I've spent the majority of my life being conscious of my weight. I think I went on my first real diet at the age of 10, when my dad and I decided to "do" Weight Watchers. We didn't sign up or attend any meetings, but my parents had all the materials for muliple previous attempts, so we just used the pamphlets as our guide. I can distinctly remember how great I felt watching the numbers on the scale drop, and the praise I got from both my parents who, at the time were overweight. I also remember getting to the point where I preferred an apple versus a cookie or candy bar. For a 10 year old? That's pretty huge.
Strangely enough the weight watchers way of life didn't stick with my 10 year-old self. It was not long until I was conscious of the fact I was larger than my peers, and I need to be doing something about it. I can look back on my family life now, and see things I was unable to see when I was immersed in it. Everything in our lives revolved around food. What were we going to eat next? Let's walk somewhere to get a treat. Oh, a special occasion is coming up, what should the menu be? It's a holiday. Let's go out to eat. This was all met with constant guilt as well- oh, we shouldn't be eating this. We need to walk extra to burn this off. I need to go on a diet...etc.
I'm not making any excuses for myself now. I am an adult, I have been living on my own for nearly 15 years. But I can see how a foundation was built for me to put more emphasis on food than it ever deserves. A foundation was built for me to see food as either "good" or "bad." A foundation was built for me to judge my self worth by my size. Not only did food = love in my family, but thin = love, success, health, and all things good. My struggles with food and body continue today. In the past four years of keeping this blog, and hashing out so many of my issues, as well as completely changing the way I view food and exercise, I've learned tremendous amounts about myself. I've learned what I need to do for me to succeed.
For the past year, I have been giving myself a major pass. Yes, I was pregnant. Yes, I just had a baby. Yes, I'm breastfeeding. But seriously, I don't feel as good as I know I'm capable of feeling. I only know I'm capable of feeling so. much. better. because I have. After my experiments in ditching the standard american diet and eating foods mainly prepared at home by me, consisting of one ingredient, or recipies that put multiple one ingredient items together (still with me?) I realized that I can feel superhuman. My mental clarity is off the charts...everything just makes sense. The pull food has on me vanishes, and I can focus on so much more. I don't know how to explain it, except its miraculous. I've said it before, and I'll say it now. I had no idea it was even possible to feel that way. But I've felt it, and now, I'm too the point where I want it back.
If there is anything I've learned from my own self, the countless articles I've read, the blogs I follow, various teams I've been on, etc.- it's that my head needs to be in the game. I can't be saying one thing and doing another. It will take constant attention to eat what is right for me, the majority of the time. I'm gearing up. I hit up Costco yesterday for massive amounts of veggies and lean protein. We are well stocked on yams, onions, peppers, broccoli, cauliflower, green beans, pears, almond butter, ground turkey, and chicken. The way I see it, I spent the past year bulking. It's time to start cutting. I'm toying with creating an Instagram account associated with this blog to track progress, I'll keep you updated on that. For some reason I don't mind if blog followers see progress pics/my boring food pics/gym selfies (because that's all I talk about here), but as far as some aquaintences/workmates/ randoms that follow my personal account...awkward. So, personal account can be for baby/dog/travel pics, and blog account can be for real foods/heavy weights/ass shrinking.
Here we go.
No comments:
Post a Comment