Ok, I haven't updated this section in over a month, but rest assured I HAVE been working on my health. I have a lot of updating in the exercise logs to do, but I should be caught up soon. My August-September goal did not go well. In the middle of September I started the First Place program at my church. Because of my hive diet, I haven't been following their eating plan, but I have been doing the bible study and weigh-in's with them. It's been fun to have some other people in the same boat, and I've lost 4 pounds so far. I still feel like I haven't been doing well. For some reason it's been really hard for me to have the motivation right now that I used to have. I'm experimenting with some things to get me going, and I appreciate having some other people to talk to about it as well. Somehow I think that I'm probably not going to be able to lose 2 lb. per week right now, but I'll be happy with 1 lb. per week.

Gosh, what a week. Last Wednesday night I insisted I was going to stop taking Benadryl for a week so that we would actually have a chance of conceiving a baby this month. My husband got really upset since I had some pretty bad hives at the time, and finally insisted that I go on another allergenic diet. So it's day 5 of the allergenic diet. 5 days of rice, lamb, turkey, salt and garlic. The upside is I'd never had lamb before, and I decided I really like it. The downside is that I'm getting really sick of eating just rice and meat. Last night after successfully struggling through some really awful cravings for cheese and gummy worms (don't ask me), I went out and got some puffed rice, rice milk, and rice flour. The rice milk is actually pretty good, and it's nice to have a bit more variety. Last time I only made it 3 days on the diet before we discovered I was allergic to aspirin and dropped it. This time I seem to have made it over the first few days of bad cravings, and I think I'll make it. The hives have improved somewhat, but we'll really have to go the whole two weeks to see. My husband had been really nice about it, and has been mostly following it with me (although he cheats when I'm not around.) I've also lost a good 3 pounds this week, so that's another bonus.

Today I've been sitting around thinking about how nice it would be to just be able to eat without having to count calories or check the label for yellow #5 or anything like that. I hope someday I'll have gotten this weight lost and gotten my allergies (if they are indeed food related) under control and I can just relax about things. I don't mean I want to pig out every day or anything, I actually think that my habits are changed enough that I will be able to maintain my weight without too much trouble. I just want to be able to eat without obsessing over every single little detail. That's what I'm working towards. Somedaysomeday

Btw, I have been exercising. I have a sheet up on the fridge that has been keeping track of that since mid September, I just need to get that updated here.

Well, I have been extremely remiss with both of my journals lately. I've been kind of depressed, and so that's kept me from updating. I'm still around though!

The First Place session is now over. I lost 6 pounds, which was nowhere close to my goal, but I was still glad to lose those 6 pounds. Right now, we're taking a bit of a break and we're going to be starting up again in February.

I have been doing some thinking lately about why I have had so little success with my weight loss in the past year. All of my significant weight loss was done in the summer and fall of 2001. Since then I've bounced around a lot, but not really gone down. (I'm actually about 5 pounds heavier than I was a year ago.) I've come up with a few reasons:

1) I'm no longer willing to forgo some of the foods that I like to eat. When I started this, I did make a lot of permanent changes, like switching to low fat versions of yogurt, mayo, etc. I started eating more vegetables and fish. Those changes have, for the most part, stuck around. However, I haven't been as good at staying away from high fat entrees when we go out (even though the restaurant usually has a low fat entrée that I know I like) and I also haven't been very good at avoiding sugary foods. Several things have caused this. Since I've been depressed, I've wanted comfort food more often. Trying out different diets for the hives have made me very sick of trying to avoid certain kinds of foods. What can I do to fix this? I really think that realizing that my commitment has waned has helped me to find some new resolve. Hopefully I'll start to improve on this point.

2) I've been binge eating a lot more. When I say binge eating, I don't necessarily mean that I'm eating 6000 calories a day, but there have been a lot more times when I keep eating even though I'm full, and that is what defines binge eating for me. The cause of this one is also that I've been more depressed. I think this will get better as I make more of an effort to get out there and do things, because that's when I start feeling better.

3) Pregnancy, miscarriage, and trying to get pregnant. This one has had many effects on my eating habits. First of all, I was pretty much plateaued at my lowest weight when I got pregnant. I gained a few pounds when I was pregnant, and I just haven't been able to get those off. The miscarriage is pretty much the sole cause of my depression, hence causing #1 and #2. And, last but not least, I've been having a real hard time dieting while trying to get pregnant. Every month I say, "why should I work so hard to lose a few pounds this month, when I could just get pregnant and have to stop losing weight." Lately, though, I have begun to see what an effect all this has on my mental state and my physical health, and I've begun to start dealing with all these issues, which I think will begin to show in my weight loss. Another significant point is that I've begun to suspect that I have PCOS. I have a lot of the symptoms, such as irregular periods, acne, excessive body hair, abdominal weight gain, etc. (I haven't seen my doctor just yet, he's got a month and a half waiting list for appointments right now, but I've got an appointment coming up.) Since the best treatment for PCOS is exercise and weight loss, this has really motivated me to work on these issues. I have been encouraged by the results, as it is looking like I'm going to ovulate about a week earlier than usual this month. This is certainly helping my mood.

4) I've also come to realize that I just haven't been putting the commitment into exercise that I need to. I didn't necessarily exercise a ton when I lost the weight before, but I was better about it. I also know that when I was younger, I used to exercise all the time just as a way of life. I didn't get my driver's license until I was 18 and so I walked everywhere. I walked to school, to work, to the movies, to friends' houses, and more. I think this is a big reason why, even though my weight changed a lot, I didn't really start to balloon up out of control until I came to college. Even for the first couple of years of college I did a lot of walking, as I didn't have a car yet, and I think that is why, even though I gained a lot of weight, I stopped at a certain point. Indeed, I didn't really start getting out of control until I met my husband. He started driving me everywhere, and I started gaining weight. So I've decided I need to do a lot more walking. I like to do lots of other things, but walking is and always will be my favorite exercise. It gives me time to think and I usually feel more relaxed and alert afterwards. Since January started, I have walked almost every day, anywhere from 2 to 7 miles. Lately I've been averaging 4 miles a day, and I want to keep increasing that. I haven't been doing it all at once, which makes it easier. I usually take the dogs for a 2-3 mile walk in the evenings, and then I often walk to or from work or around the block a few times to make up the rest. I've been feeling great about that, whether it causes me to lose a lot of weight or not.

Anyway, until the First Place group starts up again, I'm just going to be working on fixing these four problems and not worry about weighing in. I've been having a lot of success so far, so hopefully I'll be able to start next month with a renewed sense of purpose.