blogging challenge

Guess who didn’t blog last week… me. I got caught up reading on the PEER trainer site, and spent my ’scheduled time’ for posting that way. I’m still reading other blogs here and posting comments, but it isn’t the same. Last week I had a gain, and this week I’m showing a loss so far. I sure am glad for my long-time weight graph. It helps me get through the bumpy, but downward trending process. I have also been actively challenging myself to include activities that enrich my life. This is a good thing. But, it cuts into my ‘computer time’, which is also a good thing. Gotta go… got a new study group this evening…
Weight: gained last week 1 (-3/5)
Weight: lost this week -.5 (-3.5/5)
For the next while I will focus on including activities in my life that are enriching, get me out of the house and off the computer, and encourage me to be active in an informal way. While I am in the process of limiting negative things in my life, it important to include more positive things to take their place. If I do not, the negative activities tend to sneak back in.
Emily

Change in plans

My normal weigh in day is Wednesday, and I had dropped another half pound. To drop a half pound a week is my plan, so I am pleased. But that is only one measure. I purchased split skirts at the beginning of the summer, and the waist is loose. Each one has been worn and washed twice, and I’m wondering if I want to bother with tightening the waistband’s elastic. I smiled. This is a problem I like. I have decided to blog on my weigh-in days so I can track my progress.

My lessons are now around experiencing negative emotions without turning to food. Emotional eating contains important lessons for me. The lesson that continues to call for my attention is that not every emotion needs to become an action. This week my focus is on reminding myself of what I have learned:
Mindset Techniques:
Label feeling (I’m upset, not hungry); Stand firm (NO CHOICE); Don’t Struggle (oh, well…); imagine aftermath of giving in (bad result for short term relief); Read Advantages Card (Are they still important?)
Behavioral Techniques:
Distract myself; drink soothing low-calorie beverage (tea); relax (audiotape, music, muscle relaxation, guided imagery, deep breathing, slow breathing); set my timer for 20 minutes, and celebrate the number of minutes I am in ‘relaxed learning’ mode
I will apply several of these techniques as soon as I start to feel upset. Once I calm down, work on solving the problem that led to the negative emotion in the first place.
Response: By putting time between the emotional signal and the eating behavior, I am giving myself the time to make a constructive choice. I will think of this time as being in ‘relaxed learning mode’.

Thought: I can’t believe that ….
Response: I can’t prepare for every situation. The only certainty is that it will not go exactly as expected. Look for the opportunities.
Thought: After all this work, I’m still making emotional eating decisions.
Response: I am making mistakes to a lesser degree. Life is about refinement, not perfection.
Response: Because of my conscious effort, negative emotions have less power to shock or discourage or slow me down as I work toward my goal.

Thought: I’m upset because… therefore, it’s ok for me to eat to calm down.
Response: I’m upset. I’ll try to solve the problem. If I can’t focus on problem solving, I can use my mindset and behavioral tools first.
Thought: I can’t calm down without eating.
Response: I have lots of tools to use instead of food. I’ll be glad in a little while that I didn’t compound the original problem by eating.
Thought: I deserve to eat when I’m feeling bad.
Response: I deserve to feel better. I deserve comfort. But I also deserve to be thinner. Comforting myself with food will only work temporarily, and I’ll feel even worse later.
Response: Once I start using strategies other than eating to calm down, dieting will be easier.
Exercise: gardening
Weight: lost .5 (-4/5)

Enriching My Life

This weekend I went to Cirque, and actually worried about what I was going to wear. When we got there folks were in all manner of Denver-sloppy, relaxed-hanging out clothes. It is so funny to me that I would worry about that rather than the positive anticipation of the experience. “Will I fit in?” seems to be my question, rather than will I enjoy myself as I am choosing to do things to enrich my life. I had to laugh at myself this weekend. I dog myself a lot about my level of exercise and being out of shape. Then I look around. I am dating a guy that is much less active than I am, which gives me a new perspective of how my ‘athletic friends’ experience time with me. But it is fun to be with a person that walks at my speed. I guess my point is that being self-conscious about looks or level of physical fitness is a bigger block for me to enriching my life than the options available to me. I guess my new reminder card should read: “Have fun … it doesn’t matter what you wear or how fast you do it… just do it.”
Exercise: Treadmill

Changing My Environment

I love my new mattress and finally got the microwave installed. It’s amazing how important a good night’s sleep is. I also decided to re-arrange the location of the treadmill. Before, it was placed where it would be most out of the way, and yet able to be used. Unfortunately the visual stimulus was bad while using it. So, I moved it. That, alone, was an amazing accomplishment for me. Now I see it at the top of the stairs (when the bedroom door is open), ready to go, I am reminded to exercise, and I have a nice view of the house, TV, and outside window when I’m exercising. I don’t know why I didn’t do this before.
Exercise: treadmill

Rewards – Thursday

Non-food rewards have stumped me for a while. I have planned for a week to consider a rewards/celebration system, but just ‘haven’t gotten to it’ (which usually means I don’t have a clue). My big purchase this week has been a new mattress. But that’s not a ‘reward’, it is a need (and the specific mattress I selected is a want). A reward needs to be something I don’t otherwise allow myself, or something else out of the ordinary that reminds me of my successes towards my mini-goals. I think this last idea may be helpful for me. So, my question is, what else ‘out of the ordinary’ could I do/get to remind myself of the mini-goals I’ve reached? It would be nice if the system/rewards could accommodate the small successes as well as the mini goals. (Examples of small successes would be going to a party and staying ‘on plan’, tracking my calories on FitDay, keeping an accurate Wellness Journal, consciously saying ‘NO CHOICE’ to a desire or craving) I’m already kind of doing this with my ‘atta girl’ counter, maybe I need to develop a List of Rewards and attach points to each one. Maybe I need to think about this from a different direction: stopping something I enjoy, but earning it back with a certain number of points. Maybe I could think about the reward as a point where I do something for someone else (once I reach my mini-goal, take my mom shopping for something she’d like). This last one appeals to me. I think that will be what I do when I reach my first mini-goal. What’s bad about this one is that I KNOW mom will select a big bag of Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups. (She weighs 89 lbs and lives in assisted living so, I guess, there’s worse things, but I don’t want to be a ‘food pusher’.) It will be fun to see if I am right. That gives me another idea. For reaching another mini-goal I could take my grandkids shopping…now THAT would be fun. Hey, maybe I could ‘earn’ a day at the spa for my daughters-in-law. Teehee, now this is getting fun. It isn’t really rewarding to me to give myself something else, but I do enjoy the idea that I have to ‘earn’ the reward of giving ‘stuff’ to people I love. Maybe I should plan on taking a picture on each ‘shopping trip’ and keep that as a Rewards Reminder.

Exercise: treadmill

NO CHOICE thinking challenge-Wednesday

Making conscious choices can be challenging. When I get a desire or a craving, I feel the best when I automatically shift to NO CHOICE thinking, but I am not consistent with this shift. When I don’t automatically go to NO CHOICE thinking, I am doing better at pausing and thinking through the choices that I have, which includes eating something on my eating plan (perhaps at a time I had not planned on eating it). As I am in the process of shifting from ‘choice’ to ‘no choice’ thinking, I am doing better at pausing and thinking about where the choice to eat will lead me, and how I might feel about myself afterwards…If I have to think, then I should THINK IT THROUGH to its logical conclusion. Thinking before I act, choosing NO CHOICE thinking, and making the choice to do something besides eating, is what will help me the most in the long run. It is important to review my Anti-Craving Strategies…
- Mindset: label it, don’t struggle, NO CHOICE, imagine the aftermath of giving in, remember goal
- Behavior techniques: distance myself, drink water, relax, distract myself
Weight: lost .5 (-3.5/5)

Preparing to Weigh In – Tuesday

As I think about weighing in tomorrow, I am reminding myself that the number on the scale is only information, and only one way I am measuring my progress. One important measure of the impact of this program is that I am taking the time to take care of myself, and making that a priority. I am starting to identify my needs and wants. I am pausing before I eat to distinguish hunger, desire, and craving. I truly expect to have dropped a half a pound this week. I will be surprised but not devastated if I don’t.

Thought: It’s reasonable to have lost a half pound this week, but I wish it were more.
Response: My weight is going down. That’s good. It means that what I’ve been doing is working. I celebrate every half-pound weight loss. If I expect something unrealistic, I’ll be disappointed. I really deserve a lot of credit for using the mindset and behavioral techniques I’ve learned since I started this program.

Revisiting my Advantages for Weight Loss

Today I have been drawn to review and challenge my basic assumptions, therefore, my motivation to continue this process.
I have identified my purpose for this stage of my life as follows: “I enjoy a healthy, active life of shared fulfillment and abundance.” When I evaluate what I am doing, it needs to be measured against my purpose. So, in looking at my Advantages for Weight Loss, I have made progress in the following areas:
Feel greater self-esteem
- Feel in control of my body (less self-critical, happier when I step on the scales)
Improve health
- One way to monitor healthy eating habits
Easier to exercise: which will preserve my ability to function well—
- I have made no progress here in planned exercise, although spontaneous exercise is much better
The other identified advantages are long-term in nature. My biggest improvement is that I am not as self-critical. So, is what I am doing helping me work toward my purpose? Yes. I am giving my program 70% effort, and will continue through the end of the month before another re-evaluation step.

Emotional Eating: After-Holiday Letdown

One challenge for me is getting back to my routine, which includes planning/monitoring/no choice after a holiday. It has taken me 3 days to get back on track. That’s when the negative self-talk can be brutal if I have not followed my plan. Then I can get depressed or angry with myself because of the ‘lost opportunity’ for making progress on my plan. Now is the time I need to be most assertive in doing what I need to do for myself: get back to counting when I give myself positive messages, plan/monitor/no choice pattern, and ‘oh, well…’ if necessary. I can only change what I am doing right now. Regret, worry, embarrassment, are all wasted energy. I can focus on asking, ‘what did I learn?’, and ‘what adjustments do I need to make?’, and ‘do what I know to do’.

Monitoring: Measurements

There are so many ways for me to monitor my progress. Too often I get stuck on using the scale as my only measure. Today I decided to take my measurements. The last time I measured was 9/26/06. I weighed 4 lbs less then than I do now and I was 3.5 inches smaller (stated another way, I gained 4 lbs and 3.5 inches since 9/26/06). I realize I am actually down 10 pounds from my highest weight since this time, so the trend is shifting. Keeping track of my measurements is important for me. I have tracked them since 8/2000. Two measurements that have helped me gain perspective are my waist and hips. I have lost 12.5 inches in each of them since 8/2000. That’s a total of 25 inches in just these two areas of measurement. I believe it will be important for me to measure each month for a while, as I apply my new skills. In this way I will be able to prove to myself what is working and keep my weight loss and body size in perspective.

 

Exercise: another day of 45 minutes sweating in the garden (Today I listened to a CD I had wanted to hear, so I am linking my garden work with ‘reward’ time.) I have decided that since I have to expend so much exercise energy to keep the garden up, I will not expand my exercise into other planned areas until I get help here. I realize this is worded as an ‘excuse’, but it important for me to stay within the parameters of my energy and fitness level.