05/21/2011 18:25
Intangibles
The most wonderful thing, about being on a food-based program for my initial weight loss, was that I wasn't thinking about food so much any more. At long last, I saw in a structured way, how to eat for health rather than for entertainment and comfort.
Because I didn't have to think about what food to have or where I might find it, or how I might prepare it, I started thinking about what the books that came with my program had to say. I began to think about things I hadn't considered before, like the lifestyle issues that got me in my predicament. I began to think about my bingeing in a different way: I discovered that my eating habits of many decades represented an eating disorder. An eating disorder!
I started taking the Mindset aspect of my program a lot more seriously. I started journaling my feelings and getting some insight into the situations that drove my binge episodes. Little did I know when I first started, that it would turn out to be the most important, and least easy to manage aspect of all!
Now that I'm losing again, I've found a way to replace the structure of the Jenny Craig program, without the expense of the food (which I can't afford right now). Basically, it's simple repetition of the same menu every day, which I have already weighed, measured, and know the nutritional content on. It gives me the much-needed structure of not having to think much about food, and it seems to be working.