Never give up what you want most for what you want right now.

I realized something over the course of the last few days. It all started when I started reading a book called Naturally Thin. It's written by ... (wait. am I really going to admit this?)... one of the Real Housewives of New York. Have you seen that show on Bravo? It's a ridiculous waste of time, but I've seen more than my fair share of episodes. All of them, perhaps, but who's counting?

Anyway, this tiny size 0 girl who's not even a housewife but who is a natural foods chef is probably my favorite on the show. She says hilarious things and seems to notice that the lives of the other housewives are not as "Real" as most of ours are. And she wrote this book because she is into healthy foods/has had food issues/is smart enough to cash in on one of the few niches in book publishing that's making any money (diet books). For me, it was quite the impulse buy. I really don't need another book telling me what I already know. And certainly not written by a reality show flavor of the week. When it comes down to it, I should be out hiking my hills or walking my dog or pulling my weeds. Anything but watching reality TV or--even worse-- spending money on a book written by a size 0 non real, non housewife. But I did. And I'm sorta glad.

One of the things she talks about in the book is this notion of balance. You balance your checkbook, you balance your calories (although she doesn't advise counting calories, but you have to have a sense of how much you're taking in...) , you balance your meals. And by balancing your meals, she doesn't mean 30%/30%/40%, it's simpler than that: if you have a big lunch, have a light dinner. If you have a protein heavy breakfast, have a salad for lunch. Easy, right? Her point is that it's not about a "diet" it's about a mindset. And I totally get that.

But guess what... I have the worst mindset when it comes to balancing anything. Anything. ANYTHING. Money. Food. Time. My attention. I'm out of whack in a number of ways. I don't know why this is, but I can see a pattern going way back. I've never been good with money. I love it and I hate it. Same with food. I can see that my "issues" with both are very similar. I almost live in denial with both. I hate checking my bank balance. It makes my panicky. I'm horrible at making/sticking to a budget. I just don't even like to think about it. Same with food, although I make "new plans" all the time, I don't stick to them. I hate thinking about a food plan, mapping things out. Making my lunches for the week. Planning dinners. With money, there's never enough or there would be if I was more attentive to the budget, but I'm not and it's frustrating and discouraging and I hate it (is there an echo in here). And with food, it's sort of the same only opposite. Does that make sense? It's such a lack of control that I exhibit over both things. Which is weired because I'm such a control freak about other things. Is that the problem? I'm avoiding these two areas because I can't keep them in control? Or vice verse? Isn't this all so silly? I mean, I'm a smart woman. I can do this. So why am I not?

So all this has been swirling around in my head and then this afternoon Peggy Sue (thanks PS, your timing is amazing!) sends me this quote:
"Never give up what you want most for what you want right now."

And I realize that this all fits together. What do I want most? I want to feel better about myself. About how I look, about how I feel, about how I handle my finances, about how I spend my time. Balance. I want balance in my life. I allow myself to be pulled in so many directions that I'm never balanced. I don't allow myself time to find balance.

I had a good day today in terms of food. Maybe because I kept reminding myself to keep things balanced. We went to a birthday party today for two of my nephews and there was junk galore, but I made really good choices. I could have eaten a bunch of pizza and cake but I had a salad and 1/2 a piece of cheese pizza after. I had a few bites of cake but just enough to not feel deprived and that was fine. I did keep my calories in mind and I came in right at goal today. I was balanced today--at least in terms of my meals. I feel good about that.

Whine and Dine

So this was a disappointing week for me. I thought I was doing so well and looking back at my daily reports, I was. But when I saw what my scale had to show me the other morning, I felt completely defeated. Weird for me, really, since I can usually be pretty reasonable about weigh-ins. I know that my weight can fluctuate a lot. I know that it's not realistic to expect a 2+ pound weight loss each week. I know that when I skip meals it doesn't necessarily add up to weight loss for me. For some reason, though, all that reasonable-ness went out the window and I had more than one whine and dine moment over the course of the last couple of days--you know where you whine about not losing fast enough and then dine on whatever you want just to prove that...um...you aren't losing fast enough? I'm not pretending that this all makes sense, I'm just telling it like it is for me.

But this week's weigh-in convinces me that I need to track in a different way. It's apparently not enough to eyeball my portions and write it all down. I need to be more precise so I'm going to take Peggy Sue's lead and track calories--at least for now. I started today. I downloaded an app onto my iPhone that will help me track calories and I'll know at a glance how many more I have left for the day. I can already tell that it will make a difference for me to track this way since I attended a birthday party earlier today and passed on cupcakes and other goodies. I took one look at my calories I had left for the day and I knew that I didn't want to waste them on junk.

I'll still focus on getting my calories from whole foods, but even whole foods, if you eat too much of them, will make you fatter than you want to be. I can't promise that I can quit whining about this all together, but I'll try.

Wheat "Thins"? Yeah, Right.

Sure, you look all healthy and stuff. What with your whole grains and your low fat. And, you are super delicious when I dip you into cottage cheese or hummus. You even have the word "thin" in your name. But you're sneaky (and snacky!). Even if I carefully portion you out (16=130 calories) and tell myself that I can stay away from you if I put your box back in the cupboard, you call to me all day. And on days like today, when I'm working from home, you beg and you whine until I put you out of your misery. My only saving grace this time is that I packed you in kids' lunches all week so there weren't many of you left.

So that's it! I'm recycling your box for the last time and I'm not buying you anymore. I'm sure we'll cross paths again, but just let's just pretend we don't know each other. I'll stay out of your aisle and you stay out of my basket and we'll get along just fine. Farewell, crunchy friend.

New and Improved! Buy One Today!

Access denied. Account disabled. Log-in incorrect. User name and password do not match. Scheduled outage. User does not exist.

These phrases have become part of our everyday life. Why, just the other day my alter ego was informed by a very unfriendly pink message box that her Facebook account had been disabled. Panic set in. How would she stay in touch with the old friends she's reconnected with? How would she know what events and announcements her company's competitors were sending out? And how would she recover photos of her kids that only exist on Facebook?

And just as I, Betty Lou, logged in to write this post, I see that an outage is planned for Blogger this afternoon (at least that's fair warning, but I better write quick!). And poor Peggy Sue is stranded in no-woman's land with no gmail. For two days! I'm not saying that Peggy Sue actually lives in the middle of nowhere, I'm just saying that no gmail=howwillitalktotheoutsideworld?.

But it's not just internet related technology that can put a hitch in our (collective) giddy ups. Believe it or not, I, Betty Lou, use a Nike+ gadget when I go for my long walks. You do not want to be at Betty Lou's house when she's all ready to go out for a walk (to get her 3.8 miles in for the day!) and it turns out that Young Zorro has snatched, and apparently, hidden the gadget. It's not a pretty picture. Or when Gidget, charming college girl that she is, "borrows" the iPod wall charger without asking and doesn't bother to put it back.

Here's another example: I have a new fangled electric food steamer that was given to me for Christmas. It's a triple steamer and you can makes veggies, rice, and fish (for example) all at the same time. Very neat, huh? Except it worked the first time I used it and then didn't work the other day when I was in a hurry and had dinner all planned. I was tempted to call for pizza, but that would have been bad for my girlish figure. So I steamed everything the old fashioned way. In the microwave.

My point is: we're all so reliant on technology that it really messes things up when something goes wrong. And "something" goes wrong all the time! "Something" that we normal people either don't have control over or don't know how to fix. So what do we do? Take the time to come up with plan B or throw everything out the window? Do we order pizza when the steamer doesn't work? Do we skip our walks because the gadget is misplaced and we won't be able to measure exactly how many fractions of a mile we'll go. Do we not track out meals and figure we're off the hook if we're not going to be able to get onto Blogger? Sometimes, to be honest, we do.

Let's face it, there are a million excuses and distractions out there. I'm trying my best to rise above them all or at least most of them. And technology or no technology, I'm sticking to my plan to eat right, to get my exercise in, to do my job the best I can, to be a decent mother, and to try to keep a sense of humor about all of it.

Looking at my food journaling from today (see post below) I am wondering if you might be asking "Is this the menu of a woman on a diet?" Sure it is. Look people, this is real life. In real life, if I deprive myself all the time then I become a walking time bomb. I will drive myself insane. And just a week and a half ago it would have been a whole candy bar, and a huge bowl of ice cream. Not to mention probably 5 waffles. I know myself. I know that if I begin to have the mentality that I am suffering while trying to lose weight, I will fail. I am allowing myself more food than some might, but I am also cutting back on what I would have been eating had I not made the decision to work on my weight. This is the kind of mindset I can live with. I will not live the rest of my life on some kind of Spartan eating plan. Any decision I make now that is a better decision than I would have made a month ago is a victory. It's all progress.

And I'm not looking for some kind of Biggest Loser weigh-in, workout, or diet plan (although I do enjoy watching that show for motivation). Effective weight loss and habit changes for me will came as I slowly modify my way of life to fit a healthy lifestyle. My goal is for exercise and healthy eating to become almost second nature to me. That they will just become part of who I am. So that if you could look up "Peggy Sue" in the dictionary, you would see something like this:

1. wife and mother of 5
2. homeschooler
3. crafter
4. regular exerciser
5. healthy eater

Yeah. That'd be just fine with me.