Beyond Willpower

"We may think there is willpower involved, but more likely...change is due to want power. Wanting the new addiction more than the old one. Wanting the new me in preference to the person I am now." -- George Sheehan I've always had an addictive personality, I overdo EVERYTHING, so it's good that I stayed away from drugs and alcohol and cigarettes and all that throughout my life.  I've stayed away from most negative things that are harmful to your health and mental well being...except food in excess.  I am a food addict I hear a lot of my friends tell me that they don't want to get 'all obsessed with dieting' and they want to live their lives like a normal healthy person. I get that, I do. Wouldn't it be fabulous? Unfortunately, I not only have no desire for such 'normalcy', I also think I would be incapable of it. Like an Addict who goes to AA/NA meetings and becomes obsessed/addicted to recovery or religion, I have become obsessed...

So, I was reading a really interesting blog today over at  Escape from Obesity . She was asking what it is that keeps people going even when they aren't motivated. Anyhow, this was my reply, I thought I would share it here: -- I got to the point in my life where I realized that I want to be healthy more than I want to abuse myself with food. When I have slower losses, or am having a TOM craving, I just have to keep in mind that I've undone the progress I've made so many times over the years, and I am just at a place where I'm sick of it and not willing to let myself do that again.  Therapy has helped a lot. Blogging helps, I blog every day on spark, for accountability alone, and then I keep my beyondwillpower blog for the 'big things'.  When I ask myself what it is, it's just that I'm fed up. I'm 31 and still morbidly obese. This will only get more difficult the older I get. My real dad died at 47 from diabetes complications and he pretty much...

So I went shopping the other day. I had posted those pics in this blog post  with my before and current pics. I had gone to buy some new tank tops and also picked up that cute lavender type top. I bought two size 3x tank tops along with other stuff. I tried them on before buying them. I came home and was pretty happy with them, put them away and didn't think much about it until later. A day or so goes by and I put one on to wear around in the house with my jammie pants. Suddenly I realize that this shirt is way too big. Joey mentioned it as well, like, why did you buy new clothes that are too big? Wasn't the point that all your old clothes were too big? What is it that I see? Have any of you done this? I was just so confused, what was it that I saw when I looked in the mirror in the dressing room? What made me think those tanks fit me? I could have easily gotten a 2x. I even washed and dried them this week, nope, still too big. I think maybe I can't see myself being ...

So, I've been On Plan perfectly for almost 3 months. I haven't lost anything for 2 weeks. It's that time of the month though, and mine lasts FOR EV AR, so, who knows, maybe I'll have a whoosh. The thing that has me concerned though isn't that I haven't lost - so much as where I'm going mentally DUE TO the no loss. I've had a history of eating disordered behavior along the other end of the spectrum. I binge yeah, but I also have gone through periods of starvation and laxative abuse. (These things don't work out as well as you hope they will. Also they inevitably lead to binging). Anyhow, not losing for 2 weeks has almost immediately put me into the mindset of -- cutting cals. It's never so simple as oh I should cut by 100 and see after a week where that gets me. It's more like, cut by 300...and if that works, hell, go lower. I know this is the start of something bad. So yeah, I'm worried. I want to be this person: Not this pers...