The truth is, I've kind of been experimenting with what would happen if I just went about living my life without thinking about this whole thing all the time. For the past year, the thought of losing weight and controlling food has been near the front of my mind just about every day. After losing the 100 pounds, my body plateaued. It is obvious that I won't lose any more weight without either A) cutting my already restrictive diet even more or B) exercising. I refuse to do the first choice. The point of all of this was not to create a torturous and unpleasant set of rules to live by. I was trying to free myself. So, I am going to have to resort to exercise - something I loathe and still haven't gotten the drive to do yet. Now that we are emerging from the frigid winter (for Florida), I will probably start.
But, it has been interesting these past two months to see what happens if I try to just live my life with this new set of guidelines. The truth is, it has been very pleasant. Sure, there are times where the pinch of my "outlawed foods" makes me miss something. I still hate having to have cook and serve pizza for the kids. It is just too tempting. And I have been craving a burger for about two weeks now. But, overall, what I have constructed is a very workable way of life for me. And it is apparently working for my body. For two months now I have weighed exactly the same. So, I guess I have found that balance between calories taken and burned.
In doing this, I have loosened some of the restraints to see what happens. So far, nothing bad has come of it. Here are some examples of that.
- I have never liked Chinese food. It is just one of those things that never clicked with me - probably because it didn't have cheese or bread. Now, though, I have found myself utilizing it in its different forms - Chinese take out, Sarku at the Mall, Cajun Cafe (which is just glorified Chinese food). And, when I get Chinese food, I usually will get an egg roll. Yes, it is fried. But as I looked at it, I realized I never was "addicted" to egg rolls. So one those rare instances when I get Chinese food, I'll get an egg roll.
- The fried food embargo has not been completely lifted. Things like chicken tenders, fish sticks, french fries, cheese sticks are still banned. But I do get non-breaded wings sometimes - mostly at places where that is the only option for me. And, if we are at a place where fried pickles or onion rings are sold, I usually will get those. My logic on that is that those experiences are maybe once a month, they have some sort of veggie associated with them, and that it will be hard to start an addiction with something that hard to find. (The only have fried pickles at two restaurants in Tallahassee, that I know of - Zaxby's and Buffalo Wild Wings. So I'm pretty safe.)
- We got a free box of truffles at Earth Fare last month. There were about thirty small truffles in the box. I never have been a chocolate fanatic like my mom or youngest son. I like it, but it is far from an uncontrollable food for me. But I do like truffles. I have allowed myself to have one truffle a day. This has worked, since there still are some in the box and it's been three weeks now. Restraint is the key - something that I have finally learned to some extent. Chocolate is still on the watch list, but it is not forbidden. Sometimes there are chocolate chunks in my frozen yogurt. At the movies (which are very rare), I may get chocolate raisins. So, it is a controlled relationship.
- Another food I always hated and now love is guacamole. I actually have found lots of dips that are great for me - salsa, black bean dip, greek yogurt veggie dip. The problem is finding something to dip into those things. I have wrestled with this for a while. I liked chips. But it was not normal for me to annihilate a whole bag at a sitting. I remember growing up, my brother would open a bag of Doritos and just inhale the whole thing watching a game. My Munchos would sit in the cupboard, slowly decreasing for weeks. But chips are dangerous. I finally loosened up a little with some restrictions. At Mexican places, I will allow myself some tortilla chips with the salsa or guac. At home, I have found Rice Works chips - made from brown rice. They are awesome and go great with guacamole. For the Super Bowl party, I had those with Heather's homemade guac. Yum.
I still only drink water. During the day, I snack on fruit (bananas and apples, mostly) and nuts. Sometimes I'll have dried fruit or yogurt covered dried fruit. For lunch, I usually have leftovers or some kind of meat, bean, rice mixture I have in the fridge. Breakfast is still just yogurt - although once a week or so I'll toss in some granola for fun. And I end my day with frozen yogurt. The structure and routine is important. And if I don't have an option, I still will decide to eat nothing over cheating. This happened the other day when we went to Subway for lunch. Natalie and Heather like Subway and had been missing it. So we went and I ate later. At home, if I don't have any meal options, I'll eat another yogurt. Those are my emergency options.
[Side Note - if you want to make a really good yogurt dish, get a Chobani lemon yogurt, a Fage Blueberry yogurt, and a handful of granola. Mix it all together. It has like 23 grams of protein and around 300 calories. Really carries you over for even dinner.]
So, all told, I am maintaining and living. I will never say the food issues are conquered. If I was to go eat a donut right now, I have no clue if I could stop. So, those things are going to be off limits for a long time. I just can't risk it. But I feel confident that I can keep this approach to food going. I am happy and enjoying it. I feel good about how I look. I regularly wear XLT shirts now - and some of those are big. I even was able to button some LT shirts, but they would spread open too much if I tried to sit down. So, if I don't post often, it isn't because I failed or am ashamed. There just isn't a lot to say right now. But, once the exercising starts, I'll be back on here again to document that struggle.
