A Hard Day

Fasting is hard.

Not in the same way half days are, but more in the stomach-growling way.  And a "don't mess with me ~ mama's starving" life-threatening kind of way towards suppertime.

Cooking supper is tough, but the smell of baking bread is killer.  I really need to plan my bread-baking days more wisely!

I almost caved after my walk this afternoon.  But then I told myself that I've done this before and I can do it again.  So suck it up, Buttercup.

Fasting IS hard.  But teaching my stomach that I can live with less ~ and even more importantly, teaching my mind that I can be content without indulging every desire and appetite ~ is really the goal here.  That's so much more important than just seeing the numbers change on the scale.

(although let's face it, that's the most satisfying way of knowing I'm on the right track!)

I find it's tougher to fast when I'm not alone at home.  Today hubby was around all day, so I can't just do whatever I want whenever I want.  That's why I went for a walk at 12:30 instead of right after the girls get on the school bus.  That way he could eat without feeling guilty and I didn't have to see and smell it.

I also find it tougher to fast when I'm working, which I find weird because it's obviously easier to stay away from food.  Not bringing any with me pretty much fixes that!  But mentally I find it harder.  I believe it's a bit of a monotony-buster at work.  I only work seasonally around tax time at a local accounting firm, but that's right around the corner, so I will need to come up with a strategy of sorts to fight through the fasting days I'll be spending there.

I'm just thankful that fasting is easier than figuring out what "half" is...

...because there are more fasting days than half days in this eating plan.

Okay, but half of WHAT??

I mentioned in my previous post that I wasn't sure exactly what my plan was, but since then, I've decided to commit myself to following the eating plan that inspired this blog for the next 24 weeks.  That will bring me to the end of the school year and HOPEFULLY to my goal weight, which is just under 30 lbs away.

In following the plan now for a few days, I remembered how much I hated "half" days and why.  The following is a re-post from my first go at this plan.

I have come to really dislike these "half" days. What is HALF of what I would normally eat? I dare you to try it sometime ~ it's WAY harder than it sounds.

And to complicate things further, my "normal" has obviously changed somewhat over the last two weeks because I often think I've stopped at half and yet I'll feel like I've eaten too much.

Interestingly, I don't usually have that problem on the two "normal" days of this eating plan.

I don't usually have problems with over-eating or excessive snacking on "normal" OR "liquids" days either.

But on "half" days? Much more likely to be an issue. Isn't that weird?

I think it's interesting that I find "liquid" days easier to handle than "half" days. It's easier for me to just not eat, PERIOD, than to try and figure out and limit myself to what I believe would be half of what I would normally eat. I'm tellin' ya, it's harder than it sounds!!

I'm sure the point of having these "half" days in the eating plan is to really force me to examine in great detail how much I've eaten in the past compared to how little I can actually survive just fine on. But it's SO hard to determine what HALF is!!!

One thing I've discovered is that I can't allow myself to eat anything beyond what is on my plate at the beginning of the meal. My lunch today is a perfect example of why:

I began the meal with a half-bun and two thin slices of cheese on my plate, a half-cup of homemade beef barley soup in my bowl, and a cup of homemade ice tea.

What I also put on the table were containers of my mom's best pickles, raw cucumber slices, and carrot sticks, and a plate with more cheese slices.

After finishing half my open-faced cheese sandwich and some soup, I grabbed a few carrots, pickles, and cucumbers. Hubby and I were deep in conversation; the girls already playing in the living room.

And then I grabbed a piece of cheese.

And then more carrots and cucumbers.

Now, I KNOW carrots and cucumbers have next to no calories and no fat at all, so likely, as far as that goes, I probably still ate only about half what I normally would have ~ half the more fattening stuff, that is. But if the point is to really examine the quantities we eat, even replacing the other half of my bun and bowl of soup with extra carrots and cucumbers is still missing the point.

See what I mean? The line between half the quantity and half the quality can be kinda hazy sometimes. You understanding yet why I find these days a little aggravating?!

What do YOU think is more important?

Can I substitute quality for quantity and still count it as a "half" meal or does it literally have to be HALF of everything I WOULD eat, regardless of nutritional value? ARGH!

Reps.

Repetition.  Repetitiveness.  Repetitious...

With exercise and good habits, it's a good thing.

With failure, not so much.

I looked over my post from last January 1st and debated just copying and pasting it here today.  Even the numbers are virtually identical.

(Well, except that mention of my 40th birthday.)

((THAT came and went a year and a half ago...))

My self-discipline and motivation HAVE improved in some areas of my life over the last several months, but unfortunately, not in the eating/exercise category.

And I'm so tired of this.  Tired of trying, succeeding for a while, and then falling back into old eating and lack-of-exercise habits and finding myself having gained a fair portion of the weight back again in FAR too short a time.  I'm so tired of this cycle and I can't even imagine how tired everyone around me is of hearing about it while seeing I'm not really doing anything about it.

The Man and I decided over Christmas that both of us really need to lose some weight and that we need to somehow figure out a way to work together at it.  We went to bed two nights in a row with growling stomachs and struggled to fall asleep despite the gnawing feeling.

The next day, he came home from town with a package of four Oh Henry chocolate bars.  ::sigh::  While there are still three of those bars sitting in the freezer a week later, I don't think I've managed to achieve that empty feeling again since then.

The reality is, for those of us not blessed with high metabolisms, controlling our weight will always be a struggle.  There will never come a time when we can quit thinking about it.  There's no "set it and forget it" switch on this thing.  And I guess that's what I find so discouraging ~ knowing this is something I will forever HAVE to work at, no matter if and when I achieve my goal weight.

I have tried and succeeded with several diets and eating plans in the past, the most effective being the "Woman of Moderation" study that inspired this blog in the first place.  There were no dietary restrictions, per sé, and no exercise requirements, and I lost a significant amount of weight.  Of course, you have three 24-hr periods per week where you eat NOTHING...

I have tried to go back to that plan, modifying it slightly to be a little less daunting.  I swapped the numbers of "normal" and fasting days, but even doing that, I struggled to maintain two fasting days a week.  Maybe I just didn't try hard enough.  I have a hard time not having lunch when I'm working.  When I'm at home all day, it's not so bad, but I just couldn't do it while I was working last tax season.  And since that seasonal job will begin again within the next two weeks, I'm tempted not to bother trying to re-start that eating plan again.

I just want to simply train myself to eat less, but I am really not sure how to do that, exactly.  When there's no written plan or checklist to follow or calculations to make, I find it's just a little too nebulous a concept.  And yet recording everything, weighing and measuring everything, counting points... there's no way I'm sticking to that kind of a plan for the rest of my life either.  That's unrealistic.

MODERATION really is the key, even in coming up with a plan.  Wish me luck.