Yes, today is March 30, 2015 and it has been around TEN months since I last came on here to post. As expected, I am no longer at 150 lbs or whatever weight I was back in July of 2014. I got back up to 165 lbs and, since I am no longer weighing myself, would guess that I am probably down to about 163 lbs.
I was reading through my posts from last year and it was so frustrating. I wanted to jump back in time and slap some sense into myself. I was clearly falling off the wagon but wasn't doing anything to stop it. In fact, I seemed to believe that, since I had been dieting for two months, I could now control my cravings and could therefore go back to eating the crap I always had, expect this time in moderation. How f'ing stupid could I be? It had only been TWO MONTHS!! Ugh. I thought I was all about "eating healthy" and "being fit" but when I look back and see what I was eating I realize that I was TOTALLY fooling myself. I wasn't eating healthy, I was just counting calories.
I have wanted to lose weight for years. At some point, when I feel more ballsy, I will post my pre-fat "bikini model" body so you can see what I looked light before packing all of the fat on. It's funny because you don't get fat over night but it really feels that way. One day you wake up and look in the mirror and think "HOW DID I GET THIS BIG??!!" It's also funny that millions of Americans (like myself) want to lose weight more than anything but when you put a piece of cake in front of them all bets are off. We are literally saying "I would rather have that fatty piece of cake than be thin and healthy". What is it with us? Can we really not control ourselves? Are we that pathetic??
I am sorry but I am so frustrated reading through these posts. I started off so excited. I was feeling amazing!! And then life happened like it always does and I got sick for a few days. I then had a brilliant idea to try a juice cleanse RIGHT AFTERWARD. I'm not sure why I didn't realize that started a juice cleanse right after being sick for five days and not eating, is probably the worst thing you could do. That is just starving yourself. I then ran out of the Alli pills I was taking and then all bets were off. They no longer sold Alli (they had taken it off the market) so I was screwed. I went online and found some Orlistat pills I could buy from somewhere in Asia. I spent about $60 on them and was so excited when they came in the mail. My mom saw the package and said, "You seriously didn't order pills from somewhere in Asia. They could be anything. They have different laws there after all." I ended up listening to my mom and never took a single pill.
Fast forward a few months, my kids father and I finally moved back in together after four years of living separately. That arrangement lasted about thirty days. I am not joking. We moved in together on October 18, 2018 and by November 30, 2014 I knew we were over. It is a LONG story but the short version is that I left him once and for all. My daughters and I moved out into a cute little house nearby. We moved into that house on January 8, 2015 and I have never looked back. After a ten year relationship it felt oddly amazing being single. I could focus all of my time and energy on being a mom and growing my accounting business.
I was in denial about my weight. I knew I was fat (impossible to be in denial about that). What I was really in denial about was how it affected me. I pretended like it didn't bother me (even though I HATED seeing my reflection). Moving out was a form of starting over for me. Although I was a little sad, the breakup was so freeing because I finally felt like I was taking control over my life. About a month after the move I started to realize that I would also have to come to terms with my weight, I just wasn't sure I was ready. Even though I wanted to lose weight really really f'ing badly, I was so unsure of myself (still am). I have tried to lose weight so many times. What sucks is that I have been successful at losing weight more times than I can count. Where I fail is in keeping the weight off. Each time I lose twenty pounds I gain back thirty. When I started dieting in 2009 I was around 145. When I started dieting in 2014 I was 180 lbs.
About a month or so ago I got an email that changed everything. I wish I could say that I came to some realization, like I woke up one day just determined to lose weight... but that didn't happen and I want these posts to be insanely honest. The truth is, I got an email from the makers of Alli telling me that Alli was about to come back on the market. I went online immediately to see if I could buy it and, for the first time in a year, I could. Drugstore.com was selling Alli. The other store (Walgreens, Walmart. Target...) hadn't started selling Alli yet but their sites said they would be selling it soon. I decided to wait to see if I could buy it directly from a local store. After a couple weeks I was at Walgreens and saw an ad in their weekly flyer about Alli being on sale. I looked in the diet pill aisle and did not see it. I was about to ask the cashier about it when I saw the sale price in the flyer: $69.99. The price at drugstore.com was $59.99 so I went online using my iPhone (while still in Walgreens) and purchased Alli from drugstore.com.
I was so excited when my package arrived a couple days later. I immediately decided to start Alli the next morning. The instructions say to try a low fat diet for a week first but I didn't want to wait. I had waited long enough. The next morning I started a new low-fat diet and started taking Alli (which has helped keep me in check). That was about a month ago.
This time around it is seriously about being healthy. I want to be healthy just as much as I want to lose weight. I am tired of my knees hurting when I go upstairs. I am tired of my feet hurting when I am on them for an hour. I am tired of being fat and unhealthy. When I previously tried to lose weight I focused on the dieting side of things. This time around I am focused on the healthier aspect of it all. For example, I have been reading a lot of articles about being healthy and one of the first things I kept coming across was how bad artificial sweeteners are for you. I used to drink regular soda but in 2009 (when I started my first Atkins diet) I switched to diet soda and never looked back. It seems pretty clear that artificial sweeteners make you crave sugar more than actual sugar does. So, the first thing I did was cut out soda COMPLETELY. I still drink coffee every morning (with nonfat milk and powder hazelnut creamer) but I no longer drink daily sugar free Redbulls or Rockstars. I look at ingredients on packages and stay away from food that has too much sugar or too much fat. I started eating rice with my meals but it was white rice. I kept reading health articles and switched to brown rice which is better for you. I know have veggies EVERY night with dinner. I am not doing the whole "half a plate of veggies" but I am eating WAY MORE than I used to (which was nothing). I use a third of my plate for veggies, a third for a lean protein, and a third for brown rice or something similar.
My last doctor's appointment was back in October. I told my doctor that I was exercising regularly. She asked about my eating habits and I admitted that they weren't that great. I said, "But at least I am exercising." She said I had everything backward. If I had to pick between eating healthy and exercising she said EATING HEALTHY was way better for you. Now, that's not to say that exercising isn't great for you...because it is. It's just, if you had to pick one, my doctor said I should pick to eat healthy.
I came on here today to write how hard it is to stay motivated to work while trying to lose weight. But I then started reading my previous posts and got angry with myself. This post is way longer than I expected so sorry for that. I will write another post about my motivation to work (at my business). For now, I just want to let the 1-2 people a month who come across this that I am back in full force. Even if no one reads this that is 100% fine by me. I just want to document what I am going through so I can look back to see what I was doing right and what I was doing wrong...Like I did today.
xoxo Marie
