Naturally THIN-me, ha!

I can't believe when people tell me that I act "naturally thin". It makes me laugh. They should only know what I go through in order to maintain my 75 pound weight loss. The angst over every thing I eat. The anxiety every morning when I get on the scale. The constant juggling of "if I eat this, I can't eat that today". It never ends. Even with all my vigilance, I still gain weight. I wish I would get "brownie" points" for all the things I didn't eat, that I wanted to.

My "thinness" is by no means natural. I was 120 pounds at 6 years old. I was 190 at 11. I had a 38C chest at 12. At 13 I wore a men's 40 in jeans and men's clothes most of the time (because in the late 60's and early 70's being obese was uncommon and there weren't many options-and I was lucky because women wearing men's clothes was hip).

The first time I joined Weight Watchers was when I was 10, I lost no weight. I remember the original program with number 3 and number 4 vegetables. I can still remember, 2 ounces of protein for breakfast, 4 ounces of protein for lunch and 6-8 ounces of protein for dinner, fish 5 times a week, liver once a week, two eight ounce glasses of skim milk a day, 3 fruits. It was a very strict diet. No ketchup, you boiled tomato juice down till it thickened. Two slices of bread a day. People rejoiced when baked potatoes were added to the plan.

Right now I am in a "funk" with my weight. I go to the gym and gain muscle weight. I get depressed that I am gaining weight when I think that I should be losing weight. I eat too much salt and I retain 3 pounds of water. I get depressed that I gaining weight. People tell me that I look good, I don't believe them. I still have this self image of myself as the fat woman in the room. I am still self conscious about everything I put in my mouth in public. People around me are waiting to see if I put the weight back on. All very depressing.

But tomorrow is always another day to have a fresh start to make the right food choices. Another shot at getting down to my real goal weight of 155. Right now the scale is high for me. Since Christmas I am having trouble getting back down. I am trying to eat less. Smaller portions, less snacking. I think that I am succeeding with the snacking part. It's when I work out that I get ravenously hungry. If I want to lose weight, I have to eat fish. I really don't like fish. If I want to lose weight I have to write down everything I eat, everyday. I tend to "forget" to do it. If I want to lose weight, I can't eat anything with sugar in it. This I can do! and that's my start.