It's Christmas today, Chix, and I'm on my way to Idaho to see my two grandbabies. We've been driving for two hours, and my mind has been caught up in this past week's victories. (There have also been some detours that my old self would have considered set backs, but my new and improved no-dieting self has quashed the negativity and will instead see them as simply learning experiences.)
My first "aha" happened on Monday at the Walmart. For years I have dreaded trips to the Walmart because I only ever have one of two experiences there: 1) I either walk around staring at the delicious goodies like a lame dog in a butcher shop (this of course is when I am on a diet) or 2) I end up paying for several empty boxes of somethings or others because I have eaten them as I increasingly saunter down the isles in "what-the-hell" mode. Anyway, this past trip to the Walmart was a different animal. I didn't even realize it until I got to the cookie isle and told myself I could have anything I wanted. I could have Walker's Shortbread. I could have Golden Oreos. I could have those yummy powdered sugar covered lemon cookies. (I love those!). But I just wasn't feeling it. I didn't really WANT any of them. And so I left that isle and headed to produce where I got what my body was really craving....broccoli (thank you spell check). And then I went home and cooked it and ate it and was very satisfied. Of course the next morning Sharlyn brought me homemade neighbor caramels and I ate them all before I got home from class at 6:50am. But that's just one of those detours that I was talking about. The real story here is that my body really did crave something else besides refined sugar and my brain listened and my mouth obeyed. The victory was that I listened (and reacted) intuitively. That tells me that there really is hope. And though my clothes are a bit tighter than they were a month ago, (I have recently taken to wearing only clothes that are stretchy around the waist. Amazing what a difference that makes in the brain!) I am beginning to feel liberated. Maybe it's because the food police in my head are not as loud as they used to be. Or maybe it's because this is the first Christmas I can remember that I haven't told myself that I'm a big loser for enjoying dessert. I don't know. But I do know that I'm fighting a fight that's worth the effort. And I don't mean to say that everything is perfect. I feel fat most of the time. My husband is feeling a little neglected because I'm not feeling as sexy as I do when my stomach is empty. And the jeans my son bought me for Christmas will probably sit on my shelf for just a bit. But the positives are that I'm cooking dinners for my family consistently now because I can eat them, I'm finding that my mind has moments now when food isn't the primary focus, and I don't get depressed thinking that I will have to count calories for the rest of my life. But probably the main reason that I know I'm on the right track is because, even thought I've enjoyed the holiday treats, I haven't binged. Oh, don't get me wrong, I've eaten plenty, but since I've mentally given myself permission to eat, I haven't eaten to the point of hating myself. And that's huge for me.
So stay tuned. I'm fully aware that this is a process. I will continue to remind myself and you that it's the journey that counts. It's the journey that counts. It's the journey that counts. :). Wendy
Ps. A similar victory just happened at the Maverick store in Tremonton. We stopped there for a bite to eat. (Remember it's Christmas, and even the Taco Bell is closed.). I automatically went to the candy isle cause that is what I do. Nothing looked good. Nothing. So instead I had a bite of Ron's Bahama Mama hotdog and called it good. If the Walmart was open, I might just have had some broccoli (Again, thank you spell check.). This just might work.
Saturday, December 25, 2010
Sunday, December 19, 2010
Homemade Neighbor Caramels and Those Damn Food Police
Well, I’m sitting in my kitchen feeling like a bloated piece of crap. According to Intuitive Eating, the first stage of overcoming ED’s (eating disorders), including my particular favorite, binge eating, is to completely reject the diet mentality. In order to do this, we should mentally make a list of the foods we consider “bad”. You know, the foods that make us feel guilty after we eat them. In my case it’s foods like cookies, ice cream, Hersey Bars, brownies, strawberry pop tarts, brown sugar pop tarts, blueberry pop tarts… basically any kind of pop tart or any food with sugar or white flour. (Also included on my list are foods with oil and butter.) After we acknowledge the absurdness in labeling a food as “bad” or “good”, we begin to make a conscience effort to eat all of these foods without limits. This part of the process has no time restraints. And there is purpose in this madness. Supposedly the binges are the result of two types of thinking; 1) the thought of future denial. Why wouldn’t we stuff our faces with as many Pop Tarts as possible if we thought it would be the last time we were to ever have that tasty goodness? That’s the “last supper” mentality. Eat as much as possible today for tomorrow we diet. 2) Then there’s the what-the-hell mentality. This is the reason for the after diet binge. For me, I’m usually really “good” for 3 or 4 days. But then the allure of a “bad” food comes a callin’. All it takes is one bite… and BAM! The what-the-hell thoughts take over. Before I know it, I’ve consumed all the Pop-Tarts I denied myself during those 3 or 4 days of torture and then a bunch more in preparation for the diet that will eventually tell me that I can never eat a Pop Tart again.
According to Evelyn Tribble and Elyse Resch (Intuitive Eating authors) the purpose of this phase is to become re-acquainted with food as well as to begin to tune into our internal ques. It’s during this phase that we are supposed to turn off the “Food Police” in our heads. The Food Police are those thoughts that tell us that we are bad when we eat anything yummy. They tell us that we are going to get fat because we eat some of our son’s birthday cake or because we want to stop at the Dairy Queen and have an ice cream cone, or because we LOVE the homemade caramels from our neighbor at Christmas time. Speaking of homemade caramels. I have to admit it’s a nice time of year to be in the “reject the diet mentality” part of this book. Homemade neighbor caramels are definitely on my list of “bad” foods so I’ve made a point to eat as many as I possibly could. (I think my husband is wishing I would listen just a little bit to my food police… at least just enough to save him at least one of the homemade neighbor caramels.)
Anyway, this phase of the process has been tough on my self-esteem. They say in the book that we might not feel great during this time. We may gain some weight and just not feel up to par. I can testify to this statement. I’ve put on a few, and I just feel yucky lots of the time. But I’m jumping in with faith – faith that I’ll win the battle with the Food Police bullies who still nag at me every day. Faith that I’ve dieted my very last diet. Faith that eventually the Pop Tarts and homemade neighbor caramels will not be quite so appealing. And faith
that I will eventually get to the healthy eating part of the process. Evelyn and Elynse say that nutrition part of the book is coming. They say it comes at the end because we aren’t ready for it yet. Apparently nutrition cannot be the driving force at this point in the game because if it were, it would only “perpetuate [our] restrictive thoughts”. They say that if we think about eating a hot chocolate sundae at every meal, eventually we’ll crave something healthy. I believe that. And that helps give me the courage to eat those homemade neighbor Christmas caramels.
And so my beautiful Chix, I AM doing it. I want to say I’m doing it for you, so I can show you that diets don’t work and that this intuitive eating is really the way to go. But honestly, I’m doing it mostly for me. I just couldn’t live with the obsessions and the denial and the obsessions anymore. AND I’m doing it for you. Because if this works, and we can all come together in this meeting of the no-diets mind, we can change the world – at least the small worlds we’re living in, right? Right.
Saturday, December 18, 2010
Sweaty Chix Movement, Memo, or Mission Statement. I'm Not Quite Sure
Hi Chix! I've been wanting to write and share something with you all for some time. I've put it off for several reasons. 1) Because it's embarassing for me to talk about it, 2) Because I have yet to solve the problem, and 3) Because I assume people get sick of listening to me "blah blah blah". But I've decided to go ahead and share. Maybe it's because Jerry McGuire was on TV a couple of weeks ago and his "memo" inspired me too. Or maybe it's just because I realize that I'm learning on the journey, and I know lots of you can relate. In any case, I need to go back just a bit to get to where I want to go, so bare with me...
Sweaty Chix wasn't always "Sweaty Chix". It really just started out as me teaching a couple times a week at the "copper top" church in Mapleton. I think that was back in 2003 or 2004. And actually I need to go back even farther. When I was 30, I found myself divorced, pregnant, and a single mother to two little boys. Fortunately, this amazing guy (Ron) came along and married me (pregnant and all). But by the time I had given birth to that baby and then to one more (the "our's"), I was almost 200 pounds and hated myself. To make a long story short, I discovered Tae Bo and lost about 60 pounds. After a year and a half, I decided I wanted to teach so I started up at the church. After doing that gig for a year, Richard (Omega Martial Arts) talked me into bringing my class over to his building (it was the old decrepit Omega building). We did Tae Bo there for a while until he built his nice new building in our present location. Soon Kristin and I came up with the grand idea to add weights. And then Yoga and Zumba came into the picture, and kaPOW, Sweaty Chix was born.
But the purpose of this "memo" is not to give you the history of Sweaty Chix. The reason I bring all of that up is to say that through the years exercise has helped me keep off much of that 60 pounds I lost way back when. But there is another component that has continued to plague me. As a matter of fact, it has plagued me since the 8th grade, which is the first time I remember thinking that I was fat. I remember specifically comparing my thighs to Kasey Rickabaugh's thighs. Her's were much skinnier. And there it began. My battle with food. Binge, starve, binge, starve, binge, starve... and even attempting on more than one occasion to throw up. Dexatrim, fen-phen, laxitives. I've dabbled in all of them through the years. Some years have passed with just casual dieting, always ending back with the binge/starve pattern that became home to me. The best years I remember were those after my initial weight loss I mentioned previously. I can't even say why. Maybe it was the new found love of exercise, specifically Tae Bo (Billy Blanks even put me in his infomercial.) I stayed stable up until a couple of years ago. I'm not sure what happened but all of a sudden, those habits I thought I had long since abandoned came creeping back. I had plastic surgery in 2009, and I think it started then. Maybe I started feeling pressure to look perfect. It's tough telling people that I work in the "fitness industry" while feeling like I should be saying I work in the "food industry". (And that's part of the problem. I feel just as "fat" at 140 pounds as I did at 200 pounds. How does that work exactly?!) In any case, I found myself dieting again. I did HCG, high protein, Fat Loss for Idiots, etc etc etc. Each diet ended up with a bigger binge than the previous. And each diet ended up with a bigger number on the scale than the previous. Well, a few weeks ago, I decided that I was done. It was consuming my life, my mind, everything. I decided that I would rather settle for 155 pounds (which is where I ended up after the last diet) and never diet again than risk thinking about food forever. I also made an appointment with a counselor at Center for Change and vowed to do whatever they said. (I would have checked myself in had it not cost $20K) In any case, she confirmed in my head what I already knew in my heart... diets do NOT work. I know we've heard that over and over, but she really convinced me. And then she sent me to buy this book called Intuitive Eating. It's by two nutritionists, Evelyn Tribole and Elyse Resch. I'm not going to get into everything I am learning from this book in this email. I'll save that for the next one. But I want to share that thought with you. Diets don't work. Ever. At least in my 44 years they haven't.
But the main thing I want to share with you goes back to our "Sweaty Chix" beginnings. When we first started out, way back in the copper top church and old Omega building days, our main focus was to love ourselves for who we are. As a matter of fact, we started something called the Love and Laughter Society. We all carried around cards that reminded us to be happy with ourselves and to remember that the "bulges and wrinkles and grey hair are the rewards of life and love and laughter." It's hard living in Utah. The pressure to keep up is overwhelming. Did you know that we are #1 in the country when it comes to anti-depressants? And did you know that we are #1 when it comes to plastic surgery? (I'm helping with both of those stats!!) Anyway, those two have to be interconnected. There are so many talented, beautiful, amazing women. It's really hard not to get down on ourselves and feel like we aren't good enough. But the reality is WE are the talented, beautiful, amazing women! And it's not because we fit into skinny jeans, or not. It's simply because we ARE.
So this is what I want for Sweaty Chix. I want a new movement. I want us to be happy with who we are. I want us to quit worrying about the scale. If I could, I'd come over to each of your houses and throw it away. I'm throwing mine away - tonight. I hope you'll join me. Let's decide that we are not going to "diet" anymore, and let's just BE. I know some of you already have this gift, but for the rest of us, let's learn together to enjoy exercise and food without obsessing about it. And then let's be examples to the rest of Utah. If you want to go get that book, it's called Intuitive Eating. We can read it together (Do I see a Sweaty Chix book club in our future?) There are a lot of us now. We have an amazing support group. And we have a responsibility to reach out and let other women know that they don't have to wear makeup and Jimmy Choo's to the Wal-mart. (Unless they really want to.) So are you in? If so, email and let me know. Post your progress on our Facebook page, or YOUR facebook page. Or email me. Or email your friend. Or just keep it in your heart and be grateful! Here's to us! Wendy
Sweaty Chix wasn't always "Sweaty Chix". It really just started out as me teaching a couple times a week at the "copper top" church in Mapleton. I think that was back in 2003 or 2004. And actually I need to go back even farther. When I was 30, I found myself divorced, pregnant, and a single mother to two little boys. Fortunately, this amazing guy (Ron) came along and married me (pregnant and all). But by the time I had given birth to that baby and then to one more (the "our's"), I was almost 200 pounds and hated myself. To make a long story short, I discovered Tae Bo and lost about 60 pounds. After a year and a half, I decided I wanted to teach so I started up at the church. After doing that gig for a year, Richard (Omega Martial Arts) talked me into bringing my class over to his building (it was the old decrepit Omega building). We did Tae Bo there for a while until he built his nice new building in our present location. Soon Kristin and I came up with the grand idea to add weights. And then Yoga and Zumba came into the picture, and kaPOW, Sweaty Chix was born.
But the purpose of this "memo" is not to give you the history of Sweaty Chix. The reason I bring all of that up is to say that through the years exercise has helped me keep off much of that 60 pounds I lost way back when. But there is another component that has continued to plague me. As a matter of fact, it has plagued me since the 8th grade, which is the first time I remember thinking that I was fat. I remember specifically comparing my thighs to Kasey Rickabaugh's thighs. Her's were much skinnier. And there it began. My battle with food. Binge, starve, binge, starve, binge, starve... and even attempting on more than one occasion to throw up. Dexatrim, fen-phen, laxitives. I've dabbled in all of them through the years. Some years have passed with just casual dieting, always ending back with the binge/starve pattern that became home to me. The best years I remember were those after my initial weight loss I mentioned previously. I can't even say why. Maybe it was the new found love of exercise, specifically Tae Bo (Billy Blanks even put me in his infomercial.) I stayed stable up until a couple of years ago. I'm not sure what happened but all of a sudden, those habits I thought I had long since abandoned came creeping back. I had plastic surgery in 2009, and I think it started then. Maybe I started feeling pressure to look perfect. It's tough telling people that I work in the "fitness industry" while feeling like I should be saying I work in the "food industry". (And that's part of the problem. I feel just as "fat" at 140 pounds as I did at 200 pounds. How does that work exactly?!) In any case, I found myself dieting again. I did HCG, high protein, Fat Loss for Idiots, etc etc etc. Each diet ended up with a bigger binge than the previous. And each diet ended up with a bigger number on the scale than the previous. Well, a few weeks ago, I decided that I was done. It was consuming my life, my mind, everything. I decided that I would rather settle for 155 pounds (which is where I ended up after the last diet) and never diet again than risk thinking about food forever. I also made an appointment with a counselor at Center for Change and vowed to do whatever they said. (I would have checked myself in had it not cost $20K) In any case, she confirmed in my head what I already knew in my heart... diets do NOT work. I know we've heard that over and over, but she really convinced me. And then she sent me to buy this book called Intuitive Eating. It's by two nutritionists, Evelyn Tribole and Elyse Resch. I'm not going to get into everything I am learning from this book in this email. I'll save that for the next one. But I want to share that thought with you. Diets don't work. Ever. At least in my 44 years they haven't.
But the main thing I want to share with you goes back to our "Sweaty Chix" beginnings. When we first started out, way back in the copper top church and old Omega building days, our main focus was to love ourselves for who we are. As a matter of fact, we started something called the Love and Laughter Society. We all carried around cards that reminded us to be happy with ourselves and to remember that the "bulges and wrinkles and grey hair are the rewards of life and love and laughter." It's hard living in Utah. The pressure to keep up is overwhelming. Did you know that we are #1 in the country when it comes to anti-depressants? And did you know that we are #1 when it comes to plastic surgery? (I'm helping with both of those stats!!) Anyway, those two have to be interconnected. There are so many talented, beautiful, amazing women. It's really hard not to get down on ourselves and feel like we aren't good enough. But the reality is WE are the talented, beautiful, amazing women! And it's not because we fit into skinny jeans, or not. It's simply because we ARE.
So this is what I want for Sweaty Chix. I want a new movement. I want us to be happy with who we are. I want us to quit worrying about the scale. If I could, I'd come over to each of your houses and throw it away. I'm throwing mine away - tonight. I hope you'll join me. Let's decide that we are not going to "diet" anymore, and let's just BE. I know some of you already have this gift, but for the rest of us, let's learn together to enjoy exercise and food without obsessing about it. And then let's be examples to the rest of Utah. If you want to go get that book, it's called Intuitive Eating. We can read it together (Do I see a Sweaty Chix book club in our future?) There are a lot of us now. We have an amazing support group. And we have a responsibility to reach out and let other women know that they don't have to wear makeup and Jimmy Choo's to the Wal-mart. (Unless they really want to.) So are you in? If so, email and let me know. Post your progress on our Facebook page, or YOUR facebook page. Or email me. Or email your friend. Or just keep it in your heart and be grateful! Here's to us! Wendy
p.s. I’ll be sharing some of what I’m learning through this book and another great one called “When Food if Love” by Ganeen Roth. If you prefer to not receive the emails, please let me know. And feel free to email me with your thoughts and progress. And remember it’s all in the journey. Sometimes we’ll take one step forward and two steps back. But that second step back may just teach us something that we missed the first time around. So be grateful for that little detour and be kind to yourself. xoxo W.
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