My 285 lb brain today:
I often get questions how I stay motivated and keep going. I'll give you a day in my brain.
My mother left on her two week trip so my plan was to go to water aerobics this morning since I couldn't walk with her. I turned on the tv and found all the breaking news of the massacre in Las Vegas. I sat stuck to the tv and didn't get to the pool. Breakfast was 4 oz of beef I'd roasted with half a small potato, chunks of carrot and some rutabaga. Breakfast?? Well, I'd made this yesterday and it was soooo good, I saw it on the fridge shelf and couldn't resist. Why use willpower on something that doesn't need resisting?? It's a meal in the day. Doesn't HAVE to be breakfast food.
So my dogs went nuts later with too much energy. I decided I needed to get my butt moving too. I took the small dog on our typical 2000 step walk and then took the larger dog on a 3000 step walk. I did sit around for a while this afternoon, not accomplishing much at all. Lunch was cheese and crackers, yogurt cup, 2 boiled eggs. My daughter left some supermarket-made cookies on the counter and after checking the calorie contents, I decided to have one. YUCK. Awful. Why did I bother??
I wanted to go to the water aerobics class tonight but realized it's Monday and I dislike the instructor. It's a useless class with a lot of floating around with noodles, only a few min of cardio. Ok, so do I sit around or do I go power walk? I thought, "oh no, if I go that way there are sweet and sour shrimp" and then "if I go that way there's garlic cheese bread" and "if I go that way there's thugs and druggies." Hmmm...I remembered AGAIN that it was Monday, which meant the sweet and sour shrimp place was CLOSED. Yay...off I went. Walking by the pizza place I saw a family enter the door. The man was probably 450lb and the wife was likely 350 and their kid was heavy. I wanted to shout, "No no no. Get back in the car!" but I couldn't. I walked faster, pumping my arms. I passed the Asian all you can eat buffet and an obese woman drove in and looked for a parking spot. I wanted to yell, "NO! Keep driving!" But I couldn't. I kept walking, thinking about where I'd started at 380lbs a few years ago. I got sickened by the horrible stink of the grease pumping out of all the fast food places that used to smell so good. It stinks now! I had decided to walk 25 min one way and then return, giving me my last 5000 steps for the day. I was annoyed at the traffic lights taking too long because my heart rate was going to slow down. I remembered how last summer I'd take my little dog around ONE BLOCK and need two days to recover from it! How could I have let that happen?? As I walked, I thought about someone dear to me who was diagnosed with diabetes last week. It was just the thing needed to start her healing process. Just a week of eating better and getting meds she feels so much more energy and she's smiling!
Ok, so what did I learn today from my brain? I don't do everything perfectly. My brain often thinks about food and junk. But I work around it. I'm aware of it. I know my triggers and avoid them if I can. I don't necessarily avoid the fast food places because that stink is a good deterant and reminder. I learned from my brain that when I feel energy, act on it. Instead of just ignoring it and sit around, get up and DO SOMETHING. Yes, I ate a cookie. Yes, I missed TWO water aerobics classes. I'm not beating myself up because I changed my plan and made it work.
My 285 lb brain will never be 'fixed', regardless of how much weight I lose. I'll probably always struggle with those initial thoughts of food (and laziness). My motivation comes from knowing I can battle it though. I've lost 70 lbs in the last year and even though I'm on a plateau, I'm sticking to it. I can't go back. None of us can go back, right?
So if I have a tough day, I'm going to look back on this post and remember.
Atlantic coast of Canada, 52 F, Fitbit Inspire HR.
Fitbit Product Experts Alumni are retired members of the Fitbit Product Expert Program. Learn more
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