Sunday, November 26, 2006

It's all relative

Last spring, I changed my diet for three months with little result. I cut back to 1800 calories a day, max... and lost only a couple pounds. Hence, the 1500 cal/day. Back then, if I had 1700 calories, I had a totally successful day--1700 calories then was skimpy! And usually, I was still hungry.
...But now, 1700 calories is naughty. It's bad. It's fatty. It's failure.

I had 1700 calories today. Do you want to know why I'm such a glutton?

I got called in to work yesterday evening, and I had to go right back at 7 Am this morning. I worked until after 4, and I had a really productive day. Working at NW makes me super hungry--I spend lots of time running around and such. Now I know why I gained weight after I quit last December. Anyway, I worked very hard Saturday night and Sunday morning/afternoon. And I was hungry. And we have a new crock pot, which we tried out today--so yes, I ate some of the deliciousness that came out of it--all 445 calories of my serving. Did I have to eat all 445 calories? Probably not. But I was hungry.

Lots of people have told me that 1500 calories isn't very much, especially for someone of my "frame," and that I shouldn't let myself go hungry--to eat, when my body says "feed me!"

...But when I do that, I end up eating 1700 calories. True, my BMR is about 1700 calories, which means there's really no way I can gain weight eating only 1700 calories, it still feels like I'm being bad, that I'm eating too much, that I need to exercise much more to make up for it.

And now these arguments make me feel like I'm developing an eating disorder, even though I'm still a healthy eater... and I think, is there a balance? Can I lose weight and not have this thought process? And when I lose all the weight I want, will I be able to break out of it? Will I still feel like 1700 is a bad number? If I feel like I'm going crazy because I'm punishing myself for 200 more calories today that I "should" have, then how does one hold herself accountable, maintain discipline? Shouldn't I be feeling bad about that?

3 comments:

Tamara said...

Girl, you still rock. Just get back on the horse!
Winter/holidays is the worst time to cut back. I'm so impressed with how well you're doing in the midst of so much temptation!

Emily said...

calories, shmalories.
keep on truckin' Aud.

Miss L said...

(It's Laura H) I have wondered the same thing: how can I pay attention to what/how much I eat without becoming scary obsessive? I think it's less in the action of counting calories, more in the intention or mindset. don't beat yourself up, you're not a bad person! life happens. and hey, you ate 1700 calories, not 1900. that's still pretty fabulous! :)