An Answer, or Something like that

My trip to California is finally booked!  It is a really big deal for my family.  Not only is the longest we've even gone away for, but we get to get out of the cold for a whole week and feel out the potential for moving there.  I am so excited I want to jump out of my skin!  I can't wait to wear skirts and not freeze my entire self!  I can't wait to see the Giant Seqoia trees and the coast, and Napa.  

I didn't make any rash decisions about my diet, but I did put a little effort into it today.  I took the day off work to hang out with my kids, who slept past ten, giving me a good chunk of personal time. I watched a little GMA while doing some yoga and sipping some iced coffee with sugar-free, vanilla caramel flavored creamer.  When my yoga was done, it woke up an energy I haven't had in a while, so I did some walking in my absurdly long apartment.  And I included a few walking lunges for good measure.  I felt really good after that, I don't remember the last time I was sweaty.  It was that awesome kind of energized calm that I've missed out on for so long.  I didn't end up eating breakfast until almost 11am, listening to my body and not eating before I was physically hungry. I ate a fairly low-carb most of the day, but allowed some carbs later in the day, but I kept busy with some heavy-duty housework all day which kept me plenty occupied.  My Pebble finally reached my 5,000 step goal on a day off, that hasn't happened in months!  

I had a moment in the grocery store though, and I'm still not sure I made the right decision.  I had to go pick up 1 lousy thing from the grocery store for my son's lunch, and I can rarely ever walk out with just one thing.  It is maddening!  As I was cruising the aisles searching for Capri Sun I ended up going down the candy aisle.  My stomach had a gnawing, I-haven't-had-enough-calories-today sort of thinness.  And I tried to figure out why I was trying to convince myself I needed chocolate.  I decided that since food still has this control over me, maybe I'm not ready to start trying to restrict and restrain myself.  I ate an entire Caramello bar.  And I hate how happy it made me.  I felt like a little kid opening a present on Christmas Day.  

I ate regular low-carb stuff the rest of the night (had some baked pea snacks today too, they are sort of the baked equivalent to Funyuns, so good).  So I am not in any one lane, I'm sort of hogging both.  And, I'm remarkably OK with that.

I did a brief meditation tonight, imagining I was sitting on a tall empty hill with the Dalai Lama, asking how I can move forward in my health and weight loss.  The answer was, "Slow down". I immediately and ungraciously protested, "Slow down?!  I feel like I'm at a dead stop!"  The explanation was that patience awareness and kindness were the human tools I would need to move positively toward resolution of my demons. There is perhaps no other human for whom I have greater respect for, so I accepted this message without questioning further and ended my session a little astounded.  It is true, I would love to lose weight for this trip.  And I could do a juice fast and drop some, but it isn't like I would miraculously get to goal weight in a month's time anyway, and once I get off the veggies-only diet, I will leave for vacation and eat whatever I want and gain it all back, which would be bad for my heart, and worse for my spirit.  It would send me spiraling down, and I would lose important ground I've recently gained with beginning to love myself as is.  

So I am going to stick with my original plan, which is to slightly modify and mesh  South Beach, Breaking Free (Geneen), and eating more iron-rich foods.  And I am going to stretch and exercise more, because it feels good and it helps ensure I will be able to keep moving.  It will be interesting to see how my joints feel in California.  I know they hate this cold weather. Without totally self-diagnosing, I have all of the symptoms of Sjogren's but I am so tired of going to the doctor to have her tell me all of my problems stem from my weight.  My joint pain felt really sudden.  And I have gotten to the point where my mouth, eyes and skin are so dry, I drink about 2 gallons of fluids a day and still have to put eye drops in and wake up to put lotion on my skin in the middle of the night.  Maybe I'll check it out before we leave on vacation.  Ibuprofen does help with my aches, but I don't want to be on that my whole life!

Well I guess that's enough idle chatter for one night.  Hope you had a good weekend and a great start to your week!