Saturday, May 2, 2009

A Weekend Away

I am heading out of town later this afternoon and am feeling nervous about doing so. Not so much about binging, but overeating, the opportunity IS there. Big party tonight and Sunday night, so in addition to food temptations, there will also be alcohol.

The food is worrisome because I am not confident I will be able to weigh and measure food being out of town in someone else's house, but maybe this is the time to try this "normal eating" thing (I'm pretty sure normal eating doesn't consist of obsessively weighing and measuring food). I guess what is scary is not being able to control food portions, since I have become so dependent on weighing/measuring food, but I guess will have to take it as it comes. Then there is also the opportunity to overeat at these parties, and my go big or go home mentality will be my saboteur, if there is to be one, so I will just have to remember that it is ok to have something if I want something, just keep it in moderation.

Now it's not so much the alcohol that worries me, it's the thought of drinking calories which is making me nervous. But truth be told, I rarely drink, so I am going to try my hardest to allow myself to have a good time this weekend, so if that means having a few drinks, then hopefully I can bounce back on Monday.

So I do not want my obsession with food to ruin my weekend, so I am going to try extra hard to enjoy myself and not let this become the focus of my weekend. I know this will not be easy, but I also know that it will not be a reason to binge, either. And if I don't lose weight this week, that is ok too. I am going to survive, this weekend will not kill me or make me fat.

By the way, today will be day 23! Just over 3 weeks, had no idea I could do it!

Will update on Monday. Have a good one!

xo *N

Mmmm... Ice Cream Cake

So yesterday saw birthday celebrations at my office which included birthday cake and I have to say I survived the cake quite nicely, but it wasn't without its flaws. I started the day mentally debating how much I would have based on nutritional information I pulled from the cake. If I only had 1/8 slice would be "10 points", but if I had 1/16 of the cake, it would only be "5 points", which would save room for more food later. I know looking at these numbers if likely not relevant to many of you, but this demonstrates the torment that went through my mind yesterday. After having had toast for breakfast, then bran and yogurt mid-morning, I decided to forgo lunch for the 10 point piece of cake. Shortly after cake I had a small lunch, because lets face it, as amazing as the cake was, it didn't put much substance in my stomach, and I was hungry, so a small frozen dinner it was.

Later in the afternoon I wanted more cake though. So I thought, what I can do is torment myself all afternoon about depriving myself more cake, or I can have some and be done with it. And done with it I was. And perhaps I'm rationalizing here, but it wasn't even a real piece, it was a small sliver which just took the edge off my craving. So while I did go back for more, I was ok with that decision. I did not feel guilty about it, and in the end know it was best for me to do so, since it stopped me from obsessing over it all day.

But like I said, eating cake was not without its flaws, and this is where I still struggle. By having cake yesterday and a few small snacks throughout the day, I could not bring myself to eat supper, so when I got home from work and my dad was barbecuing steak, I felt like I couldn't justify eating it since I had already had something so bad for me today... so while my family ate steak, I went to my bf's place for the night and ate popcorn for supper. Not good, I know, and technically this deprived myself of having a meal last night (and a damn good one), but like I said before, I feel I have to work through baby steps, and now I am still working on not binging since it takes so much effort to NOT BINGE on food. I feel like I have 3-4 more weeks of working on not binging, and then I can start working on these other obsessions, like counting food points and "having my cake and eating it too", so to speak.

I guess this 3-4 weeks will be once I have lost the last 5 "binge" pounds and get back to what I was last fall, before I became too thin and did not have bones jutting out of my shoulders and chest - to a comfortable weight where I looked normal and healthy. What's scary to me right now, writing with a clear head, is that in spite of not binging on food, I find myself fantasizing about really good binges, or pre-Christmas when I was binging, but maybe only once a week and not to the degree it had gotten since the new year. I am afraid of slipping back into these mini binges I used to do (they would last maybe 15 minutes, compared to hours of binging as of recently), but this is where I have to be strong because I know it will just take one bite of the wrong food in the wrong state of mind for it to be all over. So I guess what they say, "knowledge is power", is true here - I know I am vulnerable to this, and through knowing this I just have to work that much harder to fight it.

Anyway, that's all for now. How are you all doing?

xo