Robin's words after my last cheat on the FB group:  " If you cheat, observe your justifications, judgments, and your guilt. Cheating opens your eyes to observe your thoughts and your resulting behavior. they can be essential steps towards changing your relationship with food and your body permanently."

So now I will use these words as a tool to analyse what happened today.  Today I broke protocol.  Again.  In one week.  But I know, I have to let go of the idea of perfection.  The goal is to slowly change how I look at food and how I look at myself.  So . . .

My justifications:

  1.) I was baking cookies for the Step Up seniors at Roosevelt and I wanted to see how they tasted (had to make some recipe modifications.
  2.) My husband and I had a huge blow out fight and I was frustrated.
  3.) The food was left out and it looked good.

My judgments/guilt:

  1.) Now I have ruined my diet and I will be fat forever.
  2.) I might as well give up.  I am going to suffer through this round and lose nothing.
  3.) I might as well give up.  I am going to keep cheating and gain back more than I was at first.
  4.) I can't do this for myself so I must hate myself.
  5.) I am never going to lose weight or meet my goal of not emotionally eating.  Ever.

Thoughts:

I notice that one thing I left out when I was so upset and food was so available was how my body felt in that emotional space.  In fact I don't remember one thought I had in that moment.  I just remember being mad and shovelling food into my face.  Last week my goal was to observe my bodies' reaction to my feelings, especially uncomfortable feelings without judgment.  Just to see what my body feels like when my mind is in an uncomfortable situation.  I ate much more normally when I did that.  So what I learned from today is that it is imperative that I give myself a time out when those emotions start to surface ESPECIALLY when food is around.

I can do this. Still.

Goodbye grads . . . happy thoughts and worried confessions

Today I had the immeasurable privilege of seeing 12 of the students I have worked with for at least one year, and some more extensively through this year GRADUATE.  What a feeling!  So much excitement and so much stress, writing all of my thoughts and wishes for each of them down.  

Food was present in my mind all day.  I noticed that I was also hungry more than usual.  True, I am dealing with TOM, but I am concerned that there was an element of stress eating.  Or celebration eating?  Whatevs. Emotional eating, not need based eating.  

I still struggle with stopping eating when I am no longer hungry.  I know if I am not satisfied, if I am still hungry I will go get more, or another food option.  But if I have scooped it out I will consume it.  :/

While I am confessing, I better put this out in the universe: I have been weighing myself.  A lot.  Like, the first two days, at least twice a day.  The past two days I have only been weighing daily.  I know I need to put the scale away!!  

What am I looking for the scale to tell me?  I guess that I am making progress?  I don't know!  I know the real progress is what is gong on inside, what the scale cannot measure.  I know that if I change PERMANENTLY my view of food that my weight, looks, outward will eventually match the changes I make inside.  

So why the scale?

I will set a date.  Saturday.  I will note my weight for the week and ask my husband to put the scale away until next week.

Also I am scared that since I have been weighing so frequently, and since my body asked for a little more then protocol today, that I will be upset/frustrated/discouraged by my weight tomorrow.  Which is, I realize, one of the biggest reasons that Mind/Body HCG protocol recommends not weighing.  I have been challenged by Robin on the Facebook support group to accept a protocol round that is not perfect.  I will take my weigh in tomorrow as a challenge to do just that.

"What does it feel like to be hungry?  Because I don't think I really know."

My mom asked me that when I explained the philosophy of Weight Loss Apocolypse's version of the HCG protocol.  I explained that my primary work on this, my second round of the HCG protocol, was not to lose the 70 pounds I have been belly aching about for 75% of my life.  My work is learning when I am hungry and when I am not.  

I went over and over and over this in my head, this question . . . I told my mom something about physical hunger, stomachs growling, something . . . but here I am in Day three, after eating 2 protein servings and one fruit . . .

And I don't know if I am hungry.

I'm watching television after my sons are in bed.  I usually eat during this.  I feel an emptiness in my stomach but I wouldn't say it's hunger . . .

I thought back to the times that I didn't think about eating as a hobby - that's what it is, right?  A hobby.  When did I eat to be nourished?  When did I eat in a way that respected my body?

I sometimes work as part of a facilitation team that does life changing summer camps for youth.  I have worked about four of them and I remember the stress of it.  I remember the late nights and early mornings.  Every meal was all you can eat.  Many people munched non stop, and at one of the camps I was pregnant.  But at camp I was so focused on the experience of the kids that I postponed eating until I finished whatever work was at hand.  Or until I caught that girl who was crying during one of the pieces.  Or until I finished writing my appreciations.  Yes, the food was camp food, and yes, I ate gummy worms and s'mores.  But my focus was not on avoiding or eating food.  My focus was on THE MOMENT.

How can I bring the honor and respect that I carry for my students and their experience into my life?  I must practice what I preach.  I cannot tell them that they can achieve anything, that they must value themselves, that they must be present and take their opportunity to change without taking mine.  

After camp we always were saddened that kids lose much of camp.  They arrive late to class.  They return to substance abuse.  They bottle up their feelings.

I never realized that camp set me up for a new beginning also.  I must take advantage of it.

Night all.  Gonna watch one of Robin Phipps Woodall's videos and try to stay away from that last melba toast.

The Hunger Scale from Robin: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jVCIWZ-WFc4