Get my weight down to below 160lb

Laptop successfully out of the kitchen, but that’s about all I’ve managed to do. All I can say in terms of progress for this goal is that at least I made it through Easter without gaining any weight?

I read a great book called ‘Intuitive Eating’ recently. While I think I’d have a lot of trouble doing their ‘anti-diet’, for several reasons, it does bring up some very good points, and it’s made me start thinking about why I eat. I’ve realised I mostly eat as a distraction, when I bored, to calm myself down, etc. I’ve come up with three things I think I need to do:

1) Move my laptop out of the kitchen. I keep it there because it’s a very social spot, where I can chat with people in the kitchen and living room, and where I’m avalible to lend a hand when someone’s cooking and needs help with the food or the cleaning. However, it means that whenever I’m bored with what I’m doing, or trying to get out of homework, or something loads too slow… I go to get a snack. Not good.

In order to get my laptop out of the kitchen, I realistically need to move it to my room. To do that I need to clean my room up, and probably re-arrange it a bit – the way it is now, my desk is shoved in a corner, facing away from the window. I’d go mad. But I’m sure I can fix that with a bit of creativity, and cleaning the room is a goal already anyhow.

Second, I need to get my internet connection in the room working, which means I need to go test the internet connections in the house to see which ones are working, so Dad will help me fix it. I should have done that ages ago, anyhow.

2) Whenever I go to eat, I need to stop and ask: why am I eating? If I’m bored, or looking to food preperation as something to do with my hands, I need to ask if food is the best way to do that. If not, I’ve cultivated a number of hobbies that require my hands and my full attention – tablet weaving, handsewing, knitting, hopefully soon chip carving. I need to go do those things instead.

3) If it turns out I really am hungry, I need to think intuitively and ask: what do I WANT to eat? If I grab the closest thing, or event he healthiest thing, that’s no good. If I’m not satisfied, I’ll just eat more later. Yes, if I’m craving bacon-wrapped scallops served with fresh greens and the nearest thing I have is bacon bits and wilting lettuce, that’s no good. Similarly, why not choose the healthier of two options? But it’s no good nibbling on an apple when there’d leftover pork roast in the fridge and I know I’m craving protien. The body knows what it wants, and how much – I might THINK I want to eat a whole bag of chips (actually, I’ve never done that, but I’ve done similar things) yet if I listen to my body, I’ll realise I’m not enjoying them nearly as much after the first few handfulls, and when I’m done I’ll feel bloated and guilty. I’m just eating them because they’re in front of me. I need to learn to listen to my body, and ‘honour my hunger’, as the book says.

I think if I can do these three things, it’ll help a lot.

I just gave away 80% of the candy I recieved for Christmas. Does that count as progress?

Stupid body. I’ve actually come to the realization I could, in time, learn to be happy at my current weight… the only problem is, I’ve gained something like fiveish pounds per year for the last five or six years. Which gives me about six years untill I’m 200 pounds… this, I think, constitutes a Disturbing Trend.

(That was a VERY in-joke. Don’t worry, you’re not really supposed to get it, not unless our tastes in books are very, very alike.)

Double blah.

I edit the goal a bit. Rather then just ‘loose weight’, I want to get below 160lb. That would put me at the upper end of ‘normal’ as measured by the BMI, which is reasonable because I’m built sturdy. Frankley, as both friends and family have told me, I’d look pretty stupid if I weighed 140lb (my original weight goal back when this whole thing started).

Edit: Screw the diet route, I can never stick to it. New idea is to just feed myself what I want, but only at mealtimes – no snacks. Additionally, I’m upping my exercise level. Here we go again…