219

219. A bar from which I was once forcibly ejected with a painter named Dwight Easter. Also? My weight as of this morning. Response to both situations: ABSOLUTE SHOCK.

I've taken the last two weeks totally off from exercising. As I mentioned in my last post, my knee has been bothering me more and more, and finally I just decided to put the brakes on and give myself a good solid rest. I've been enjoying it -- sleeping past 3 AM is nice, for sure. But in the back of my mind was a little nagging voice saying, "You're going to gain it all baaaaaaaaaack!" I wasn't going crazy with food, but I definitely didn't stick to the plan Smith gave me. (There was a little incident with cream cheese frosting, too.)

So when I hopped on the scale this morning, my jaw dropped. 219?! What the HELL?! I moved the scale three times just to make sure it was on a good, level spot. Yep, still 219. Wow.

Two things occurred to me. First, I realized that my worst food days over the last two weeks don't even come close to my "bad" days from before. I'm not eating donuts, whole pizzas, soda, or other crap like I used to. And the things I did indulge in were (mostly) homemade, meaning they weren't full of preservatives, sodium, nitrates, or any other garbage.

The second thing I realized (for the millionth time) is that I have to stop being so hard on myself. All these changes I'm making are going to take time to sink in. And really, it is always going to be a battle for me. Always. There will never be a magical day where I wake up and never want to eat anything but lean protein and vegetables, a day where I want to exercise for a million hours and have a huge grin on my face the whole time. It's always going to suck a little teeny bit. Have I learned that I feel MUCH BETTER when I eat right and exercise? Absolutely! But I'm also coming to accept that there are things I like that aren't super healthy, and that's okay. It's okay to have a slice of pizza, a cupcake, a glass of wine. I just can't do it every meal, every day.

Anyhoo...my posting has been (and may continue to be, at least for a little while) sporadic, mostly because of holiday craziness. I've also changed my weigh-in day to Friday, simply because a good loss will a) give me something to be happy about over the weekend and b) keep me from over-doing it on the two days a week that I do most of my socializing.

I've also found two fantastic weight loss blogs that you HAVE to check out. The first, Escape from Obesity, is really well-written, and full of fantastic insights. I find myself nodding and saying "YES!" almost every time I read it. Then there's Bitchcakes, which has great Weight Watchers info. Plus, the writer is gorgeous and an amazing photographer (her pictures of NYC make me want to move there. For reals.). So if you need something to read and you're not finding it here, go check those two ladies out!

Hope your holidays are rolling along smoothly...I'll post again soon!