Doing It All The Time

Calianna "I don't know how you do it all the time."

(Hi Calianna! Nice to have someone who understands this particular pitfall).

I have no choice. I have to keep on keeping on, or I'll be 250lbs again within, oh, about 2 years, I'd say. There are some days when I wish I'd found low-carbing much much earlier than I did. Say when I was sixteen. That way I could have avoided the yo-yo dieting, the extra stretchmarks and loose skin, the pain of living at all at 250lbs. But then if low-carb had been the first 'solution' I'd found, maybe I wouldn't have been so absolutely sure that it actually is the *only* solution for me. And then maybe I'd have tried to experiment; to find a way to work back in things like bread and crisps as a frequent part of my diet. I know that won't work for me. But the reason I know is because I have the experience of trying to diet low-fat and I know how absolutely horrendous and impossible it was. People are always commenting admiringly on my willpower and self-control, and they did so even more when I was heavier and actively losing the weight, but to me, the only reason these past five years of low-carbing have even been possible is because they take far less willpower than anything else ever did.

Or rather, what I have to exercise now is pure emotional willpower. Fighting taste-buds, fighting circumstance, fighting the convention of 'spoiling yourself' with carby food, etc. But I'm not - or not usually, anyway - fighting insulin surges anymore.

I have a very strong respect for how strong that sucker is. Because it always, always won against me. Most of the time it won after only a few days - even at the end of day one of a "i'm dieting again" mantra. Occasionally - for only two extended periods in my life - I managed to beat it long enough to actually be consistently on a low-fat diet. Sheer torture, and *that* was real willpower. I am amazed now that I managed to stay on weightwatchers for almost a year when I was in my early twenties. Fighting those cravings and that hunger all that time? Incredible (And tragic, of course, because the rebound after I finally snapped is what took me up to my alltime high of 250lbs).

Anyway, I didn't actually come on here today to talk about that. I came on to say that I was just eating lunch. I had 2 100% beef patties, spread with some thousand island dressing made with low-fat mayo and low-carb ketchup, some slices of homemade pickled cucumbers, cherry tomatoes, and raw onion, wrapped in lettuce leaves. And as I was eating it, I was really enjoying all the tastes, and it struck me that really, the only thing that the beefburger bun is good for is to make it easier to hold all that stuff together. That it really doesn't add anything in terms of taste.

And my next thought was: I must be getting over the carb cravings now, if I can think that.

Phew. It's wednesday now, and the carb blowout was friday/saturday. Over the past few days I've eaten way too much food, but it's all been low-carb. I have eaten nuts, and very high percent cocoa dark chocolate, but nothing that's not 'legal'. After 3 days, I'm beginning to feel normal again with regard to my cravings. Soon I'll start cutting calories again.

In a few hours I'm off to Pilates. I started doing it once a week a few months ago, but stopped in October when I was faced with so much travelling it wasn't worth trying to arrange a session for the few weeks I would be around. Now I'm back, solidly, no more travel for a few months. So every week, wednesday at 4pm. Every little bit helps.