to. My body told me to binge, I binged. My body told me to eat healthy, I ate healthy. Depression will hit me again. I will binge again. And I'm totally ok with it.

I have NEVER been knocked down and got back up again. I am so happy I could do cartwheels. I've gone all rainbows & unicorns about food again

Hi everyone, and good work!

I'm a newbie, but I've been a lurker for some time. Finally joined last week when I was about to leave one-derland. Got a little freaked out and pulled out my trusty food journal, which enables me to stop the binge (I also become obsessive with my journal, but that's another story). I suppose I should be thankful it's easy to get back on track, at the same time, it's unbelievable that I veered 24 pounds off track over the holidays. Too many triggers.
Anyway, journal in hand, 1500 calories a day, almost all clean, and four one hour workouts, and five pounds dropped off. I know two or three pounds is water, my body saying thank you for stepping away from processed foods, so I feel like I'm right on track. Yay for a good first week.

And the shiv - I understand what you mean when you say you are happy that after your binge you're not beating yourself up. It's time we start being nicer to ourselves and figuring solutions without all the self-criticism.

Thanks for all the great posts. I have been so stubborn all these years about being able to conquer this "by myself" (I am woman, hear me roar......or in my case whimper!). I didn't realize how much I needed the support that I get from this group. Congrats on all the victories and thanks for sharing them!