052: One day at a time.

Sorry to have neglected you, oh blog of mine. The rest of my weekend was really busy. Good times with good friends, and BATMAN. Which was awesome. But that is another blog for another time and place.

Yesterday, I met with a new Herbalife coach. I had been doing some thinking, and really took everyone's responses to blog 49 to heart about how words affect me. Put downs and pointing out shortcomings don't motivate me. At all. It really deeply saddened me and stuck with me all this week... and didn't encourage me to eat better, at all. In fact, it was quite the opposite.

So anyway. Marie, my new coach, really gets the process I'm going through. She used to be a lot heavier (though now she looks amazing!), so she's a girl who has genuinely struggled with her weight. She's also really picky about food, like me, and tends to have the same cravings I do, so she was able to offer me real solutions that will help me sustain these choices for life, rather than committing to some sort of insane OCD ritual that will not last 3 months before I break down completely and toss the idea entirely. She and I came up with a realistic meal plan that I think will really work for me.

Also, at the suggestion of a friend, I went to a compulsive overeaters anonymous meeting. It was quite an experience, and I don't know if I quite fit into that category, but I went anyway. First of all, I was the only person in the room who was under the age of 40. So there was that. Also, most of the compulsive overeaters were still overweight, despite having been in the program for years, so I'm not entirely sure how that works. Also, most of them struggled with other addiction problems, to either drugs or alcohol. Their stories were really moving, but I don't know if I'm quite there yet. For one thing, I don't pick food out of the trash and eat it.

But it got me to thinking of food as an addiction. I have histories of substance abuse in my family, on both sides. Drug addicts and alcoholics. But I never really thought that addictive personality trait could manifest itself in food. And if food is an addiction, that sucks. Because alcoholics and drug addicts can simply say "I won't ever have this again.". Food addicts have to be subjected to their addiction at least three times a day. To completely abstain from food forever would basically mean I have an eating disorder, which is a whole different and equally serious problem.

I don't know if meetings and sharing my feelings are for me. It was a little hard to handle, emotionally. I think it's a lot easier to share and be honest in this format. Mostly because I don't have to look any of you in the eye when I say this stuff. However, I think I will take some of their tools away with me. I have been thinking very seriously about giving up my emotional trigger foods for life. It's kind of crazy to think of never having something like, say, pizza, ever again, but maybe that's a good thing. Then again, I've also been told it's a bad idea to completely cut stuff like that out, since you eventually go crazy and binge on it anyway.  In any event, one thing I will definitely take away from my brief encounter with OA is the idea of living for today. Yesterday is done,a nd I've got to let it go, and I can't worry about tomorrow just yet. So for today, I am on my herbalife food plan. And that works for me.