Dieting... Like Stopping a Runaway Train!

I kept thinking to myself "If I had started loosing weight 6 months ago, I could be feeling good about myself by now". I just don't want to be thinking that same thought about myself 6 months from now!

I seemed to have this mindset that if I wasn't going to diet, I may as well just eat anything and everything I wanted to. I mean, why not? Sometime I was going to go on a diet, and then I wasn't going to get to eat all the things I wanted to anymore... so I better enjoy it while I could, right? This mindset really led to completely out of control benge eating. I was like a runaway train, totally out of control. I felt like I couldn't stop myself from eating. Good thing I had a superhero within to help me!

Image from The Superhero Handbook

The truth is, every calorie you eat has to be burned at some time or another, otherwise it's just going to sit on your body and turn you into a big yucky blob. It's just like saving money. Cutting a calorie out here and there really does help, and it adds up faster than you think it might!

Yesterday I caught a glimpse of my reflection in a window as I was flying by a skyscraper. Normally, I would avert my eyes as quickly as possible in order to preserve whatever small shred of self esteem might be left after seeing my fat rolls and cellulite. However, this time, something was different. I looked better. I took a moment and hovered there, amazed. This is quite a change for me. Over the last 7 years, I have only gotten progressively bigger and bigger. Therefore, for the past 7 years, every time I looked into the mirror, I saw the fattest most unattractive version of myself I had ever seen! Every day of my life was the day I'd felt the worst about myself. That's a downer in the morning.

But now, my stomach, my back fat, my arms... they're all looking smaller!

So here are some things that really helped me to start cutting some calorie corners and have really been adding up for me!

1. Skim Milk (I honestly don't taste the difference from 2%, so why waste the fat?)
2. Fat Free Chicken Broth (This is an amazing cooking tool. It's so low in calories that it's practically free of ww points!)
3. 100 Calorie Snack Packs (You know, the cookies, the crackers, whatever. I just need them individually packaged so I know when to STOP! Lol!)
4. Sugar Free Pudding (In place of my regular ice cream benges.)
5. Fruit Smoothies (I have to have something sweet for breakfast, and I find that smoothies are yummy and a much better choice that doughnuts, cookies, or... oh, I don't know... eating dry cake mix right out of the box with a cup of milk...)
6. Using smaller plates and spoons (maybe this sounds silly to you, but it works! I especially eat "treats" with baby spoons. It's a lot more satisfying that shoveling it in with a serving spoon. It feels more dainty and it really does feel like you're getting more because it lasts longer.)
7. Multi Grain Cheerios (these are a great sweet thing to snack on.)
8. Fat Free Popcorn (I've never been much of a popcorn eater, but when you eat compulsively and you have to keep something going in your mouth, it's certainly a descent choice.)
9. Buying "diet" or "fat free" versions of anything possible (they're really quite good. Well, not salad dressing. Fat free salad dressing is really gross!)
10. Coke Zero (I'm addicted.)

It also really helps that I do all the cooking at our house, so I can just cut back on butter and things like that as I go. It was very hard while I was traveling to eat healthy when other people were preparing my food for me. It was just impossible to know what I was putting in my mouth.

Thanks for being out there to listen to me, my bloggy sidekicks!