The MakeMeThinner Support Forum

[nickieluv]

I had an OK night - the baby was up for over an hour, but then she slept until 10 - I had no idea it was that late. My older daughter climbs in bed with me and goes back to sleep, too, so it was a pretty nice morning.

I have to say, though, that I didn't even try to be on plan today. For a very dumb reason - I hadn't pre-mixed any shakes and I wasn't able to grab anything but a bar, and you're not supposed to have a bar first thing in the morning, so I waited but by the time I could get myself a meal it was past an hour, and I just let it slide.

It is just plain hard work the first week, no doubt about it. It's a struggle until you get in the zone and get used to saying 'no' and start to feel lighter and stronger. Until you literally yank yourself 180 degrees and start moving in the right direction, it is so despicably easy to keep on going the same way you always have been.

It's not going to be any fun, but I'm going to go to bed early tonight, make sure the kitchen is clean and my shakes are mixed, and try to set myself up for success a lot more than I did today. I almost think having success last time makes me more complacent, because I feel like 'whenever I get around to it' things will start to happen, guaranteed. But there's no way I can win this fight until I want it with all my heart and soul and mind and body. Gotta say, though - I'm starting to look fat to myself again. After almost 5 months you can't keep saying it's baby weight, you know?

Leigh said I have to post a loss this week at roll call, so I'd better get busy or she'll hunt me down and beat me.

[nickieluv]

Can I just say, though, that it was nice to not fight with myself today. To just go about my day and not worry about what I was eating. Granted I ate nothing at all nutritious, and my body does not feel good about today - but my mind enjoyed the rest.

I just know this won't happen if I have to fight with myself from now until goal. I think I need a mini-goal - like I will fight with myself for one week and hopefully by the end of that week it won't seem so terrible.

I definitely need my butt whipped into shape, because all this hanging around and thinking and moping is not getting me any closer to where I want to eventually end up.

OK - so tomorrow, I will not eat anything that isn't MF. If I am hungry but it is not time to eat I will first have a big glass of something (water, preferably, but certainly something no-calorie) and keep myself busy for 30 miinutes, and if I am still hungry after that, I will let myself have more MF.

Tomorrow is only Tuesday. I can do a lot of good this week if I start right now. I will quite plainly never start if something doesn't change in my mind and my actions. That's been proven. But it's also been proven that I can do this, and lose a ton of weight. And feel amazing. I want that back.

It occurred to me this evening that my baby will be mobile not too many months from now. She's 'easy' to care for now because she doesn't move. But soon I will need to chase after her and watch my older daughter even more carefully to be sure there are no collisions. There may be some actual running involved from time to time. I am in no shape to do that right now, and I want my girls to have a fun mom, not a broken one. Plus, good weather is not that far away, and I will want to go outdoors again with my oldest and play on the playground, go for walks, just plain old be willing to get off the darn couch every day. It's easy to 'hibernate' in the winter but I will regret it in the spring if I don't start taking off the fat now. I might actually be able to fit on the playground slides with her if I get myself moving right now.

NO MORE EXCUSES!!!! I must do EVERYTHING and ANYTHING that it takes to stay on plan. No more letting myself off easy. No more rationalization or justifications. I WANT THIS AND THAT MEANS I HAVE TO DO THE WORK. Period. End of sentence.

[nickieluv]

So I finally had a 'yay, me!' moment.

Obviously the day isn't a success yet, but earlier I was hungry - of course. I'd already had 3 supplements, two of them bars (the new 'legal' bars are coming soon!!!), and I was going to have 'just a little cheese' because I had just eaten but felt hungry still. Well, I was really close to doing that, but I told myself to cut it out. I did eat - I had MF raspberry tea - but I am proud that I did what I said I was going to and only ate something that was MF.

It's been a bit of a rough day, although nothing crazy has been going on. I've had 5 meals already, and three were bars, but I'm almost out of the bars and from now on I'll probably only buy the new kind that you can have more than once without worrying. I'm allowing myself 7 meals this week on the days I am not having a L&G - normal 5+1 on the weekends. I know that's me tweaking the plan again, but I'm hoping it will only be temporary. I'd like to do a 5+1 all the time when I'm feeling stronger.

Of course I keep stepping on the scale a lot, and it's been going up all day. Usually it goes down throughout the day on my first day on plan. But that doesn't matter - and actually I keep meaning to put the scale away and only weigh once a week. It's too easy for me to justify bad choices when the scale goes down a little bit. Perhaps after my weigh-in Sunday I will try that.

I'm happy that I'm doing OK today. I feel so much better about eating the MF than I would have felt if I'd thrown in the towel again. And I don't feel too bad about having extra supplements at first because I have such a huge stock of meals that I am actually in the position of needing to clear out space.

I was going to only order the tiniest order next month, since I have all this, but then they had the 'holiday kit' special which is 3 boxes of the hot drinks for only $35 - and that's such a great deal that I have to do it. Although if they discontinue it before my order processes I guess I'll drop down. Maybe I'll change my batch date this month to be before Christmas. I can always move it back again next month. I'm all about shopping the deals, as long as it's something I'll actually use. And now they have the new 'skip a month' feature or something like that, which I can always do later on once if I need to.

Well, as usual I was on longer than I meant to be - just glad I had some good news to report today. As of now I'm allowing myself 2 more meals today, which should work fine if I have one for dinner and one before bed. I didn't go to bed early yesterday, but I'm going to try harder to do that today.

One last thing - I was thinking today and last time I succeeded, I did it under about the worst conditions possible. I was essentially a single mom, because my husband worked second shift 3 to midnight. So I would get my daughter ready in the morning, take her to the sitter (my sister), work all day, teach piano lessons, pick up my daughter, feed her and get her to bed, and then plop in bed myself. Maybe it worked because I didn't have a spare moment to breathe, let alone eat. But I was always alone and that's one of my big triggers. So it's pretty impressive that I did so well last time with all that going on, and this time since I'm home full-time and my husband is working normal hours, I shouldn't be having any problems. There are so many reasons to lose weight - and even if sometimes the reasons to stay the same are more numerous, they are never really good reasons. Quality, not quantity, pertains to the reasons I should be changing my lifestyle right now.

So anyway - so far so good, and once that first day is over it has to get a little easier to resist, right? Although in my experience it gets harder each day until about day 5 - but I'm trying to be optimistic.

[DutchChoc]

nickieluv, I love reading your thoughts and aspirations because they seem so awesome to me - such good intentions and don't you stop for a minute thinking! You don't mope, as you said, you plan for excellence, frankly, and I think you should acknowledge that and give yourself some credit. I'll bet you're your worst critic, always trying harder when you're already trying as hard as a person can or even NEEDS to. My wish for you would be to be able to enjoy all the things you already are doing right, because it sounds like there are lots of them.

All that aside, it's cool that you have confidence in your ability to succeed at this; I can relate to being afraid of that success. Sometimes approaching success can feel like "now what?" - thats un-nerving, or else one can look at beauriful women and start thinking they're just normal-looking instead of fantastically perfect for looking that way. I can't explain it, but I know I havent always been as thrilled with being a smaller size as I thought I'd be - it became a "so what?" to me and that remains a twisted piece of confusion. It meant fairly little to me to give it all up. Go figure? Maybe I also "never appreciate myself".

So, just my thoughts. I think you're doing great and just keep truckin'.

[nickieluv]

My thought for the day:

People mention their inner child or inner brat wanting the foods that aren't on plan, wanting that instant gratification.

After a fight with hubby last night, I went out driving and thinking. And it occurred to me that maybe me wanting to just eat whatever whenever is another way of hearkening back to a simpler time. That time before puberty when no one cared how much you weighed or how smart you were and everyone was just your friend.

There is a theme in my fears that no one will like me if I'm thin. People already think I'm stuck up because I'm shy and it's hard for me to open up and be myself around people until I've known them for a VERY long time. Then that turns into them thinking that I think I'm better than them. And I've turned people off with my brains, when I do try to just be myself and something slips out and they think I'm showing off or trying to be snooty. So if I am thin, too, how could I have any friends? As a fat person, I'm a safe friend. I think Katie mentioned something like this a few days ago.

Also, last time I talked a bit about things with my husband and wondering if being thin would hurt my marriage. Well, I'm very impulsive. Driving around last night, angry and hurt, I actually (shamefully) had the thought that it would really serve him right if I went into a bar and - I can't even finish writing it. I'm sure you all can figure it out. But I couldn't do that because I'm fat and it would never happen.

Now it was most likely a little fantasy that would never happen. I've grown up since college, I'm a mom and a teacher and a church member and all those virtuous things, so I wouldn't do something like that. I have much better filtering mechanisms and impulse control. Except that maybe I don't have that control, because look at how I eat. And if eating is a drug for me, an addiction, an escape mechanism, couldn't I just switch to some other vice if I finally do learn to control my eating?

I hate to say it, but I suppose I should go back to counseling for a bit. It usually only lasts 2 or 3 sessions and then I feel better, but last time I went the counselor told me that was normal. She said most people don't need long-term therapy, they just need help over some bumps in their lives from time to time.

And the fight last night brought up some sad memories and some daddy issues that I try never to think about. So I suppose I could talk with someone about that.

Not trying to be on plan today. I know I could be, but I'm not. I have no doubt it will happen when I'm ready, and it will be wonderful. I feel like I need to lay some more groundwork. The first step is that I'm going to try to lay off the junk. If I'm not going to be on plan, that doesn't mean I have to eat poorly. Maybe I'll try low-carb - because there is some junk that is definitely low carb, but you can't have the sugary stuff that I'm tending to lose it over - so maybe for a couple of days I could do that. Sort of a compromise.

[DogMa]

There is a theme in my fears that no one will like me if I'm thin. People already think I'm stuck up because I'm shy and it's hard for me to open up and be myself around people until I've known them for a VERY long time. Then that turns into them thinking that I think I'm better than them. And I've turned people off with my brains, when I do try to just be myself and something slips out and they think I'm showing off or trying to be snooty. So if I am thin, too, how could I have any friends? As a fat person, I'm a safe friend. I think Katie mentioned something like this a few days ago.

I so understand this. I have some of the same problems, and frankly, there HAS been some friction since I lost the weight. I think I mentioned some of it in talking about my visit with my brother. But the good new is that's NOT the case with my other friends. I even asked one yesterday if maybe I unintentionally DO somehow make people feel bad about their choices or feel that I think I'm somehow superior because I'm thinner and healthier. She said that's not at all the case, and I believe her.

So the upshot is ... I think the people who already have some jealousy/rivalry issues (like my brother and, to a lesser degree, his wife) will have problems with you losing weight and getting healthy. The others won't. And, at least in my case, I refuse to let my brother's jealousy affect my health. I love him, but I'm not going to be fat and lazy to make him more comfortable. And deep down, I don't think he would even want that.

[nickieluv]

I'm sure that despite surface jealousy, our families of all people want to see us healthy and happy. On the BL makeover episode, they showed Michelle's father saying that he didn't have to worry about her any more. I suppose he was talking about more than just weight, but it made me wonder if my parents worry about my health because I'm so big - especially my Dad, seeing how many problems he has and how many medicines he takes, many of which could be discontinued if he lost weight and exercised (his doctor has told him this).

I think I'm starting to come around. I entertained the idea this morning of just waiting until after Christmas to start - or waiting until I have 60 days left until the trip - but that's just so darn stupid to put things off. What am I going to do, have a food orgy for 10 days? Moronic. There are so many good things waiting for me on the other side of this 100 pounds. So tomorrow I'm doing a new weigh-in, adjusting my ticker to that starting weight (by no stretch of the imagination have I been on enough to justify calling the last month a re-start), and getting my butt in gear.

Plus hubby and I found a neat idea for a rewards system, inspired by Leigh's mention of recent 'alone time.' I won't go into detail, don't worry. But it definitely makes me want to start losing some weight in a hurry.

[DogMa]

[nickieluv]

Now Robin, I deliberately tried to be vague so I wouldn't get those looks. I guess I wasn't entirely successful.

[nickieluv]

Exactly. If I wait for no holidays coming up, or no birthdays, or the stars to be in perfect alignment or something else stupid, I'll be waiting forever. I am actually excited this time - not just because of the rewards system. I think instead of writing 'rewards system' I'll just use and you'll all know what I mean. Let me just say you'll be seeing a for every pound I lose so I may not have as much time to be online.

Onward and downward MF posse!!

[DogMa]

Sigh. OK, is it wrong of me to feel a little bummed that MY only rewards were things like new clothes and an iPod Shuffle? Sniffle.

[nickieluv]

Well this works great if you're poor. Which we are until I go back to work. Next Christmas I'll ask for the new clothes and the iPod.

So new starting weight - 252.8. Let me just outline why this is so sad. In August when I tried to start up again, I was just under 235. Then in October when I re-restarted, I was around 245. Now it's early December and here I am, almost back completely where I started before finding MF in the first place.

I'm not going to dwell on that - the weight is going to come off now - but I thought I should write that down in case I think waiting a few weeks to start is a good idea. I went from less than 95 pounds to goal, to now almost 113 pounds to goal, in about 4 months of fooling around. AND I can't believe it's been four months. The time flew by.

We have ten weeks until Disney and I'm going to make them good weeks. Today I've had a new bar and a glass of water - I'm going to have a glass of water with every meal. My glasses are 16oz almost so I'll be getting just about 3L of water each day doing that. I was ignoring the water issue but back when I was on a roll, I was drinking 4L of water every day at work. Whether that made any difference I don't know, but it certainly can't hurt to hydrate.

So today is off to a good start. I am trying to keep the goal in mind, and the is helping, too - also it's intriguing to think about how the will change as the weight drops off. I feel pretty calm about my decision - I've certainly proven to myself what happens if I'm using the 'wait and see' attitude about what I'll eat each day. So being on plan will certainly be better for me - physically and emotionally, too, as I start to feel the inner power that comes from taking care of myself.

Have a great Friday, everyone.

[DogMa]

Sigh. Yeah, my rewards work great if you're single and dateless.

[nickieluv]

Don't worry Robin, you'll find another gentle stalker someday soon. Remember him? How could you forget, right? There was some excitement you could have lived without I bet....

Well, I am about to finish my first day being 100% on plan. I've had all my meals and water but one, which I'm about to have, and then it's off to bed early. Busy weekend ahead, but I'm sure I'll find time to check in. Hope all are well.

[katieb920]

Omg I remember the stalker. I think people started medifast to find out more about the stalker.

That is so cool that your weight is almost there again. Hope you are having a great weekend