Reflection. Reorganization. Review.

Let me tell you a short story: I have a friend who less than 3 months ago was a size 12. She started losing weight as part of a competition at work and has since lost 30lbs and is now a size 6/8!!! I am super happy for her and I am also frickin' jealous! I don't know exactly what she's been doing or if this was done in a 100% healthful manner but I need to step up my game! If she can do it, I can do it and summer is peaking around the corner.

My 5 day detox gave me back my focus and my drive. I can do this. I can say "no" to things. I can, in fact, feel much better about myself in just 5 days. I'm entering a new block of about 39 days. It is the 39 days before I go to Florida with 2 friends, one of which is mentioned in the above short story. It is going to be hot and we are going to be in skimpy clothes and bathing suits and I am determined to feel good about myself, and not like a lard ass.

Here's my new mission: I want to eat like I friggin' ate on this detox for the majority of those 39 days. That means minimally and basically while still counting my weight watchers points and banking those weekly flexible ones. (In my 5 days I used 4 of 20!) I'm already aware of 3 days where that will not be possible. On those days, hopefully only once a week and no more than twice a week, I will eat thoughtfully and not exceed those banked flexible points. So, really, I'm staying with the structure of the points system I've been using all along but with loads of new rules piled on. To improve on my 5 day detox I have to eat more vegetables. I ate a load of fruit but did not do great with veggies. My trainer is not a fan of all the sugar I'm getting from the fruit and the subsequent sugar highs and lows, etc. so I'll have to get creative. If I can do this I bet I can shed a bunch before Florida. I think 9 lbs, bringing me down to real 145 is totally do-able.

Day 31

I did it! I stuck to my super strict detox for 5 days! It was not easy and I was hungry a lot therefore cranky a lot...and definitely eating less makes me severely feel energy dips and the direct effects of what I'm eating and when. I was tired, I had headaches...it was all sorts of fun.

Soooo. I weighed myself this morning. 148. Not so bad. That means I only gained 3 pounds over this rocky period when I intentionally took a break and then unintentionally could not find my footing again. I bet this detox helped. I wonder how much I weighed before I did this...

Here's another thing. My scale said I weighed 148. My mother's scale said I weighed 154. I have the sneaking suspicion that my mom's is right :( That's ok, I guess, it just means way back when I though I had hit a new low of 145, I actually had not. I really probably hit 151. That's still well and good but not nearly as exciting. But now I know and knowing is half the battle.

Day 25

I had a fun weekend with a fair share of indulgences. One thing I've realized is that the last indulgence in a group of many is certainly not as sweet as the first (few). That's why they are indulgences. While I've recently been growing batty under extreme restraints, that is the very thing that make indulgences so sweet. They're occasional and special.

I've been trying to eliminate all of my 100 calorie packs and Weight Watchers ice cream bars and other diet desserts chock full of artificial sweeteners and chemicals. By cutting those out completely and not replacing them with, say, 2 Hershey's kisses or 1 cookie, I have made myself into a wild child that goes bat shit crazy once let off her leash! While my one time goal was to eliminate the diet desserts and the real desserts, denying myself completely makes me a ticking time bomb. I'm now left with the question, do I allow diet desserts back into my life or do I allow full fat fatty things back in my life that could be potentially dangerous should a binge be brewing?

I need a new approach. I need to think of food only as fuel for the body. It is not a reward, it is not comfort, it is not love, it is not rebellion. Food is what we need to survive. By putting good nutritious substance into my system, I am taking care of myself. By binge eating junk food, I am abusing and punishing my body. My cravings are not working against me, they are not to be squashed and denied, they are to be honored and accommodated rationally. Does this sound like a bunch of zen bullshit? Because that's not what I'm going for...I want to be good to myself rather than continue a somewhat destructive pattern.

I'm going to detox for the next 5 days. Not a crazy liquids only detox or a eat only grapefruit detox, but a simplifying and minimalistic detox. I want to eat primarily fruits and vegetables, lean meats, and dairy. I will leave out extraneous carbs, sugars, salts, caffeine and chemicals. I don't want to eat pre-prepared foods, I want to know everything that is going into each dish that I eat. For example, here's my plan for tomorrow:

Breakfast
Oatmeal with a dash of cinnamon, 2 tbsp. sliced almonds, and 2 tbsp. dried cranberries and 2 small mandarin oranges
Snack
2 bananas
Lunch
1/2 c. plain 0% greek yogurt with 1 c. mixed berries
Snack
myoplex light protein shake
Dinner
6 shrimp sauteed with sugar snap peas and 3 tbsp. soy vey marinade over 1/2 c. quinoa
Snack
5 hard boiled egg whites

Obviously I will not be making the protein shake but I think it's important to include for a quick, post-workout refuel. There will be no additional oils or extraneous snacks. There will, however, be lots of water and multivitamins. With 5 of these days in a row, hopefully I can shed any pounds I may have put on this weekend and shrink my belly in time for D-day. W-day. Weigh Day.