Yes, I have pounds to lose. Yes I have clothing sizes to drop. Yes, I have muscles to grow. But you know what else? I'm still me. I'm still Stacey Marie, no matter how much space I take up. And as a general rule, I kind of like who I have become in these last 34 years.
I am a mother, a wife, a friend, an employee of a great company doing one of THE coolest jobs in the world, a volunteer, a good listener, a shower singer, a writer, a smiler, a laugher, a nurturer, and so much more.
NONE OF THOSE THINGS HAVE A THING TO DO WITH A NUMBER ON THE SCALE OR CLOTHING SIZE!!!
It seems simple, but somehow I always enveloped my "goodness" with my size. The bigger I was, the less worthy of good things I felt. I dug into how some of that came into being with my last post, and have come out on the other side realizing that weight is just that. A number. I don't HAVE to shrink to be loved, accepted, or happy.
But now that I don't feel imprisoned by that great "I have to," a funny thing has happened. Now I want to. I REALLY do want to. I even WANT to do the work.
In the past, I've run the gamut of trying different diets, fads, supplements, and anything in between. I have enough knowledge to know what works and what doesn't. And now that my headspace is a little more cleared out, I've also thought about what I actually HAVE been successful with in the past.
The only plan that has worked for me has been Weight Watchers. I kept my food journals and weigh-in logs from when I lost 28lbs in a very short amount of time when Zela was near a year old. I have often looked back to see what I did to achieve the loss, and here's what it boiled down to: I ate all of my daily points allotted to me, and I also ate all of my weekly points allowed. The estimated caloric range was 1600-2200 calories a day, depending on how active I was (because you bet your bottom dollar I ate my activity points I'd earn, too). Sometimes I ate really crappy food like Mcdonald's. Sometimes I ate dessert. I almost always used some extra points of a few cocktails. I added fruits and veggies to nearly every meal, but didn't feel guilty when I didn't. I walked daily, worked out harder sometimes, and was okay with my life. I lost quickly and easily.
I tried WW again after Aidan was born. At that time, I was under a lot more stress. I started a new career, and my marriage was ending. For some reason it never really worked as well as the first time. And the funny thing? If you were to look at my food journals from this attempt, you would see a lot more healthy choices, a lot less fast food, and definitely less alcohol. I was eating a lot of organic, plant-based foods, and feeling generally rather smug about how great I was treating my body and the planet, all the while hating myself for taking up too much space. My self-worth was directly attached to what the scale told me, and as soon as I plateaued, I basically gave up.
I tried simply tracking calories and macro nutrients I tried going vegetarian gluten-free, paleo, primal, etc. I tried WW a few more times, both with and without subscribing. I found that with each of those methods, whenever I'd try REALLY hard, I'd end up at around 1200 calories a day... sometimes less. Whoa, nelly. I'm 5'9" and I truly believe I still have to have SOME of my muscles left under this padding. 1200 calories? Something didn't quite compute there, and MAYBE that's why my attempts were not successful. Maybe I was just grumpy and HUNGRY. Maybe I didn't really have adrenal fatigue and low thyroid. Maybe I just didn't give myself enough fuel to get through the day and through workouts. Maybe I needed to really reconsider why and how I lost so well the first time.
Somehow I've always ended each attempt just a little heavier and a lot more miserable... until now.
I've been reading a great blog by a amazingly inspirational woman over at Go Kaleo, and it's been her musings that have lead me to really be okay with who I am, where I am, and where I'm going. She opened up my mind to the idea that "taking up space" is just that.... taking up space. She's a big proponent of "Eating the food" and bucking the idea that the average woman really needs to restrict herself to 1200 calories a day and work her butt off in order to be thin. She's smart, strong, and beautiful. She's inspired me to go back to what I know works: tracking my intake, keeping it at a suitable level to sustain daily life and activity, enjoying life and all the foods that come with it, removing guilt and other emotional labels from food -- even fast food -- and just finding balance. It took an internet stranger to help me embrace my own "beauty," even if I have a hard time seeing it right now. That step is what has me going in the right direction this time, instead of circular self-loathing, restrict, binge, restrict, crawl in a ball and cry, etc.
This is me, and I feel free to take up as much space as I need to. And now that I've released the internal weight, I'm willing to bet the external will soon follow suit.
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