Yesterday went well... healthy foods in moderate portions and plenty of exercise. I had the best night of sleep I've had in a long time. I forgot how much better I sleep when I don't overeat.
I am focusing on retraining my thinking and that is revealing to me how wrong my thinking has been.
I am working on not thinking about myself as dieting, but thinking of this as a long-term healthy lifestyle. This means: not doing all the little calculations in my head of when I could get down to goal weight and not trying to get too excessive with exercise or too restrictive with food intake (that's not lifestyle--that's diet). I also have to work at feeling thankful for where I am today and live in the moment. This is nearly impossible for me!
Yesterday I read an article that talked about the 'myth' of emotional eating. It basically said that people don't overeat for emotional reasons so much as because they are in an endless cycle of dieting and bingeing. I think there can be some truth to this in some instances; I also think that the EMOTIONS that surface when you overeat can lead to more overeating. Is this sounding convoluted?! Anyway, what I walked away from that article with is a resolve to do what is right for my body because of what I KNOW, not because of what I FEEL. From one day to the next (one hour to the next) my emotions and even my body can tell me a lot of mixed messages, so I need to choose a lifestyle based on clear, logical, healthy choices, not emotions.
Finding 3FC was hugely eye-opening for me because I finally found other people on the planet who eat the way I HAVE to eat if I am not going to be enormous. I don't know anyone else outside of 3FC who has to contintually weigh/measure their food, count their calories, exercise regularly, eat minimally, choose healthy/whole foods, etc. It is incredibly supportive to know that there are many people who choose these things for themselves ALL the time! I think this is a BIG part of why I didn't 'get' maintenance at first...I never met anyone for whom these choices were part of daily healthy living and not 'dieting'.
Thanks for being here!
Lindy