Wednesday, September 22, 2010

Success versus Failure

There is no such thing as Failure in weight loss. Only giving up. Case in point. Last night was my husband's birthday. We went out for dinner to The Keg. It's our favorite place. They hand wrote him a birthday card and everyone working that night signed it. I really didn't want a steak. I'm eating much healthier now and it's just not my favorite thing. I LOVE scallops. And salmon if done right. But the seafood just didn't seem to be that much better. I saw a lot of seafood with cream sauces or butter. And that just wasn't really what I was searching for when I say seafood. I like herbs and spices and lightly grilled.

So I had steak. I got the steak done the way I wanted and got the sides, appetizer, and dessert that I wanted. I figured if I couldn't do it better I would do it my way. Today I was right back on my game plan. I feel great. I don't feel guilty for what I ate, because, I did what I wanted. Not because I could but I weighed my options and made the right decision.

Had I said well I gave up last night in the battle and let the rest of my week go downhill then that's just giving up. One minor set back is not failure. Even if I gain 1 pound this week instead of lose it. Again, that would be giving up. Seeing the scale go up 1 pound and giving up is just giving up. I didn't fail. I let life happen and enjoyed my night. I ate what "I" wanted. Not what I should be eating, or tried to save 100 calories on the night.

I had fun and now I'm back in the game. But I'm still in the game!!

Tuesday, September 21, 2010

Life has gotten in the way...

You probably all have experienced this. From time to time life gets in the way and prevents us from losing weight. I feel like I have been so out of touch that I wanted to get everyone up to speed as to what is going on and why it's been 5 months since I last posted an update.

These last 5 months have been more than enough to bear without having to try to lose weight on top of everything else. Dieting has been next to impossible and I thought rather than fail I would just postpone things a bit.

Normally I would not be as gracious to myself, but these 5 months have been a very rare exception for me. If I would have tried to start a diet I would have hated myself for putting myself through this at a time like this so I did not.

About 5 months ago my husband had a cancer scare that really through him for a loop. He has been having general digestive issues. About 5 years ago he had his gall bladder removed. There were about 100-200 stones and he nearly died. His liver was in failure. He is so stubborn about going to the doctor that he let the gall bladder get so bad that it began affecting other organs as well. Even a glass of water or soda was setting off his gall bladder and producing gall stones. Some of the words that doctors uttered were impossible to believe. I am still curious what those enzyme levels were but they were so off the chart that one doctor advised he had never seen levels that high in anyone alive. It took about a week in the hospital on IV before the gall bladder and liver were healthy enough to operate. Luckily he survived.

About 2 months ago we moved back to Arizona from being on the East Coast for a year. Initially my job was going to let me try to work remotely. But they really needed someone in the office and in the end was not meant to be. I was able to find work in a very short time span (2 weeks). Which is really good in this economy. We spent about the past 2 months house hunting. With interest rates so low, and housing prices some of the lowest ever, it only made sense that we try and buy now. There is some new construction we fell in love with and made an offer. It was accepted and we have been spending about the last month making choices on all the various options. The location is great, as is the price. And the options for modifying the floor plan has been incredible. It's not a custom home, but is very close to custom or semi-custom. Eventually my husbands dream is to build a fully custom home that we create from floor to ceiling. But that's many years down the road. And when we finally are more financially secure. Right now that's far from the case. But it's always nice to dream big.

Then about 3 weeks ago my husbands father died abroad. He was killed in a car accident in Saudi Arabia. We had the memorial within a week and burial was this weekend. I'm 110% fully exhausted from it all. I am spending all my free time these days working out the final housing details. The rest of my waking time is spending time with my husband and his mother through it all.

So like I say, life has gotten in the way. I had considered dieting through it all. It would have been just as easy to throw together a salad these past 3 weeks as it would have been to grab fast food on the way. But then again, my time has been very valuable to me and those around me. And time is what we all needed together, full of lots of hugs, rather than making salad.

But this week I was able to get back on track. My diet has been completely meat free so far this week. I'm sorry to say that I didn't take any pics of all the great and yummy salads. But I'm one to always make terrific salads so there will be many pics yet to come as I progress. My lunch break is almost over, but soon as I have a break in my day I will post an update to what I have eaten so far this week.