I bring myself back to blogspot because my boyfriend suggested that I reflect upon my weight loss. I think it's a marvelous idea to document it here because I feel like I've reached a milestone point in my life and from a practical standpoint writing in blogspot tied to my gmail account will ensure I find this someday. The livejournals of the 2000s area already long lost and my tumblr locks away some of my darkest times.
Today, I write about a happy thing. I lost 26 pounds which is 14.3%! Here are the things I've realized and never took a moment to write about.
1. About the past: I spent the entirely of my adolescent, teen, and young-adult overweight. It doesn't mean that the rest of my life will fall in suit. I am not a self-fulfilling prophecy, who I was does not dictate who I will be. I will control the rest of my life.
2. About food: Growing up, I ate my feelings quite frequently when there were sad moments, celebratory moments, and moments of boredom. My life revolved around food and at one point, eating was a hobby, aka being a foodie. Food is just associated with so many memories in my life. I've had to break positive and negative associations with food. I eat because I'm hungry and because i feel a hunger pain, not because it will solve problems.
I think I placed a high value on food because I grew up poor and we didn't have much in terms of access to the "best" food. So once I went to college and began making an income, my access to food felt like a marker of "success." I felt successful in life that I could have access to delicious dorm food or buy the things I wanted on my own, but then I got in over my head.
Now I realize the less food I have in my fridge the better I feel. I don't strive to stock my pantry full with too much and I want to just buy enough for what I need to eat. I eat when I'm hungry and fill up the gas tank. I work on breaking the cycle and breaking my old habits.
3. About the journey: I'm not embarrassed about my weight anymore. I'm proud of where I've gotten today, and this journey didn't really begin 4 months ago. This is probably the 4th time I've lost weight in my life (poor skin stretching in and out). In retrospect, everything that I did up to this point wasn't sustainable and chased a temporary fix.
- I lost weight when I was younger (aged 14/15) at Los Cab Club over the summer one year doing cardio, weight machines, and swimming. The sad truth is that I eventually fell in love with the smoothie bar at the gym and saved all my money to buy smoothies. I didn't change how I ate, but this was the first and only time I saw muscles in my legs.
- I lost weight when I was 19/20 before my junior year in college. My mom fed me Chinese diet pills that caused major gross diarrhea / gas and I ate literally nothing but dinner because it was an appetite suppressant. I did cardio every night on top of working a full time job. I felt great, probably down to 140 pounds I'm thinking, but eventually this life wasn't sustainable and those diet pills made me feel like crap.
- I lost weight through a 20 pound weight loss challenge in Sacramento when I realized I had loss control at 179 pounds. It started on 3/18/2015, when I was 27. I lost 15 pounds and later 5 more pounds after the challenge. I felt like a million bucks after. I worked out 5 days a week at bootcamp and ate "clean" on a low carb, low fat, high on chicken breast type of diet. Eventually my attendance at bootcamp decreased from 5-6 days to 2-3 days and there were times I didn't go for weeks. I thought to myself I could eat whatever I wanted as long as I "attended" boot camp, obviously this was a skewed balance. I found this weight again.
- Now I'm here, 26 pounds down from my all time high of 182. I feel tremendously better about myself because I'm making better decisions for the right reason, which is to live a healthy life. The gym doesn't scare me, exercise is fulfilling, and I've come to understand the trade offs you make in life to be able to live it. A lack of activity and bad food is a recipe for disaster and an unfulfilled life. A healthier and stronger me can do more and live a better life.
- I don't feel self-conscious at the store shopping for clothes or asking for help from sales people about getting different sizes. I remember in July when shopping for a dress to a wedding I just wanted the girl at free people to go away and not get me more sizes because I'd have to tell her I needed a large or that the dress looked ugly because of my body.
- I respect myself more because of how hard I've had to work to get here and how many times I've fallen and gotten up. I love myself more and feel that I've been working on an upgrade the last 4 months. #strongerversion
