I'm not hiding anymore!

Today is a cardio day so I will be getting on the treadmill in a bit. I read some more in the book "Overcoming Overeating" and the more I get into it the more I like it. It traces most overeating to an effort to maintain a balance in emotions. Somewhere along the line, compulsive overeaters lose touch with the ability to calm themselves. When they feel uncomfortable, or when they feel as if life is spinning out of control, they use food as a means of disconnecting for a bit - to calm themselves. As a result, the underlying feelings are never addressed - they either escalate or they resolve themselves by the passage of time. But the effects of trying to deal with these feelings by reaching for food remain. And in remaining, add to the imbalance in emotions which in turn leads one to reach for food in an effort to restore the balance and to calm oneself - and the whole cycle begins again. This isn't exactly how the authors put it, but it's how I'm reading it and it makes sense to me.

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Daily stats:
Type: Wii Fit yoga and balance
Route: Living room
Time:30 min
Average heart rate: 85
Max heart rate: 104
Calories burned:131

Daily stats:
Type: Treadmill
Route: Workout room
Time: 30 min
Average heart rate: 120
Max heart rate: 140
Calories burned: 226

I need to remember to eat something before I start working out. I've worked out on an empty stomach for years, but I need to change that.

I broke a couple of records, surpassed some of my own, and tried some new yoga poses. Apparently I am a Yoga Master when it comes to the Downward Dog.

The scale was way up this morning and I'm not really sure why (except that Wii said I was actually down a little).

In "Overcoming Overeating" (which will now be referred to as "OO" ) it says that we spend a lot of time beating ourselves up about our weight. We diet in an effort to "punish" ourselves and then our rational selves rebel. The chapter I'm on now is focusing on loving ourselves exactly the way we are - as if we would never change. We are to invest in a full length mirror and look in it every day. We are to stop negative thoughts in their tracks. We are not to speak to ourselves in a way that we wouldn't speak to others.

Example: I had a victory last night. A week ago I wouldn't have viewed it as such. I have been trying to stay under 1600 calories. I was doing well with that yesterday. About 9:00 I was hungry. Actually hungry - not something I allow myself to experience very often. I asked myself what I wanted. I chose a cup of ice cream. I knew that it would put me over my 1600 for the day, but I also knew I was going to be eating something. In the past I would have worked my way through all of the "healthy" choices and in the end would still have eaten the ice cream. And then having "cheated" I would let it become a full blown binge because today wasn't perfect and tomorrow will be perfect. But I didn't do that. I ate the ice cream and stopped there. No guilt, no stress. Come on, do normal weight people spend a lot of time feeling guilty about what they eat? I know they give lip service to it at the time of the indulgence, but they don't then go on the eat everything in sight because perfection wasn't achieved on a single day - and then continue it for days on end. Good grief! I am sick of punishing myself - with diets, with restrictions, with self- loathing. But I am also smart enough to know that these mental habits have been in place for a long time and it's going to take some work to reprogram my attitude.

Anyway, those are my thoughts for the day. Oh, and in the interest of loving myself right where I am, I'm posting my scale results for the day. That's right - I'm doing something I said I would never do. It takes a lot of courage for me to do it, but as Melisa says, "It's not like we can't see you." I'm sure that no one around me is under the impression that I weigh 150 pounds. Anyway, this is my highest weight ever. From here it goes down. I am sick of hiding, I am sick of putting my life on hold, I am sick of obsessing over what other people think - especially since my thoughts about myself aren't any kinder. After today, my "scale" pic will be posted on Sunday because that is my official weigh-in day.



There it is - deal with it, because I certainly intend to!
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Update:
I just got a call from the doctor's office. Apparently my numbers are in the pre-diabetic range. That really doesn't surprise me given my recent lack of control around sweets. I've been in the hypoglycemic range, which is a precursor, for many years. It's no longer about vanity. It's about health. (I know, it's always supposed to have been about health.) This is my wake-up call. I really do not want to become a diabetic so things are definitely going to have to change. A tiny taste can no longer turn into a binge. Even though I'm not happy about the numbers, this may be the motivation I need to get done what needs to get done.