I love to eat. I lost 108 pounds, but I needed to lose 138 pounds.
“My 600-lb Life” on TLC is my booster. I lost 108 pounds five years ago. I have kept the weight off. I did not meet my weight loss goal. I use “My 600-lb Life” to justify not losing the rest of the weight.
I have the same problems as those on the show. I eat too much. I don’t exercise enough. I don’t gain, but I’m not losing either. I’m certain that I’m a carbohydrate addict. And a sugar addict. Why do I think this? Here are the reasons:
1. I need to lose more weight, but I don’t. I don’t. It’s only another thirty pounds, but it has been “another thirty pounds” for five years.
2. Carbohydrates are almost irresistible to me. I love potatoes in all their forms. French fries. Mashed. Scalloped. Baked. I’ll eat raw sweet potatoes sliced thin and soaked in ice-cold water. Potatoes make me feel wonderful. I get a natural high from eating them.
Fruit, fruit, fruit. I consume a lot of fruit. I once ate an entire full-sized watermelon in one day. It was so sweet, cold and delicious I kept going back and cutting small pieces off of it. I was surprised when there was no more left. Orange juice is my Armageddon. A glass of fresh squeezed orange juice will make me sing. I can’t drink just one.
3. Sugar is my crack. My appetite is under control until I eat something sweet. Then I must make a tremendous effort to get back in control and stop eating sweet after sweet. I have tamed this problem by carefully eating sweets when my life is going well. If I am under severe stress, (life is a bitch that will mess you up randomly) I avoid sweets and eat carbs.
4. I’ll use any reason not to exercise. Some days my excuses don’t hold water. Like today, I need to pick the lint off my sweaters, so I don’t have time to go to the gym.
I watch the show to enable myself. I think “I don’t weigh 600 pounds. I don’t even weigh 200 pounds. I’m fine. I’ll maintain this weight and be happy.”
As I watch people on the show struggle and succeed, I feel a sense of satisfaction, as if I deserved the credit for their success. Then I pop another French fry into my mouth. In my head, I hear the doctor from the show, Dr. Younan Nowzaradan, speaking to me in the blunt terms he uses with patients.
He would say, “What a bunch of BS. Are you telling me that five years is not enough time to lose thirty pounds? There is nothing sadder than an unmet weight loss goal. Who are you kidding?”
The imaginary doctor is right. I’m not happy about my continuing procrastination. As I applaud the people losing weight on the flickering screen, I know the truth about me. You can’t hide from yourself. I don’t want to do the hard work to reach the goal I set years ago.
I’ve decided to finish what I started. I must love myself more than I love French fries. I have taken the first step: admitting I have a problem. I love eating. But I love me more.
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