Off Topic

This is not quilt related. It is weight loss related. Before you run screaming from the room - yeah, I'm sorry to go there, too but this topic is like a sword over my head, a little black dog that follows me wherever I go, my little gray cloud.

This morning I got my credit card out, ready to go to Weight Watchers online and sign up, then at the critical moment, i just could not.

My first experience with WW was - lordy - 38 years ago! I lost 50 pounds on the diet which was a DIET back then, no matter what they say; it was very restrictive but I did it. Over the years, I've lost and gained and lost and gained about a hundred times.

I guess it's nearly four years ago that I lost 25 pounds. After my mother's diagnosis with Alzheimers, I just went crazy eating for comfort and solace and anxiety and everything else. After visiting her, my family & I would stop at a pancake house on the square near the nursing home and have a big brunch to try & smother our sorrow. After her death, I realized I had to do something, and I was so please and felt so good after getting that weight off.

But there's a pattern to my weight loss stories. I lose, I feel good, I start getting lax, I stop exercising, I gain, I feel miserable, I struggle with whether to do it all over again or just live with it, I'm miserable, I join WW, I lose, etc etc ad nauseum.

I have finally realized this is not going to change, probably, this is most likely just the way I'm wired where weight loss is concerned and I had just as well get on with it and get the weight off.

I could probably cope with the weight I'm at now, about 10 pounds heavier that I want to be; but I know it wouldn't stop there. In another year, I'll be another 10 pounds heaver and so on.

There is a history of diabetes and cardiovascular disease in my family, and extra poundage does not help that. Diabetes is linked to Alzheimer's as is high blood pressure.

So I'm going to do it, I'm going to take the step once again to get the weight off and get back on the bike and on the trail and get healthy. Not that I'm not healthy but as we age, it takes more effort to stay that way. I don't want to be sick!!

Is this a bad thing or a good thing? I prefer to look at it from a positive perspective. Yes, I fall off the wagon and i gain weight now and then. It would be wonderful if I could discipline myself not to do that - to immediately lose the pound or two before they become ten or fifteen. But I'm not wired that way, maybe I can change; I certainly will work on that. But at least -- at least -- I put the brakes on (and it's like stopping a moving train) when I just can't stand it any more.

**Big Gigantic Sigh**.

So here I go again. I'll probably wait until my pay check is deposited on Wednesday to take the big plunge, but I think I've avoided it long enough. I know you all understand, even if my family puzzles over why this is such an issue with me. Because it is, that's why. It just is.

And I will feel better and not be so stressed. Those are the two major benefits of my keeping my weight down. It's worth the effort.