Day 109: A Day To Rest

 

Today is day 109 of Nutrisystem 2.0 and it's Sunday. I woke up just before 9 and as tempting as it was to go back to sleep, I got up to start the day. As expected, temps are back to seasonable 50's and 60's during the day with lows in the 30's and 40's. Looks like this is where we'll be for the remainder of the month. I had my first cup of coffee and breakfast, then lingered on the couch for too long. 

Breakfast was a Jimmy Dean Delights breakfast sandwich. I haven't had one of these in a while and it was just delicious. I didn't have a morning snack. Lunch was a pepperoni pizza melt. Afternoon snack was cottage cheese & oatmeal cookies. Dinner was pizza and evening snack was a pint of Ben & Jerry's. Calories are off the chart.

I didn't work out today. I spent much of the morning on the couch (again) and finally headed out to grocery shop around 2 pm. Today I decided to stop at Walmart in Central Square first and get whatever I could there, since they're cheaper than Wegman's. I was able to get the canned & dry food that I prefer for the stray cats, so that was a win ! I also got more baby food for Abby as I like to keep a good supply of that on hand too. I also restocked my salad items: green olives, kalamata olives, pickled onions and red pepper strips. I also bought a large container of cottage cheese as the Great Value brand is $1 less than Wegman's brand. I will always go to Wegman's for produce and specialty items. Much to my surprise, Wegman's had no lettuce. Apparently there are shortages again but I was able to get 4 heads at Price Chopper right down the road, so figure that one out ! I had to pay $2.49 a head (Wegman's is usually $1.79) but I made sure to search through and find the biggest and heaviest heads I could find. I'm thinking about dropping cucumbers and celery from my salads for a while and adding more radishes and maybe some shredded cabbage. I got home around 4 pm and cooked a pizza I had bought at Wegman's. I had half and will have the 2nd half tomorrow.

Today I gave some thought to the next stage of grief, which is Depression. I've struggled with depression for many years and although she never acknowledged it or sought treatment, my mother did too. I sought treatment for depression in 1996 and took anti-depressants for a few years. I've had my ups and downs in the years since but I never took it seriously enough to seek medical intervention. My younger sister has also experienced depression and sought treatment as well. She still suffers from anxiety and medicates for that. I experience anxiety as well but I don't feel the need to medicate for it, since it's not an every day thing. Recently the siding saga led to a bit of anxiety but I've processed all that and the anxiety has passed. Right now I'm impatient to get the last estimate and make a decision. But I digress. The topic here is grief, depression and weight loss. When I realized yet again that I had allowed my weight to balloon and was looking at losing 87 pounds to get back to where I was, I was devastated. I knew I'd gained weight but I fooled myself for a long time, thinking it was 30 or 40 pounds and that it would be "easy" to take off. Well, wrong again ! It was 87 and it is definitely NOT easy to take off. Maybe if I'd been super strict from day 1 I'd have lost more by now, but I wasn't and so here I am. Once I restarted Nutrisystem on January 4 I had high hopes. I didn't expect to struggle as much as I did. I've talked about this before and found that exercise was the biggest source of frustration. It was depressing to realize I'd lost all of the endurance I had built up and it took me a long time to accept that and develop a plan to start working my way back. I'll talk more about acceptance tomorrow. I've had a lot of "come to Jesus" moments with myself over the past 109 days. Yet again I've set unrealistic goals and expectations and then felt "bad" when I couldn't achieve them. This is nothing new - it's a pattern I keep repeating. I'm working harder to try and set realistic goals but it remains a struggle. It's a struggle because I want these 87 pounds to magically disappear ! Well, that's not going to happen without a whole lot of hard work and patience. One thing I know will make me feel a whole lot better is reaching 199 pounds. I feel like that will be turning a corner because I'd be past the halfway mark. So, depression. They say exercise can help with that and it definitely does make me feel good. Winter is the hardest for me because I hate the cold and when temps get into the single digits and below my house can't maintain a comfortable temp. I'm really hoping that the siding will make a big difference because it will eliminate the anxiety that I experience every winter. I digress yet again, the majority of my depression ties back to my weight but there are so many things that contribute to depression. To combat it I just have to keep going. I've dialed back my "goals" to instead just focus on each day as it comes. I'm working more on settling into a manageable routine during the week. I feel like getting 5 of 7 days under control makes the most sense right now. Now that winter is gone my mood has lifted considerably, but the siding saga derailed my progress for a few weeks. That is no longer an issue as I've already narrowed my choices and the decision will be easy. I'm excited about the project now that I'm past the sticker shock. Today I would say I'm past the depression stage of grief. I'm still bouncing back to Bargaining and Anger, but I don't feel hopeless and I really don't feel depressed. More than anything I am angry with myself for allowing this to happen. I'm angry that I haven't made more progress. Honestly, I don't like weakness and giving in to excuses and cravings are signs of weakness in myself that I do not like. Weakness tends to drive me away and I think that's a failure within myself. I'm not sure how to change that, so it might be something to think about addressing at some point. Right now today the goal is getting the weight off and that is where my focus will remain. Tomorrow I will talk about the final stage of grief, which is Acceptance. 

On an unrelated to everything note .. today I was watching a Youtube video that was filmed in Australia and it featured someone driving on the left. Being left handed, I'll bet that driving on the left would feel SO natural for me !