lack of progress

I first started blogging my walking as part of my three-day training and fundraising. Then I moved to an online journal that within a year shut down. I wasn't going to blog anymore, but people would ask questions, and sending out group email was just causing more SPAM, so a blog it is.

I started this blog 11 years ago as someplace to track my walking adventures, and my progress at becoming healthy. But a funny thing happened on the way to physical fitness. Today I am more educated about nutrition and healthy eating, how your mind plays into health, movement, and all the associated topics. Yet I am heavier and less physically fit now then I was then. Part of that could be because I'm also a decade older. 

Am I healthier? I don't think so. But I have been going to doctors a lot. I've been racing to catch up with twenty years of no insurance.

 

Sunday I should have just eaten from the trash can. That's how bad my diet was.  The day began as every day does. I hopped on the scale and gained a pound. Then I had eggs for breakfast. I'm beginning to hate eggs. Then I picked up my niece and we went to Emmaus Community Park to help paint a mural. (There are no pics of me. Though there are two online on the mcall.com page. Scroll and my dirty hand is painting, and then there's another near the end.)

We arrived at the park to boxes of Dunkin Donuts. I was doing fine ignoring them until someone opened the lid. I ate one. And damn was it good.  Sunday is ice cream truck day at Shaon's building and to get her walking a long distance we get ice cream. In my family we will walk for food. And I put bacon and cheese in supper. It was so much fun. The first time in weeks that I've enjoyed eating -- all 1600+ calories, more than half of them red ones. Funny thing is today when I weighed myself I was down a pound. Go figure.

I only have one more section of Noom to go before I become a Noom Master. That will be in about two weeks. It's silly to think about that. I haven't done any of the work. I'm reading the material but I'm not comprehending it. It's going in one eye and out the other. I'm passing the mini quizzes at the end of each section, but if there is a big test, I'm screwed. Or maybe I am retaining something.

 

Above is an example of the fill-in-the-blanks that I encounter every couple of days. You type and then the computer lines it all up and regurgitates it, so you know how to proceed. I'm thankful that my friend Allison taught me that all you need to put in a field is one letter and it will allow you to move on. I do it all the time. Because if I couldn't do that I would probably be still back on week three or four. Hell, I probably would have quit. Although what I'm doing is pretty much the same as quitting, isn't it? I'm not giving it 100%. Or probably even 50%. 

One thing they suggested we do is make a pro/con list. I don't remember the particular lesson. But you had to do a standard 2 column and break it into a four column. I make them all the time. This one is for Noom.

PROs
Eating better
Stopped grazing (mostly. But is it because I keep no junk food in the house or because I've learned not to do it. I think it's the former.)
Drinking a lot more water
Walking more regularly
Sleeping better. Again, is it because I'm eating better and hydrated and finally cleared up that horrible rash. Or is it because I am not working right now and have minimal stress?)
Good information if I cared enough to read it with comprehension. I think I doing a variation of intense scanning or skimming.

CONs
Weighing in EVERY fucking day. You get thirty, forty seconds of positivity and peace in the morning. It's all sunshine and rainbows until you step on the scale and see you gained weight. Again. Same 5 pounds over and over and over. Actually, I think I might have lost a pound and a half. It only took 90 days.
The interface
The acronyms
The hash-tags
The self-help pscho babble
Eating/cooking is yet another chore.  The joy is gone.
The fucking positivity. In the lessons and in the chat. They way the program is written is positive on steroids. Everyone in chat who is succeeding is so over-overwhelmingly positive like they've drank the calorie-free Kool-Aid. Even if I leave down my guard and speak my truth, the positivity fairies flip the script and thank me for being honest. Barf. 

Now I'm not against being positive. I know I'm a negative person. I know I have low self-esteem and I self-bully. As my mother always said, I am my own worse enemy. But I think those are the two extremes. How about we meet in the middle. Some positive PLUS some realism. That would be refreshing.

Here's my weight loss chart. It's a zig-zag. It's the same five pounds -- well now, 7 pounds -- up and down. I'm in an up phase right now. My target date was originally mid-October. Now it's mid-December. Probably when I finish the program in mid-October the graph will have moved to mid-March.

I often wonder that if I was actually losing weight if I'd approach this differently.  If in those first weeks I actually lost weight would I have followed thru on the rest of the program? I know age effects how you you lose weight. But I've never had trouble losing weight (or gaining it back) before. What is different this time?