Observations

The last few days, I've been feeling particularly zealous about eating well. There have been two reasons. The first is that my weight loss is the most successful thing in my life now. My job is becoming more challenging every day as my industry reacts to the stupidity of greed based decisions made over the last few years. My marriage is in limbo. It's been nine months of being separated. We've done a lot of work and gotten nowhere but being not really married and not really single.

Needing real improvements in other life areas, I've looked to what's been working. What has made this diet work well for me so far has been 1) having the right goal, 2)having a plan, 3) monitoring my actions, and 4) being realistic. I feel like those are the steps I need to take in other areas as well. The catch is putting those steps into action, and it's tricky, tricky stuff, which makes focusing on the diet which is working well that much easier.

The second reason is that I've recently realized that I have changed my life, not that I am changing my life, but that I already have. I still have much more weight to lose, but the changes I've made now seem as natural as breathing. Reaching for water, actually wanting water instead of something bubbly amazes me. Wanting exercise gets me even more, even if I'm only up to about 20 minutes of intense exercise on an almost daily basis. I know that intense for me is someone else's standard for being a slacker, but I'm measuring life by standards now, not someone else's. (Hah! just found the fifth element of my diet success so far.)

This really hit me last night. I was buying groceries at Wal-Mart and realized that my shopping cart looked like a healthy person's. I had fresh asparagus, artichokes, celery, spinach, onions, tomatoes, grapes and bananas. I had shrimp, canned beans, high fiber bread, low fat feta and cream cheeses (they're okay to cook with). I had a case of bottled water, and I had Edy's Lite Slow Churned ice cream, one of the absolutely best lower, fat, sugar and calorie sweet treats out there. I also had to pick up some non-grocery items, and by the time I'd finished, I'd walked over the entire store. That's over a mile of walking according to the pedometer I wear when I go places like the mall or a discount store now. I was exhausted. I hadn't eaten in about six hours, and my blood sugar was bottoming out.

With a hypoglemic crash facing me soon, I decided to grab a meal out and hit a chicken drive through on the way home. I ordered a meal of chicken bites that came with a biscuit, mashed potatoes, and cole slaw. I ate it all, 22 points worth of food. That's more than two thirds of what I need to eat in one day. It's a good thing I'd barely touched my bonus points for the week. I was Thanksgiving, undo your waist button and groan full. I felt sick all night long over a meal that used to look normal to me. That's a change that I know isn't a mind trick. That was a real physical response to something quantifiable. This wasn't a number on a scale that can fluctuate with the time of month, time of day, the status of my medications or being a little irregular. This was proof positive that I have changed.

One change can lead to another, and I have proof that I can make good changes happen. That's not a bad way to begin a day.

health and wellness,weight loss, changes