I tried over and over again for years to lose this weight. I'd sometimes give up before I barely got started, and other times I'd lose some weight and either just hold there (got from 197 to 187 this way), or lose and then gain it back (went from 187 to about 174 and back I can't tell you how many times).
And you know what? Every time I lost without success, it was a valuable learning experience that began to put my head in the right place to lose for real. I learned what did work for me (Weight watchers, eating clean, having a ton of variety in my diet, varying my calories from day to day), and what did not (pre-packaged food diet plans, limited food choices, the same calorie level every day). And without all those false starts I'm almost certain I'd have weighed more than I did when I finally decided to get serious and make the real changes to improve my health permanently.
Plus, each time I took a few pounds off I gave my heart a break for a bit.
They say that most smokers who finally stop successfully have tried and failed multiple times. I'm thinking that making a permanent and healthy change in one's diet could very well be the same- Maybe that's just the necessary process of stopping any bad habit or addiction.
So if you have tried and quit multiple times to lose weight, or tried and lost weight and then gained it all back, don't count it as wasted time. Count it as a valuable lesson learned. Think about it, glean what you can from it, then get back to trying again! You never know when this try is the one that finally gets your head where it belongs to make it "for real" this time.
Thanks for this post, it's been on my mind the last couple of days as I am in between "Starts" so to speak.
ReplyDeleteI guess I have been practicing getting my head around the idea of me as a physically active fit person.
As a non-smoker (4 years now) I can remember practicing the final "quit".
Your post reminds me that I haven’t failed until I stop trying. Thanks!