{"id":43412,"date":"2014-08-11T08:28:03","date_gmt":"2014-08-11T15:28:03","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.110pounds.com\/?p=43412"},"modified":"2014-06-30T14:33:19","modified_gmt":"2014-06-30T21:33:19","slug":"6-years","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.110pounds.com\/?p=43412","title":{"rendered":"The “After” – 6 Year Anniversary"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"6<\/a><\/p>\n

When I think back to when I started my journey to lose 100 pounds<\/a>, I don’t think I ever thought about the “After.” Not really. I think part of that was that I’d never really been skinny and part of it was that I doubted whether I’d ever reach the “After.” I had a goal in my mind and I naively thought that all my problems would thus be fixed when I was “skinny”<\/a> and while they weren’t magically improved, there was a lot of improvement in my life. The biggest improvement, obviously, was my health. I was no longer pre-diabetic and I didn’t have high blood pressure. Mission accomplished. But when I was steadily truckin’ along, losing a pound here and a pound there, I couldn’t really see my future as a “skinny” person and now that I’ve kept the weight off for 6 years, I have a hard time picturing myself as I used to be. It’s strange how your reality and perception changes.<\/p>\n

Over the years I’ve had ups and downs in my weight. I gained 15 pounds<\/a> a few years ago and it took a\u00a0really long time<\/em> to lose that extra 15 pounds but I did it. Despite the occasional body image issues I still struggle with, my weight has been maintained in the same 4-6 pound range. Sometimes it’s more of a struggle to keep myself in that range. I am no longer naive about weight loss and I KNOW it takes hard work<\/strong> and\u00a0honesty.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Honesty is the hard part. When you’re obese you’re not honest with yourself, or others, not really. When I was obese I would sneak\u00a0food, \u00a0I’d eat in private, I’d make\u00a0excuses\u00a0<\/em>as to why I wasn’t losing weight, I’d make excuses to other poeple– “No really, I don’t eat that much…I don’t know why I can’t lose weight…” \u00a0(Read these posts:\u00a0Why Can\u2019t I Lose Weight?<\/a>,\u00a0An Excuse to Eat<\/a>, and\u00a0Overcoming Exercise Obstacles<\/a>.) Once I faced that I was lying about everything and that I hadn’t REALLY tried to lose weight, I had renewed desire to really succeed this time.<\/p>\n

I had to change the way I thought about food<\/a>.<\/strong><\/span><\/h4>\n

I had to change the way I thought about exercise.<\/strong><\/span><\/h4>\n

I had to change the way I thought about MYSELF. No more excuses.\u00a0<\/strong><\/span><\/h4>\n

Was it easy? Hell no! There were so so so many plateaus. There were set-backs. There were some very frustrating times where I felt like I was being punished because I couldn’t eat the same things everyone else was eating. Is it easier now that the weight is gone? Nope. It’s still hard. I still have to make an effort<\/strong>. I can’t just let things slide. I will probably always have to count my calories or do some sort of food tracking. I don’t think as a reformed binge-eater I can just stop doing what worked to lose the weight and keep it off and not expect to gain it back. So the hard work continues.<\/p>\n

\"before\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Don’t take that as a negative. Sure I’d love to not be AWARE of how many calories are in foods and wouldn’t it be nice to just sit down and binge eat a carton of ice cream? Or half a pizza (or, ahem, a whole pizza) like the old days? But I can’t unlearn that knowledge and I know how my body feels when I eat junk and when I eat good, healthy foods. I dislike that feeling of overeating now and when I go too long without eating fruits and vegetables I feel ill. Most of the time my healthy choices are second nature and I don’t give them any thought. On those times when it does feel like my willpower isn’t as strong as I’d like, I try to cut myself some slack. It’s ok to take a break sometimes.<\/p>\n

It’s my 6th year anniversary of reaching goal weight. I’m now at the “After.”<\/strong> It feels like a lifetime ago, but at the same time I still feel that same giddy joy when I remember that moment when I stepped on the scale and saw GOAL WEIGHT. That feeling is still there and it helps keep me motivate to keep trying when things get rough.<\/p>\n

Check out previous year\u2019s anniversary posts here:<\/p>\n

My 100 Pound Anniversary<\/a><\/p>\n

100 Pound Anniversary \u2013 3 Years<\/a><\/p>\n

100 Pound Anniversary \u2013 4 Years<\/a><\/p>\n

Another Year Gone By\u00a0— 5 Years<\/a><\/p>\n

\"magazine9\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Things are changing in my life. Priorities are shifting, goals are changing, but the fact remains: I love my fit life and I will always make myself and my health a priority. It has to be that way. If I’m healthy, my family is healthy. In a little over a month I will be marrying the love of my life. I expect we’ll start discussing family planning in the next year or two and that will most definitely effect my weight loss\/maintenance journey. My sincere hope is that I can maintain a healthy weight for the rest of my life and\u00a0hopefully<\/strong> pass on my love of healthy living to my future children.<\/p>\n

For now, I keep truckin’ along. Another day, another week, another year goes by and I can happily say “I’m at goal weight.” That’s enough for me. Skinny isn’t necessary. I’d rather be healthy and fit.<\/p>\n

Thanks for reading all these years!<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

When I think back to when I started my journey to lose 100 pounds, I don’t think I ever thought about the “After.” Not really. I think part of that was that I’d never really been skinny and part of it was that I doubted whether I’d ever reach the “After.” I had a goal […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_s2mail":"yes","footnotes":""},"categories":[2500,44,2721,101,2663,152,154,5463,5597,318,319,2778,2625,214,258,297,298,3372],"tags":[355,8029,6178,1862,747,8662,8758,1311,2662,8028],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.110pounds.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/43412"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.110pounds.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.110pounds.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.110pounds.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.110pounds.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=43412"}],"version-history":[{"count":19,"href":"https:\/\/www.110pounds.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/43412\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":43436,"href":"https:\/\/www.110pounds.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/43412\/revisions\/43436"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.110pounds.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=43412"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.110pounds.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=43412"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.110pounds.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=43412"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}