Failing, failing...

I'm failing miserably for a second week in a row. Really, this has to stop and it has to stop now. I haven't given up and I'm not going to. I exercise and try to limit the calories. But every other day or so I slip and it's getting annoying.

Yesterday and today the failing was due to parliamentary election results here in Finland. I know I'm making it into a bigger deal than it is, but I just can't believe Finns voted into the parliament 39 representatives of a racist, fascist and chauvinist party who don't even have a political agenda nor any idea how economy works. It makes me so sad I want to cry so of course I treat it with the one and only known cure for everything: food.

I need to cut the excuses and get back in line x_x Yes, starting from now. Not tomorrow, but now.

Yosh!

Exercising history

Exercising and me don't go well together. Or rather we haven't had many good times together in the past. As a child I roamed around like any other kid and didn't have any weight problems. When I entered third grade I decided to start soccer. This was also the beginning of my weight struggles. Even so soccer was my hobby until sixth grade and I really enjoyed it. Then I had to quit because of the horrible team spirit in my team (or the lack of thereof actually). I still loved soccer, but playing in that team had become impossible. I was a little round even then and after I quit soccer my weight problems got worse. My dad dragged me swimming once every week for a year or so "because I didn't do any other sports." When I got rid of that school was the only place I was forced to do any kind of exercise.

Physical education in school was horrible. I hated it with passion, always. The exercising itself wasn't that bad but the way the lessons were carried out was. Especially when they would measure your performance: how fast you run, endurance, how far you jump etc. I sucked at them all. Running a mile took me around 3 minutes longer than anyone else. Needless to say those humiliating experiences didn't boost my self confidence or make me develop a passion for exercising.

Our high school PE was a joke and after that I haven't done much of anything. So here I am not having exercised in 5 years and the 3 before it weren't much better. Oh I would try to start exercising every now and then, but it'd be horrible and I'd drop it after a couple of times. All my previous attempts at weight loss I have done without exercising, just cutting back the calories. I drew reassurance from articles and specialists statements that claimed you can lose weight without exercising. Which is very true, it's probably easier to lose weight by cutting back calories than just exercising. However I'm beginning to suspect that the combination of those two bring the most stable results.

This time I'm determined to correct the mistakes I have made in the past and I'm convinced that not exercising is one of them. As I have grown into an adult I have also had to acknowledge the truth that my body won't stay young forever and not exercising is going to either take me to early grave or at least give me constant pain when I get older. I don't want that so I have to do something and now is just about the time. I hope doing exercise will have the desired effect. I hope it will be the key, the missing piece that I have lacked before. And maybe the traumas from PE lessons have worn off enough that I can also keep at it this time :P

PS. The follow thingy seems to be uncooperative today (I'm not the only one so it's the problem is probably with blogger and not me) But you luckily there is another button in the navigation bar up left :)

A more prominent failure

I managed to prove all over again that stress, too little sleep and no free time is the dead certain way for me to wreck my diet. The result is four days of uncontrolled eating and around 1kg gained back. On Sunday I actually ignored my weekly measuring day. I was just too tired to get out of bed in time to do it so I didn't and now I have no idea how the week 3 went.

I weighted myself today though and found I had gained 0.9kg back since my last time on the scale. Oops. Well I suppose it's only fair, I earned it. Now I have to get going again and hope that the birthday party next Friday won't wreck my control again. I am going to allow myself to eat there though, it's my birthday party dammit. Two days to go before the party and after it I need to be back in line the next day without lapsing into eating the leftovers.

I expected to be more upset about this failure than I am actually. After all this is a different kind of failure than last time when it was... controlled I suppose. Actually if I'm completely honest I was upset about this. But this morning when I weighted myself and saw the damage, I felt calm. I thought it could have been worse and it's over now anyway, it's past now and there is nothing I can do about it now. Except get back to controlling my eating and exercising. Gonna do that now :)

A failure turned into success

Yesterday I was tired and down so I turned to the one thing that has always helped me whenever I have been feeling blue: food. I bought chocolate, an ice cream and just ate about anything I felt like, not caring about exceeding my calorie limit.

I don't even really feel upset with myself. I suppose I was kind of expecting it to happen, since I have been dieting for 2,5 weeks now and this was my first really unsuccessful day. I don't think I have ever been able to go this long without slipping before. Rather than being upset I feel... sympathy. And acceptance, even contentment. I suppose I should open that a bit.

I have been trying to lose weight countless times before, and I'd always have unsuccessful days. Days witch I would indulge into old habits and even worse days when I'd stuff my face like it was my last day alive. Afterwards I would feel guilty and hate myself for not being strong enough. This time was different. Instead of giving it, I made a decision. I was down and craving chocolate so I made a conscious decision. I gave myself the permission to eat, on the condition that I'd eat only as much as I really felt like and not wolf down everything I saw "because the day was already ruined" and that I'd continue with my diet the next day. I didn't blame myself but instead I acknowledged the depressed mood I was in and took pity on myself. Then I let it go and decided not to punish myself about it.

The difference to the way I have reacted to failures like this before is tremendous. Before I'd feel guilty, blame myself for being weak and hate myself for "ruining" my diet. This time I feel sympathy and understanding towards myself. I don't need to be perfect to be able to do it.

Part of the difference is that this time I have accepted the fact that this is going to take time and it's impossible to be on a diet for a year or more and not allowing yourself a single treat. Trying would be setting myself up for a certain failure so why should I hate myself when I enjoy those necessary little treats? I'm bound to face hardships during such a long time, but I have now realized that those hardships aren't impossible to overcome. As long as I don't let the failures to dominate my thoughts but concentrate on the successes instead, those failures can't hinder me.

All in all, I feel like yesterday's slip did me more good than harm. The only reason why I feel disappointed is that I'm attending a party on Saturday and I already promised myself I don't need to count calories there. I feel a little inclined to cancel that promise now, but I know that's the wrong thing to do. I promised not to punish myself for yesterday so I won't.

I wish I had words to describe how fundamental this change in attitude is for me, and how important I feel it is. Before I'd dwell on my failures and punish myself for them, which would only result in more failures when I'd push myself too hard, which would result in more failures and eventually in giving up altogether. This time I forgave myself for the failure, put it behind me and continued forward as if it never happened. 

I'm beginning to see that I am myself indeed my biggest enemy. What made me fail before was not the chocolate, not my bad fitness, not being busy with work or school nor the low self confidence but me. That means I can also succeed if only let myself. And this time I'm not going to stand in my way.

The ugly truth

I took a picture of myself when I started, which I have never done before. I have been too scared to I guess. I hate cameras with passion since they have the ability to shove into my face what I refuse to see when I look into a mirror. But then it occurred to me that it could also act as motivation, instead of something to make me hate myself even more. With the picture I would actually see the progress I'm (hopefully) making, since it happens so slow that it's hard to notice in the mirror. Looking at it would also always remind me why I'm doing this, and why it's worth it.

It's not pretty, but it's not something I can't change. I took a purposefully "bad" picture, straight from front without posing, in clothes that don't hide the ugly truth one bit. (No, I would never leave the house in those clothes, but that's beside the point :P)

I don't want to look the way I do, I really don't. Time to work on it.

On a side note, I had lost 0.3kg this morning. So maybe my last night worrying was unnecessary :)

The second weighing day

The moment of truth arrived again this morning. The scale said I have lost 0.8kg since last week and the measuring tape that I have gained 0.4cm on my waist. It's probably just due to the inaccuracy of my measuring since most of the weight loss happened the first day of this week though.

It's undoubtedly good news are that I have lost almost 1kg but I still can't help but feel a bit disappointed since all of that weight came off on the first two days of the week and nothing happened during the rest of the week. I worry that I'm only eating little enough to get rid of the extra fluid, but not little enough to actually lose weight.

It's stupid of course, I'm eating 1500kcal per day now which it should be enough. I don't want to cut down the calories yet since I'm occasionally hungry during the day as it is and like every dieter knows, hunger is your worst enemy. I have done that mistake often enough to know it's something to avoid as much as I can.

I'm not blessed with the best patience when it comes to losing weight, so I usually would try to lose as much weight as quickly as possible. Eating 1200kcal or less per day works great, for a week. Then hunger would make me slip. Sometimes I'd manage two weeks, but then I'd either slip, or get frustrated with my metabolic rate slowing down, making the weight loss slow down with it.

I suppose I'll give it another week and just try to be a bit more strict with myself. It's after all only normal that you don't constantly lose weight even when you are eating appropriately, right? :3

It's not about how many times you fail, but how many times you get up again.

Now, I'm not new to losing weight. Like so many others I have done this countless times before. I have succeeded and I have failed. A couple of times I have managed to keep the lost pounds away for a while, but I have always gained it back eventually. The last few years I have been caught in the vicious circle of yo-yo dieting,

Sound familiar? I'm sure it does, we have all been there.

It's very disheartening to think that I have always failed before. My mind insists that I'm just not strong enough to do it, so why even try. Usually when I finally get myself to start dieting again, I do so with scepticism, wondering how many weeks it'll be this time before I fail again. In other words, I'm setting myself up to fail before I have even started.

That just won't do. If I believe I'll fail, I'm not even giving myself a chance. I'm refusing to do that this time, so I had to find a way to silence that little voice in my head whispering about past failures. Simply ignoring it wasn't going to do the trick so I needed a strong counter-argument. Then I realized that it wasn't the truth in the first place. I have not failed. The old wisdom "it's not about how many times you fail, but how many times you get up again" applies to losing weight better than anything. I have not failed. As long as I'm still trying, I have not failed. I have stumbled, I have gotten astray, I have slipped and I have gone back to the starting point and even beyond, but as long as I haven't given up for good, I have not failed.

That thought filled me with optimism and determination. I accepted the fact that my past attempts at losing weight hadn't gotten me where I wanted to be. I also stopped blaming myself for being weak and started thinking what actually made me fail instead. I let go of the frustration I had harbored and decided that past failures don't determine my future success. Having made mistakes in the past doesn't mean I'll repeat them but instead makes then easier to avoid in the future.

This time I won't be starting over with the weight of past failures on my shoulders, but rather with them as my strength, as an ace up my sleeve.

I'm ready to go again. *^-^*

Introduction

I'm a 20 year old university student, and I have struggled with my weight for about half of my life. I started gaining weight during third grade in elementary school mainly due to radical changes in my social circle. Since then, I have made emotional eating into art. I eat when I'm down, because "I deserve it since my life is bad enough already and I can't deny myself my one and only comfort" and I eat when I'm happy because "life is good, why make it less so."

I gained weight steadily through elementary school and junior high. Not as much as I easily could have, but enough to always make me the biggest kid in class and guarantee an exceptionally low self confidence to take with me along with the diploma. In high school I experienced a turn for the better; I found some really great friends, developed a really big crush and lost quite a bit of weight without even really trying. Life was great, and even if I wasn't exactly thin, I was normal, M sized.

It didn't last though. Life took a turn for worse, I was quite badly depressed for a year, and when I started to finally see good things in life again, my best friend got an eating disorder and depression, turned into someone I didn't know, and dragged me down with her. The following two years were horrible, and I continued the comfort eating I had picked up again during my own depression. When I graduated from high school I was bigger than even before. That was when I gathered myself, and started dieting for real, and unlike many previously failed attempts, I did lose weight. Slowly, but I was almost back to that M size.

Then I finally broke down under the stress my friends situation and said friend herself had put on me. Combining it with the stress created by university entrance exams getting closer and controlling my eating habits got impossible to control again.

I got in though, and last fall I started in university. It was supposed to be the beginning of a new life. I had decided to continue dieting, participate in as many activities in my student organization as possible and get to know as many people as possible. It backfired. Badly. I put myself under so much stress and pressure when starting a new school was already overwhelming enough that I only clung more tightly to my trusted comfort: food.

Now I have gained almost 20kg since the start of university and weight more than I ever have before.

Now this all sounds really depressing, but I'm really not depressed. I got over my self pitying party I started after new year and decided to dedicate as much time for myself as I need, as long as I need. If I can get some studies done in the side, all the better but not necessary. I realized that more than anything, I want to like myself. I want to be confident, and maybe a little selfish, and live my life for myself, the way I want to. Nothing is really as important to me right now, not my studies, not working, not social responsibilities I have created for myself. No one cares if I don't force myself to go into every party, and nothing is lost if I graduate a little later if it means I get to be happy about myself. Why wouldn't I work towards the goal I want to achieve most?

I start with my biggest obstacle: me. I don't want to lose weight because I hate myself and the way I look. I want to lose weight because I love myself, and deserve better. Now I have to work to make that last sentence true, and to lose that weight.

This blog is about my journey to find myself under the fat. I hope it helps me in sorting things out, keeping me motivated and maybe even connecting me with the many, many people I know are struggling with the same issues.