Undoing old programming

I had a bit of a rough time as of late (as seen in the previous post) but I've been able to get through it, finally.

What I found out was there I had an internal sabotage point buried deep in my brain that would not allow me to get below 320lbs. Why that specific weight? No clue. I had seen it happen before so I knew that something was up. The last time that I seriously tried to lose weight was about 3 years ago. I started around 350-360 and got down to 320 and got stuck. I was stuck there for so long (about a month) that I became overly frustrated and found some reason to rationalize ending the diet.

So when it happened again this time, I knew something was at work behind the scenes. What I found was that it was my own mind trying to live up to years of programming that I had been doing to myself. I had always said to myself and others that "I'll never be skinny. I'll always be big" and if you say something enough times, you believe it and it becomes law in your mind. For some reason my mind picked 320 as the place to drawn that proverbial line in the sand and conjured up every weapon it could to thwart my efforts. So, I had a good long talk with myself (meditation) and made sure that my inner psyche understood that what I was doing was for the good of my entire body and that I was not trying to hurt myself or that I didn't love myself anymore. In fact I was doing this so I would be around longer and live a healthier and hopefully much longer life.

Within about 2 days, I felt renewed with my determination to lose the weight. I could see my goal again just like I could from day 1. The cravings and binges I did the week before were gone and that fire was roaring at full blast again. Best of all....the scale started moving again. :)

Another thing I noticed was that people are finally seeing that I've lost a lot of weight. My uniform has gone down 3 sizes (almost ready for a 4th) and when I was 320, no one noticed it but it seems like the last 10 lbs made all the difference. People are stopping me every day at work and saying "What the hell happened to you? You are looking so much better." It's funny that 3 and a half months of hard work finally gets noticed in the past few days. I'm totally not used to getting compliments so this is something new for me but I also find it encouraging. It's not just myself that sees the changes, but now it's the rest of the world that sees them too.

Diving head first into an empty swimming pool

Yes, it's dumb and yes it hurts and yes....I did just that (well metaphorically speaking).

Things had been going fairly well even with that small plateau I hit but somewhere along the way I think I got lost. 2 out of the past 3 days (Monday and today) have involved MAJOR binges on my part. No it wasn't candy or ice cream or any of the typical ammunition used with such dietetic attacks. This was meat, cheese and mayonaise (at least it was low fat hehehe).

After both times I felt like shit. I was thinking "what the hell did I just do!" Here I am 60 pounds lighter than when I started and fitting into clothes I haven't been able to wear in about 3 years and I'm destroying it all!

Have I given up? No. Have I lost sight of my goal? Maybe a little. Have I become bored with my program? Umm...yes. For nearly 12 weeks I've been doing the same thing day in and day out meal wise. There has been very little variety or change in the routine. I know I used to use non-fat sugar-free yougurt instead of milk for my shakes once in a while (roughly the same amount of calories - Dannone Sillouette brand) but maybe I need to do something else, something more.

I know I've been horrible about going to the gym. I've had ZERO motivation and it's been about 3 weeks since I've been there. I have lots of excuses but no good reasons.

I think what added to this (this time) is that I've had 3 days off in a row. Three days of being stuck in the house and being BORED! At work it's not an issue and tomorrow I start my week (4 on, 3 off, repeat) so those days will be easier.

So what will I do? Well first off I'll get over being pissed, angry, depressed, frustrated, and every other bad thing towards myself and brush myself off and start again. It's not the end of the world, just a nasty pothole that I thought was a puddle.