Celebrating my First Milestone!

[Fair warning: this is a long post. I'm sorry for those it might bore, but truthfully I'm writing it for me, as a marker of my success. And I've never been short-winded, as my late mother would confirm. Feel free to skip if time is a premium for you.]

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18 weeks ago, I was in an emotional tailspin after 2 of my doctors said that I should get bariatric surgery because "you're not making any progress" and "it will change your life!" I even agreed to meet with the bariatric surgeon (and did; to her credit she was so honest about post-surgery life and the downside that nobody talks about that it merely reaffirmed my strong feelings that I did not want it, full stop.)

18 weeks ago, knowing all that I already knew about why I was morbidly obese (135 pounds more than the chart said I "should weigh" and 110 pounds more than I, as a Black woman, wanted to weigh -- because I'm not giving up my badonkadong for anything . My weight gain had not been from excess food consumption in terms of quantity - indeed, my adult children were saying that I wasn't eating enough. It had been, instead, from an extremely sedentary life and personal food choices that were and are extremely satisfying, extremely caloric, and while delicious were very likely to put on pounds if eaten all the time.

So, 18 weeks ago, I decided "F those MFers!" I said to myself in that Brooklyn voice that comes out when I'm most stubborn and most determined to prove a point. I knew that no matter what assumptions are made about overweight and obese people in terms of stuffing our faces all day, I knew why I'm overweight. I decided that I was going to prove that they are wrong about why (i.e. eating too much food) as it related to ME. So, after a lot of tears and anger at both my doctors and--most crucially--myself for letting things get to the place they were, I decided to focus on what one of them had said during my last visit:

Even losing 10% of my then-weight of 260 (at 5'3" /sigh) would make a real difference in my diabetic and blood pressure health markers, which is what concerned my primary care physician the most.

Yet I knew myself and know myself, now almost 60 trips around the sun. I have a firm, unmovable bug up my butt about deprivation. [Childhood created, and yes I'm working with a therapist on it!] So, when people tell me "you can't", I get my Brooklyn-ghetto-born Black woman back up. I get passive aggressive AND aggressive, i.e. "F Y'all MFers".

This is a great mindset for my now 30-year long successful career as a lawyer at times. Not so much, however, for weight loss.

So I decided two things.

First, I gave myself grace: I told myself that it had taken me 40+ years to go from a healthy weight of 130 when I first came to college as a 17-year old to the weight I was on March 8, 2021, so if it took me 2 or 3 years to take it off then that was perfectly fine *no matter what anyone else said.* I would affirmatively refuse to lose weight fast *just because everyone else wanted me to*.

Second, I decided that since deprivation is a major psychological trigger for me, I wouldn't deprive myself. Full stop. I would eat exactly what I wanted to eat - but that I would focus on mindfully focusing on and enjoying my good, and reducing the caloric load of each meal by small reductions in portion size. I would again start recording everything, no matter how "small", that went into my mouth. I would up my physical activity from basically zero no matter what my work load and life load (I'm raising a grandson day-to-day) looked like. And I'd drink more water.

I downloaded the Weight Watchers app, not to stick to program (I chose Blue) but to make recording easier. Every day, I reminded myself that I was not doing Weight Watchers, I was doing "Not Weight Watchers." So, if I was at points one day, great. If I was over, great as long as I knew exactly why.

Of course, me being a problem solving control freak at my best, even though I wasn't "on Weight Watchers" I started making small differences in my choices, day by day. Most of them just happened, after I'd do my weekly weigh in and see that I had lost a pound or so. Next thing I knew, I was actively managing my choices.

But since I refused to, and refuse to, feel deprived, I quite unexpectedly soon found myself recipe hacking - shaving off 10 and 20% of the calories in a normal recipe through substitutions of/reductions in the fats and sugars and amount of meats called for. I discovered that I missed none of those hacked-away recipe calories. Portions got easy because I was measuring. I needed the reminders that having only a cup of something isn't deprivation, it's actually quite substantial. It's enough. Having three bites of a pie or a cake or a mousse was all I needed to feel that it was enough. Although if I want the whole slice or serving, that's OK too - as long as it's not what I do all the time. And yes, my macaroni and cheese is still the best in California in my opinion -and still bloody delicious even though it's now a 400 calorie dish instead of 600.

Oh yeah, I also started exercising. Tried pilates with the reformer machine. Got reminded quickly that I'm 59, not 29 and could barely walk for a week. So I started going back to the gym instead.

In May, I realized that I was increasingly resentful about how much WW's point system penalizes certain foods (carbs, fats and sugars) matter how de minimis. I knew where my resentment was heading. I knew that I would just stop if the resentment kept building. Because "F those MFers". (I confess that don't love myself enough to care about a shortened lifespan or any of those things that doctors and family members use to motivate patients; I just want to be happy after working so hard all my life). So, after seeking out some WW groups to commiserate/whinge about this, I discovered that a lot of folks on WW were also using MyFitnessPal. I downloaded the app 40 days or so ago.

MFP confirmed that, yes, WW was being punitive because its points totals said that I was overeating when I went over points yet MFP said that I was eating a healthy number of calories (even too little, some days - twice it wouldn't let me publish my food diary!) and even getting good nutrients each day. The resentment quickly went back into its hidey hole. Its absence is what kept me focused on the small, up and down, life changes and movement on the scale.

Through all of this my goal, and my ONLY goal, was to lose the 10% of my body weight that my primary care physician said would make a health difference. However long it took. I said that I would work to hit this first goal by my birthday in late August.

I hit my goal this morning. I have gone in 18 weeks from 260.1 pounds on March 8 to 233.5 today. 26.6 pounds gone.

After I got done bursting into tears of happiness, I did two things. First I gave glory to God for giving me the strength to prove to MYSELF that I could truly change my relationship with food. Proving that I didn't need to have a stomach the size of banana to be healthy, I just needed me and the same approach I've given to everything else in my life: all in, but always in control. I thanked Him because for the first time I truly felt in my heart it wasn't too late for me, this grandmother, to get healthy (no matter what that ultimate healthy weight is.)

The second thing I did was celebrate my own effort and commitment to this journey. I have consciously lost more weight since March than I have ever lost in my life with two exceptions: (1) the year following my divorce from my children's father during which the genuine insanity (not hyperbole, trust me; my late ex-husband became psychotic and brought everything that went with it to the table) left me brutally depressed and suicidal and 40 pounds lighter; (2) after I had a severe diverticular rupture in 2012 that, with life threatening secondary infections, landed me in the hospital with major gastric surgery and living on an IV for 3 solid weeks.

I much prefer losing weight this way, for the record.

Oh, and in my bloodwork last week, my A1C had plummeted from 6.8 to 6.4 (I'd been on Metformin for a year and it had done nothing) and my blood glucose dropped from 138 to 106. My systolic blood pressure is even down an average 5 points. I got a note from my doctor noting that things had improved and that my blood work looked good (right now, she doesn't know why; it's a surprise for my annual exam in October LOL).

I have no next goal right now. I'm just going to celebrate and try to maintain for a week or two before taking on the next challenge. I'm going to focus on getting my exercise more consistent, because work continues to kick my *kitten* right now with a trial coming up. It is still harder than I would like to make myself do SOMETHING even if it's a walk around the block every day.

And I'm going to keep reminding myself that I may be old, I may be tired, but damnit when I want something I not only can have it, I am entitled to want it just.for.ME.

Thanks for reading!