Fall down seven times...(Part 2)

2) Starting family
This one is a tough one to talk about, and I won’t go into much detail for many reasons, but for the year leading up to last June I was trying to get pregnant. Because it had been a year with no baby, that June we were diagnosed as infertile. We have since begun the testing and diagnosis stage of this, trying to find out why we cannot conceive and all the while still trying. It has been extremely stressful and has not contributed well to my problem with emotional eating, so continuing to shred and blog during this time was basically out of the question. Things have so far gotten worse for me emotionally, and physically no answers have come. I was able to cope well for quite some time, but in the last month or so our family has started to find out what has been going on with us (I had only told a select few close people) and it has led to more stress. Now just hearing people talk about babies, being pregnant, and the like makes me feel like crying, and has caused me to break down once. I am trying to not keep it in so much now because that obviously doesn’t help the situation, but I still choose not to talk about it mostly because I don’t like answering questions and don’t want to hear anyone’s stupid advice on the subject when they have not been through this. So hopefully there will be good news on this front in the future, but for now it is a constant source of pain and disappointment, as well as a part of every day of my life. That’s all I’m going to say about that.

The Biggest Reason…
1) No long term solution
This has been the major downfall of every weight loss attempt I have ever undertaken, and probably so for the majority of people trying to lose weight all over the world. I don’t really have much trouble losing the weight, it’s that once I lose it, I do not have any way to transition into making an everyday maintenance out of the program that I am on. I know that there has been much discussion of that in the Shreddersphere, pertaining to all the different types of weight loss that we have tried. And although there may not be any such thing as “maintenance” (I think TV said that), for me, there was never any way to make the change from the hard core fat loss mentality to being happy with my body fat percentage and just focusing on muscle preservation and metabolism upkeep. That’s not to say that PN, BFFM, MS, WW, Atkins, and all the other methods I have tried, have not addressed that issue. Some have better than others, but whatever they have said about it has either been a badly conceived method, or was just lost on me somewhere. I want to get to a place where I can have a good relationship with food. Right now I have a love/hate relationship and it may be too much to ask to get to that neutral ground, but I have always loved food, loved cooking, loved entertaining and eating, all of that, but hated the way that food made my body look and feel. I have never been able to face the prospect of eating virtually the same thing every day like some people I know (you know who you are!), or restricting my calories, carbs, fats, etc for every day of the rest of my natural life. I just can’t do it. Call me a quitter, but that kind of strict regiment is not how I want to live my life. I don’t have to be able to eat everything all the time, but I need something that is easily maintained, allows for my need to cook, my want to go out to restaurants, my Italian ancestry that must have pasta and bread. I’m not talking about restriction during a fat loss period, I understand that completely. But I want to have a plan in place ahead of time for when I have gotten to my goal or at least close enough that I am ready to move to the “everyday life” stage of the program. Who has the answer to this? Maybe no one and that’s why there are so many yo-yo dieters in this world, but I simply cannot face a life where I have to deprive myself every meal for the rest of my life. To be honest, I would rather be overweight. As much as I don’t like being the weight I am now, I am no longer gaining as I was when I first stopped shredding. I have achieved stasis with the way that I eat and my activity levels now. I believe that all things being equal, I could basically maintain this weight for quite a while with no additional effort expended. I know this because I have jumped up to this weight many times after stints in one program or another and I usually get to this general size and stop gaining. So I want to achieve that same kind of comfort level but at 30 pounds lighter. Is that too much to ask? Probably. But it does call into question the idea that there is no maintenance, because I have been doing pretty good with that here lately, I’m just not maintaining the level I want to be on. I want to find an answer for the long term before I embark on another journey of shredding. I want a plan in place so I will not let myself down again as I have done so many times. Some of you have found this answer, or at least a part of it, I believe, because you have had long term loss, but I need it to apply to a real life situation. How does the average person get by everyday as a shredder? I can’t deny myself food for the rest of my life, I know I will relapse, it’s just a given. I am too emotional of a person and I don’t think that will change. I would like to find the root of my emotional eating, and I think that would help a lot, but it would still not solve the overall problem. But after losing the weight that I did, using primarily MS, that routine is not even meant to be long term. It says so straight from the beginning, so while the results are great, the maintenance is left up to the individual, and I didn’t know where to go from there. All fruit days are not a part of a normal person’s life. I will never strive to be a professional bodybuilder or model. I just want to be happy with the way I look, feel, and fit into my clothes. I think that’s what a lot of people out there want, and I have yet to see a way to achieve it, unless I am missing something. Maybe I am. Maybe all this time away from you all has made me forget how I can do these things, but from where I’m sitting right now, I have no long term plan.
So I guess that’s why I’m back. I want to solve this aspect of my life, and the best way I have found so far is this community of people. The support is essential, I know that, but I want the whole answer. And I am unhappy with where I am now. I know I can do it, but I refuse to start until I have a clear cut action plan for the future. The happiness I felt at losing all of the weight has been far surpassed by the guilt and disappointment I feel for gaining all of it back, and I don’t want to go through that again. So, (Suz) I will get back up for the 8th (800th) time, but it will be on my own terms and for good. I am sure I have a lot of falling down to do in a lot of other parts of my life, but I could use a victory right about now and I would like it to be in this respect. Anyone who is still out there, still awake after my incessant ramblings, if you have advice, please help.
Thanks and I have missed you all,
JP