Living the Lifestyle - Tues., Sept. 27th

60in2017

Everyone says it, but just how do you do it? How do you take the guidelines of the WW program and turn them into a lifestyle you can live every day...from now on? That is what we are here to explore. Each weekday, a new topic is offered up for discussion. Newbie? Join in! Veteran? Join in! Your thoughts may be just what someone else needs to hear.

Monday -- crewahl / Charlie
Tuesday --60in2017 / Millie
Wednesday -- minimyzeme / Kim
Thursday -- MICHGOLFER2 / Jane
Friday --Jimb376mfp / Jim

Today's topic: In thinking about my questions this month, I’ve discovered that my ponderings about weight loss/fitness have been centered around where I might be less than truthful to myself about my efforts. So, that is my last set of questions for the month. Where have you been less than truthful to yourself during your weight loss/fitness journey? Have these distortions been something you’re aware of or do you discover them at the scale or in the mirror? Maybe some of your distortions have been beneficial or helped you get through a difficult aspect of weight loss/fitness. If so, clue us in on how you’ve benefited.

steve0mania

Interesting question.

On the "maladaptive" side, I have often been less than truthful with myself about alcohol intake. I know, intellectually, that I really should minimize my alcohol intake, as a few beers or glasses of wine here and there really add a lot of calories to my day/week. Right now I am shooting for ~1500 calories a day. Two good beers can be 400-500 calories, i.e., ~30% of my daily intake! However, although I understand all of this intellectually, that doesn't translate into being easy to follow. There are plenty of times where I think "just one beer won't hurt anything." But then, one leads to another, and perhaps another, etc. It would be better if I stuck to my "only on the weekend" plan.

On the "adaptive" side, I still believe that I can't trust my eyes to serve a single portion of food. This lack of trust in myself causes me to weigh/measure most foods at home. It probably doesn't really matter if I'm off a bit when I pour a bowl of cereal, for example, but somehow I have it in my head that it does matter and that I need to pour my cereal into a measuring cup to make sure I only have one cup.

Rachel0778

I think my biggest distortion is body dismorphia. I still see myself as much bigger than I am even though I've accomplished a lot with my weight loss/fitness. I have a hard time celebrating my successes because I always see myself as a work as progress (this can be both a good thing and a bad thing since I'm always trying to improve).

I think I do pretty well with estimating food servings and not overestimating activity so I don't see either of those harming me. When I do stall or gain I usually know exactly why since I do track everything. Now I just need to get my head around my new body and to stop thinking of myself as the fat girl.

88olds

Negative: I'm in denial about the fact that at 66 I'm at least an inch shorter than I was 5 years ago.

Positive: when I first started WL, I started to exercise. My first workout was 8 min on the old stationary bike gathering dust in the basement. 8 minutes was about all I could do. But I kept at it 5x per week. Long walk on Saturday, Sunday off.

The distortion- even as I worked up to 10, 12, 15 minutes, I made a big deal out of it. It was my workout. I had to put on my workout clothes. The prep took longer than the exercise. I recall at some point thinking to myself "I'm the kind of person who exercises every day." Technically true at the time, but very distorted.

It worked as a strategy. I highly recommend it.

gadgetgirlIL

I'm sure I tend to overestimate my incidental movement during the day as a way to justify the times I go over my calorie budget. But the scale trends don't lie so eventually I have to face the music and stay on budget if I want my weight to stay in my happy zone.

goldenfrisbee

I think I am most prone to be less than truthful with my intake, so that will show up on the scale. I am estimating most of what I eat since I only have a scale available at dinner time. Most days I skip breakfast because I just don't feel like eating yet (wish that was the case at night) I am tracking everything, but could be fudging some on the calorie count.

And I have a new problem. The wife and I toured the Jack Daniels distillery in Tenn. last week. I brought home a bottle of Jack Daniels Fire. Wow, what an interesting drink. Tastes light Big Red gum with a whiskey kick to it. I could easily take 2-3 shots of that a night.

leeless511

Yes, I do kid myself at times. Usually I know I am, often it is related to not wanting to beat myself up for eating more points or not working out...and usually it happens when I go "type A" in my efforts because I want something to happen fast. The benefit of doing this is it brings me back to "just do it" and removes the "type A" behaviors. I find I do this more in maintenance than when I first lost weight.

Example, a few weeks ago I ate a bunch of chocolate throughout the day and blew all my weeklies on my first day of the WW week. I did not log the chocolate and decided to treat the week as a 6 day week. That helped me not feel bad by seeing negative numbers all week which would kick up my "type A" behavior to compensate for the overage.

podkey

Wow deep thoughts there. I am maybe less than truthful when out with others and libations may be involved. Hmmmmmmmmmmmm.

minimyzeme

I was less than truthful about what I love about MFP message boards. I just now discovered while writing a response, I can enlarge the text box to full screen and (AND) turn the whole thing black with white text. This is freakin' awesome-- WW offered nothing even close to this option!

P'raps a little closer to the program, my distortion of note has oddly enough come after poo-pooing (so to speak) the scale for so long, finding I am actually somewhat 'ruled' by it. Not game-changer ruled, but more influenced by it than I want to be. It's been in maintaining over the summer that this has come to light for me. I was and am a bit obsessed with staying 80 pounds less than when I started. I've crept up as much as five pounds over the course of the summer. It's been a constant incremental up and down for weeks. Sometimes it made sense; sometimes less so. But what didn't was the fear the gain brought me.

I didn't think I was that vested in the scale. And maybe it's not the scale. It's almost like I feel like less than the 80 pounds invalidates the accomplishment or something. It's not a fear that stays with me all day, but it has given me a jolt over several days / weeks this summer. Just this week, I breathed a sigh of relief because I was at or below this somewhat arbitrary goal.

For two years, I've claimed not to be held hostage by the scale. While it certainly hasn't dominated any of my days or ruined any weeks, the dynamics have made me realize the (imaginary) power of the box. On the plus side, I've not let the scale numbers rule the day--but they sure did for a few minutes many of those days.

MICHGOLFER2

I have been less than truthful to myself about my desire to lose weight. I say I want to lose weight, but am I really willing to do what I know I need to do to make the desire a reality?

Jimb376mfp

My river of denial is not measuring and weighing my food. I'm estimating most of it and still losing but wonder how much better I would be doing if I actually measured?
Second area is being lazy about just moving when my usual exercise routine is disrupted.
Some LTL topics make me look deep into the abyss!