If you're at a restaurant and you can't stop that darn Food Monster from finishing something on your plate (or your spouse's, or your kids') that you don't intend on taking home, and your server is too busy to take the plate (or thinks you're still working on it), it's a good idea (God bless the poor server/dishwasher) to destroy the leftover food. Try to be discreet for the sake of the other patrons and without wasting the restaurant's ketchup (it wasn't doing anything wrong!), but you could crumple that roll into a ball, douse those fries in your leftover water, etc. You don't want to eat it and you can't if you destroy it. Pretend like you're destroying your Food Monster, which actually, you are. See! It can be done.
I, my friends, go from being a demure young blonde to a voracious,fangèd, drooling, many-armed, covered in goo, baked-goods-seeking-creature-from-the-innermost-circle-of-Hell. It's definitely not pretty, and what's worse, the beautiful blonde trapped in this awful being is pounding, pounding pounding on its ugly chest from the inside, pleading the Food Monster to not eat that third pretzel roll (believe me, they taste as good as they sound)-- saying "We can be friends! I'll let you have a glass of wine if you don't eat any more! You can stop now! You can *sob sob* stop!!!"
One of the reasons I've been plateauing is I've allowed myself many of my trigger foods, and so my Food Monster (I should really name her!) creeps back into my life. When things got busy for both of us here at the restaurant, my husband and I opted for Subway sandwiches. It's great because it's fast and it's "healthy," never mind that I was off bread for a couple months, with the exception of the weekly breakfast we have with Eric's dad at a local diner. Well, I noticed the increase of Subway sandwiches coincided with my weight loss slumping and put a cabbash on it.
But it was too late. I had reintroduced too many things, stuff I didn't even realize was triggering me to eat badly (or not eat well enough)! More caffeine than normal started bloating me, as did adding salt to my food; eating a whole PB &J when I used to eat half, even a serving of ice cream --an actual half cup, people-- , all of these things led me to my so-called plateau. I attributed this to my weight-loss journey coming to an end; I had a cold that lasted 2 weeks; my period makes me bloated; when you've got less moving around, you lose fewer calories... the excuses were almost endless. I keep a personal journal in which I document my weight each morning, and jot down a few feelings and observations and such. Lately, my entries were all about "staying positive," "trying," but I'm realizing now that that 1 pretzel roll a day can't happen. Maybe I can't have it more than once a month! You see, the longer you go on eating a diet that is good for you, is burned cleanly by your body, the less likely a slip-up will become a major set-back. In fact when I was eating almost perfectly- very little fat, usually in the form of olive oil or the traces of it in beans or very lean meat, when I splurged on a couple of cocktails or a half of a piece of pie, my body didn't even notice it. Like it was magic or something!
Now I have the challenge of facing my trigger foods again and building up the courage to say, You won't make me happy, dear french fry, and what's more, I don't need you. I know I can do it, because I did it before. Yesterday was my first day of Meals Only, MAYBE 1 REASONABLE SNACK and you know what? I made it through. And boy was I hungry! Here is what I ate:
for breakfast:
- a serving (1/2 cup dry) of oatmeal with sliced banana and a serving (1 teaspoon!) of brown sugar
for lunch:
- 1 whole peanut butter and jelly sandwich on "wheat" bread with 1/2 an apple
desperate snack right after lunch:
- strawberry fruit strip (45 calories, so easily inhaled, but at least it was organic, and thankfully, the last one, because 50 calories should stretch a littttle further)
snack before dinner:
- salad (around 1.5 cups of lettuce) with cannelli beans, shredded carrot, shaved red onion, and pepperoncinis with fresh ground pepper and fresh-squeezed lemon juice
snack after salad snack:
- 3 cherry tomatoes
for dinner:
- 3 grilled shrimp (around 1oz. each) with green tabasco for dippin' and broccoli with lemon squeezed on it
And that was all I ate! I WAS SUFFERING! But you know what? I'll get used to it, and this time, I am going to stick with it. Why? Because I woke up -.6 pounds! Oh happy day! And how did I do it? By controlling myself. I can do it, you can do it, it's called caging the food monster, baby!!!!
So basically, if you want to lose weight, and keep it off, you have to be mindful of what you put in your body, and really, be mindful of what your eating habits are when you eat other things (which is easier said than done, I know). If you notice that you're starting to slip, look at what you're eating. Keeping a food journal is an awesome way to do this. In fact, when I started keeping a food journal, I was like, Screw this! I don't want to write down every little thing! So I stopped eating those little things. People act like they have no control over what they eat, and I know, it actually feels that way a lot of the time. But you do have control, and it's not going to kill you to change your eating habits and cage that darn food monster, it's going to make your life almost unbelievably better. Don't trust me, though! Pick up a book about it, do some research. By learning more, you're investing time (and maybe a few dollahs) in your health. By investing time, you're telling yourself, Yeah, I deserve this! And by telling yourself you deserve this, you're going to achieve your goals. Just be mindful, always. It will become second nature. If one bite is all it takes to unleash your Food Monster, then you're aware of the one most important thing- exactly how to stay in control.
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