My Diet - Weeks 4 & 5

I know this is late. I’ve been avoiding it for two whole weeks. And at first I didn’t have a reason to avoid it other than I was just being childish. But after that, I was avoiding it because I was ashamed.

So the bald truth is that I cheated this weekend and went TOTALLY off diet. I ate pretty much whatever was put in front of me.

However, that was preceded by the news that I’d lost a total of 21.5 lbs in my 4 weeks! YAY! It was obvious because all of my pants where practically falling off me. That’s a mixed blessing. Everyone keeps telling me they can really see the difference. I can’t, but if you think about it, that’s four 5lb bags of sugar. THAT’S HUGE!

So I stood naked in front of my mirror and started examining myself and I STILL don’t see it. People say they see it in my face…I spent an hour examining my face in the mirror.

No matter how hard I try I don’t see it. I feel it a little. My pants are looser and I need a belt. But that’s it. On top of that, Little Man went away to summer camp for the first time.

Most mothers would be overjoyed to have a week without the kids. And I must say I had planned out my “dream schedule” for while he was gone. But once I actually dropped him off and he told me “You can leave now mommy” and wouldn’t let me kiss him in front of his friends, I just kind of broke.

I cried the whole way home. I sat like a lump and stared at my computer. I had no words for the diet. They were all tied up in the fact that my baby is growing up! I’m not ready for this yet! I suppose no parent thinks themselves ready for their offspring to grow up, but it hit me hard and fast I guess.

Over the next 5 days, I stared at books that I needed to read, stared at my computer screen and stared at my TV, all without actually paying attention to any of it. I remember how long he took to walk and how we took him to speech therapy because he was 2 and not talking yet, only to be told that he would talk when he had something to say. I remember how scared and pissy I was when he was delivered by emergency C-section more than 2 months before he was due and how incredibly angry I was that I hadn’t even gotten the chance to take ONE Lamaze class. I don’t know why but that seemed very important at the time.

Eventually I pulled myself out of my stupor enough to at least attempt to play his video games. The plan was to be kinda good at it by the time he came home, because apparently, according to him, I suck. And on the day he came back, when my grandmother picked him up while I was at work and called me to let me talk to him, I cried silently while he told me how much fun he’d had and how he was happy to be home.

He came home 7/2, so we went straight into the holiday weekend. So I gorged. I ate every single thing placed in front of me and I just COULDN’T stop myself (which is total bullshit because I could have, but I didn’t want to and rationalized the hell out of my behavior).

I have explanations for it. Right before he left, I started my period, which I’d missed for the last 3 months (not at all uncommon for me). So it came and it made up for lost time. It was heavier, harder and lasted longer than it usually does. My diet counselor thought this was probably because of the extreme nature of the diet. Whatever it was, I was DYING of hunger. This part, I couldn’t exaggerate if I tried. I was so hungry my stomach was literally cramping for lack of food. Now, I don’t think this excuses my food consumption at all because it did stop. It stopped 2 days before the holiday weekend. I behaved myself the whole time. I was very good. I did exactly what I was supposed to do and didn’t eat anything I wasn’t supposed to have.

But once I hit the holiday weekend, I guess I just thought it was owed to me. Like I deserved to feast after the week I’d just been through and of course also to celebrate losing weight! LOL! That’s right! In my head, I thought I was celebrating my weight loss…by eating. And I knew better!

So I went in Monday for my body composition and weigh-in. And I admitted to everything. Plus I took Little Man and he told on me the MINUTE that door was closed! LOL!

And they told me that if I don’t straighten up and fly right, they will have to kick me out of the ketosis diet and put me on something else. On another diet I will still lose weight, just not as fast. I have a personal time-line to keep, so this got to me. Apparently, it’s not safe for me to keep dropping back into the 500 calorie diet.

So this means that I absolutely cannot, for any reason, go off diet again for at least the next 11 weeks. I have to finish my first 16 week program before I can even think about rewarding myself with food. And even then, I will have to temper myself and have some seriously extreme control.

The good news is I only gained 1.5 pounds, but if you think about it, I probably lost 4 pounds during the week between and actually gained back 5.5 to leave me at a grand total of 20 lbs lost. Still not bad at all, but could be better.

So I need to lose 117 more pounds in the next 27 weeks. That’s 4.3 lbs per week. My track record shows me that’s possible. But I’m still feeling a little guilty for my binge last weekend. I got to weigh again tomorrow. Let’s hope me behaving myself since Monday actually pays off.
No picture today. Honestly, I’m already dressed for bed and I just don’t feel like getting up again.

I know I’m feeling sorry for myself. I know that my accomplishments so far are nothing to sneeze at. I know that I can do this and the sacrifice I need to make to achieve my goal isn’t THAT big in the grand scheme of things.

But I can tell you that I’ll be dreaming of cupcakes tonight! *rolls eyes* It’s sad, but completely true. You can take the obesity out of the person, but you can’t take the person out of the obesity. Nope, that’s something they have to do for themselves. So I may need some personal growth work during the course of this diet too.