Starling Fitness: Daily writings on Fitness, Diet, and Health

I saw this quote and I felt I should say something about it.

It reads:

Of all the self-fulfilling prophecies in our culture, the assumption that aging means decline and poor health is probably the deadliest.

• Marilyn Ferguson

I started this weight loss journey when I was a child. I tried to lose weight for years. I was never able to keep it off for a month, much less a year. I didn’t come to Overeater’s Anonymous until I was 44 years old. I am now 46 years old and I am closer to a healthy weight than I have ever been in my life.

Don’t let the idea of middle age, menopause or anything else get in the way of your success. You can do this, no matter what your age. Don’t let this fat kill you just because you think you can’t do it. Don’t be a victim of that self-fulfilling prophecy.

Overeater’s Anonymous does not endorse anything on this entry or blog. I speak only of my personal experience and not for OA as a whole.

I found this motivational poster and it really made me nod my head.

It reads:

You will get a lot more compliments for working out than you will for sleeping in.

It’s true and that might be a great motivation for some people. Here are a couple more iterations of the idea.

The truth of the matter is, I am pretty uncomfortable when I receive compliments, especially about my body. At the same time, I CRAVE them. It’s a strange dichotomy that I really need to work in my mind because the longer I maintain this loss and the closer I get to the weight the government thinks I should weigh, the more compliments I’m going to get.

This is one of those things I haven’t figured out yet. I crave compliments, but at the same time, I am uncomfortable when I get them. I brush them off, feeling that I don’t deserve them. A friend of mine the other day said that I was looking svelte and I literally waved it away and said, “No.” I want to impress people and at the same time, I am tremendously unwilling to take any compliments I receive.

This is insanity and I’m sure if I had a better self-esteem, it wouldn’t be a problem. I just don’t know how to get one of them self-esteem things.

Images via:

• You Will Get Alot More Compliments For Working Out Than You Will For Sleeping In
• You’ll Get A Lot More COMPLIMENTS For WORKING OUT than you will for SLEEPING IN | Nourished Existence | Balanced Brunette
• Share a LUV KiCK – It’s Time To Kick BuTs

I saw this motivational thought and it made me want to make a poster out of it.

It reads:

A year from now, you’ll wish you started today.

The funny thing is, a year ago is about when I finished my step work with my sponsor. I have been slowly, but steadily losing weight ever since I joined Overeater’s Anonymous in January 2014. I am so grateful that I walked through the doors to that meeting a year and a half ago.

I AM in that position. I started this a year and a half ago and I am so happy that I did. Coming out the other side, it was totally worth it. I failed so many times because I tried to do this alone. Now that I have a sponsor and many good friends in OA, I understand. I wasn’t meant to do it alone. Trying to do it alone was part of the problem.

START TODAY!

Find an Overeater’s Anonymous meeting in your area. Find a sponsor. Do what she says without arguing with her. Even if it sounds stupid, just DO what she says and you will see far more progress than you EVER saw alone. In July 2016, you can be in either two places. You can be in exactly the same position as you are now, or you can be grateful that you started today.

Overeater’s Anonymous does not endorse anything on this entry or blog. I speak only of my personal experience and not for OA as a whole.

Getting a healthy body can take a long time. Just like a plant takes time to grow, so does a body need time to recover. You can give a plant water, sunshine and fertilizer, but it will only grow as fast as its biology allows it. You can give your body water, exercise and healthy food and it will only grow strong as fast as your biology will allow it.

So, you must stay positive, patient and persistent.

If you become negative, you might lose your patience with the length of time it takes and stop giving your body the healthy things it needs like water, exercise and healthy food. Just like the plant that withers if you stop giving it water, sunshine and fertilizer, your body will wither.

Be Positive.

Be Patient.

Be Persistent.

I saw this quote today and it made me feel so much better.

It reads:

You always pass failure on the way to success.

• Mickey Rooney

I have failed to eat healthy so many times. I have failed at consistent exercise so many times. After reading this quote, it makes me feel better instead of ashamed. If I wasn’t trying, I wouldn’t be failing.

My biggest problem with those past failures is thinking that they are always around the corner. I have gotten very close to a healthy weight before. Now that I am nearing a healthy weight again, I have a fear that I will “lose it.” Fear is just as damaging as any other negative emotion, so the fear of gaining weight back can, ironically, make me gain weight back.

As long as I keep following the program and using the twelve steps as a guideline for everything in my life, I will be safe. So, the opposite of fear is faith, confidence and courage. I need to meditate on that today and find another compulsive eater to help.

I love this quote from The Quotations Page:

It reads:

Only I can change my life. No one can do it for me.

• Carol Burnett

Every time I was tempted to have gastric bypass surgery, I remembered this. I could have a surgery to make my stomach tiny and if I don’t change my behavior, I will literally KILL myself by bingeing and tearing open my tiny stomach. No one can change my life for me: not a doctor, a pill, an exercise guru or even a magic exercise machine can change me.

My biggest problem is that I didn’t know HOW to change.

That’s where Overeater’s Anonymous and my sponsor helped me. Working through the twelve steps helped me to CHANGE. It gave me a whole new way of living. If you are feeling stuck, get yourself to Overeater’s Anonymous, get a sponsor and do everything they say. They can’t change your life, but they sure can show YOU how to change your life.

Overeater’s Anonymous does not endorse anything on this entry or blog. I speak only of my personal experience and not for OA as a whole.

I am so inspired by this guy! Matt Diaz has lost 270 pounds! He is self-conscious about his excess skin, but I am truly inspired by him! You lost weight, man! Be PROUD of your body! You EARNED it!

I, too, have excess skin under my arms and lying flaccidly over my flatter stomach. I will never have a six pack. I will never be one of those girls to wear a mid-riff baring shirt, but it’s not out of shame. Even if I had always been thin, I wouldn’t have worn one of those shirts. I was never that comfortable with showing off my body. That’s WHY I ended up gaining so much weight. To protect myself.

Now that I’m all grown up, I can protect myself. I don’t need a layer of fat to keep the guys away. I can just calmly and gracefully let them down easily. I am completely unaffected by that loose skin flapping on my body because I lost weight to save my life, not to look sexy.

I was looking through some old photos and I found this one of myself.

I’ve talked about the Utah State Fair in the past here:

• Starling Fitness – I Was In No Mood To Eat One

The only reason I ever went to the Utah State Fair is staring you in the face right now. I went to eat. I wasn’t attracted by the cross-stitch or the leather work. I didn’t go to pet the goats (okay, maybe a little). I didn’t go for the cheesy vendors. I went for the FOOD.

Last September when I wrote that entry, I had no desire to go to the State Fair. Even now, looking at that picture, doesn’t make me salivate at the thought of corn dipped into lemon pepper butter. All I can see was what I was and how different than it is from now.

I don’t have a current picture in a similar outfit to show an “after” shot, but I am better physically.

Most importantly, I have my life back. I’m not spending all day of every day thinking about food, getting food, planning what I’m going to eat, exercising off food or trying not to eat it. I have so much extra time that I feel an incredible joy and gratefulness to Overeater’s Anonymous.

If you find that there are some events that you only attend because of the food, like I did with the Utah State Fair, then you might have an eating problem and Overeater’s Anonymous might help you. It sure helped me.

Overeater’s Anonymous does not endorse anything on this entry or blog. I speak only of my personal experience and not for OA as a whole.

I was looking through old photos a few days ago and I found one that surprised me. I still had the clothes I wore that day, so I put them on and snapped a picture for comparison. Since the clothes felt like they still fit, I thought there wouldn’t be much difference, but there definitely is. Click on the picture to see it full-sized.

I had snapped that picture because I really liked that outfit and thought it looked super cute. It DOES look super cute, actually. I took that photo on December 5, 2013. The after picture I took on Saturday, February 21, 2015. I found Overeater’s Anonymous in January of 2014, so this photo was right before it.

OA doesn’t like to post pictures like this without faces blotted out because they don’t want me to get a big head and they don’t want to compromise my anonymity. The truth is, however, just a photo of my hand holding the iPhone is enough to break my anonymity. No one else on the planet has a hand like mine. As I have said before, it’s not possible to be anonymous.

More importantly, so many photos like these are FAKE. Either they are pictures of two different girls or they are highly altered. Showing my face proves that it’s me in both pictures. I tried to alter the photo only enough to put in a watermark and put them next to each other, but it’s obvious that there has been no alteration. You just can’t fake this difference.

Is this picture amazing? No. I am only halfway through my journey and I still have a long way to go. I wanted to post it here so that you would have hope. Hope that there is something out there that can help you stop the cravings. Help you stop the binges.

If you feel like you’re too old, you’re not. I am forty-five years old. If you feel like you need to exercise like a crazy woman to lose weight, you don’t. I walked the dog twenty minutes a day. That’s about it. If you feel like you need to starve, you don’t. I never once felt like I was starving.

All you need to do is be willing to TELL THE TRUTH. Tell the truth to yourself, your sponsor, your OA group. Get yourself to an OA meeting. Keep going back. Do everything your sponsor tells you as quickly and efficiently as possible and you will see results.

Overeater’s Anonymous does not endorse anything on this entry or blog. I speak only of my personal experience and not for OA as a whole.

This is one of those quotes that just makes me confused.

It reads:

Achievement is largely the product of steadily raising one’s levels of aspiration and expectation.

• Jack Nicklaus

I didn’t know if I agreed with that, mostly because I didn’t know what aspiration was. I thought that was breathing something into your lungs. I LITERALLY had to look it up.

as·pi·ra·tion

a strong desire, longing, or aim; ambition

It wasn’t until we got to the third definition that breathing came up.

So the quote is saying that as long as I hope and expect HARD enough, then I will achieve my goals.

Yeah, that’s complete bullshit.

You kind of have to DO things to succeed. I hoped that I would get thin. I wished on every damn eyelash that fell out of my head. That never helped me get thinner.

I even EXPECTED to get thin. I spent hours visualizing a thinner me. I never lost one pound from all that visualization.

I think this quote is fundamentally WRONG. Expectation and aspiration might send your mind where your body needs to go, but you need to DO the things to make your body go. For example, for my hard training runs, I visualize being able to easily complete them, but then I actually get my butt on the treadmill and DO the workout. Expectation and aspiration can only take you so far. You need to do that work, too.