Commitments for the coming week

I have been forgetting to call my counselor at the Optifast clinic to let him know I was leaving the group, so I decided to just leave him a message on his voicemail today.  I felt a little weird leaving a message like that for him, but I never really catch him at his desk or I'm working and can't really talk to him.  I have to say that I got the nervous nellies in my tummy as I was picking up my phone to call.  I don't know where that came from since my decision is very firm that I'm moving on. It's understandable, though ... Optifast has been a part of my life for the last year, in some form or another.  I've had the same counselor the whole way through and he was incredibly supportive.  It was hard making the decision to leave that to go down a different road, although not something I'm regretting.  I don't want anyone getting the wrong impression about the program.  While I couldn't stay on it the entire time because of medical issues, I did lose a lot of weight on it.  Of course, there are things about it that I wish it were different because when I went back to food, it was extremely difficult for me and I just don't think I was prepared enough for how hard it really would be.  However, there are some people that go on it, lose their weight and go off of it with absolutely no problems.  I'm glad it works so seamlessly for them.  For me, it was the first half of my journey.  The most important part was that it showed me how strong I am and how absolutely resilient (maybe stubborn?) I can be so that I know I can make it through the next part of the journey. 

For this coming week, I'm committing here that I'm going to follow through on some changes WW suggests for success on the program.  It's not even just with the food, but with some lifestyle changes, too.  Here's what my plan is:

• Pack my lunch/snacks the night before work for the next day.
• Continuing to track every food I have in my WW tracker, no matter what.
• Figuring out what I'll wear the night before so that I have plenty of time to eat breakfast in the morning and other things I need to do before heading out the door without rushing.
• Setting up a fruit bowl on my dining room table which is where I will go for easy to grab snacks.  I might even consider doing one at work, too.  
• Putting my workout clothes in see-through bins in my bedroom so that they are in plain sight as a reminder to exercise.  In fact, tomorrow I plan on bringing my clothes with me so that I can go for a workout on my way home from work.   

I have one more I want to add that is not part of WW:  at some point this week, I will look into scheduling an appointment to meet with a therapist through Kaiser.  It's time.  I have avoided this for a long time, probably years, because I have history with therapy.  What I mean by that is that things come out in sessions with a therapist, things that I probably wanted buried and didn't want to deal with, things that I am certain will make me cry.  I've shared on here before that I had a pretty horrible childhood that included abuse and sexual assault towards me, which resulted in some pretty horrible adult years and food was the thing that was my coping mechanism.  I don't sit in hate in any longer about that time and I have forgiven the abusers, but that doesn't mean I've treated myself in the same way.  And I know that when I get stressed out, frustrated, sad, happy - whatever the emotion is, I pick up food to help me deal with that feeling.  I've never been thin before, having always had this issue in my life, and I don't want to get down to a normal weight only to put it all back on again.  Even as small as I got before I gained some weight back caused some of those feelings to surface.  So, as much as I don't want to see a therapist, I know that it is something I absolutely must do if I want to continue moving forward in the most healthy way possible. 

I'm in a good space right now as I type this, feeling some much needed peace that I haven't felt for a long while.  My body is still feeling pain, but I'm seeing the rheumatologist later this week to deal with my leg pain and I know I'm doing everything I can to find some relief in that realm as well.  Putting one foot in the front of the other is the best thing for me.