Mental Progression

I made a very important discovery this past weekend.  Last year as I was losing the majority of the weight that I lost, I remember that I just wanted to be allowed to eat, and I would crave that feeling of fullness.  I wanted to feel physically full.  I wanted my stomach to actually feel full, and I spent a lot of time bemoaning the fact that in order to lose weight I could not attain that feeling and I felt deprived, and sad, and sometimes a little hopeless because how could I keep this up for the rest of my life, all I wanted to be able to do was the one thing I wasn't allowed to do- eat. 

Over the past two weeks, after haphazardly throwing myself into intuitive eating and completely butchering it I did make one incredibly important discovery.  Something that is so mind blowing to me that I am still reeling from the shock of it.  I realized that I don't like that feeling of fullness.  I no longer crave the feeling of being physically full because when my stomach is filled to capacity I feel lethargic, a little sick, bloated, and tired.  When I eat a decent meal following my points or calorie guidelines I feel energized, light, and ready to move on.  It was an amazing discovery for me, and a turning point.  I started to realize that even though I have only lost 10 pounds this year and last year I lost 60 pounds, I have largely been working on the other aspect of weight loss: mentality.  There are a few big components to weight loss, one being physical, another emotional, and another mental. 

Last year while I was very excited to be losing weight I feel like I was just going through the motions.  I was doing what I was supposed to be doing but I wasn't doing it because that is what I really wanted to be doing, I was doing it because I wanted to lose weight.  This year, I have noticed that I have been struggling with the mental and emotional side which has impacted the physical aspect of it.  I hit my plateau and I know that the reason why is because I was caught in a binge eating cycle.  I would be good for four days and binge for two, good for five and binge for one, etc etc etc. As I got closer to my healthy weight zone it became indefinitely harder to lose weight the way I was eating because I didn't want to be eating that way, mentally I was fighting it.  I didn't want to be eating healthy, I wanted to eat all the things I had been depriving myself of and so those things crept in on a rapidly increasing basis.  Finally, after the last two and a half weeks my mind set has caught up with my goals.  I have made the first real mental steps to reaching my goals and being able to be successful on maintenance.  While all along I have been stubborn and determined, my desires haven't come around to match up with my reality until now.

I was talking about this with my older sister who is naturally thin and she commented that it blew her mind that I used to crave that full feeling because she has never been in my situation.  For her, she knows that eating too much makes her feel yucky and so she just doesn't do it (except maybe at Thanksgiving and a few other special occasions) because she genuinely doesn't like to do it.  She knows where her body feels its best and stops eating when she reaches that point.  She knows how different foods make her feel and instinctively chooses food that is healthier because it makes her feel better.  These are the realizations that we need to make ourselves, the mind changes that we need to make if we want to be successful.  We all want to be thin so badly, but we have to be able to let go of our old selves and to allow ourselves to morph into something completely different.  This isn't just a physical journey, if it were I would be there by now!  There is so much of this journey that is mental- the ability to change our believes, our desires, and our wants, and the way we look at, view, and understand our body and our food.  There is also so much of this journey that is emotional- the way we feel about food and our body, the way food and exercise and our bodies make us feel.  Our opinions about ourselves, good or bad.

For the first time in a long time, I feel like if I can make this one connection now, then maybe, just maybe I can be successful with making other mental connections too.  Maybe someday I too can realize that I genuinely want to eat healthier food and I will no longer crave the junk.  If I can make this realization...........you can too.

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