OK,
truth
time....show of hands...
How many of us have gone on vacation... and OFF PLAN?
[I always get this 'picture' in my head, of that scene from City Slickers, where Billy Crystal is being dragged through the MUD by an errant cow...and he's screaming, "But I'm on VACATION!!!!"]
We can justify it to ourselves so easily!
It's 'just for now'.
"I'm on vacation, I'm supposed to ENJOY myself. How can I enjoy myself if I have to say NO all this delicious FOOD?!!!"
But wait a minute.
The last time you were on vacation, did you take pictures of what you ate, or where you WERE? And who you were WITH?
(Actually, I have a SIL who does that, believe it or not. She goes out to eat and takes pictures of the food and posts it on FB. And yes she's overweight. And I'm like "UGH, gimme a break, will you? What is she trying to prove? That she can eat? I can do that too! BOY can I! Wanna have an eating contest? Your place or mine? Oh boy get ready because I can EAT YOU UNDER THE TABLE!" LOL....)
I submit to you...I CHALLENGE you....the next time you go on vacation do it On plan. And ENJOY the PLACES you go and the PEOPLE you're with! And guess what? You can STILL enjoy the food! OP! (ON PLAN)
I remember a great dinner with hubby...in San Francisco on vacation. I stayed OP! And it was awesome! The atmosphere, the background music, his smile across the table, the fish which was cooked to PERFECTION, being waited on, lots of ice water (I drive waiters NUTS with my requests for water LOL), etc.!
"Who says" you can't have a great time on vacation OP?
As my fav comic used to say, the late great George Carlin,
"SHOW ME THE RULE".
And while we're at it...how many of us have been SICK and 'given ourselves permission' to go off plan?
Oh poor DEAR you're sick! "It's OK....feel better, do whatever you have to in order to feel better"
Translation: YES, make that comfort food...
For me it was always tomato soup with OODLES (I mean, like 6-7 SLICES) of American cheese torn up and thrown inside it...AND a bunch of club crackers, too. There was like 20% SOUP, 80% cheese and crackers. Who was I trying to kid? LOL).
And I don't even NEED the soup. I've overeaten COUGH DROPS.
(Yep! Not the sugarfree ones, either....bleh, hate those. Although I can overdo those in a pinch, too....LOL)....
I am NOT advocating you don't use cough drops or cough syrup if the doctor has said you should, by the way....I'm talking about OVERDOING it because you want that TASTE in your mouth. You know what I'm talking about...(I can see the heads nodding sheepishly....!)
Oh by the way stay away from Cepacol's latest cough drops called 'Hydra'....OMG they taste TOO good. I was like ODing on them last week. And I DIDN'T HAVE A COUGH. LOL....
Another great justification, right? We're so SICK....and "nobody understands"....despite the fact that we're sick we still have all the housework to do and the cooking and etc
"Life goes on", right?
A MAN gets sick and the WORLD comes to an end.
A WOMAN gets sick and ..... she keeps GOING.
LOL...sorry, men out there...I call it like I see it! (and if you're not like that- BRAVO!)
(I don't know about you but my hubs isn't exactly a "Pro" in the TLC department! In fact he is totally CLUELESS. He knows he probably SHOULD do things like put his hand on my forehead to check for fever, go 'tsk tsk' a lot, make me a cup of tea, tell me 'It's allright, go lie down, I'll take care of everything'....but he doesn't.
Mind you, -I- do that....a woman does that automatically....but a man? Not so much. Not my man, anyway. He's wonderful and I adore him but...he just can't handle the tender loving care bit. He just looks.. lost and dejected. I guess that's his way of emphathizing with me but it falls flat and I just get ANGRY. I feel like everything in the house revolves around ME (uh...true....) and if I don't do it, it doesn't get DONE (also true).
But ...who is making it that way?
Guess!
LOL....! ME!!!!
If I ASKED him to do more, maybe he'd DO it!
If I DIDN'T 'do it all', maybe he'd chip in more!
What a concept, right? LOL....
Sigh....oh, being a woman is hard sometimes, isn't it?
.....and we make it harder on OURSELVES.
We expect to be Superwoman. We have to do it ALL, and do it PERFECTLY. And when we're sick, well, we NEED a little sympathy, we NEED a little TLC, and when we don't get it....it's 'ALL TOO EASY' to fall back on our old friend and companion, FOOD!
Because nobody ELSE is helping us, right?
But...FOOD is still there, right? Just WAITING for you!
And you NEED good nutrition when you're sick, right?
And you NEED....extra calories...and maybe a little extra sugar....etc.
It goes on and on. The krazy ILLLOGIC that Fat Brain can come up with is astounding sometimes. I'm STILL amazed at my OWN EXCUSES!
FOOD will NOT make it 'all better'.
FOOD will NOT make you heal quicker. It will not make the fever go away, it will not get you on your feet any faster, it will not help with the aches and pains, it will NOT get rid of your headache, it will NOT stop the coughing or the sneezing or the runny nose or ANY of it.
Only TIME...and maybe some antibiotics if your doctor prescribed them...can help here.
And you KNOW that.
It's just ... JUSTIFICATION. AGAIN.
BE WATCHFUL OF FAT BRAIN. SHE NEVER GOES AWAY COMPLETELY!
...last but not least..
How many of us have had 'bad things' happen in our lives...everything from a fight with a loved one to a horrible horrible thing like a death in the family or something really evil or bad happen in our lives....and gone off plan?
Again, this is the perfect justification, right? After all, most of us in this life, if we're fortunate, don't have many of these huge CRISIS situations happening. So it's really easy to say "this is a one shot deal....this situation will NEVER happen again...I'm SUPER stressed out, I have SO MUCH to deal with right now.
So I CAN today, I NEED it today, I DESERVE it today, Look at what I have to GO THROUGH today. It's an emotional day, a horrible day, a day when I NEED the comfort of (insert food here)."
Sometimes it goes the other way....we're so distraught we CAN'T eat....and that can backfire, too.
Because once the crisis is over and we can eat again we're RAVENOUS because our body is literally 'starved' for nutrition, and then it can become REALLY hard to stay OP.
The secret here is to eat OP, even if you barely taste it or it tastes like sawdust to you because of what you're dealing with. Have something easy and quick. A ready-to-drink shake is perfect for these times. Or a bar (with plenty of water handy). When you're in crisis mode you may be crying a lot, having a dry throat as a result. So you need to keep hydrating, too. BIGtime.
And I submit to you that IF you allow yourself to go off plan during this 'big crisis' (whatever it was, even if it NEVER happens to you again in your LIFETIME)....you still won't be real happy with yourself. Because in your heart of hearts you'll realize the food didn't really make anything "better", did it?
In fact it can feel like you're punishing yourself with it!
In fact you MAY BE!
Food addictions are mysterious and ever-changing things. You literally almost never know what's going to happen next. You have to be willing to roll with the punches and SEE THROUGH YOUR OWN LOGIC AND EXCUSES and get down to the nitty-gritty.
That's why I love blogging so much, and this website so much...and having FRIENDS to talk to so much! They act like SOUNDING BOARDS to my kraziness.
They help me to see straight. EVEN when life is handing me some really really big 'lemons'.
It's NEVER an excuse to overeat or go off my food plan because when I do that? I'm NOT being TRUE TO MYSELF.
Bottom line? It's amazing how often...when you stop and think about it....we give ourselves 'PERMISSION' to go off plan.
We tell ourselves "It's OK, I just NEED this right now, I can always go back OP - LATER."
And we fall for it.
Because we remember times even when maybe we DID just that!
But how quickly we FORGET how HARD that was!
It can be very, very, very, VERY hard to get back OP.
Ask anyone who's done it!
And it can be SO painful to do so! Agonizing over how much weight we gained (if we got on the scale), OR over how much we THINK we gained (if we didn't get on the scale). Worrying over 'how long will it take to RE-LOSE it this time?'
And then trying and failing, over and over again, to stay 100% OP, to crawl out of that 'food hole', that wall of MUD we have to literally FIGHT our way UP and OUT OF to get back OP.
The second time around is always harder. And the third, harder yet.
It NEVER GETS EASY. NEVER.
Trust me on this.
If you're LUCKY you can contain yourself to a one-day binge.
And if you're REALLY lucky you can get away with it....weight-wise,
IF you go back OP immediately the next day.
But those are big 'IF's.
And even IF you do that....what are you teaching yourself?
"It's OK to go off plan once in awhile when I'm having a tough day or I'm on vacation".
And that means you aren't really changing your lifestyle, are you?
After all, NO ONE is happy 'all' the time. NO ONE goes through this life with wonderful days. Into each life some rain must fall...and when we hit those bad patches, if we have allowed ourselves to go off plan when they hit, then the NEXT time we have a bad patch, guess what's going to happen?
Fat brain will start in again...and this time she'll have even MORE ammunition...because she'll say things like 'Remember last time? You did it and you got away with it! You didn't even gain any weight! You just got right back OP the next day and it was cool!'
BUT....!!!! If you're anything like me? And that one day 'binge' was....well, let's face it, was it really 'wonderful'?
Or did you HATE YOURSELF - WHILE - you were were doing it?
You're forgetting how AWFUL it was WHILE YOU WERE DOING IT.
All you remember is how great that food tasted. But THINK BACK HONESTLY.
Did you eat past the point of fullness? Did you HATE yourself as you were doing it? Feel weak, and like you had 'no willpower', and that you would NEVER get control of your eating? Did you sneak food? Did you eat to the point where you made yourself SICK in terms of your stomach hurting or feeling bloated?
So...that was a GOOD thing? REALLY?
The next time you tell yourself 'It's OK because .... (insert excuse here)....' STOP. Really stop and think about it.
THERE IS NO REASON TO GO OFF PLAN.
EVER.
PERIOD.
You can stay on the 5/1 if you're sick. You won't 'die'.
You can stay on the 5/1 if you're on vacation. And you can STILL HAVE A GREAT TIME! It's not ABOUT the food.....not always!
It's about the company, and the PLACE you're at, isn't it?
When you keep making excuses you aren't really changing, are you?
TRUE weight loss and maintenance comes when we STOP with the excuses and realize that this is...as a friend said to me today...
"FOREVER".
Of course she said it was a "FOREVER DIET".
And I said, DON'T LOOK AT IT THAT WAY!
It's not a "forever diet".
It's a HEALTHY EATING PLAN FOR LIFE.
It's changing your eating habits one day at a time, one meal at a time, until it becomes so ingrained, so second-nature, that you just 'automatically' eat that way.
And then it's....amazing.
Because good health is there.
A slim body is there.
FREEDOM FROM YOUR FOOD ADDICTION is there.
FREEDOM FROM THE SCALE is even there!
Wouldn't it be GREAT NOT to have to agonize over your weight all the time?
Wouldn't it be GREAT to devote your resources to....(wonder of wonders)...something ELSE instead? Maybe you have a passion for creating music, or writing, or singing, or you're into painting or sculpting or physics or teaching or being a great lawyer or a computer nerd. Whatever! Wouldn't it be great to free up your time, all the time you now spend DEALING with your food addiction, to instead pursue your PASSIONS, the things you LOVE to do?
THINK how much you could accomplish if you didn't have to worry about your weight anymore! If you could wear whatever you wanted, whenever you wanted....if you never had to assess the strength of a chair to ensure it would hold you...if you never had to suck in your stomach to get your jeans on...if you never had to worry about being fat EVER again?
THINK how marvelous it would be to go to a restaurant and AUTOMATICALLY want the healthiest thing on the menu and look at the sludge and go 'yuck'!
THINK how great your world would be if you LOVED water. Truly loved water more than ANY other drink and preferred it!
WOW!
Right? Get what I'm saying?
It CAN happen. And along with that you can even have the pleasure of LOOKING FORWARD to the gym (I DO!) and of challenging yourself just for the sheer pleasure of moving your body....and looking AMAZING while you're doing it!
IT IS POSSIBLE!
YOU CAN DO IT!
Keep on keepin' on!!!!
How many of us have gone on vacation... and OFF PLAN?
[I always get this 'picture' in my head, of that scene from City Slickers, where Billy Crystal is being dragged through the MUD by an errant cow...and he's screaming, "But I'm on VACATION!!!!"]
We can justify it to ourselves so easily!
It's 'just for now'.
"I'm on vacation, I'm supposed to ENJOY myself. How can I enjoy myself if I have to say NO all this delicious FOOD?!!!"
But wait a minute.
The last time you were on vacation, did you take pictures of what you ate, or where you WERE? And who you were WITH?
(Actually, I have a SIL who does that, believe it or not. She goes out to eat and takes pictures of the food and posts it on FB. And yes she's overweight. And I'm like "UGH, gimme a break, will you? What is she trying to prove? That she can eat? I can do that too! BOY can I! Wanna have an eating contest? Your place or mine? Oh boy get ready because I can EAT YOU UNDER THE TABLE!" LOL....)
I submit to you...I CHALLENGE you....the next time you go on vacation do it On plan. And ENJOY the PLACES you go and the PEOPLE you're with! And guess what? You can STILL enjoy the food! OP! (ON PLAN)
I remember a great dinner with hubby...in San Francisco on vacation. I stayed OP! And it was awesome! The atmosphere, the background music, his smile across the table, the fish which was cooked to PERFECTION, being waited on, lots of ice water (I drive waiters NUTS with my requests for water LOL), etc.!
"Who says" you can't have a great time on vacation OP?
As my fav comic used to say, the late great George Carlin,
"SHOW ME THE RULE".
And while we're at it...how many of us have been SICK and 'given ourselves permission' to go off plan?
Oh poor DEAR you're sick! "It's OK....feel better, do whatever you have to in order to feel better"
Translation: YES, make that comfort food...
For me it was always tomato soup with OODLES (I mean, like 6-7 SLICES) of American cheese torn up and thrown inside it...AND a bunch of club crackers, too. There was like 20% SOUP, 80% cheese and crackers. Who was I trying to kid? LOL).
And I don't even NEED the soup. I've overeaten COUGH DROPS.
(Yep! Not the sugarfree ones, either....bleh, hate those. Although I can overdo those in a pinch, too....LOL)....
I am NOT advocating you don't use cough drops or cough syrup if the doctor has said you should, by the way....I'm talking about OVERDOING it because you want that TASTE in your mouth. You know what I'm talking about...(I can see the heads nodding sheepishly....!)
Oh by the way stay away from Cepacol's latest cough drops called 'Hydra'....OMG they taste TOO good. I was like ODing on them last week. And I DIDN'T HAVE A COUGH. LOL....
Another great justification, right? We're so SICK....and "nobody understands"....despite the fact that we're sick we still have all the housework to do and the cooking and etc
"Life goes on", right?
A MAN gets sick and the WORLD comes to an end.
A WOMAN gets sick and ..... she keeps GOING.
LOL...sorry, men out there...I call it like I see it! (and if you're not like that- BRAVO!)
(I don't know about you but my hubs isn't exactly a "Pro" in the TLC department! In fact he is totally CLUELESS. He knows he probably SHOULD do things like put his hand on my forehead to check for fever, go 'tsk tsk' a lot, make me a cup of tea, tell me 'It's allright, go lie down, I'll take care of everything'....but he doesn't.
Mind you, -I- do that....a woman does that automatically....but a man? Not so much. Not my man, anyway. He's wonderful and I adore him but...he just can't handle the tender loving care bit. He just looks.. lost and dejected. I guess that's his way of emphathizing with me but it falls flat and I just get ANGRY. I feel like everything in the house revolves around ME (uh...true....) and if I don't do it, it doesn't get DONE (also true).
But ...who is making it that way?
Guess!
LOL....! ME!!!!
If I ASKED him to do more, maybe he'd DO it!
If I DIDN'T 'do it all', maybe he'd chip in more!
What a concept, right? LOL....
Sigh....oh, being a woman is hard sometimes, isn't it?
.....and we make it harder on OURSELVES.
We expect to be Superwoman. We have to do it ALL, and do it PERFECTLY. And when we're sick, well, we NEED a little sympathy, we NEED a little TLC, and when we don't get it....it's 'ALL TOO EASY' to fall back on our old friend and companion, FOOD!
Because nobody ELSE is helping us, right?
But...FOOD is still there, right? Just WAITING for you!
And you NEED good nutrition when you're sick, right?
And you NEED....extra calories...and maybe a little extra sugar....etc.
It goes on and on. The krazy ILLLOGIC that Fat Brain can come up with is astounding sometimes. I'm STILL amazed at my OWN EXCUSES!
FOOD will NOT make it 'all better'.
FOOD will NOT make you heal quicker. It will not make the fever go away, it will not get you on your feet any faster, it will not help with the aches and pains, it will NOT get rid of your headache, it will NOT stop the coughing or the sneezing or the runny nose or ANY of it.
Only TIME...and maybe some antibiotics if your doctor prescribed them...can help here.
And you KNOW that.
It's just ... JUSTIFICATION. AGAIN.
BE WATCHFUL OF FAT BRAIN. SHE NEVER GOES AWAY COMPLETELY!
...last but not least..
How many of us have had 'bad things' happen in our lives...everything from a fight with a loved one to a horrible horrible thing like a death in the family or something really evil or bad happen in our lives....and gone off plan?
Again, this is the perfect justification, right? After all, most of us in this life, if we're fortunate, don't have many of these huge CRISIS situations happening. So it's really easy to say "this is a one shot deal....this situation will NEVER happen again...I'm SUPER stressed out, I have SO MUCH to deal with right now.
So I CAN today, I NEED it today, I DESERVE it today, Look at what I have to GO THROUGH today. It's an emotional day, a horrible day, a day when I NEED the comfort of (insert food here)."
Sometimes it goes the other way....we're so distraught we CAN'T eat....and that can backfire, too.
Because once the crisis is over and we can eat again we're RAVENOUS because our body is literally 'starved' for nutrition, and then it can become REALLY hard to stay OP.
The secret here is to eat OP, even if you barely taste it or it tastes like sawdust to you because of what you're dealing with. Have something easy and quick. A ready-to-drink shake is perfect for these times. Or a bar (with plenty of water handy). When you're in crisis mode you may be crying a lot, having a dry throat as a result. So you need to keep hydrating, too. BIGtime.
And I submit to you that IF you allow yourself to go off plan during this 'big crisis' (whatever it was, even if it NEVER happens to you again in your LIFETIME)....you still won't be real happy with yourself. Because in your heart of hearts you'll realize the food didn't really make anything "better", did it?
In fact it can feel like you're punishing yourself with it!
In fact you MAY BE!
Food addictions are mysterious and ever-changing things. You literally almost never know what's going to happen next. You have to be willing to roll with the punches and SEE THROUGH YOUR OWN LOGIC AND EXCUSES and get down to the nitty-gritty.
That's why I love blogging so much, and this website so much...and having FRIENDS to talk to so much! They act like SOUNDING BOARDS to my kraziness.
They help me to see straight. EVEN when life is handing me some really really big 'lemons'.
It's NEVER an excuse to overeat or go off my food plan because when I do that? I'm NOT being TRUE TO MYSELF.
Bottom line? It's amazing how often...when you stop and think about it....we give ourselves 'PERMISSION' to go off plan.
We tell ourselves "It's OK, I just NEED this right now, I can always go back OP - LATER."
And we fall for it.
Because we remember times even when maybe we DID just that!
But how quickly we FORGET how HARD that was!
It can be very, very, very, VERY hard to get back OP.
Ask anyone who's done it!
And it can be SO painful to do so! Agonizing over how much weight we gained (if we got on the scale), OR over how much we THINK we gained (if we didn't get on the scale). Worrying over 'how long will it take to RE-LOSE it this time?'
And then trying and failing, over and over again, to stay 100% OP, to crawl out of that 'food hole', that wall of MUD we have to literally FIGHT our way UP and OUT OF to get back OP.
The second time around is always harder. And the third, harder yet.
It NEVER GETS EASY. NEVER.
Trust me on this.
If you're LUCKY you can contain yourself to a one-day binge.
And if you're REALLY lucky you can get away with it....weight-wise,
IF you go back OP immediately the next day.
But those are big 'IF's.
And even IF you do that....what are you teaching yourself?
"It's OK to go off plan once in awhile when I'm having a tough day or I'm on vacation".
And that means you aren't really changing your lifestyle, are you?
After all, NO ONE is happy 'all' the time. NO ONE goes through this life with wonderful days. Into each life some rain must fall...and when we hit those bad patches, if we have allowed ourselves to go off plan when they hit, then the NEXT time we have a bad patch, guess what's going to happen?
Fat brain will start in again...and this time she'll have even MORE ammunition...because she'll say things like 'Remember last time? You did it and you got away with it! You didn't even gain any weight! You just got right back OP the next day and it was cool!'
BUT....!!!! If you're anything like me? And that one day 'binge' was....well, let's face it, was it really 'wonderful'?
Or did you HATE YOURSELF - WHILE - you were were doing it?
You're forgetting how AWFUL it was WHILE YOU WERE DOING IT.
All you remember is how great that food tasted. But THINK BACK HONESTLY.
Did you eat past the point of fullness? Did you HATE yourself as you were doing it? Feel weak, and like you had 'no willpower', and that you would NEVER get control of your eating? Did you sneak food? Did you eat to the point where you made yourself SICK in terms of your stomach hurting or feeling bloated?
So...that was a GOOD thing? REALLY?
The next time you tell yourself 'It's OK because .... (insert excuse here)....' STOP. Really stop and think about it.
THERE IS NO REASON TO GO OFF PLAN.
EVER.
PERIOD.
You can stay on the 5/1 if you're sick. You won't 'die'.
You can stay on the 5/1 if you're on vacation. And you can STILL HAVE A GREAT TIME! It's not ABOUT the food.....not always!
It's about the company, and the PLACE you're at, isn't it?
When you keep making excuses you aren't really changing, are you?
TRUE weight loss and maintenance comes when we STOP with the excuses and realize that this is...as a friend said to me today...
"FOREVER".
Of course she said it was a "FOREVER DIET".
And I said, DON'T LOOK AT IT THAT WAY!
It's not a "forever diet".
It's a HEALTHY EATING PLAN FOR LIFE.
It's changing your eating habits one day at a time, one meal at a time, until it becomes so ingrained, so second-nature, that you just 'automatically' eat that way.
And then it's....amazing.
Because good health is there.
A slim body is there.
FREEDOM FROM YOUR FOOD ADDICTION is there.
FREEDOM FROM THE SCALE is even there!
Wouldn't it be GREAT NOT to have to agonize over your weight all the time?
Wouldn't it be GREAT to devote your resources to....(wonder of wonders)...something ELSE instead? Maybe you have a passion for creating music, or writing, or singing, or you're into painting or sculpting or physics or teaching or being a great lawyer or a computer nerd. Whatever! Wouldn't it be great to free up your time, all the time you now spend DEALING with your food addiction, to instead pursue your PASSIONS, the things you LOVE to do?
THINK how much you could accomplish if you didn't have to worry about your weight anymore! If you could wear whatever you wanted, whenever you wanted....if you never had to assess the strength of a chair to ensure it would hold you...if you never had to suck in your stomach to get your jeans on...if you never had to worry about being fat EVER again?
THINK how marvelous it would be to go to a restaurant and AUTOMATICALLY want the healthiest thing on the menu and look at the sludge and go 'yuck'!
THINK how great your world would be if you LOVED water. Truly loved water more than ANY other drink and preferred it!
WOW!
Right? Get what I'm saying?
It CAN happen. And along with that you can even have the pleasure of LOOKING FORWARD to the gym (I DO!) and of challenging yourself just for the sheer pleasure of moving your body....and looking AMAZING while you're doing it!
IT IS POSSIBLE!
YOU CAN DO IT!
Keep on keepin' on!!!!
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