I am a 30-year-old woman, and I have been fat since approximately third grade. I am 5’9″. When I was 22, I hit my max weight of 215 pounds. For my 23rd birthday, I bought myself a membership to Weight Watchers online. I lost 60 pounds in the next 6 months or so and then I bounced around between 150 and 175 for the next few years. In the past 2 years, I went from 150 to my current weight in what seemed like an uncontrollable spiral and am fat again.
Someone recently recommend the book “Why We Get Fat,” along with a glowing recommendation for low-carb diets. This “someone” was actually a couple of someones and they were doctors. I have also found that the couple of times I’ve been living the “paleo” lifestyle, I’ve felt really good. Paleo diets end up being fairly low carb. I still had my doubts. I felt like depriving oneself of carbs was not a good idea. It sounded like starvation. How can oatmeal possibly be bad for me?
But, desperate times call for potentially desperate measures, so I downloaded the audio book. Here’s what got me:
There’s a bit in the book when he talks about mice who get fat after they have their ovaries removed (no, I am not a mouse and I have not had my ovaries removed). They get fat. If they can, they eat more food. If their food is restricted, they move less. Basically, they find a way to get fat. He says common perception of what causes fatties to become fatties is backward. People don’t get fat because they overeat; they overeat because they’re getting fat. This is such a simplification of his simplification, and you really should read or listen to the book. But that’s the gist of what I got out of it, and it resonated perfectly with me. It always seemed like I would start to lose weight and then it would be super easy to follow whatever diet I was on and to be active, and the slight weight gain would seem to come before the lethargy and the voracious appetite. In the times when I was suddenly anxious to eat right and move more, it would always be harder.
So, what? Did I start a blog to recommend this book? No. I started a blog because I decided to cut carbs out of my life and then I got into work today and someone put cupcakes in the break room. Chocolate cupcakes. Moist, sweet, happy-making cupcakes.
This blog is not so people can “come along on my weight loss journey” or “find inspiration.” I have no illusions that I’m writing this to somehow contribute to the world. I wanted a place where I could vent about cravings or failures. Where I can record things that go well so I can re-read them when I need a boost. Where I can admit to things that go badly so I can leave them behind and never re-read them again. Where I can be ridiculous and not worry about being judged. I don’t know whether I’ll really want to revisit any of this ever, but I do know that today I needed a place to tell whomever left delicious cupcakes in the break room this morning that he or she can suck on it. I didn’t eat one of those cupcakes and I’m not going to. Boom.
So, read it if you want to. We’ll find out together whether this ends up being an inspirational journey or another failed diet attempt by another fatty bombolatty.
Current weight: 189 pounds.
It has been 1 day(s) since I’ve eaten not-allowed carbs.
bombolatty 