Less of me around

And no, I’m not writing about my recent lack of writing. I’m working on that even as we speak! This time I’m writing about my favorite subject…ME.

I’ve talked before about having been a bigger girl most of my life. By the 5th grade I was 5’1″ and (almost) towered over my 4’11” mama. I already had a womanly shape, complete with boobs and the accompanying embarrassment over needing a bra before the other girls in my grade did. It took me years to understand the power of those curves, as well as to realize that they could betray me if left to their own devices…it’s a sad, sad tale.

By high school I was still shapely, but in a bigger boned sort of way. I still loved my southern food (hello, Banana Puddin’…I wish I knew how to quit you), and I never was one for sports. By the time I got to college and met my new best friend Michelob, I had been introduced to a whole new set of adventures and opportunities for getting even fluffier.

It turns out that there’s a point for some of us when voluptuousness can take a left turn down a dark road called Chunky Lane… a byway littered with empty SnackWell and Quarter Pounder wrappers, Halloween candy bowls with only the nasty orange-colored marshmallow things left at the bottom, and the occasional half-drunk can of Slimfast. It’s a path that I’ve known intimately my entire life.

In my twenties I stumbled into one of those give us your money and we’ll give you nasty food that will make you skinny companies. I gave them a chunk of change, lost 10 pounds and crashed so badly from a potassium deficiency that the word attorney was actually thrown around (to no avail). Not being one to learn give up that easily, a few years back I tried yet another diet plan that involved plastic (both the food and the payments). I figured, hell, if it’s good enough for Marie Osmond, who am I to judge? Much to my surprise, I was miserable on the plan and couldn’t get past 10 pounds, and the counselor kept looking at me and shaking her head. Let’s just say that Marie wouldn’t have been very happy to see me eating about 10 bags of those teeny tiny cardboard cookies at one sitting!

It’s now been about 8 years since that last foray into $$$ for pounds. I started thinking recently about how my eating might be affecting me and somehow, in spite of myself, I managed to figure out that eating entire bags of ‘baked not fried’ carbs, adding just a little sugar to my morning coffee and hitting the Burger King once or twice a week might actually be a real problem…who knew?! What I did know for sure was that my curves were leaving Chunky Lane in the dust and Butterball Acres was coming up fast on the right. I had to get serious.

As it turns out, it’s not food in general that I have a problem with…it’s sugar. No, I’m not diabetic yet, but that was looming on the horizon, so I cut out all processed sugar, artificial sweeteners and am severely limiting my total carbs (oh bread and taters…you betrayed me!) On my new plan my old pal known as ‘The First 10 Pounds’ came off, just like it always has…but this time was somehow different. Once I got past the I’m definitely going to hurt someone if I don’t have a candy bar phase, things started falling into place for me. I stuck to it and am now hitting the 20 pound mark. I certainly have a long way to go, but I feel so much better that it’s easy to stay focused.

At this point I’m just setting the GPS for straight ahead…and we won’t be stopping at the Krispy Kreme.