I hit the panic button and didn’t reset it for the past few weeks. So what happened?

I had started out the week with a half marathon in early March, in 35 degree weather, in 25 mph winds, along a beach in Rhode Island. The winds were howling down at Misquamicut, to the extent that the race organizers were unable to put up the finish line arch or any standup signage/mile markers. My coworker was worried sick about me and exclaimed (at least my take on it) that I was dead. Given that I received whiplashes of frostbite and went into a deep sleep the next day, he was half-right. More to come about the Ocean’s Run half in another post.

When I gathered enough strength to do more than lounge about the house, I devoured one of my favorite breads, Trader Joe’s cranberry pecan pull aparts. All six in one sitting, and yet I still wanted more. My next craving turned into bowlfuls of American chop suey, simply because it was available. My ravenous streak continued with eating a family size bag of Utz sour cream chips — in one sitting, after dinner. It struck again earlier this week when I ate half a loaf of bread with multiple spreads of délice de Bourgogne (creamy brie cheese!).

Of course, all the while I have been exercising. My net weight loss in the past three weeks is about 0-1lb. Surprised? So was I.

In part, it’s because my meals lately have been vegetarian or even vegan. Aside from the chop suey, I might’ve eaten three slices of leftover pork chop or a bite of beef pot roast while I was cooking. During St. Patrick’s week, cabbage was ridiculously cheap. On my own, I had 5 heads of cabbage in a week and a half. My dinner could’ve consisted of 2/3 of a cabbage and three eggs, and I’d be satiated for a while. If anything came out of these past few weeks, it’s that I’ve added (red) cabbage to my eating repertoire.

TMI – The Unintended Effect of Too Much Information

Sometimes my eating episodes are triggered due to knowing information. With gadgets like the fitbit automatically tracking our activity and information at our fingertips via Google, it’s become easier to reason with ourselves. Thankfully, I don’t have any such gadget and only use Google Fit for tracking. Weighing myself at the gym has become addictive, but in a bad way. I’ll look at the scale, see numbers I haven’t seen in… ever, and then reason that I could make an exception (with eating aforementioned extras) here and there.

I’m not a calorie counter per se, but I do become curious about the foods I eat. Having rarely eaten cabbage before, I took a look at the nutrition facts and found that cabbage doesn’t have much in terms of calories. I suppose I shouldn’t be too surprised, considering this applies to most leafy greens. What ends up happening, though, is that I say to myself that I can eat more.

To address these scenarios, perhaps what I need to do is ask myself a simple question: Am I really hungry?

Forget reasoning. I need to come back to the purpose, to the why.

Looking Ahead

I wasn’t kidding when I said from here on out that it’s mind over matter. In the past decade and more, my weight has never dipped to the low 120s. Maybe subconsciously my body’s fighting back. Whatever it is, I know it’ll continue to be an uphill battle. My only solace is that I’ve reset the panic button.

Today is another day. There’s another week to look forward to. Let’s make the best of it—

Success is stumbling from failure to failure with no loss of enthusiasm.
—Winston Churchill