Today is officially the three week mark since this whole thing started. I know, it’s not much. But I think enough time has passed to briefly take stock of what I have learned so far.
Lesson 1: Weigh-ins are a bitch. It’s almost incredible how much a tiny home appliance like a bathroom scale can either make or break your whole day, but by the time I step off that sucker in the morning, my fate is sealed. If it’s a good number, my day is made. If it’s not; well, obviously I’m a failure and I should just give up, why bother with this, lol nothing matters I hate everyone.
Thing is, those numbers have gotten predictable already. I know weight fluctuates day to day for any number of reasons besides diet and exercise—water weight, time of day, etc.—but that doesn’t really soften the blow of seeing the number tick up slightly even when you were so sure you did everything right the day before.
So far, the pattern goes like this: Step on the scale, see the number drop by more than a pound. Smile. Proceed with day. Step back on the next morning, see the number go up, wallow.
Ultimately, the trend line is moving in the right direction, which is obviously the more important thing. But seeing a higher number—even if it’s a fraction of a pound—is a shitty way to wake up in the morning.
Lesson 2: Maybe the food thing isn’t so hard? It’s weird, I’ve definitely tried cutting back on lousy food before, and remember it being incredibly hard. And yet, three weeks in, I am doing better than I would have imagined up to this point.
I’ve virtually eliminated all sugary drinks, save for my various coffee concoctions which all come sweetened. I’ve avoided fast food like the plague, even standing firm while accompanying friends on Wendy’s runs. Chinese takeout, which I could eat 7 days a week if given a choice, has been eliminated. I’ve kept a few guilty pleasures in the rotation for now, including the occasional pizza and fruit pop, but for the most part I’m down to poultry, fish, eggs, fruits, veggies, and a few other miscellaneous things sprinkled in.
I’m doing my best to log it all on MyFitnessPal, though it’s still not quite as routine as it should be. For the most part, I’m hovering around 1100–1300 calories per day.
More astonishing, it took no time at all for the cravings to subside. They’re not gone entirely, but it’s more a quiet hum in the back of my head than the deafening bellow I was preparing to contend with.
Lesson 3: Maybe the food thing isn’t so easy? All of the above is contingent on one thing: not getting bored with a fairly narrow list of food options. I’ve probably already had more chicken and tuna in the last three weeks than in the previous three months, and while they make for some delicious meals, I can already feel my patience waning.
This means having to find alternatives, which would be fine except the appeal of chicken and fish, aside from the health aspect, is that they are easy to fix up at a moment’s notice.
I have also started sharing this blog with some friends and family, mostly for my own selfish reasons: if I know there’s an audience, even a small one, it means people will notice when it hasn’t been updated in a few days. And have I mentioned lately my inability to not care what people think of me?
Anyway, there’s more work to be done.
