Sitting at mom’s last night, she quietly asks me, “Have you gained weight?”. Her tone was one of concern because she knows how hard I’ve worked to lose 81 pounds and she’s one of my biggest cheerleaders in my weight loss journey.

The answer is, sadly, yes. I’ve gained back about 15 of that 81 pounds over the last year or so. Not a ton  – all things considered – but it’s visible (at least to me) around the waistline and thighs. And I feel it.

What happened? Lots of reasons:

• Stopped tracking my food.
• Stopped paying strict attention to food portions and choices.
• Stopped exercising regularly.
• Increased stress, worry, and depression.
• Stopped putting myself first.
• Weight Watchers changed their plan and gave me more points, which I thought meant I could eat much more each day. Calories in. Calories out. It all adds up.
• Lost my walking buddies and didn’t replace them with new ones.
• Lost my bicycling partners and didn’t replace them with new ones.
• Hit menopause.
• Stopped going regularly to my meetings for support.

The good news:

• I know what to do.
• I can do it all again.
• I can start now, today.
• I can put myself first and my family will thank me for it.
• I can make better food choices and not go hungry – even when dining at mom’s place with her or dining out.
• I haven’t changed clothing sizes.
• I am determined and willful in a positive way.
• I have support of family, friends, and my Weight Watchers group.
• I can bicycle or walk or run by myself and don’t have to wait for others.

Can = will do.

Now.

Photo credit: http://comicadze.com/

Mom’s moving to a retirement and assisted living home. As part of that move, my daughters and I are helping her sort through her stuff to see what goes in the trash, what gets donated or sold, what comes home with me, and what goes to her new, 800 sq. ft. apartment from her 1200 sq. ft. condo.

Through that process, we came across some letters that I had written to my mother when I was at boarding school in Plymouth, England. I knew that when I was a teenager, from about the time I was 15, I started being conscious of my weight – for some reason I thought I was fat. I wasn’t. I was a slim 130 (if that) 5’6” healthy teenager. I was active in competitive swimming, school sports including the occasional cross-country run, every other weekend “expeditions” consisting of 20 mile hikes across southern England carrying a backpack (stuffed with contraband) and a sleeping bag.

My memories of my teenage years are somewhat fragmented but I had always thought of myself as healthy, albeit depressed a lot, but that’s a different topic. What really opened my eyes was this paragraph I wrote to mom:

“I’m on a diet. Today I ate only five carrots and a biscuit.”

My heart is broken when I look back at the young girl who was so lost and thought that eating only five carrots and a biscuit was a healthy diet. No one noticed that it was the sign of an eating disorder. And yes, I now think I probably had a pretty active eating disorder. The picture above is me at my high school graduation. I had a 23 inch waist at the time. I was proud of that.

Things soon changed when I went to college because I switched over to eating hamburgers and milkshakes and quickly lost that 23” waist. It grew even further about six months later when I became pregnant at age 18. Then I switched from eating 5 carrots a day to eating bread and sugar sandwiches.

Good lord. No wonder by the time I hit Weight Watchers I was nearly 100 pounds overweight. I would go in cycles of binging and not eating. Nothing was normal or healthy. I didn’t know what healthy was. I was never taught, or never witnessed, healthy eating.

Now I know better. And I’m glad I wrote that letter. It resurfaced at just the right time. My life focus is now on being healthy – body, mind, and spirit – and going to whatever lengths I can to make that happen.

It’s day three for me of being on the new Weight Watchers POINTSPlus program. I’m actually very excited about this. If you know me at all, you know that Weight Watchers is a passion of mine since it has helped me to lose 80 pounds (currently 77 since I gained a few back). It has taught me a completely new outlook on life and on eating healthy.

My opinion of the new plan so far? I LOVE IT! This new WW program has changed how we calculate points and how we look at our food choices. Where in the past I used to focus on what was the lowest points value, I ended up making poorer (but not always bad) choices when hungry. For example, if I wanted something sweet after dinner, I chose a one-point giant fudge bar. Those are now three points (because of the new calculations based on fiber, fat, protein, and carbohydrates), so I’m likely to choose something more on the order of fruit for my sweet tooth instead. Still focused on lower points values, but this is healthier, and obvious: fruit vs. ice cream. Choice makes sense to me.

This summer, when on the prior POINTS program, I was visiting my brother and sister- in-law. My sister-in-law asked me that if I was eating healthy fruits and vegetables, why couldn’t I eat as much as I wanted? (Was she psychic or something? No… just smart – and skinny as I’ve ever known someone to be skinny, in a healthy way.) Then, I limited even my fruit intake because the points would add up, according to the old way of calculating points (based on calories, fat, and fiber only.) Now, I can eat fruit until I am satisfied – not full.

So, today for breakfast, I had a bowl of mixed fresh fruit – zero points – versus a bowl of oatmeal or cereal with banana and milk – now 5 or 6 points (depending on milk quantity.) I know I’ll be hungry in a couple hours, so then I can have a light veggie omelet or something. (It helps to work at home….)

We’ll see how I do next week on the scale, but so far at home, my scale is not fluctuating as wildly as it was even just last week. And it seems to be going the right way, without even adding in the exercise part of the program.

*My title is a play on an old song about “Yes we have no bananas” that I remember singing with my parents as a child. I think the song originated somewhere around the 1920s. One of the keys of the new POINTSPlus program is that fruit is free – including bananas which were previously two points for a large banana.

Seriously, I am baffled how people pull these things off – beautifully decorated homes and perfectly browned turkeys.  I read a ton of decorating blogs across the interwebs where all these women are decorating their hearths and showing us how to do these cute little crafty trees out of burlap or wreaths out of ornaments. It makes me wonder if they are high on happy pills or caffeine, or if somewhere behind their computer screen they are screaming at the top of their lungs because they, too, feel the pressure. The pressure to be perfect. The pressure to be just like the Waltons or Leave it to Beaver.

It’s unreal, folks. I’m exhausted just thinking about it and ready to dive for cover. And we haven’t even had Thanksgiving yet.

Don’t get me wrong – I love the holidays. I really do. I love the family and friends that you connect with and share times and meals with. It’s an important respite from a very busy world.

I’m trying, I really am. My house is full to the brim of boxes and bins of the necessary decorations – ribbons, lights, candles, whimsical characters, and all manner of cozy things to make one feel good. Once they all get put where they’re supposed to go, I know I’ll feel better. But until then, the requisite mess that they create makes me feel like I’m a borderline hoarder.

So, this year (as I tell myself every year), I’m going to pause, take a deep breath, and just relax. Screw perfection. (Is that even possible for me, the ultimate perfectionist?) I’m going to enjoy the family and the grandkids whenever and however I can, and I’m going to not worry if my pie burns or if I gain two pounds.

Remind me tomorrow that I said this, okay?

If you wondered why I’ve been missing in action on this here blog of mine, it’s because I’ve been working. Between working and family, I’ve not had any interest in blogging. Not that I’ve not had things to say – I have. Just that those things probably are better left off the interwebs. Most likely, you, Joe Public, aren’t interested in reading it.

You might be interested to know, however, that the last year, I’ve floated between 9 and 15 pounds away from my all-time weight loss goal. My daughter got pregnant, had a baby, the baby was in the NICU for a month, baby came home (they live with me) and I work full time – all that got in the way of my continued weight loss efforts.

Now I’m done with the floating around and flitting back and forth on the scale. Time to get to work and get it done. So, I’ve been hitting the gym a self-mandated minimum of three times a week. (If I can’t get to the gym, I spend an hour outdoors in some sort of hard-core walking or whatnot.)

Last week was the first week of this initiative, and I was down nearly 2 pounds. I hope to do that again – or more – this week.

And to all the Thanksgiving gorge-fest activities? I say, bring it on, because I’m pissed off enough and determined enough to not gain weight but to thumb my nose at the bird and lose weight!

Yeah, not the kind you think.

I know – and the scale at Weight Watchers confirms it – that my weight loss is improved when I exercise. But I resist this fact. With strength and determination of the perverse sort. I don’t want to move. It hurts. I don’t want to get outside and walk. The thought of it exhausts me.

Life just kind of forced it into me this morning. The car had to go to the shop – again – and the easiest way to get home was to walk. Sure, I could have asked for a ride home but then, would I have learned this lesson? The shop is only about three miles from home, and the weather had cleared, so it was a good decision.

Once I got started, I wondered why I fight this so much.

The weather was crisp and sunny. The music was loud and motivating in my ears, drowning out the rush of the trucks and cars going down the hill. The uphill climb the last two of the three miles was great for the aerobic factor.

And the photo ops were plentiful. Too bad all I had was my sucky camera phone. Still, my brain took pictures that will hopefully last me until the next time I resist getting out and walking.

Oh, and the other thing I’m resisting – the fact that my chiropractor told me no running. I’m defiant, if anything. I tried jogging part of the way home just because I felt so good. Later, my chiropractor didn’t need to scold me because my knee already did it for him.

In more ways than one. Just a quick update: my weigh-in this week rocked and surprised even me. I lost 3.2 pounds! This was after a week of relentless tracking of my food intake, staying within my food limits (points, if you are on Weight Watchers), and increased activity. Just goes to show ya – It works if you work it.

I’m also working a lot – a LOT. We are rolling out a new website a week from Friday and it’s going to be visible to employees around the globe. The work my team has done is going to get my boss huge and well deserved kudos. It’s been months of hard work and I’m proud and grateful to be a part of it.

People may or may not realize just how many hours go into the text you see on a website. Things are discussed ad infinitum like:

• How many characters can you have in that field
• Will the international countries understand that term?
• If we say “please” in that error message, is it patronizing, helpful, or unnecessary?

And so on, and so on. But that’s my field of expertise. And that’s why they hired me. And again, why I am so utterly grateful for my job, my skills and abilities, and the fact that they keep signing me on for more work.

I leave you with this sweet picture of Little Miss Laila who fell asleep in her jumperoo. I’m blessed that I was here to snap the picture.

I always thought that was a really stupid saying: “It works if you work it”. Seems a bit like stating the obvious, to me. Honestly, I guess I never really thought much about it but if you dig into it deeper, it really is a helpful reminder saying.

What does working it mean? For me, it means working the Weight Watcher’s program as it was written by the experts – those who know more about successful weight loss than I do. Clearly I didn’t know how to do it, or I wouldn’t have been 100 pounds overweight when I joined in 2008.

Working it also means working it all the way – not dipping my toe in it. It means if I am going to see the results I want, I have to work the program the way they say to, not fudging it to suit my mood.

Over the last few weeks I’ve been only doing part of the program – sorta tracking, sorta not, and sorta not really watching what I eat and only sorta doing activity. As a result, I only sorta lost weight. Out of six weeks, I lost weight only one of those weeks. The others I gained.

So last week, I buckled down and quit playing around. I got back to tracking my food – all of it including the bites, licks, and tastes. I calculated points properly by weighing my food or calculating it off the nutrition panel of the package and measuring the correct servings.

And guess what? This week I lost weight. I lost 1.2 pounds. I can try to blame hormones, water retention, stress, muscle gain, or any number of things for my weight gain, but if I’m truly honest with myself (and I was last week) it really boils down to what I put in my mouth.

So, yep, it works if you work it. And I worked it. Because I’m worth it.

In the continuing saga of my weight loss journey, I feel compelled to ‘fess up.

I have been basking in the glow of compliments and skinny clothing for about a year now while hovering about 9 pounds from goal. I love the compliments – they really help with encouragement and staying on my path. I’ve also been steadily and consistently going to my Weight Watchers meetings every week unless I’ve been sick or out of town or the location was closed for the holiday. I have been doing a lot of things right.

But I’ve also been doing some things wrong.

I’ve been slipping.

BLTs they call them. Bites, licks, and tastes. And portion distortion. And plain just not counting what should be counted.

And now it’s biting me back in the ass. The sum of the last two weeks has resulted in a 5 pound gain. That is HUGE in the world of weight loss – or in this case, gain.

At my meeting tonight, I talked to my leader. We tried to figure out what caused the weight gain this week as I tracked (mostly) and I did a lot more activity. I know what happened the week prior – that was no tracking and eating bad-for-weight-loss food in San Antonio. I also talked with my fellow members and we tried chalking it up to hormones changing post-age 50, too much sodium in my diet, you name it, we tried to blame it.

The bottom line is it all adds up to what you put in your mouth and putting too much of it in. I immediately came home and weighed out the watermelon I’ve been eating (per serving). What was being not counted – at all – added up to 2 points. Do that a few times and I’ve eaten up 1/3 of my weekly bonus points. Add in the second helping of coleslaw and the ice cream cake that was justified as a meal – and then coming home and eating a late night leftover meal anyway. It all adds up.

So keeping it honest and keeping it real here means I’ll do a better job of staying on program this next week. And I’ll remember that each week when I weigh in, it’s feedback, not failure.

I’m declaring this National Hug Your Scale Month. Who’s in with me? If there isn’t already such a thing, then there should be. So many people are starting – or restarting – their weight loss program this month after a month or six weeks of food binging from Thanksgiving to New Year’s. And for many of us – me included – we have, or have had, a love/hate relationship with the scale.

There are the camps of “I won’t be a slave to the scale” and those that say, “There are other indicators of weight loss rather than the scale”. There are those that say all you need to do is lift weights, eat only vegetables, cut out all sugars, fats, and caffeine, or any number of variations on self-limitation and restrictions.

I say that many of these are valid when done in moderation but not exclusivity and will lead to positive results. However, the one main tool of my weight loss and ultimate maintenance of a healthy body and lifestyle – the one that never lies to me and the one that I can’t manipulate – is the scale.

I used to hate the scale. I doubt I’ve ever loved it in the past. In fact, I righteously refused to have a scale in my house citing many of the same reasons as above. Truth was, I really didn’t want to know what I weighed. And when my pants got tighter, it was obviously because my dryer was shrinking them. Didn’t matter that they never stretched out during the day. And I had a million lies I told myself as to why the size of my clothes kept increasing, why my health was getting worse.

One such example was when I saw pictures of my mother, who is now nearly 90, and me. I kept remarking how my mother kept looking smaller and smaller. She was shrinking! It never occurred to me that I was expanding and she was staying the same.

I still don’t have a scale in my house. Instead, I go once a week and weigh in. I may not literally hug my scale, but I embrace stepping on it. As for manipulating the scale – believe me, I try. I wear the lightest clothes possible, even in the dead of winter and freezing temperatures. I eat the same menu on weigh in day and  weigh in at the same time every week. I try to be as consistent in everything as possible so when I do step on the scale, the only variable is my weight. Why? Because then I can get honest feedback about how I did the prior week, up or down. And I can get honest with myself.

How my clothes fit, how I feel health-wise, my body measurements, and my esteem are all equally good indicators of my progress but they aren’t as objective as the scale. I can stretch that tape measure to have it say what I want it to say. I can buy clothes that are sized for vanity. I can lie to myself in a number of ways that hides the fact that ultimately what goes in my mouth counts. Cause and effect.

Today, I no longer have hate or animosity toward the scale, nor does it wield any power over my emotions. It’s feedback. Pure and honest.