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April 2009

Hooray for Non-Scale Victories!

For anybody who was wondering, it took me exactly 9 days to get back to the weight I was before that weekend trip with the wine, the dessert and the fried calamari. Which I think is actually not so bad. At any rate, I’m fine with it.

Many of my Twitter fitness and weight loss friends like to talk about NSV, or “non-scale victories.” In other words, how do you measure success other than the numbers on the scale?

I really really hate body measurements so I have avoided those like the plague. Now of course I wish I HAD measured myself in January because I’d certainly have some nice inches lost there, but I didn’t. Even now – I just measured my waist just for the fun of it, and it puts me at a SIZE 16 in ALL of the clothing catalogs I love – Athleta, J. Crew, J. Jill, Garnet Hill… bleah. Now I know there is no way I wear a size 16. Yet my measurement says that is what I should order. Which is why I am so loathe to buy clothes via catalog!!

But I had a great non-scale victory this week.

I have been going to the same trainer for about four years. He has mixed up my workouts for all this time, so my body (and mind) never know what to expect. But I have certain things I love to do and others that I dread and hate. One of my most dreaded exercise EVER has been the crab walk. We used to have to do these back and forth across the large gym floor. They made me cry. I could really not go more than 3 “steps” and my butt would collapse on the floor.  It was freaking imPOSSIBLE for me to do and they made me feel hopeless. For YEARS.

So this week I was merrily feeling quite confident and fit and everything I did, he’d say, “Piece of cake?” and I’d go, “Yeah!!” Then he said “Sit down.” I got a sick feeling in my stomach. “Give me a crab walk across the floor.” I really felt like I was going to cry. “DO IT!” So I set off. And… holy guacamole. I could do it! I wasn’t dragging my butt! I wasn’t collapsing!! I was doing it, almost like this guy!! And I realized – before, I was trying to crab walk with an extra 23 pounds on my body. If you stuck a 25 lb sandbag on top of my stomach, I can tell you I would collapse. So it’s a combination of getting stronger and having 23 lbs less to haul around!

In other NSV news, I have been working diligently on the Couch-to-5k program and I am amazed and thrilled to report that last night I completed week 5. Week five is crazier than any week so far – it took me from running 8 minutes nonstop to running 20 minutes nonstop! (um, what happened to 10, 12 or 15 minutes? Huh?) I’m basically skipping weeks 6-9 and going straight to my 5k run this Sunday. I wish I had those 3 extra weeks to train, but I think I can do it anyway. (cue Rocky music!)

And those are my non-scale victories for this week. What are yours?

14

Over the River and Up the Mountain

I have always had this very vivid image of my weight-loss efforts over the years. I recently tried to draw it but the drawing looked so bad I will have to stick with a verbal description. (can’t draw with a trackpad to save my life!!)

I call it the River. For as long as I can remember (at least in my adult life) I have been on one side of the river, or the other. One side (I’ll call it The Banks of Unconscious Eating!) is where I defiantly stayed for long periods of my life. When I was on that side, I’d eat whatever, whenever and how much I felt like. Often very high caloric, fat and carb-y foods. (think: macaroni and cheese in huge quantities) I’d exercise fairly minimally. I’d thumb my nose at “dieters” and think they were super anal control freaks. I’d feel disdain for people who were “obsessed with exercise.” And, I’d be (surprise?) overweight and fairly unhappy. But really believing that I was “free” because I was not being oppressed by counting calories, depriving myself or flogging myself to exercise. You get the picture. During the periods when I was on that side of the river, I’d look at the Other side and feel anxiety, anger, fear, disgust, whatever.  I was firmly entrenched.

At other times in my life, I’d be on the Dieting side of the river. On that side, I felt fairly rigid, usually counted calories or points, was fairly tense. I exercised whether I liked it or not. I steeled myself with “willpower.” I lost weight, but it was exhausting and I could never ever get to my actual goal weight and never maintain it for very long. I was (maybe) happier but also very tense. And when I was on THIS side of the river, I felt disgust and fear and shame about the OTHER side. (ie, “you fat slob,” I never want to be like you again!!)

Sometimes I’d thrash back and forth from one side to the other, in the space of days.  Often I’d be on the dieting side for 4-5 days of a week, then after my Weight Watchers weigh-in day, I’d fling myself to the “unconscious” side by giving myself a “treat” day.

The truly remarkable thing about this time around is that I feel like I’m not even near the river anymore. I feel like I’ve gone from a short period on the Dieting Side, where I was very anxious (see January posts) but somehow I kept going, away from the river. I crossed a field. I got to the foot of a mountain. I feel like I am miles away and above where I’ve ever been before.

Even though I feel like that Unconscious side is so far away, when I look down it from here, I don’t feel disgusted or afraid of going there anymore. I feel a lot of compassion and love for all the suffering that happened when I was over there. It makes me sad. And I don’t feel tense OR self-righteous or anything about where I am now. It’s easy to be here. I have these small moments (like longing for carrot cake when I was in Trader Joe’s) but they sort of pass, like clouds. (do you see the influence of my meditation class kicking in?) As my meditation teacher says, “You can notice the train going by. You don’t have to hop on that train and let it take you for a ride.”  (okay, HOW many metaphors am I going to use in this post??)

I truly feel like I am geographically, physically, emotionally, in a place where I have never, ever been before. It’s not without its challenges at ALL, but I feel like I’ve moved far away from the banks of that river where I was always feeling battered, conflicted, cold, wet.

9

The “Eat Without Guilt” Process

I’ve referred to Dinneen Diette and her “Eat Without Guilt” approach before, but was never really able to articulate what her approach was exactly, or why it worked. She just wrote this article for her newsletter which pretty much sums it up. This is exactly what my problem was before, and exactly how it ended up changing, and pretty much exactly how I’ve experienced that past several months.  I’m sharing her article here because I really did not think, back in January, that any of this was possible. (my comments in red!) When she said that she ate brie and croissants, I felt like she had to be lying, but now… I get it. Thank you, Dinneen!

How a Shift Towards Food Can Create a Shift on the Scale
by Dinneen Diette

A few years ago I had a major shift in the way I thought about food and eating, and it has improved my health and waistline ever since.

In a snapshot, this is how I used to view food:

I associated unhealthy food with pleasure and healthy foods with pain. Yes!! Totally!!

You see, when I was eating healthy food, the whole time I’d be wishing I could be eating a hamburger and fries instead. I’d be thinking about how tasty and juicy it would be, and how THAT was what I wanted, not the salad. Exactly. Salad felt like the “healthy” but less wonderful choice.

And then I’d want some ice cream, and not some fruit for dessert. Yup!!

The Reward Factor

Think about it.  Often we ‘reward’ ourselves with something like chocolate or ice cream when we’ve ‘been good’ or ‘deserved a break’ where the salad feels like a punishment.  We think “I have to eat this salad to stay thin” and anything remotely guilty becomes something that’s a reward for being good.

We often learn this as children.  Remember your parents saying you could have the cake after you finished your dinner?  Or if you were quiet in the store Mom said she’d buy you a treat or take you to a burger place or to the ice cream shop? Not only do I remember this (over and over and over) as a child, I am also guilty of doing this as a parent. I’m sorry, girls. REALLY.

So even at a young age we learned that these foods were treats and something we got if we were “good.”

The Stress Factor

When I got older, after a busy day at work I’d come come tired and stressed and would reward myself with junk food, comfort food or a treat.  It was almost like a medication, I used it to make myself feel good.  Is this sounding familiar to anybody??

The Chore Factor

But this is a problem.  If you associate unhealthy foods with pleasure and healthy foods with pain, then eating right will always be difficult.  Mentally, you’re telling yourself that eating healthy food is a burden or chore, so what do you expect?  Eventually you will lose the battle as we all want to feel good. (emphasis mine)

The Pleasure Principle

When I lived in France, I saw how they took such pleasure in all foods.  Eating foods, even healthy ones, became something that I enjoyed, instead of dreading.

And there wasn’t a focus on good foods or bad foods.  They do eat a lot of healthy foods, but they look at them as something that nourishes and does the body good.  Things like sweets and desserts were looked upon as something to be enjoyed for a special occasion, like a dinner with friends.  Not something to be used to soothe. (again, my emphasis. What a concept!!!!!)

They don’t use food so much for comfort either.  It’s nourishment and something that gives us energy and vitality.

Shifting My Mindset Towards Food

So I slowly shifted my mindset.  The way I eat now is:

All foods are okay, but healthy foods make me FEEL better in the long-run.

I get pleasure out of all foods, even healthy ones.  And I don’t look at any food as punishment or pain anymore.

You see, once I started eating better and healthier foods, I started to feel better.  I remember one day I went to have a burger and fries (I wanted a taste of home!).  Though in the moment I felt good, afterwards I felt stuffed and uncomfortable.  Then all afternoon I was tired and not effective in getting any work done.  I just wanted to sit in front of the TV and do nothing.

And this would happen over and over.  I started to notice how these once pleasurable foods were making me feel like crap. I never noticed this BEFORE because I was *always* eating unhealthy foods, so I always felt like crap! and that felt normal.

So I slowly started to eat better and started to see that the healthy foods WERE actually making me feel better! AMAZING!!!

Same With Exercise

Just like exercise.  When you first start, it becomes such a drag. I can’t even describe how painful and dreaded exercise was – for YEARS – even when I had a trainer! It was soooo hard for me. Like you “have to” get out there and walk.  But then every week you find you can walk longer, then faster, and before you know it you start looking forward to the exercise (yes, that DOES happen). And that has finally, finally happened for me, too! Yay for endorphins!!! You find your body feeling better and enjoying it.  Often when people start to exercise regularly, they wonder why they didn’t do it earlier. The key word there is “regularly.” I don’t think I did it often enough to get any benefits before, just the aches of it.

Ditto for Food

Same with food.  The more I ate better, the better I felt.  So I started to gravitate towards the healthier foods as I knew it would give me energy and that extra boost to get through the day.  No longer did I have those afternoon crashes.  And I was so much more productive at work that I found myself having more free time.  YES!   YES! YES!! (well, I don’t know about the “free time” part…)

There’s Room for All

Now this doesn’t mean I never eat unhealthy foods.  I have found there’s a place for all foods in life.  It’s about how much and how often I eat them.  This is what I love about this approach. It is so… pleasurable and unpunishing and unjudgmental. As I know that healthier foods will make me feel better, I naturally turn to them more often. Yes!

So instead of using food to make you feel better, use it as a way to get energy and you’ll see dramatic changes in your health and waistline (and the scale!) over time.

Change your mindset, and you’ll start to see a shift….everywhere.  You said it, Dinneen. Thank you so so much.

© 2009, Dinneen Diette.  All Rights Reserved.

—————
Dinneen Diette is founder of  Eat Without Guilt.com, a speaker, and contributor to various online health & wellness magazines, newsletters and websites. She helps and guides you to attain the dream of a slimmer, sexier and healthier you! To receive her easy tips, action steps, how-to articles and Special Report for FREE, visit www.EatWithoutGuilt.com.

4

Guest Bloggers: The Fabulous Fatties Sit On A Ball!

I recently read an article that described how people who fidget more tend to be a lot thinner. I found this very intriguing.  I tend to be pretty restless, especially when sitting. So I was especially interested in reading this post on Weight Loss With The Fabulous Fatties’ blog. (we are doing a blog post swap!) It’s pretty funny too, but truly useful for weight loss!

It’s Saturday and I (Angie) am working, or supposed to be, but apparently I am blogging. :) Has anyone with a desk job tried to sit on an exercise  ball while at work?  A couple years back I was seeing a nutritionist who recommended I try this.  I didn’t at the time, but have done it a few times more recently, and am in fact sitting on a sleek silver exercise ball as we speak.  I recommend everyone this this as it does use some muscle’s for balancing (legs, stomach and booty).  Oh… I just had a great thought!  I am renaming this exercise ball to my blogging ball and I will force myself to sit on it when ever I am blogging or twittering.

However, this advice does come with a WARNING!

  • Do not reach for items out of your reach, the ball will roll and you will fall flat on your face.
  • Do not try to scoot the ball, it does not have wheels like your cushy office chair and you will fall.
  • People will look at you like you are crazy!  Now I am used to this type of reaction from people.  One lady I work with calls me her “eccentric friend” but some of you may be more sensitive than I to others reactions.
  • Co-workers will probably steal your ball when you leave your desk to go potty and you will have to hunt it down, which unfortunately decreases productivity.  Bit of Advice: always check the supply closet first!
  • When standing up do not scoot your ball back you will fall on your head and have a minor concussion.  Most employers will expect you to still work with a minor concussion.
  • Do not lean forward to get a closer look at your computer screen while on the exercise ball as you will face plant into your desk and get a bloody nose and possibly some mouth bleeding.
  • If you suck in your gut and sit tall while on the exercise ball you will get tired at a quicker rate.

I’m just sayin’ sit on the ball with caution!

Have a FABULOUSweekend and eat a brownie for me, preferably one with chocolate chips, white chocolate chips and pecans.  I had a skinny friend once tell me nothing tastes as good as thin feels.  I think she believed that so I never shared my brownies with her!

Thanks for the great tip, Angie!!

And for those of you for whom a ball does not provide enough fidgety movement, you can always try Ellen’s Hawaii chair!!

2

Shopped Until I Dropped

I had a really, really intense and unique (for me) experience today.  I went clothes shopping for… seven hours!! It was craaaaaaazy!  My friend A., who is totally a clone of Stacey on What Not To Wear, offered to take me clothes shopping and hold my hand and give me advice since I am such a total deer in the headlights.

A. has taken me shopping a few other times in the past ten years- but those times, it was because I was feeling hopeless about being overweight and she was trying to show me that I could still find things that looked decent even if I didn’t feel great about my body. This was the first time that I have gone shopping – I think in about thirty years – where I actually got any pleasure from it.

My relationship with clothes is almost as complicated as my relationship with food!  Basically, my “before” wardrobe consisted of everything that was either black or brown, shapeless, drab, with no “adornment” (A’s word).  She used to describe my clothing as “mouse-colored pajamas.”

I owned (until today) four pairs of shoes. A pair of Dansko clogs for everyday, a pair of really ugly slip on sandals for warmer weather, a pair of Uggs for super cold weather, and running shoes. THAT IS IT. My feet are really really wide, and my arches are flat as pancakes, and most shoes out there are very painful.

We spent two hours in the shoe department alone, and my head nearly exploded. But I did prevail and I actually bought three pairs of shoes – that fit me, were comfortable and actually nice looking. Here is one of my new pairs of shoes. Check out the little gray and pink flowers! They look sort of sandallish, but guess what – they are really clogs in disguise. Which is why they feel magnificent.

It’s funny. Our plan was to meet around 11:30. I figured we would shop for maybe half an hour, have lunch, shop for maybe an hour more tops, and that would be MORE than enough. When I was staggering around with 20 pieces of clothing about an hour in, and said, “I think this is plenty,” A. just looked at me and laughed. Clearly she was just getting started.

I probably tried on fifty pieces of clothing. My main objective was to purchase a festive outfit for our friend W.’s wedding celebration party tomorrow. (the actual marriage took place a while back, this was a post-wedding party) Casual, but festive. It’s going to be at their house and yard, where they have goats. Not super formal by any means.

As we passed by a rack of dresses, A. pointed out this navy blue Cleopatra kind of dress with all sorts of gold “adornment.” I nearly wet my pants from laughing. “Yeah RIGHT!” She ignored my close-minded attitude and swept it up, putting it onto the three foot high pile in my arms.

When I literally could not hold up the quantity of clothing any longer, we went into a dressing room and I started trying on things at a manic pace. My friend sat and “evaluated” each outfit, why it “worked,” why it didn’t. It was truly a revelation. For one, I never had any concept of what might look good on me  – my motto was, the bigger and floppier and more nondescript, the better. But here she was talking about my shoulders, my “waist,” (ha ha ha!) my legs and butt and all of it.  And I started understanding more about myself and why certain things actually DID look better than others.

I tried on the gold-adorned Cleopatra dress. She said, “O my god, that looks great!” and I had to take a double take in the mirror. It actually did not look bad. But ME? Wear a GOLD-ENCRUSTED dress?

Let me pause here and say that I HAVE NOT WORN A DRESS IN FIFTEEN YEARS. I have one dress that I bought for a wedding fifteen years ago, and it is so ancient and ridiculous I have had to swear to both my daughters that I will never wear it again and not in their presence.

So here I was wearing a gold-adorned Cleopatra dress. And pigs were flying past the dressing room door, and hell was freezing over. But hey, Barack Obama is now president. ANYthing is possible, right?? 🙂

I bought the dress. Along with a bunch of other things, some of which I adore more than I can say. I bought some Romanesque sandals to go with the Cleopatra dress.

I am going to post pictures. Yes I am! But I realize that these pictures will not have much impact unless I post my “before” pictures first.  I’m going to do it. So here’s the befores. You’ll see the Cleopatra outfit tomorrow, and then the rest of the clothes later next week.  Macy’s (where all this debauchery took place) is having some crazy storewide 25% off sale (YAHOO) but the catch is that you can’t actually HAVE the clothes until April 29th. Don’t ask. I don’t understand really, but I was willing to do that since I saved a bucketload of money.

The one thing we did NOT do was visit the makeup counter. Another place where I get incredibly nervous and feel like I am eight years old and playing grownup. We’ll have to save that for another time.

PHOTO UPDATE: Here are my hideous “before” pics, along with some pics of the Cleopatra dress.

13

Watch Out What You Wish For…

All my adult life, I’ve wished – I mean desperately wished….

  • that I could enjoy exercise.
  • that I could be satisfied with small portions of food
  • that I could deal with hard emotional times without diving into high-carb comfort/smother foods
  • that I could truly CHOOSE healthier options, and feel good about it
  • that I could run again
  • that I could lose weight without feeling deprived
  • that I could feel the benefits of meditation
  • that I could develop a meaningful spiritual life

Well, guess what. It looks like I’ve gotten all those things – for now, anyway. I have to say I’m sort of stunned. Because just a few months ago I would not have believed that even ONE of these things were even remotely possible.

All of these statements are now true.
AND… I’ve got diabetes.

Is that the tradeoff? Or was it diabetes that allowed me to finally wake up and have these things I always wanted?

It’s like a zen koan. It’s actually too incomprehensible for words.  I wonder what I would have said, if I’d climbed to the guru on the top of the mountain, please let me have these things, and he said, “OK, but you also have to have diabetes.” What would I have said? What would I have chosen?

Several people have remarked to me that I am doing an amazing job dealing with my diabetes. But I really feel like, what choice do I have? That’s how I feel now. I feel like there is no option but to be as healthy as I can be.

But I didn’t feel like this before, when I was way overweight, when I had high blood pressure, when I was inactive. Those things didn’t scare me and didn’t cause me to change anything. If anything they made things worse. It was the diabetes that woke me up.

Funny how life is.

14

Feedback from the Scale: It’s Just Information

So my weight was up a few pounds when I got back to my home scale this morning. I’m not completely shocked, and for once not distraught or freaked out over seeing that plus sign. I can attribute it traveling for 3-4 days, eating out every meal, eating in greater quantities, and exercising less. Although I was exhausted from walking around in 90 degree heat, it wasn’t the same as working out. I had two sesssions at the hotel fitness center but not as regular as usual.

I think the thing I am happiest about is that I’m not flipping out. I’m not feeling GUILTY or overly upset. I looked at those numbers and just said, “Hmm. Okay. Now what?”

On Saturday night I went back to the same restaurant as Friday night (with the dieters) – this time it was with a group of other parents, and we all ordered from the menu. The food was awesome.

I had: a glass of wine (first time since my dx – I was experimenting), a bunch of grilled/marinated veggies from antipasti plate (artichokes, mushrooms, bell peppers, tomato), about 4 little fried calamari rings, about 3-4 oz of seared ahi tuna with tomatoes, 3 tiny pieces of potato, a bite of chicken from my hubby’s plate, and… some whipped cream (from the top of the complimentary tiramisu) and blueberries/strawberries.

It was all really really delicious. I enjoyed it a LOT. I was more concerned with my blood sugars than my weight, though, so I took an extra dose of Metformin before going to bed. When I woke up, all was well.

I’m thinking about the two “optional” items I don’t usually get – the wine and the little portion of dessert. Was it worth it? Would I, in the future, choose to forgo those things, or would I do it all again the same way?

Hard to say. I’m going to see how long it takes me to get back down to last week’s pre-trip weight. If it happens fairly quickly,  I’d say it was all worth it. I didn’t pig out, I wasn’t crazily full. If it takes forever (how long is “forever?” two weeks??) then I’ll have to re-evaluate.

So my answer to “now what” is I’m going to eat as mindfully/cleanly as possible, try to step up the exercise a bit this week, and see how it goes.

UPDATE: so it took me exactly 9 days to get back to the pre-trip weight. It wasn’t forever. But of course it takes longer  – a lot longer – to take it off than to put it on.  I’m not upset about this. I don’t think it was “not worth it.” It was just… interesting. (I’m channeling my meditation teacher now: “Just notice.”)

17

Dieters Make Me Nervous

Last night I was eating out with a bunch of parents with my kid’s sports team. We were at a huge pasta feed in prep for today’s race, that had been prepaid (ie the menu was set).  It was penne pasta in an amazingly delicious homemade marinara. Plus a salad with oil and vinegar.

Now I’m not any big pasta eater anymore, mostly bc my diabetes doesn’t tolerate it very well.  But I took about half cup worth and a bunch of salad. Three of the women at my table were not eating ANYthing. I was wondering if they were shunning the salad because… it had oil in the dressing?  They ordered off the menu and asked for a plate of grilled vegetables. In came a big plate of steamed carrots and broccoli, and then some grilled veggies. While they were delicious, I was like.. this is too much. I could almost palpably feel the anxiety of these (thin) women who didn’t want to eat anything.

After dinner I felt myself ravenously hungry for the first time in a very long time. Being around these women had made me SO nervous and wanting to eat, just out of being in proximity to them. Sitting with them made me want to order a huge plate of lasagne. I felt myself getting angry (at what, I am not sure) and I was completely off my “center.” It took several hours to settle down, during which time I didn’t eat, but I sure wanted to.

I had the feeling that they were doing the exact opposite of intuitive eating. It was like “fear eating” and I could smell the fear.

13

Eating Without Guilt? Really? Really.

It doesn’t seem so long ago that I joined the weight-loss Twittersphere and blogosphere. I was scared, lonely feeling, desperate and really needing community. I felt like it was do-or-die time, and if that I didn’t find a way to lose weight, get healthy, that things were really going to be dire. But I didn’t feel very hopeful or optimistic. I had tried (and failed, failed, failed) to lose weight so many times. Or I tried and it worked for a short time, but I was always eyeing the door and the clock, wondering when I could stop.

I started following anybody who had any kind of tag related to diets, weight loss, health, and exercise. A lot of these turned out to be utter spam machines – just trying to sell some product or whatever, or spewing out the same dumb posts over and over, and linking to them like they were something new. I quickly unfollowed the majority of people I started out following, and eventually began to meet some “real” people. It took a while.

One person I was intrigued by was somebody with the username “EatWithoutGuilt.” My first reaction was, yeah right!! For me, eating and guilt have gone together like – you know, Lucy and Ricky, peanut butter and jelly, Thelma and Louise. I can’t even REMEMBER a time when eating didn’t = guilt of SOME kind. I was always eating too much, or the wrong thing, or wishing I was eating the wrong thing (remember Jimmy Carter “lusting in his heart” – well that was me). I always felt guilty, or longing, or secretive or something that ultimately felt BAD.

I checked out EatWithoutGuilt’s website. At first I could do nothing but snort (sadly) when reading this:

Let’s face it. We’re ALL trying to look good, feel good, and lose those extra pounds. So when you look at the French and Italians and wonder, “How DO they stay so slim?” I can guarantee you this… EATING WITHOUT GUILT IS a huge part of that success!

They enjoy rich foods – like chocolate, pastries, and pasta – and don’t gain weight. YOU TOO can eat the foods you love by learning how to EAT WITHOUT GUILT.

Imagine losing weight…
WITHOUT dieting, counting calories, carbs or fat grams.

I read all this and just thought to myself, YEAH, in another universe!! But I was definitely intrigued. I messaged her (her real name is Dinneen Diette, believe it or not! for real!) and she responded in such a warm, personal way. It was disarming. Later I called her up for a short phone consult that turned long. She was so human and kind, so understanding and compassionate, and GENEROUS. This was definitely not just someone trying to sell me a product or a doodad.

I have continued to be wowed by Dinneen’s steady, kind presence. She has counseled me through some rough times, with incredible attentiveness.

And now she is holding a contest on her blog, and the prize is an hour-long consult with her! I tell you, this would be a GREAT prize to get.

In order to enter the contest, all you need to do is write about your biggest weight-loss or diet challenge.

I’ve been giving that some thought. The things that are challenging me now are not what challenged me a few months ago. Right now I’d say my biggest challenges are related to what Buddha called the “five hindrances” (which I learned about in my meditation class) – desire, anger, tiredness or boredom (“sloth”), restless worry, or doubt.

I think I’m mostly challenged by doubt right now – doubt that I can see this newfound healthy way through the rest of my life, doubt that I can keep it up. Doubt doubt doubt. I probably have a little bit of desire thrown in there too, but that has subsided greatly since January. I think doubt is definitely the biggest one, maybe coupled with restless worry.

Whenever I feel this way all I can do is come back to what I am doing right now, which is taking care of myself in a healthy way.

Dinneen? Any thoughts? How can I calm my doubtful mind?

If any of YOU want to enter Dinneen’s “Get out of the Diet Rut” contest, all YOU need to do is:

1)  Email it directly to her at info@EatWithoutGuilt.com OR

2)  post it on your blog or Facebook with a link back to www.EatWithoutGuilt.com.   Then email info@EatWithoutGuilt.com with your entry. OR

3) Leave a comment on her blog here.

So this post is meant to be a great big shout-out and thank you to Dinneen, who showed me a peek at a world I didn’t think was possible for me, just four short months ago (or less?). I’m truly grateful to know you and to have been shown that possibility.



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