Mental Roller Coaster

So much of this process is mental.  It is changing the way I think about food and life.  I think that is why in the past I never succeeded long term, even when I was doing well short term.  I may have found ways to plug things into the diet formula.  But it never actually translated into thinking differently about things.  I still craved foods and saw the diet as a short term proposal.  I couldn't wait until I got off the diet and could eat the same way again.  That is one thing that is definitely different this time - I have somehow been able to see this as a permanent life change.  It was a mental step before a single food choice.

And, as I talk to people who have come to me over the last few months about diets and such, I can see that the number one problem most people have is that they mentally are not willing to make a long term change.  There are several guys I know who are in the same boat as me - naturally bigger guys carrying too much weight and desperately addicted to certain unhealthy foods.  This is a BIG problem for guys.  It is socially acceptable for guys to consume more food and to eat more "manly foods."  So they get drawn to big hefty foods - giant burritos, triple burgers, mammoth butter drenched steaks.  And breaking that addiction is their big struggle.  How can they start eating "sissy foods" like salads and soups and quiche?

That is one reason the Atkins' Diet is such a big draw for guys.  You can still eat horrible food and see weight drop off.  By depriving yourself of carbs, you can slim down fast.  And the menu is stuffed full of man-friendly foods.  Going to a fast food place?  Grab a triple cheeseburger and take the bun off.  Get the biggest steak you can at a steak place.  Pour cheese on everything.  You don't have to worry about calories or fat.  Just avoid carbs.  (This even includes fruit and veggie based carbs.)  But, it does not teach a person to eat differently.  It just is cheating the system.  And the second you go off the diet, you gain everything back.  If anything, you are in WORSE shape because it fed the addiction.  You can't go back to regular cheeseburgers, now that you have spend months eating triples.

It is a mental effort - even more than a physical one.  Most of the battle is fought - and, subsequently, won and lost - in the mind.  This is true of any addiction.  It just requires seeing the food battle as a true addiction battle.  Each food choice must be considered carefully.  You can't even grab a handful of snacks without thinking through it first.  What exactly is this I am about to eat?  Will this cause me a problem?  Is this a food that I have a problem controlling my intake of?  Is this food close to a problem food for me?  will it trigger a desire in me I can't handle?

For example, Frosted Mini Wheats brought out Chocolate Bite Size Mini Wheats a while back.  We finally let the kids try them about two or three months ago.  They loved them.  So, we frequently have them in the house.  My argument is that they are still mini wheats, which is one of the better cereals.  And they are a better snack than cookies or brownies.  So the kids have them for breakfast and sometimes for snacks - especially Gabe, who loves having them.  They are cereal.  And they are a healthier cereal.  But I refuse to even try them.  Why?  They are chocolate.  I don't want to introduce that product into my world again.  Chocolate cereal is just too dangerous for me.  I also am not eating cereal, due to the carbs.  I could come up with arguments why that would be okay.  But I feel there is danger there.  The only chocolate I ever have is in the Stonyfield Farms Fat Free Chocolate Underground yogurt, when I mix it with peanut butter as a fruit dip.  And, trust me, if you ranked that product on the chocolate flavor scale, it would be right down on the bottom near chocolate scratch and sniff stickers.

That is the kind of vigilance that is necessary.  There cannot be stray snacking or ingredients.  I have to know what I'm eating.  I don't write something off and say, "Oh no biggie.  There was hardly any on there."  Like when someone puts cheese on my salad.  Grrrr.  Now, there is definitely a down side to this kind of mental hyper-sensitivity.  There are times when that kind of careful approach leads to constantly second guessing myself - especially if things don't go well.  Every time I come to a kind of "gray area" food, it is a huge mental fight.  This happened when I decided to add in peanut butter, switch to vanilla/flavored yogurt from plain, eat beans again, bring back rice.  I would wrestle within my brain over whether or not it was okay for me to bring those foods in.  I would feel guilty once I did.  If there was any kind of glitch with my weight, I would freak out.  And then, finally, I would realize things were fine and I needed to get a grip on my weirdness.

Let me give you an example of this mental roller coaster.  Things have been a little out of the ordinary for us for the last week or so.  Last Monday, I drove down to Orlando for four days.  That meant that I was eating out a lot, away from my comfort zone.  On Thursday, I drove to Tampa to drop off a computer with my mom.  I drove back home that same day.  On Friday, we drove over to Orange Park for the weekend with Heather's family.  We spent the day in St. Augustine on Saturday.  Monday night, we came back home.  This week, the kids have their last week of school.  They get out at lunch time, so that throws off schedules.  So, for the last week and a half, I have been confronted by all kinds of dangerous situations.  Pizza.  Brownies.  Bread and chips on the table at restaurants.  Grocery stores out of town.  Not having my stash of snack foods.  Weird schedules that affect meal times.  Favorite restaurants that had trouble meals I used to eat a lot.  And tons of driving - long boring drives.  I could have wrecked in a huge manner - and it would have been "understandable."  But I didn't.  I had BBQ.  I had fajitas (without cheese, sour cream, or tortillas).  I made yogurt dip.  It actually was another big victory.  But, was I happy?  No.  I found myself upset this morning - beating myself up about frozen yogurt.

Frozen yogurt is the lastest food I wrestle with myself about.  On one level, it is just yogurt.  It has fewer calories than ice cream.  It isn't that much different than the yogurt I am eating at night.  I can top it with fruit and nuts.  And, there is an explosion of places that sell frozen yogurt.  I found three in Orlando.  There are four up here in Tallahassee.  We even found one in St. Augustine.  But, it is awfully close to ice cream.  And, through my travels, I ended up having frozen yogurt three times in the last week.  Last night was the third time.  I took the family to TCBY.  And I beat myself up about it.  I didn't have anything wrong.  I had bananas, strawberries, peanut butter and yogurt.  But I was worrying that I was slipping into the ice cream trap.  I was getting beside myself by this morning - convinced that I had ruined everything.

On Friday, after my Orlando trip, I had weighed 287.0 pounds.  That was down about a pound from before my trip.  But, on Tuesday (yesterday), after the Orange Park trip, I was up to 288.6.  I had gained weight over the weekend.  So I sat there an analyzed everything I had eaten.  "It was probably the yogurt in St. Augustine.  Or the yogurt dip.  Maybe it was too many cherries or beans."  I was beating myself up.  And this morning, I was sure that I had done myself in yesterday.  The dessert had probably put me back up over 290.  Finally, I forced myself to weigh.  I try not to weigh except on Monday and Friday.  That keeps me from obsessing every day over my weight.  But, there are times when my mind is going absolutely nuts, that I force myself to get on the scale during the week.  It is to either validate the fears - and give me something sure to work from.  Or it is to cancel the fears, so I won't keep worrying.  That was what I needed to do today.

285.0

I don't understand how I lost 3.6 pounds since yesterday.  There probably was some water retention from all the driving.  Who knows.  All I know is that I hit seventy pounds lost with that weigh in.  It also, once again, helped to diffuse a worry I had about slightly expanding an acceptable food definition.  Frozen yogurt is okay.  But I do need to restrict it to a rarity.  It is too easy to mess up with that.  At least it is an okay option when everyone is getting dessert.

It's mental.  That is good and bad.  I don't like the mental gymnastics and thrashing.  But I wouldn't want to go back to mindless eating.  I am still learning how to be strict, and cut myself some slack.  I usually drift towards one or the other.  I can clamp down and ban things.  Or I can not care and just do whatever.  But it is hard to stay anchored in the middle - merciful strictness.  (Of course, that is the same kind of struggle I have as a parent.)  Even when the battle on the scale is being won, the one in the mind still rages strong.