Hello Readers --
Things are going really well, I want to stress that I feel good and that I am very grateful.
In other news I am seeing a new 10's place number, full disclosure I am down to about 168 from my original 220. My 'goal' is to get down to having a 4 in the 10's place -- ie: maintaining between 145-149. In the past, this is a good weight for me when I'm staying active and eating with thoughtfulness
Maintaining is my struggle and the meaning behind the title of this blog: Moderating Moderating.
I took the past week off from food logging. Food logging has been revolutionary in my awareness of calories it lets me know the truth about foods and when to be generous and when to cut things in half. While I have learned and put into practice portion control coupled with emphasizing 'real' foods (lots of vegetables, regular amounts of fruit, some whole grains/regular oatmeal, low-fat dairy, and some lean meats) I have also be allowing myself to eat everything I want to eat (in moderation). Recently I have reached a size that is noticeable as is evidenced by people regularly telling me that I "look great" often followed by "what are you doing?" While my short answer is calorie counting as I believe this is key to my success it makes me nervous to say that because it sounds like a gimmick and that makes me worry that it's not sustainable.
I really relate to the video link below from this bodybuilder's weight loss of 180 pounds in his early 20's (years ago). At minute 3'33" he relays that "diet is by far more important than the gym" --I AGREE!
Even more, so I relate to his longer telling of how he was nervous to slow down his tracking of food after his first major bodybuilding experience, starting at about 18:50 he explains that he was scared that he revert back to binge eating. In the end, he did make a plan to stop tracking and ended up being successful. He attributes his success greatly to the fact that he had spent a lot of time logging food and had, therefore, learned what was acceptable, etc.
For me personally, I still need to work on learning what is acceptable but after taking a week off of logging and still losing weight this week I want to revise my plan of logging to from every meal all the time to every other week. I think this will serve me well as I look towards the long-term. Once I reach my goal weight I will revisit this strategy. Maybe I'll log every month for one week??? Or maybe just log dinners (my hardest time of the day). I think the main thing is that I have a plan and that I share that plan with someone(s). As I shared recently the accountability factor is huge for me and my sisters have generously and transparently been key, again I'm very grateful.
ObesetoBeast (diet and food logging fears)
With much love to all,
AmyB.
