Day 77: 24 Hours at a Time

“Don’t think about what can happen in a month. Don’t think about what can happen in a year. Just focus on the 24 hours in front of you and do what you can to get closer to where you want to be.” ~unknown~

This is pretty much how I’m handling my weight loss. It’s truly a day to day process and that’s why I write these notes. When I think about where I want to be it is overwhelming because the goal is still pretty far out. When your goal is far away it’s easy to get discouraged if you spend all your time thinking about that. Instead I focus on what I need to achieve today. I need to eat the food, drink the water and get some exercise. When you look at it that way weight loss becomes simple. Once I’ve eaten all the food, drank all the water and had that workout my day is done and I can say “Mission accomplished ! I am one day closer to my goal!”. My goal has no timeline so I don’t know when I will reach it. I expect it will be a year or more before I’m there … so you can see why I need to keep my focus on today. I apply the same philosophy to my quest to be debt free. It’s not going to happen overnight so I focus on the month to month decrease in account balances and I celebrate the zero balances as they occur. Fortunately I am not in an overwhelming amount of debt so this quest is moving along pretty effortlessly. I have a very healthy credit score so I guess I’m doing something right !

I had a case of the hungries this morning so I had a 2 ounce 170 calorie double chocolate muffin with french vanilla coffee to settle things down. Also had a 100 calorie string cheese. About 11:30 I realized I was starving so I broke out the 155 calorie chocolate shake with peanut butter powder. For me the shake is as delicious at it sounds. Chocolate and peanut butter .. what is not to like ?!?!?!? Some in the Nutrisystem group say the shakes are awful but I love them. My typical morning would have been a 320 calorie coffee and a 240 calorie cup of oatmeal. 580 calories vs the 425 I had today. Lunch today was a 4 ounce 240 calorie hamburger. I added some barbecue sauce to it since I don’t have ketchup in the house. I think this is the first time I’ve had the hamburger and it wasn’t bad. Truth be told it tasted the same as the “meatloaf” sandwich. I also had the usual raw carrots and cottage cheese (80 calories) with it. I slacked a little on my water but was ready for a refill by 2:30 and came home with 16 ounces to go. My afternoon snack was 3 wedges of Laughing Cow cheese (90) calories) and 12 wheat thins (90 calories). I feel like I’m eating a lot of cheese so I’ll be picking up some new options on my next shopping trip ! Dinner was a 4.4 ounce 260 calorie italian sausage and turkey pepperoni pizza. I still have 2 frozen entrees left from my last order, along with probably 7 or 8 non-frozen dinners. Now Nutrisystem has a 50% off sale so I might be squeezing a little more into the freezer ! My evening snack was a 1.3 ounce 150 calorie package of chocolate chip cookies. I wanted to have some skim milk with them, which would have put me over my calories for the first time ever. Wouldn’t you know my milk was no good ! I guess that saved me from myself. I’m at about 1340 calories for the day and a cup of skim milk has about 90 calories so I’d have gone over. Oh well.

I spend less and less time browsing the Nutrisystem group on FB because there are so many who do nothing but complain. I guess they think that is what a “support group” is for. To me a support group should be uplifting and although the group contains many positive members they are overshadowed by the negative ones. It’s likely I will leave the group soon so you won’t have to hear about it ! I did get some great tips there, like using the Costco gift cards, so it hasn’t been all bad. Being in that group I’ve also realized just how many unhappy people out there are using food to cope and many want to lose weight without dealing with the issues that are the root of their problem. They also don’t want to give up their bad habits. How do you tell someone who is already struggling that they need to resolve those issues if they want to be successful with weight loss ? Or that their bad habits are what got them to this point and if they don’t change they won’t be successful ? You can’t. We all know we need to lose weight and most of us know WHY we are overweight. We also know what we need to do in order to change it. The key is finding that strength and motivation and commitment .. and you have to do that yourself.

I took an important step today. I wore a top I’ve been avoiding since Christmas. It’s the top I was wearing on Christmas Day. The day that photo was taken. That awful photo that made me realize my weight was ballooning out of control. That wonderful photo that put me on this journey. That wonderful photo that made me see what everyone else could already see, but I was blind to. That photo that I will post on 12/25/19 with an “after” photo. Ironic that someone stopped me in the hall at work today to ask if I’m running miles because I’m getting “so thin” !!! That top is loose on me now and I’ve only worn it a few times so I don’t intend to throw it away anytime soon. It’s also an important reminder of why I’m doing this and I really like that top !

Wow .. tonight’s workout was a struggle ! I’m not sure why as it is the same workout I’ve been doing every day. Once I got past the half way mark it wasn’t so bad. I had considered trying a more challenging program tonight and I guess it’s a good thing I didn’t ! Perhaps I am just tired. I see a hot shower and a warm bed in my future !