Diet History

Take a look at your dieting “history,” outlining the crazy crash diets you have embarked on over the years. How did those diets make you feel? How did you feel once you regained the weight?

My dieting history is a relatively short one, since I never really tried to do much about my weight before I met Josh. Sure, I have never been really thin by any means, but I never really did much about it (other than the occasional time of feeling sorry for myself because I was fat.) Before I started dating Josh I was working almost full-time at a group home in Cedar Falls. At the group home we had to eat with the clients and other staff. I started feeling self conscious about my weight and how much I was eating there. We only served balanced mostly healthy meals at the group home, so all I did was work a lot and only eat the meals prepared at work. I didn’t keep too many snacks at my place, so there wasn’t much for me to snack on when I was home. I also started to care about how much I was eating when I was at work. I didn’t want to look like a pig, so I only took one serving. This worked for me. I didn’t really think of myself as dieting, I was just not eating that much at work. One would think I would have wanted to stop by McDonald’s on my way back across town since I wasn’t eating as much, but I didn’t. I wasn’t hungry. I had actually started to lose weight. I don’t know how much I actually lost during this time period because I wasn’t concentrating on it so I didn’t weigh myself regularly.

Then I started dating Josh. Now I am not blaming him for my weight gain at all. Do not get me wrong. It was just that we would eat out every meal. Not really sure why we did because we each had our own kitchen and could cook. It just seemed easier to eat out than to cook at our houses. I also stopped working less, so I could spend more time with him. By working less I was eating on my own more, which led to me to eat out more. Working less also meant not doing the heavy lifting my body was used to doing. Then when I came back on the weekends, instead of cooking at Josh’s house we would go out to eat or out drinking with friends.

When we started discussing getting married, I thought I wouldn’t like my wedding pictures if I was fat, so I needed to do something about it. I started this crazy quest to learn everything I could about losing weight. I also joined the Y in an effort to lose weight. However, if you have seen my wedding pictures (which I really like) I did not lose any of the weight. I did however remain constant with my weight for the most part. That was something new. At times I lost up to 12 lbs, but I put it back on in no time flat. For once it wasn’t just going up. After the wedding that all changed however. The sad part is I really don’t know why it did. Maybe it is because we were eating out because I started making more money at my new job. Maybe I was comfortable with the fact that I had my man and I didn’t need to be attractive anymore. I really don’t know why I have gained weight since my wedding.

I have a new plan starting as soon as school gets out. I am hoping to so a biggest loser type thing with exercising 4-5 hours a day, since I don't have anything better to do over the summer. I hope to finally get the weight off and keep it off. This is my diet history as of now. Hopefully through some reflection and thinking I will be able to get the results I am looking for soon.

Beginning a reflective process

I recently have decided to start my new work out plan when school gets out. However since I made that decision, I have started to to sabotage my weight loss efforts to date. I have eating like crap, not exercised and just been bad to myself. It has also got me thinking "why should I wait until June to start my healthier lifestyle" or "what am I going to do when school starts back up?" Another thing I decided to try to do some strong reflection before I start my new plan, in a hopes that maybe by reflecting and getting things straightened out in my head it will help me better prepare for my new life as a thinner, healthier person. My next posts will be reflections to questions brought up in the book "Coach Approach" that I borrowed from Tracy. I am hoping my thinking and writing about these topics will help me to finally be successful in my journey of weight loss.

My Wonderful Students

I do have success story from today. Back at the beginning of April I told my resource students they could bug me about my weight loss, since I bug them almost everyday about their grades. Well, in a fleeting moment a few other students came in and offered me a piece of cake. I said yes. When I sat down to eat and and help one of my resource kids- as soon as I took a bite- said "That's not good for your diet!" And started picking on me about it. So I stopped eating it. A little later he asked for a bite. So I said sure (after removing the part I had bitten from.) This prevented me from eating anymore of it. I was so proud of my student for stopping me. Sure, would have been better if I had stopped myself, but to know that I have the support of my students is so great.