Losing a part of me

Yesterday was the first day in I don’t know how many that I got through the day without my wife being here that I did not cheat at all. It is not easy to get through these days, but I am finding inspiration in my wife. She is an amazing woman who has been through so much; if she is willing to put up with me then I owe it to her to look and to feel as good as I can, and to stay as healthy as I can so as to not make her a widow – or worse, a nursemaid to an infirm husband. I am back on track, and I will keep at it so that I can be the best me that I can be. When I pick her up at the airport in California in just over three weeks, she will see the slimmest Mitch that she has ever seen… I make that promise not to her but to myself.

By staying true to the program I was rewarded on the bathroom scale this morning, this time by a drop of .6 lbs. Doing as I have done these last few days, there are now twelve days that I registered at or lower than my current weight. There was one day in mid-April, and then from May 20 (when my weight was the same as it is this morning) through May 31^st. If I drop another .4 lb tomorrow morning, then that number will drop to nine. With a lot of mindfulness and discipline then within the week that scale should be behind me, and looking forward I will only see uncharted weight territory. How exciting… as long as I can stay true to the program.

I have two obstacles today that I have to overcome with regard to my goal of staying on track. The first is a couple of errands I have to run in the afternoon. Before I go to see my barber, I have to stop off at an office to sign a few papers, but that is of no concern. I seem to have a pattern of going to Bulk Barn to buy peanuts after getting my hair cut. I have to be mindful that I come straight home after that. The second obstacle is that I am meeting someone to buy more meal replacements; he is someone I was advising on the program but who decided it is not for him, and we are meeting for a cup of coffee. There is no harm in the coffee; what else might be tempting at the café is quite another story. I will gird myself to stay disciplined and will not succumb to any temptations. It is so easy to say or write that at 9:45am, an hour after I finished my breakfast omelette, and in the comfort and safety of my apartment. It is quite another to say it in the face of the temptations. I can only do my very best to stay focused and remember why I am depriving myself of all of those foods that I love… so that I will eventually look and feel better than I have in decades.

Okay, following the conclusion of that paragraph I should mention that I do now already look and feel much better than I have in decades… it is simply that I want to keep improving upon what I have achieved… looking and feeling even better than I do now. That will only come with discipline, and I know it.

Last night following my class I had my first meeting in a month with my diet buddy. She has moved to Yukon for the year and so our meetings will all be virtual, but it was great to catch up with her. She told me about some of the challenges that she is facing in her new environment. We can talk about small towns in southern Ontario and joke about it, but they are nothing like the sheer isolation of the great white north. She is a schoolteacher, and the stories of her indigenous students tear at your heart. I remember the expression that ‘There but for the grace of G-d go I.’ Yes, I have experienced a hard and challenging life, but it pales in comparison to how some of those children are growing up. Nearly two months after the move she is still adjusting to her new reality, and I hope that when she does get acclimated she will resume with her weight loss success.

In speaking with Leslie the other day I realized something horrible. She told me she was tempted by a particular food – I do not remember what – and I told her about a weight loss mantra that I have heard many times over the years: Nothing tastes as good as slim feels. When she told me that it was a mantra for anorexics I was horrified. I did not know that the people who said this suffer from a mental condition that is so unhealthy as to lead to hospitalization and even death. I will never forget that lesson and will tell it to the next person who says it to me.

I am putting off buying a new hard drive. One of my external storage devices failed yesterday, and it will need to be replaced. Fortunately there was nothing critical on it, but I do need the device. I am thinking of purchasing a network attached storage (NAS) device to replace it, but I do not feel like spending the money just now. I have other priorities, and I will hold off a while. I think before I buy that, I should probably buy my server… which I have put off buying because I just do not feel like spending the money right now. There is no connection between that and the meal replacements I am buying today (which will set me back over $500 for what I am buying, and which cannot be put on a credit card); I need to eat, and while my storage will be a little tighter now than it was previously, I am sure I will be able to make do for a couple of months.

Okay, I suppose it is time for me to get on with it. I am going to see if my wife is available, and if not then I will get a couple of hours of studying in before heading out for my first set of errands.

Have a great day folks!