Meanwhile… I promise that I won’t keep posting about the appointments with my dietician/psychologist – and not just because I’m boring you all to death – but also because it kinda perpetuates the overthinking crap I’m prone to experience.

But, in response to a couple of comments on my Goals at any weight post I wanted to talk about some challenges I’m currently facing. My Shrink (Shrinkette?) who talked about my life being overly focussed on dieting, weight, weightloss etc, wondered if writing a blog about dieting was – in fact – not helping with my obsession. She suggested my writing needs to become more positive and focussed on recovery. I said that my blogs posts HAVE in fact, become more positive as I’ve had more weightloss success (which I guess just confirms what she’s saying)… but despite the frustrating lack of weight loss over the past six months, I haven’t reverted to the overly despondent posts of just a year ago.

HOWEVER… Since my last visit with her I’ve been grappling with something that I’ve been trying to decide whether to share or not. Not because I’m embarrassed and not because I’m self-conscious or the like. But rather… I’m also tired of being so bloody negative all of the time (yes, you heard it here first!). I’m tired of feeling like I’m failing on this weight loss journey – even though (even I) don’t think I currently am. (I’m telling myself I’m just ‘consolidating’ last year’s efforts!)

But, I’ve been quite preoccupied by something and in fact found myself quite stressed by it in the days after my last appointment.

I’ve mentioned I’ve had to start keeping a food log. I ‘think’ the log is less about what I’m eating and more about eating regularly and with some normality. (Although having said that I’m still being pretty healthy – other than wine most nights – I’m having what I would have had when ‘dieting’. Just not weighing things and keeping my portion sizes as low as they’d be if I was calculating calories.)

You’d think simply logging my food would be easy… after all I’ve been a dieter much of my life and have tracked calories, points, carbohydrates and the like. I’ve used spreadsheets, My Fitness Pal, Calorie King, iPhone Apps and trusty old notebooks. Been there, done that, have the t-shirt.

And better still, the therapist hasn’t even asked me to work out the calories I’m eating. I just have to write down what I’m eating; when and where I’m eating it; and the context / my feelings. Easy peasy, right?

But… I – again – suffered a melancholy / despondency a couple of days into my logging. I’m sure I’ve previously talked about the sensation that sometimes comes over me when I start a ‘diet’ (or restrict my eating in some way) and the notion of DOING WITHOUT hits home. I fall into a funk. I ponder on the purpose of life. I’ve said it before: ‘What’s the point of living if I can’t bloody well eat what I want?’

I know this doesn’t make sense. I know that this mindset / thinking needs to be addressed (and has been documented in the ‘cognitive’ issues in my case plan) BUT it doesn’t bloody help in the actual moment.

I’ve been perfectly fine over the past few weeks. I was not documenting what I was eating, I was not tracking calories or points, I was not binging at all (really – just over-eating a couple of times on the weekend perhaps). In fact, I like to that that I was coasting along pretty well and feeling a bit contented with life and relatively sane and in control – for me! But… I was also not losing weight. And that alone should have been enough to issue me a wake-up call.

The cold hard fact is that I want to lose more weight. I’ve been hovering between 105.5 and 108kgs since January (and before Christmas last year). According to BMI charts etc, my ‘ideal’ weight is 79kg. My doctor is saying anything under 100kg is good. My own goal is 90kg.

I’m so much happier than I was at 130kg. I’m so much fitter. I know this is true.

So, why why WHY can I not accept that I sometimes have to ‘do without’? I’m not good at moderation. I can’t buy chocolate and eat a piece. I can’t buy a packet of corn chips and eat a few. I can’t buy rice cakes (my latest ‘thing’) and just eat a couple. As you know… it’s all or nothing.

And yet, somehow I managed to do it last year. I ‘dieted’ for three months and lost 20kg (44lbs). Towards the end of the 12 weeks I struggled a bit more, but I really didn’t contemplate too much ‘evilness’ and if I fell off the wagon I recovered pretty quickly. (Note: I know I’m not supposed to use those kinds of words and will pause for a moment to slap myself around the head a little!!!)

So why am I now back in the mindset that even having to write down what I eat is akin to a life of rules and rigour and deprivation?