Realizations

This has been a hard weekend for me in some ways.  I'm plugging along, feeling really good about the lifestyle changes I'm implementing and feeling like I'm making progress on creating some good habits.  I ate a little too many calories when I was in Anchorage on Friday, but it didn't freak me out or make me give up.  I just kept going. Then, Bob mentions that he ran into an old, and former friend of mine and she had lost major weight.  She's doing this Ideal Protein diet that so many folks I know are on.  I had actually considered it myself.  My dr. mentioned that she has lots of patients that do well on it, and some friends of mine have lost a bunch.  I did some research (it's basically an 800 calorie high protein diet using their food) and decided that given my past history a long term, but slower, plan would be more successful.  However, knowing that this person that I really don't like is all skinny now sent me into a deep depression.  My husband tried to support me, my best friend cited scientific studies about how my approach was most likely to be successful in the long term, my son called me to the living room saying a Weight Watchers commercial was on.

So after questioning my choices - Do I do Ideal Protein myself?  Do I just give up and crack open the cookies?  Do I do some other diet?

Somehow I managed to not freak out completely.  I thought about it long and hard.  In the past, when I've "dieted" I always perseverate on food and freak out and end up binging.  What's been nice about this whole new approach is that I'm NOT dieting.  I'm making healthy choices to stay in the 1100-1300 calorie range.  I'm exercising consistently.  I'm developing some good alternatives to my inclination to overeat every time I get stressed.  So I've decided to stay my course.  It's a long term plan but it's doable and realistic and lets me feel like I can live my life.

So it's all good.  Crisis averted, at least temporarily.  I'm keeping my eyes on the prize.