Anyway, 30lbs is a major victory for me. This is the lowest my weight has been since college 17 years ago. I'm astonished that I've come this far, not because I didn't think I'd be deciplined enough, but after having been so big for so long (read: all my life) I had begun to believe that I was just destined to only get fatter. Or at the very least, not get any "thinner" than I'd been. Not that I'm thin, just, not as fat.
I came across a photo the other day of myself from 2015 when I was at my heaviest and I wanted to cry. Like, seriously, I wanted to cry. Partly because I was ever that big but also because the person I was in 2015 was miserable. 2013-2017 Jana was the deepest, darkest depressed version of myself that I've ever been. I ate my feelings and you could totally tell.
I'm only just now starting to really visibly (myself) starting to see the changes in my body. I'm still too large to really say that I can see a total change, but I can see definition in some areas. My visual goal is for my chest to stick out further than my belly and y'all...I'm almost there! Weird goal, I know, but being a big girl with a small chest is kinda sad. Like, if I hafta be fat, couldn't I at least have had some large boobs? haha
And because I'm obsessed, I found a similar photo from a couple of weeks ago for a before and after shot. Faces edited to protect the innocent. ;-)
They're not exact match ups but I think they're pretty good visuals.
The smile is the same, which is a good indictor of how good I am at hiding my depression on my face. It's visible in the body but folks can just write that off as me enjoying food a little too much. Which, don't get me wrong, I do enjoy food a lot. Food is delicious and I do love to eat. But all that extra? That was me eating my feelings. I still enjoy food but I don't need it as a coping mechanism anymore.
Anyway, I noticed something in my eating habits this weekend that kinda shook me in a good way. Saturday was my nephew's birthday party and he requested pizza and chicken strips. I ate exactly one slice of pizza and two chicken strips with a small scoop of potato salad and a handful of tater tots instead of three or four slices of pizza and four chicken strips and a plate of tater tots that I probably would have had this time last year. I also cut an already small slice of cake in half and ate a two bite piece of cake and a cookie. No ice cream. And you know what? I was satisfied both physically and emotionally. I didn't yearn for more pizza or feel like I was being punished. I ate enough to feel satisfied but not stuffed. And I was happy. I didn't regret what I ate or didn't eat. Major milestone there.
Which goes back to what I've been saying...getting healthy is as much about your mindset as it is your body. Yes, aiming for those 10,000 steps a day is good, cutting back on portions and watching carbs is great, but the biggest hurdle for myself was my mindset. Placing so much importance on food. Letting food be my emotional crutch. Neglecting my health in favor of self medicating. Having the motivation of prediabetes helps with that new mindset, certainly. So in a way, I'm thankful for that diagnosis back in June. It was the kick in the pants I needed to really evaluate myself and my behaviors. Having to really look down the barrel at what will happen if I don't get a grip was a necessary evil for me. It does make me kinda sad that it took that drastic measure to wake me up, but sometimes drastic times call for drastic measures.
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