Eating better sucks

I know that you all are about say, "you'll get used to it..it's not that bad!" Bullshit. It sucks. The things I enjoy eating are all porportedly terrible for me. Cheese, bacon, ham, chocolate, cool whip, ice cream and tiramisu. Starbucks is crack and Dairy Queen is hell.

I'll back up a bit.

I talked in an earlier post about the fact that I know I need to make some lifestyle changes. For a long time, a couple years at least, I've been eating with reckless abandon. Shoving whatever I felt like eating in my mouth. While that's been enjoyable, it really hasn't been good for my hips and ass. Some of this behavior was born out of anxiety/depression from a shitty job right to the divorce. I think over the last few months I've given my life greater thought. I don't mean "why am I here?" type thought I mean concious thinking about the direction my health is going. I think a fair amount of this has been brought about by watching the changes in my parents. My mom is getting used to dealing with diabetes, and my father is struggling with his hip/back pain. I guess I"m seeing first hand that I am no longer at an age where "later" is an option. I either do it now or don't bother.

One of my friends has had some success with a free website in which you can track your food intake - calories, fat, carbs all that happy horse shit. SO, for the past week, I have done my best to not only track my food, but be honest. It's one thing to say you ate a ham and cheese sandwich on whole wheat - its quite another to admit you ate chips and had 3 glazed munchkins for a snack AFTER breakfast. So, I"m trying to be honest. I'm trying to see why I'm making the choices I"m making, and figure out how to stop mindless eating. Buddhists always talk about being in the moment, living life in the present. I'm trying to be mindful of what goes in my mouth. I'm hoping by seeing the actual calories of each item it'll force me to make different choices. I think it'll work. It'll take time. I'm not in a rush this time. I'm not going totally cold turkey, and frankly, if I really want a piece of chocolate I'm fucking having it. I've never been someone who can live life devoid of sweets. It's the moderation part that I need to change. If I can master that, I think I might actually be successful. I'm also afraid to talk about it. Is that wierd? I think there have been so many times in the past where I've done so much gabbing about my goals, plans, etc. and then when it whithers out, I feel like a failure.

I remember one time, I had come home from the gym, and I had felt pretty good about what I had done. My ex turned to me and said, "well, let's see if you keep it up; you haven't before." It was like somebody punched me in the stomach. All the talking up I'd done to myself was gone in one second. Disappeared. The thing is he had no idea the mental struggle with myself to actually GO to the gym, let alone the mental gymnastics to say "HOORAY! YOU DID IT!" over and over again so I'd feel like I did something instead of feeling like an idiot.
I don't think I was strong enough or knew how to ignore what he said and just keep on exercising and move forward. I felt defeated and more to the point I BELIEVED I was a failure. Why try - you'll never get any better was what the voice in my head said to me. It's almost like you have to separate out what is true, and what is false in your brain. (I know it sounds awfully new agey, bear with me) The negative voices need to be called out for what they are- negative voices and then I need to find a way to believe in myself. To truly believe that I have the ability to be better than I am right now. That's a tough one. It's been a long time since I truly believed in myself. I've done things out of sheer will and refusal to break down, but not because I believed I could do it. It was more out of a survival and "i have no fucking choice" mentality. To have faith in myself is a much more complex animal. It is a different kind of achievement. A different mindset. A "lifestyle change" as they call it.

I've been at this a full week. I've done pretty good with a false start here and there... and I've lost 1 pound. That pound needs to represent success. Each pound now needs to represent success and has to begin to foster a belief in myself that I am successful.
Almost like a daily affirmation.
Christ if I start talking into a mirror and saying "I'm good enough, I"m smart enough and dammit people like me!" someone put me out in a field with the cows.