Smile-breaks
The Eat More Diet
Okay, okay, okay. Eating more is in no way a legitimate diet. So this is prob'ly not for you—I bet none of you ever get on a scale to see if you gained or lost a pound or two. Unlike me, who had an ongoing romance with the square white scale in my bathroom. Like all romances it had its ups and downs. Way too many. Time for a divorce
When the scale's down, the whole block hears a resounding "Yay!" coming forth from my bathroom window. When it's up, the bathroom window is silent as I go into deep mourning. Being an optimist by nature, the mourning lasts only fifteen minutes until I resolve to eat less that day.
My ups and downs seemingly have nothing to do with eating less or eating more. Not that I can see. I don't eat that much anyway, even on the days I indulge with dinner out and dessert at home later, not to mention that I had a whole sandwich for lunch instead of a half. And a Hershey's chocolate bar with almonds mid-afternoon. The next day I weigh less. Huh??? My daughter-in-law, a nurse, told me it takes a day to catch up. It did. But other times it doesn't.
The other morning, looking at the scale, I decided I'd had enough. Up and down; up and down. A pound here, two pounds there, and always pretty much within a five to ten pound range. Who needs it? For too many years I'd been starting my day with a trip to the scale and ending the day wishing I hadn't finished the entire plate of spaghetti. Or I spent the day refraining from everything good. Did the scale appreciate it? Absolutely not. Carrots and nuts and leafy greens are not a satisfactory menu for a person such as myself.
What if? What if I didn't? What if I didn't weigh myself at all? What if I just ate what I wanted and didn't worry about it? I could actually enjoy food! What freedom! If I got fat, I'd know when I couldn't get into my clothes.
So you'll be happy to know—if you're still with me—that I did just that. My scale hasn't felt the feel of my feet for a month. I'm eating regular meals, which I hadn't done in years, and enjoying every lick of dessert that comes my way. Now you're going to think I'm truly rationalizing here, but when I decided to skip the scale and eat what I want, I had this theory that since my metabolism had tanked somewhere after the age of thirty or forty and I'd been eating less to make up for it, my metabolism had lost its ability to process food—whatever that means. I'm no scientist. So I concluded that maybe I needed to reacquaint my metabolism with this substance commonly known as food, which it had been having rather scanty meet-ups with for too long.
I only cheated twice. After two weeks, I got on the scale. I weighed exactly what I weighed when I started this whole thing. Two weeks later, unable to resist—as my clothes were still fitting fine, I got on the scale again. I was ready for whatever would come up—or down.
The scale is my new friend. It told me I was A-OK—same weight as when I started. But new friend or not, I'm loving my new freedom from food-worry. No more scale for me. i hope my metabolism is listening and strenuously doing its food exercises to ramp up its calorie-burning skills.
This, this is my Eat More Diet. I hope you like it!
