So, I weighed myself this morning (I’ve decided Tuesday mornings are my weigh-in days, so this wasn’t "official") and I was all the way down at 194.4. Wow. I sort of don’t believe it, but this IS post-TOM and I have been both exercising and sticking to the diet. So maybe this trend will stick around until the official weigh-in on Tuesday.

I consider 189 to be my "pre-pregnancy" weight, and would really like to get down to like 150 or so. But I honestly don’t know if I can, or want to, wait that long before trying again to get pregnant. Not that I’m looking forward to that ordeal again, but we would like to have another child before all is said and done. And I’m not getting any younger. Our thought was to start trying again when the boy reaches 18 months, and he’s nearly 15 months now. Hmm…

I just had today’s breakfast from the diet delivery service, and may I just say, it was amazing. I don’t mean to be a commercial for the service, but only for the idea that one can make and eat really delicious stuff (in small quantities) and still stay within a certain calorie range. The challenge, esp. with something that tastes so good, would be to avoid having more, if it wasn’t delivered to you in a hermetically-sealed single-serving package. What was it? Scrambled egg over turkey bacon on 1/2 whole wheat english muffin. With something resembling hollandaise sauce. A beautiful thing.

There I was, purring along merrily on day 2 of the "diet delivery road to redemption" and disaster struck. I was at work Friday, eating lunch a little early due to still adjusting to the smaller portion sizes (I was hungry!). And the phone rings. My cell phone. With an unfamiliar number, but one from my home area code. It was the boy’s day care. He’d fallen. And hit his head. And he was acting lethargic. Because this is a story about my diet, and not about my son’s concussion, you can probably assume that he came out of this little incident without major scarring.

The most interesting part, for me, was my reaction. I was in the middle of lunch when the phone call came, and I immediately began getting ready to go pick him up, which included scarfing down the rest of my meal. I told myself that this was because I wasn’t going to eat anything more for lunch, and so I needed to make sure I was eating my fill. But it could be that I gained some kind of primal satisfaction from the chewing, and the swallowing, so quickly, under stress. It was so bad that I called the doctor’s office with my mouth full and proceeded to try to explain the situation, my words wending their way around chunks of chicken and potato. Kind of embarrassing, but with the adrenaline pumping, I wasn’t too worried about it.

The food urges didn’t really kick in again until after I got him home, and I’d talked to the doctor (who urged me to keep an eye on him rather than take him to the hospital), and he was asleep. Then, at home, and surrounded by food (Well, it was all in the kitchen, but you get the idea.) I started to have thoughts of stuffing my face. At this point, I was beginning to get really uncomfortable with the idea that I’d left work "for nothing" and therefore wasn’t getting anything accomplished. This feeling got worse when the boy woke up, acting pretty much normally, and he refused to let me work, instead demanding all of my attention. (As usual.) I am such a workaholic, really, and I get such satisfaction out of getting things done at work, and we are a start-up so there’s plenty to do, and I’m fairly new on the job so really still proving myself. So to be "robbed" of a work day, when we’d paid for day care, and when the kid was just fine, was stressing me out.

So I started thinking. This was really the problem, after all. Emotional eating. Guilt, stress, loneliness, despair are my triggers, and no amount of diet delivery convenience can solve that for me. And eating is something that’s compatible with my workaholic tendencies, because I can eat while I work. Of course in this case, I was stuck with the kid so there was no way I was getting any work done, regardless. What did I do? I changed clothes and shoes, strapped the boy into the jog stroller, and we took off. We did around 3 miles, I think. Jogging, walking. Plenty of stopping, including a stop at the park to allow him to run around a bit. Even a stop at the store on the way back to buy milk (thank goodness for the storage in his jog stroller). I was away from work for another hour — completely away from work — but I should be able to make it up this weekend. And I got a workout in. And I didn’t eat.

What will I do when stress hits when I’m at work or in a place where I can’t just leave for a jog? Maybe just drink some tea or go for a short stroll outside? I don’t know. I’m just starting. But goodness, isn’t it exciting?

P.S. I signed up for a 5K or 2 mile run on October 29th (you didn’t have to choose at sign-up so I’m leaving my options open). Stoller-friendly. And signed up for Zipcar so I can get there even if DH has the car for soccer that day. Yay for me!

Well, it’s the first night of the new regimen and I’m a bit hungry at 9 p.m., but not TOO hungry. I’m going to make it. I added a bit of tomato to my dinner, and I had some of the boy’s nectarine for dessert. And a tiny bit of wine at Music in the Park this evening. But, even all added up, it was not a big deal. (The diet organizers even say a glass of wine a day is OK, and extra fruit and veggies, within reason, are cool.) I’m actually really psyched.

I’m daring to hope for a day when my clothes will fit me loosely, rather than tightly. I’m daring to hope that I will feel comfortable in my skin. I’m daring to hope that i’ll be able to go biking with my co-workers at lunch. (They are hitting the Marin Headands next week, and I am so jealous. I’d try to tag along but it just isn’t realistic to think I could keep up.)

There is hope, though. I already feel a bit more energetic, since I’m not weighed down by all
that extra food. That said, I’m not going on the treadmill tonight. Too
tired!

Well, off to sleep. Thx for tuning into my great adventure.

Sometimes I wonder where I get the energy to keep starting again. This time, I feel like I’ve really "hit bottom," to use the addict’s language. I hesitate to look back through this blog to figure out whether I’ve thought this before.

No, this time it’s for real, and I’m spending big dough to make it so. What with the time pressures of work and child, I’ve settled on trying one of those programs where they deliver a week’s worth of food to you at once, and that (and only that) is your sustenance to rely upon. No choices, no decisions. As with JC, it may not be the best way to learn how to eat properly, but it’s at least giving me a sense of proper portion size, and helping me shrink my stomach so it’s satisfied with that amount. Hopefully it’ll at least be a jump start.

I’m doing a lower-carb option, but that didn’t keep me from eating french toast (1 slice) with cream cheese and jelly, and eggs for breakfast this a.m. Pretty darned good, I must say. But the whole rest of the time at work I get a tiny packet of mixed nuts and a v.s. burrito with rice and sour cream. Plus lots of water and tea, I would imagine.

Why do I think it’s for real this time? The whole delivery thing is super easy and takes away many of the difficulties I’ve had in the past with logistics. But I also know myself well enough to know I could come up with excuses why this isn’t going to work, just like I’ve come up with excuses in the past. Still, the last few days — culminating in my recent birthday — I’ve been thinking a lot about myself, and my life, and what I want to be. A few thoughts.

* I’m 38 now, and, god willing, I have only lived less than half my life. I’ve gotta make this body last a long long time if I want to be healthy and active by the time the boy is in college or getting married or something.

* I look around me and I see people managing to fit exercise into their lives. A colleague rode his bike in to work yesterday, and that’s 30 miles. Well, he took public transport for much of it, but 40 minutes (across the GG bridge) was biking. Gotta like that. It honestly won’t fit into my limited-by-day-care schedule, but who’s to say I don’t go out for a bike immediately upon getting home from work, with the boy in his trailer?

* I have been looking in the mirror a lot lately and have realized how profoundly I’ve been fooling myself. I’ve been thinking, "oh, I’m a little chubby," or "I could stand to lose a few pounds," but when I really look, I see I really am obese, just like those BMI charts say I am. I feel a little like Melissa at Suburban Bliss described in a post yesterday. I have been neglecting myself, I am miserable and I have got to do something.

And so I am. Now.

I’m still alive, folks. Just very stressed with the new job and hubby mostly out of town. The single parenting thing pretty much sucks. I’m trying to look at it through the lens of really getting to know the boy, but it only works when he’s not crying or making some other unreasonable demand (like for food, or attention).

You’d think my workload would be lessened with hubby back in town for a week, but now I just have to cook dinner for the whole family, too. Usually, I’d just scrape up something for the boy and I. The good part of the whole dinner-cooking scenario is that we’ve been eating more veggies. Last night, the boy was actually giggling while he shoveled pieces of zucchini in his mouth. He was acting as if he was doing something forbidden (yes, he’s already begun to take pleasure in being a bad boy). Let’s hope this fondness for greens continues.

Well, the weight and exercise things are about at a standstill. I keep saying that when we put the child to bed, I’ll hop on the treadmill for a few minutes. But somehow I end up needing to get work done, and, before I know it, it’s 10 p.m. Oh, and along those lines, I got a talking-to at the boy’s day care this morning. "Can you please try to arrive at 5:30 or a little before?" the day care provider asked nicely, citing the time I am supposed to pick him up each day. Aargh. So I’m a little pressed for time, which generally has resulted in stress eating and no exercise. Haven’t really figured out a plan to address this yet, unfortunately. Meanwhile… better get back to work!