Satisfaction vs. deprivation...

There are a lot of mindsets with food & weight loss that I have shifted through lately and have begun the process of unraveling, and I'll definitely be sharing more of those in the days ahead.  But I felt like I wanted to start out with one that I am still VERY much trying to wrap my head around.  One that drives me positively and utterly BATTY...

Why are there days where you feel satisfied and why are there days when you feel deprived?

Why can THE SAME MEAL on one day feel like enough & other days it feels like it takes EVERY ounce of mental effort NOT to polish off that whole plate of fries, follow it up with an ice cream sundae and then lick the plates clean when you're done?  

You're welcome for the visualJ

I don't know the answer, but I do know one thing FOR SURE:  it has absolutely NOTHING to do with your body ACTUALLY needing more food.  Ready to get into that mental game of weight loss??  Let's begin...

Backstory:  I've never really went about my weight loss journey as choosing to order "the salad" (or insert whatever equally dreaded thing you're 'supposed to order' here) with the side of steamed vegetables in place of that burger and fries that I knew I REALLY, REALLY wanted.  I guess before any of the brain chatter really set in, I learned early on that ordering that salad, when every cell in your body screamed 'burger', was the quickest way to set up for failure.  It leads to resentment and anger and I somehow, without even trying, I avoided that path from early on.  Instead, I chose to order the burger, but stick to half.  And most days, I never felt deprived and I never felt stuffed.  As perfect of a victory as I could have hoped for.  Im hindsight, I probably was able to live in this space contently while having my 1st big weight losses many years ago.

BUT...

There are times when that 1/2 a burger just doesn't cut it.  And I don't mean physical hunger (unless it does, and in which case:  YES, eat more), but the reality of this circumstance is you've physically had enough food, you've had THE BURGER that you wanted and you didn't hate your life while angrily poking at the salad...but why are you staring at the second half as if it's screaming to you & ignoring it just makes it scream even louder?  Not having it makes you feel so deprived, as if you're never going to get to eat EVER EVER again except in that very moment.  You start to think how everyone else gets to have all the fun while you MENTALLY have to ninja with that burger in order for it to stop begging for your attention. It takes every ounce of effort not to flag down the waiter with flailing arms, just to have it GO AWAY.  

And then, gasp, what about when it happens again??  

Well now the mental game alone has become so EXHAUSTING that you've had enough with trying to be 'good.'  You are just SO TIRED of paying SO MUCH ATTENTION to every bite and all of this mental fighting.  This time you've had enough and you're not even gonna try.  Screw it!  "I'm just gonna eat this whole damn thing!"

Until you do, and then what happens?  You feel kinda gross, depressed & defeated and you vow to never, ever do that to yourself again.

We've all been there.  (I mean, right??) 

After typing up this post and letting it marinate for a few days, I think I stumbled on a thought that might be a key to part of unlocking this answer.  I think the difference in the two scenarios might be in telling yourself that you DON'T WANT/NEED more vs. telling yourself you SHOULDN'T have more.  Ya feel me?  I've always thought that the 'don't want vs. shouldn't' mindset is one that could always be applied to having a healthy lifestyle vs. being on a diet.  Being healthy means that you don't WANT to overindulge, but a diet tells you you CAN'T (in huge glaring, blinking, bright red letters) have what you truly desire.  But maybe the 'don't want/shouldn't' mindset can also be applied to tackling moderation here as well.  

Here's an example:  I always find that when I'm being 'good' and eating healthy, careful & clean (especially when you first get on that roll), that it is SO much easier to tell yourself how you don't WANT something.  You truly don't.  You feel satisfied & content and in the swing of your healthy lifestyle.  Then a week passes and you get to celebrate a victory on the scale and you feel happy & elated that you were able to eat that burger and STILL loose weight because you were IN CONTROL!  Rejoice!  And you're never, ever, ever gonna back to that 'bad' place again because you just feel SO GOOD!  Again, exactly where I squarely stayed during my inital loss.

BUT THEN...

...as the weeks go on, the weight loss results begin to diminish just a little bit each week.  You begin to feel the twinges of disappointment, but you keep on.  

AND THEN the next week, the scale just doesn't produce the number you were hoping for in your head.  Your brain really sets off the panic signal now.  You feel confused, disappointed and PISSED OFF.  "But I only ate half the burger.  Why did I only eat half the burger if I was only going to loose .2 ounces??  Now I better make sure I eat SUPEREXTRAGOOD cause I DON'T want to gain any of that weight back."  See also:  paranoia & panic.  

And then, oh God, what if you've been SO GOOD AND EVEN ATE THAT QUIONA ON TUESDAY NIGHT WHEN YOU DIDN'T WANT IT, but that happens to be the week you gain and now you and the scale (and that mother f'in quinoa!) are now officially no longer friends??

"F this!  I'm just gonna eat whatever the hell I want because I just CANNOT. LOOSE. WEIGHT!"

Sound familiar?  It might if you know me, because I've probably uttered it a few zillion timesJ

And is that above statement even true?  Can you REALLY not loose weight?  Of course you can.  But all that THINKING, all of that ANXIETY has now added MANY layers of emotions, worries and panics to your psyche.  And what does emotions, worries and panic bring??  Well, if you're anything like me: it brings a one way ticket to the bottom of a gallon of ice cream, face first...because now I HATE the world for making me NEED to loose weight and I just don't give an F anymore!

It's exhausting just reading that, isn't it?  Yet we all live in it daily.  Breaking up with your scale is another post for another day and one relationship I am STILL trying to release, BUT as I've started shifting my thoughts & feelings on to how food makes me FEEL rather than what it's doing (or NOT doing) for me, it has been one of the mental shifts that has made that darn number on the scale matter less & less (on MOST days.  Let's be honest hereJ)  How do I FEEL when I can recognize that I don't need any more food in that moment, I've had enough to fill me and that I'm going to survive to see another day and another burger?  And that eating MORE than I know I should is going to make me feel kinda gross, so maybe if I just stay at 'satisfied' and focus on how good THAT feels, and then I'll just feel OK?  Could that help quiet all of that brain chatter & anxiety??

I will be the first to admit that shifting your focusing on how you feel is a minute-to-minute, meal-by-meal challenge.  It takes a lot of effort to PAY ATTENTION, BUT I'm starting to really see the effects of CALMLY having what you want, knowing when to stop and not letting yourself get to the "UGH" point. (more on that another day, as well)  A process I seemed to do with EASE back in the day, before all of the brain chatter/guilt/anxiety set in.  It's amazing how far off track we can get when even our full stomachs don't even send off enough of a signal to stop eating.  That's the surest sign I can think of to know that we are eating 'from our minds' and not from our stomachs.  Maybe if I can just rely on how I feel to tell me what I'm supposed to do, I won't feel like there's a devil on my shoulder telling me I just CAN'T have something and I'll focus on how, in reality, I just don't really WANT it??  For me, the thought of "don't want" feels so much peaceful rather than punishing "can't".  I don't think it's the ENTIRE answer to the 'satisfaction vs. deprivation' debate, but it might just put a dent in the question.

How bout you guys??  When do you find the most contentment in a meal vs. when you feel like you're being left out of all the 'food fun'?  I wanna hear!  Leave me a comment below OR Connect with me on Facebook, on Instagram or through Email.

Thanks for reading!  We're gonna figure out this ish togetherJ

The beginning of the shift...

Well, I wouldn't be able to go much further in talking about all of the mental changes I've undergone in the last few years/months without talking about its source.  One I didn't anticipate and one I didn't embark on with any thoughts of changing.  Instead, it just smacked me down and brought me to my core and it was only after I got up did I realize how much had changed around me.

Yoga.

I know, I know.  I've talked about it ad nauseum before, but I've never really truly explained how I started out and where it's brought me to and continues to move me along.  First of all, coming from a place of 215+ pounds, I never EVER (ever, ever, ever, EVER...do you get the picture?) thought yoga would be something that was part of my life.  I felt so unworthy, staring into those classes through the glass window.  An outsider looking in on all of the itty-bitty spandex clad women so content, confident and silent in the freedom of how easily they were able to move their bodies.   It was something I wanted to try, but just didn't feel like it was something that was for me.  I had tried one DVD many years ago and it just felt so sloowwww and not for someone who needed to sweat off the pounds.  And the thought of them wanting me to lay still for 5 minutes at the end??  LAUGHABLE!  WHO HAS TIME TO JUST LAY STILL FOR 5 minutes??  Not ME!  "I'm way too busy for that!"

Cira 2007-2008, Bob Harper from "The Biggest Loser" put out a DVD:  "Weight Loss yoga."  Sounded good to me.  Yoga I could do with the SOLE purpose of loosing weight...because "I don't want to know nothing about any of that new age-y stuff!"  And with that, I embarked on trying out this DVD and promptly getting my ASS kicked.  Oh, yoga involves planks??  What are those and why do I want to die within 5 seconds??  The DVD was just what I wanted:  a KILLER workout with just a glimmer of poses and relaxation squeezed in.  I fell in love...even when I was DRENCHED in sweat.

As the weeks went on, without my even realizing it, my self-proclaimed 'no strength' noodle arms started to actually feel like they could hold me up so much easier.  And even STRANGER:  I began to notice that things were not BOTHERING me as much as they used to.  Where the hell did THAT come from?  It certainly wasn't anything I sought out or anticipated, but there I was:  able to stay squarely below 7 on the anger scale when I used to go from 0-100 in seconds. (ok, ok...at least 85% of the time.  I'm only humanJ)  It was very bizarre to me at that time because it was just something I did NOT plan on.

With time and after getting some confidence from feeling strong, thanks to the DVD, I became confident enough to try a Power yoga class at the gym.  I was surprised how easy (well, easy is a loose term.  Power is NO JOKE) I was able to hang in throughout the class and I loved how EXHAUSTED I felt at the end.  The once dreaded end relaxation (in yoga speak, we call it "Savasana"...aka. heaven on earthJ) was now a WELCOMED break.   And much like ALL of my yoga journey so far, where everything has went backwards, it was only after taking power for so long that I was actually able to take GENTLE.  I know...how crazy does that seem??  But the idea of going SLOW just seemed DREADFUL to me after falling in love with the 'push yourself comfortably beyond your limits' mindset of power.  It took some getting used to (and on some day, when I'm CRAVING being SUPER ACTIVE and jumpy/flowy in yoga, it's STILL a challenge) but gentle is where I really learned how to just BE.  What a concept, huh?

And in those classes (with the help of my INCREDIBLE teachers) I began to start seeing mind shifts without even realizing they were being made.  Some of the the most important & unexpected being:

Gratitude:  I would say about 85% of time I walked out of class, I would make it as far as the parking lot before breaking into tears thinking how lucky I was to have legs.

Say what???

I KNOW!  As crazy as it seemed, the thankfulness of recognizing how lucky I was to have strong legs that were able to support me throughout a class always stayed with me long after the class was through and usually knocked me on my ass in awe and gratitude. (I know...)  Not to mention, HOW OFTEN do we really ever stop and think just how damn lucky we are JUST to have legs???  It was a mindfulness I had certainly never consciously acknowledged and it unknowingly opened the floodgates of gratitude.  Did I know at the time that yoga cultivated gratitude?  Nope...but it just happened anyway.  (see also:  my life is backwardsJ)

Focus/Being in the present moment:  While going through the 10 zillion emotions and worries EVERY single second of every single day in the months following the birth of my 1st daughter, I will forever credit my Wednesday morning Power yoga class with being one of the major factors in getting me through Postpartum depression (which possibly & probably will be another post for another day).  That class became my sole refuge as the ONE place I was able to just SHUT off my brain and NOT think about all those endless worries that come with new motherhood.  I always say, it's hard to balance a yoga pose when you aren't FULLY concentrated on what you're doing...because as soon as your mind starts to wander, it is the greater likelihood you'll find yourself having a close encounter with the gym floorJ)  Focusing on staying in the present is very much a minute to minute work in progress, but the rewards are in just being happy with where you are RIGHT NOW.

Body acceptance:  This was one that DEFINITELY took YEARS to begin to stick.  I'll be the VERY FIRST to tell you arm balances & crazy poses are NOT what yoga is about.  BUT they were an aspect of yoga where I truly found fun in the TRYING.  If I fell?  Fine!  Because who the hell ever thought I'd be doing ARM BALANCES ANYWAY???  I had zero expectations and that was very freeing.  And the times they actually worked??  It never ceased to surprise me.  Usually because (and here's the life lesson mixed in):  I never felt 100% ready going into them.  Out of absolute nowhere, suddenly everything would just work and I'd find myself magically just balancing on my arms...and more times than not, usually with a look of shock on my face and my brain screaming "ohmygodohmygod!"J  This went hand in hand with body acceptace for me because it was one of the first times I ever really stopped and said to myself "OK, I might not be the skinniest person in this class, but HOLY MOLY I have gained a lot of strength!"  A strength (see above!) I NEVER thought I'd have.  And that singular thought seemed to seep into my life OUTSIDE of the class too.  I began to realize more and more that I might not be the 'ideal weight' I have in my head, but my body was becoming so much more than JUST a number on the scale.  It was also one of the 1st times I was able to look in the mirror and not STILL see that girl from the 'before' photo looking back.  You'd be AMAZED how long it takes to remove yourself from those memories.  It has begun the slow (and on-going) process of treating my body with respect & compassion rather than anger and a source of strife & embarrassment.  TRUST ME:  This is far from perfect most days, but there's definitely a space for love there where there once was none.

A greater "connection":  As a raised devout Catholic, it seemed almost downright blasphemous to say that as more time went on, I began to feel more reverent in a yoga class than I have felt in really any other place.  Yoga just seemed to start clearing out all of that space & chatter between me & God/the universe (whatever you want to call it...to me, it's all the sameJ) and the more I quieted that 'chatter', the more I was able to hear 'what needed to be heard' so much more clearly.  I know this topic seems probably scary and WAY out there for some, but seeing as how I know a few who have felt that inner conflict between what they've known vs. what they've discovered, it's one I would be remiss not to mention as an aspect of my life that is continuing to evolve.  I don't see yoga & religion as one in the same, but I also don't see them as being much different from the other either.  To me, I just let them go hand in hand as best as I can rather than letting either/or become more "righteous."  
My final thought on this is:  wherever you feel "the good"?  Go in that direction.  For me, it just happens to be a yoga placeJ

Oh...did I mention early in this post that I didn't want ANYTHING to do with new age-y ness?? J hahahaha

And of course, MINDFULNESS.  I can't even really pinpoint where this one began, but I can say it was probably honed to its greatest extent after entering yoga teacher training in the Fall of 2014.  I'm not sure if I would ever be able to articulate how much teacher training changed every fiber of my being.  I remember receiving an email the week before the class began with a final sentence of "I so look forward to beholding the wondrous transformational adventure you are about to begin!"

Who?  ME?  There was NO WAY it was going to be THIS big of a deal.  I mean, how could it?  Wasn't I just the girl standing outside the classroom looking in about 5 minutes ago?  Not realizing what I was getting into was highlighted even further when during my "introduce yourself" speech to the class I announced that one of the reasons I was there was because I had lost 65 pounds.  A fact I cringe about to this day because yoga was SO FAR from that 'exercise/weight loss' perception I began with.  That course thoroughly stripped away any prior notions about what I THOUGHT yoga was about and replaced them with all the deeper meanings that change you from the inside out.

And ya wanna know the weirdest part?  (oh yes, it gets weirderJ)

That reading through one of our required readings for the course Patanjali's Yoga Sutra, I found not only that the sutras were VERY dense and required a lot of attention and time to digest...but also:  ...that I already knew them.  Talk about a love letter from your soul to your brain saying "you already got this!  You already KNOW this!"  A reminder that you were really yourself all along, you just built up a LOT of layers for many years of who you thought you were going to be or who you were supposed to be, but your true self is just hanging around waiting for you to say 'hey.'

Am I making any sense??  Are we already at that "Woah, she is WAY more crazier than I thought" moment?  

Probably.  That's OKJ  

ANYWAY...back to what else yoga brought me and it was the absolute FURTHEST thing I wanted or thought I needed when I started that WEIGHT LOSS yoga all those years ago:  the art of BEING STILL.  
Meditation is still something that I find to be difficult on the easiest & 'clearest' of days, but one I am determined to make part of my daily life.  Just allowing yourself to STOP for 15 minutes a day gives your brain just enough hang time to have a moment of "wait a minute, everything isn't really wrong" when you would normally have already thrown yourself off the mental cliff of negativity face first.  Not to mention, the irony is not lost on me that all of these posts crystallized for me as I'm currently going through a 21-day "Shedding the Weight" Oprah & Deepak Chopra meditation series.  Meditation has a way of just having things make sense.  But BELIEVE ME, it is a work in progress.  Being STILL in this world, one that is jockeying for your attention 8 thousand times a day (add to that, as any parent knows, the constant demands of raising young children), is tedious and tough at best.  Even right now, setting my 'alarm' for a routine 20 minute meditation has even proved too difficult and I feel my mind throwing out an S.O.S at the 15 minute mark EVERY. SINGLE. TIME.  Do I fight that or do I just go with it, knowing that 15 minutes is better than nothing and maybe at SOME point I'll be able to work up to 20, 30+ minutes??  I'm going with the latter, because it's what's bringing me the most peace at the moment.  And ya know what Momma needs right now?  PEACEJ

So, that all brings me to where I am now:  taking ALL of these lessons that have managed to latch onto me, even when I wasn't looking, and turning them into really changing my outlook on food & weight loss.  I felt I couldn't explain any of the changes without first giving you that (long-winded) back story about my shift towards mindfulness & awareness and one that is STILL very much evolving.  I've just set out on my journey to begin TEACHING yoga (how scary & exciting all wrapped into one) and I'm sure that's going to bring its own evolution and new chapter.  Yoga has already opened a lot of doors where I've previously found none.     
I'm as clueless as you are as to where all of this is going to lead, but in hindsight, I feel like it has all brought me to this place where I'm supposed to be right now.  And if there's anything I've learned about yoga: just when you think you understand it and figured it out, it flips on its head and you realized you've just barely even scratched the surface of understanding anything.  

Hope this post gave you more insight into where this journey has brought me as we continue to move it on forwardJ  For some reason, I feel compelled to put this all out there, and maybe, just maybe it'll lead one person to make the changes they've felt nagging them for so long...even when you don't even know where they'll lead.
(oh yeah...did I mention that I'm still having trouble with the yoga concept of 'detatchment with no expectation of the outcome??'  Yeah...that's still a MAJOR work in progress for me.  I'm working right along there with youJ)

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Yet another updated journey...

Hi, everyone!

And by everyone, I mean:  Is anyone still here??

I know it's been QUITE awhile since I've last posted on here and since then A LOT has changed.  The biggest of which included graduating yoga teacher training...

(photo source)

...and being joined by the most awesome little girl we named Lily. 

Oh, did I happen to mention those 2 huge life events happened in under 24 hours??

Well, they did.  The end of June was one for the record books in our house, for sure.

Another thing that's changed in a great way is my relationship with food & a lot of the mindsets I've had for the last, oh I don't know, my whole life.  I had debated back and forth for a long while about whether I wanted to continue this blog or not, juggling back & forth between an underlying itch to talk about health & wellness-y things and the desire to 'put it all out there' vs. remaining more private (ya know, aside from my daily Facebook shared photos of the 2 princesses.  I can't help myselfJ)  But if there's one thing I've learned about myself in the last 2 years, it's that I'm VERY good at one thing: being vulnerable.  And in turn, I've noticed that people feel comforted about being vulnerable with me in return.  So I figured what better place to continue to do that than would be on this little space I've created on the ole' world wide web.

Speaking of, I've actually thought a lot about deleting this entire account & starting from scratch.  I don't even feel like a lot of it represents where my life & thoughts are at the moment. (none the least of which include an updated banner & format...but we'll get there.  Anyone interested in walking me through a Blogger to Wordpress import??  I'm hopelessly untech savvy forever and always)  But at the same time, I have a bit of a love affair with the fact that I have a LOT of good, fun years documented on here...in all their ill-grammered, misspelled, exclamation point heavy gloryJ  It's as imperfect as my life.  One I don't mind living unfiltered.  And as much as I admire those glossy, BEAUTIFUL Pinterest perfect blogs, the thoughts I had about mine 'not being one of them' (aka-not good enough) is a thought I'm OK with now.  I definitely won't have the most beautiful photos or the most well-structured sentences, but I will do the one thing I know I'm good at:  being honest and letting you know I'm right there with you in the daily struggle.  Some of you might say "Wow, I feel the exact same way!" & some of you might say "Woah...she has WAY more issues than me!" and I'm A-OK with either reactionJ

Which brings me to what I want to talk more about on this blog going forward.  I feel like I want to be more open and honest about food choices, the thought processes that go along with them and more of the mental journey of being healthy.  As much as I'm passionate and still LOVE food and any & all of the good, old reason to enjoy it to the fullest, I'm also kinda tired of feeling so OBSESSED by it.  I have loved it and feared it at the same time and since I feel like I'm coming a bit out of the other side of that food addiction (and/or working towards it, depends on the day), I thought I'd show you more about working towards that freedom, as I work on it myself.  At this point, as much as I've enjoyed talking about how things are SOGOOD (and probably still will, on occasion), I kinda just want food to be what it is at this point:  Just food.  I want to enjoy it to the fullest and then just be DONE.  Without any longing for more from "deprivation" or guilt that comes from overindulging.

It's seriously kinda crazy to think that it has taken me so long to get here, or at least be aware enough to really tackle & work through it.  I'm thoroughly envious of people who can just enjoy food for what it is, without any brain chatter.  To be quite honest, I think I didn't even have any brain chatter at my heaviest weight.  I think more of it came in as I lost weight and started to associate guilt with overeating.  Sans pregnancy weight (more on that in a sec), I've managed to maintain my weight loss (give or take) over the last 10+ years and I'm only now starting to really sort through all of the mental baggage that has comes with it.  Part of me thought the blog was really adding to the food obsession and I really needed to step back for a second, and maybe now I'm ready to start shifting this journey up a bit.

So back to the current weight situation:  I've always sorta regretted that I started this blog after my inital big weight loss that changed my life.  But given that I'm currently trying to AGAIN loose the last 15ish pounds I have left to loose since having Lily in June  (which I still chalk up the excessive amount of carbs I needed to consume to quell the near 5-month long stretch of morning/all-damn-day sickness), now is a good a time as any to share my next steps with you.  And I'm also curious, given my healthier MENTAL relationship I've been REALLY working on developing, where that will lead to in regards to weight loss.  I've debated for the last several years if I wanted to be content with my 'easy, maintenance weight' or if I wanted to see if I could cross another threshold again and reach a new low.  I have no idea about the answer to that right now, but I'm sure I'll be sharing more about it in the future.  All I know is I plan for my next path to be more mindful & body/mind aware vs. feeling teethered & white-knuckled obsessed with the scale.  

So....long-winded first post back wrap-up:  I'm not sure what the format of this blog is going to be going forward.  We'll see what feels authentic & what it evolves in to.  I might share some daily eats posts or I might focus other posts on more mental challenges.  And I also highly doubt I'll be here every day, given my 2 little peanuts at my feetJ.  The only thing I can promise is to be open & honest and let you know that you're not alone in this ongoing struggle of the joys of food balanced with the even greater joys of health.

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Hiatus...

Morning, folks!  Well, I think it's about time I put the ole blog on hiatus while we get the last few odds & ends ready for our new arrival.  And by 'odds & ends,' I mean spending all my extra time with Katie, considering I've been acting like we're shipping her off to Europe vs. her becoming a big sisterJ.  Just can't get enough of her at the moment.

So I'll be back once I get everything settled.  Itll probably be a minute, thoughJ.  In the meantime, I'll still post some quick updates from my My Tasty Journey Facebook page.  Since...I still just can't shut up about food & working outJ.  I'll just have to do it QUICKER at the momentJ

Talk to you again soon...hopefully!J