I've been ruined for all others . . .

3 January 2022

Summer 2018

Bright Line Eating is the most effective plan I have ever used in my lifelong war with my weight. On November 6, 2017, I was 5' 3.5" tall, and weighed 245 pounds. I was 58-years old, and a post-menopausal, post-cancer thriving, morbidly obese woman. I began following the Bright Line Eating (BLE) plan. I had read Dr. Susan Peirce Thompson's debut book, Bright Line Eating, The Science of Living Happy, Thin, and Free. 

Within less than a month I had lost 15 pounds. By the 2-month mark, I had lost 27 pounds. In just under 5 months, I reached ONEderland, meaning I was no longer over 200 pounds. And after 11 months, on October 6, 2018, I had lost just over 65 pounds. But sadly by this point, the ship of discipline in which I had smoothly sailed for almost a year began to spring leaks. In myriad significant and insignificant ways life happened. And life has continued to happen ever since. 

I find myself today, more than four years after my initial launch into the BLE life, with my weight over 200 again. I weighed myself this morning and the scale tried to shame me with the number I saw. 210. Despite the success I enjoyed and the freedom I felt for the first time in my adult life, I began to question this stringent way of eating. I tried to reason other ways of getting that would get me where I want to go without being as restrictive. But if the past few years have taught me anything, it's that I had found what works and I stepped away from it. I want what I once had. I want the peace and freedom I experienced. I wasn't finished. I was well on my way, but I wasn't finished. The race wasn't over. And I want to finish the race for the first time in my life. I wanted to defeat the thing that had defeated me for such a long, long time.

I have rejoined the fold by signing up for one year of Bright Line Eating, which includes my second Boot Camp, a rigorous 8 to 10-week course of learning about the science of weight loss, how the brain can and should function when nourished properly and conversely, how it can betray our strongest desires to take control of our eating. And of course, this journey involves behavior change. In addition to the Boot Camp, I now have membership in the ongoing support arm of the organization, Bright Lifers. This is open to those who have completed a Boot Camp and wish to stay connected to, as the founder likes to say, the mothership. 

Even still, with all I know and have tasted (bad pun), some part of me keeps trying to broker a better deal. You see, this plan has four rules for lack of a better word:

1. No sugar of any kind (including honey, maple syrup, stevia, or any other sweetener)
2. No flour of any kind (it's not the grain that's the problem, it's the highly processed nature of flour)
3. Three meals a day with nothing in between
4. Weighed and measured quantities of protein, fruit, vegetables, grains, and fats at each meal

Summer 2018

Why, despite knowing how effective this plan is for dropping weight with relative ease even for those of us in the demographic deemed least likely to be able to lose weight, would something inside me continue to try to talk me out of wholehearted surrender to the plan? One of BLE's mantras if you will, is JFTFP, or Just Follow The Fabulous (though there are those who use a variation of the last F-word) Plan. What part of the internal "me" endlessly tries to sabotage my attempts to lose the extra weight?

Today was supposed to be Day1, but I wasn't true to the plan today. So tomorrow will be my Day 1. One of the disciplines that is encouraged is writing down what you eat the night before. This bypasses will power, because in a clear-thinking manner after eating dinner, I can plan tomorrow's meals without being hungry in the moment and potentially falling to temptation.

So, tomorrow (Tuesday, 1/4/2022) I will eat the following:

• Breakfast: 4 ounces of oatmeal, 1 banana, and 2 ounces of natural peanut butter (just ground peanuts with a little salt), and 1 cup of coffee.
  
• Lunch: 1/2 portion of protein (3 ounces chick peas) and the other portion protein (1 ounce of shredded cheese); 10 ounces of vegetables (a salad with Romaine, kale, matchstick carrots, sliced cooked beets, mini peppers, radishes, and cucumbers); dressing (.5 ounce oil mixed with red wine vinegar, and some seasonings); and an apple. Throughout the day I will drink cold water.
• Dinner: bowl of chicken soup with veggies and a small side salad with the same dressing as at lunch. After dinner, the kitchen will be closed.

One reason I am writing here about all this is because it allows me enough moments of sanity to silence, or at least quiet, the internal voices that try to steer me off course. Another is that I will have a record of the journey to look back upon. That reason, I will admit, is less important to me today. The accountability piece is huge for me.

That is all for tonight. I need to put myself to bed because it's back to school with students tomorrow. I'll be back soon though.

Peace . . .