4/26/2012: Ups and Downs

Today's weigh-in was 208.2 pounds.  This is the first week in a while that I actually lost a little weight from Monday to Thursday, so I am pleased with that.  The funny thing is, I can't help wanting just a little bit more and being just slightly disappointed that I was not able to get to the 207.somethings by today.  This week I have been very conscious of everything I ate, including not licking my fingers or snacking on cookies when I baked about 600 cookies for a company picnic.  That took willpower!  I was hoping that willpower alone would cause me to drop a pound.  Of course, it didn't.  Sometimes the reality sets in around me like a wet blanket on a cold day, this is going to take a long time.  It's easy to get impatient with this process, to want to see more results, faster.  I've been exercising 6 days a week for almost 9 weeks, I'm starting to feel pretty good.  I'm stronger, I have better balance, my clothes are getting looser, I'm sleeping well, I feel like a million bucks.  What I feel like, really, is like I should look like a million bucks.  I am internalizing these changes a lot faster than I am externalizing them, and my outward image is not keeping up with my inward image.  Not even a little bit.  It's hard for me to accept the fact that it is going to take another month, an entire month, to get below 200 pounds.  I am guessing it will be that first week of June, before I see 199.8, or thereabouts, on my scale.  I want it tomorrow, or next week, not next month.  That's not going to happen.  Accept it.  I think the origins of today's frustration came from setting a little trap for myself.  About two weeks ago I thought maybe, just maybe, I could lose 20 pounds by my birthday if I was very careful with food and super diligent about exercise.  I set a stealth goal for myself.  I kept telling myself to not set the goal, because I knew it was a super big reach and I knew how frustrated I'd get if I set the goal and didn't make it.  But still, deep down inside, I secretly made that a goal.  Today I faced the harsh reality that this is an impossible reach.  I cannot make it to 204 by next Thursday.  It's impossible.  And if I starved myself to try, that would just be stupid and counterproductive.  So I've settled back down to the original plan.  The goal is 1.5 pounds a week.  This is going to take 48 weeks.  That is OK.  It will be June before I see the 190s.  That is OK.  This is a slow boat, but it's a steady boat.  I am going to get there, I'm just not going to get there over night.

Sometimes I can't help being disappointed in myself for not sticking to my plan when I started this last June.  Back then, I knew what I needed to do, but I didn't stick with it.  Back then, last June, reaching my goal weight by my 50th birthday was attainable.  But I blew it.  A lot of times I am disappointed in myself for ever letting myself get this heavy in the first place.  *Sigh*  These emotions are bubbling up because of my impending birthday.  It is a benchmark year, the end of my 50th.  Ever since I was a little kid I wanted to live to be 100 years old.  This birthday marks the end of my first half.  If you've been reading my blog all along, you know how much I am looking forward to the second half, so this is a happy occasion, not a sad one, but I can't help looking back 10 months and saying to myself, "If you had just stuck with it back then, you'd be there, already."  Shake it off!!!! 

Enough of this nonsense, there is a bit of good news I want to share with you.  I think I have turned a corner on the whole exercise thing.  I alluded to it a couple of days ago when I wrote about trying to talk myself out of exercising.  Did you catch that?  I was trying to talk myself out of exercising, not into exercising.  Then yesterday, a similar thing happened.  I was up late on Tuesday night (10:30, for me, is late) baking cookies for a company picnic.  I had to be at work at 7:00AM for an interview Wednesday morning.  That meant in order to get to the gym and work out, I had to get up even earlier than normal.  I started to process through all the reasons why I should just skip exercise on Wednesday morning, but I couldn't do it.  I build enough cushion into my mornings that in reality, all I really needed to do was get up 15 minutes earlier and then rush just a little, and I would be fine.  So that's what I did.  I got up at 4:15 yesterday morning to be at the gym and pumping iron by 4:30.  I was back home shortly after 5:30 and made it to the interview in plenty of time.  The fact of that matter is, not exercising was not an option for me.  I had to do it.  Dare I say, I wanted to do it?  I don't know if I'm ready to make that mental leap.  But I can say, with conviction, that I exercise every morning.  It is part of my routine.  With the exception of one planned day off a week, I exercise every day.  It's what I do.  Yes, it feels good to be able to say that.  It's a relief, in a way.  It feels like a load off my shoulders to know that I have effectively incorporated vigorous exercise into my daily routine.  That's a start!!!

And now its time for me to do that other thing that I have to do everyday.  Work.  Have a great day, everyone!!

Oh, and by the way, Rebecca, I was thinking about you and your heart monitor story when I put up the title to this post.  Thank you for that!!!!