Mamavation Monday-Things are looking up

As you probably read last week. I declared myself a compulsive overeater by joining Overeaters Anonymous last week. And I have great news, I have been what "OAers" call abstinent for 7 days now. 

Every OAer's "diet" portion of the program is different, because we all have different "triggers". For me, I've been staying away from sugar, watching my portions-particularly of the unrefined carbs that I've been eating, and being mindful of how full I am when I do eat. I've been eating 3 meals a day. No snacks. I'm doing this because it allows me to feel what actual, legitimate hunger paings feel like. Which is something that as an overeater, I am unfamiliar with because I'm normally eating by emotion, or when I think I should eat because the clock says so-not when I am actually hungry.

I can't lie though, these past 7 days have been HARD. I swear, I've thought about food every second, from the time I woke up, to the time I went to bed. But not just any food. First it was cupcakes. Then it was a  Frozen Carmel Mocha from Biggby Coffee, the craziest part-I DON'T EVEN LIKE COFFEE! But OAers that stay abstinent tell me that it gets better, so I'm having faith in that, praying to my higher power, and attending meetings. I also think that being abstinent is easier for me to stick to than a "diet" or a "lifestyle change" because OA made it clear to me that I don't just want to be skinny, but that I have a disease, a compulsion to overeat that is preventing me from being skinny/healthy/insert other positive word here; and I refuse to succumb to a disease. I have to treat it, and the way to treat the disease of compulsive overeating is to remain abstinent. So that's what I'm going to do.

I think the biggest motivator is that the hard work of abstinence is paying off. This week I lost 3.4 pounds! AND one of my coworkers came up to me and told me that my pants are starting to look baggy! Score!


This week I'm going to work on:

• Staying abstinent
• Working out more
• Working more of the steps
• Finding a church, so I can continue to grow spiritually

Wishing all of you a fabulous week!

“This post is sponsored by Mamavation – a community dedicated to obesity prevention & weight loss for women and I’m writing this to be entered into a giveaway”

Mamavation Monday-I'm a Food Addict

Despite my best laid plans this past week, I gained 0.4 lbs. I'm okay with it, because I deserve it. This past week, I spent most of my days doing really well, only to binge myself to sleep at night. It has been a really sick vicious cycle.

Saturday night, Little Man wanted  watch our local cable access channel, Channel 3, because he says that it's the "pretty music" channel (other than that it's a power point presentation about things going on around the area). While I was watching I saw an "ad" for Overeaters Anonymous (OA). I'm always looking for what is going to "fix" me and my eating issues, so I ventured over to their website, because I've always known I've had a problem with food. I mean, isn't that why we're all part of Mamavation in the first place? There's a reason I can't stick to a "diet", or a "lifestyle change" for more than a few hours-or at most a few days. There's a reason why in my teen years I was anorexic, and then bulimic. There's a reason why I'm going on these daily binges.

After browsing the OA website, I decided that it would be in my best interest to go to a meeting. So I did.

And I'm glad I did.

Last night, I learned a lot about myself, merely through other people telling their stories. I saw myself in every single one of them, in one way or another, and I started connecting the dots.

I'm an addict. A food addict. It must have started when I was little, or maybe I was born with this, because one of my earliest memories (I must have been 4 or 5) is hiding under the table while my mom was in the shower eating stick after stick of butter. Then in high school, when I knew that boys were looking at me (and seeing my fat rolls), I was able to gain control of my eating by switching addictions. Instead of eating food, I started drinking and getting high (you would have never guessed, I was a straight A student and had "my shit together"). Now, since it's not socially acceptable to be a drunk, drug addict, mother, I've got nothing left to do but eat to quell my problems. Which is why I'm having trouble sticking to a "diet". 

I came to all of these conclusions in under an hour. It was kind of cathartic being my own psychologist. :)

So now that I've mastered Step One of the 12 Steps, the one where you admit that you have a problem, my next course of action is to identify the foods that I'm addicted to so I can abstain. The foods that, when I eat them, set off a vicious cycle of binge eating. So that's what I'll be working on this week. I've already got a few things on the list-deep dish pizza, and butter, and there's more than those-I just have to figure them out.

Wishing you all a fabulous week.

Mamavation Monday-Finding My Motivation AGAIN....

I'm sure that the one thing we can all agree on is that one of the biggest parts of the weight loss battle is finding your motivation. Mine comes and goes, and I really wish it would stay--I mean, when it's here I lose weight, and when it's gone, I don't. Which is frustrating.

But yesterday I had a wake up call. Everything I put on made me look like sausage links, bumps and lumps everywhere. And then I noticed how hard it was becoming hard just to put the damn dishes away--bending over I felt pressure in my lungs. It grossed me out, feeling like that is just not acceptable, particularly at 26. And then it hit me, I've gotta do something. I can't play with my son when I can barely put the dishes away. Not to mention, I hate having sex with my husband because bits that shouldn't wobble, are MORE than wobbling--it's just not hot. And because it's not hot, I hold out. And that doesn't make him happy....

This is what I look like now. These were taken yesterday, and mortified me.

So here's the plan...

Food: I'm going to watch my portion sizes--this is my biggest battle. Because if you tell me I can't have something (i.e. pizza), I'm going to run out and eat 40 pounds of it. I'll be counting points+ values in coordination with Weight Watchers.

And then comes the exercise that I have to rediscover a love for, because I really don't want to get off my lazy ass and do it, but know that once I start I won't want to stop. Fickle relationship exercise and I have. So....

Exercise: I'm going to start doing TurboFire again. But I'm going to do it as a hybrid with ChaLEAN Extreme in hopes that new muscle will incinerate the fat that's sitting on top of it.

Today, I weigh 174 pounds. I can't wait to see that number drop next week! In the meantime, I'm going to attempt to use this blog as my personal accountability space. Posting what I'm eating, and exercising every day.

Wishing everyone a week of losses!