It's Not Fair

More than once I've felt like it's just not fair that I can't eat "normally" like everyone else.  Anytime I've even ventured into the neighborhood of my old eating habits, the scale and the way my clothes fit quickly remind me that I can never go back there.  I wish I could honestly say that none of that food ever tempts me, but that's not the truth.  The brutal reality is that I still have a fully-developed set of fat-girl taste buds and most of the old stuff still tastes pretty good to me.  I choose to eat healthy the vast majority of the time, but my natural inclination would take me back to that old, high fat, high carb/high sugar neighborhood.  Were I to settle back into that neighborhood, some unwanted things like high blood pressure and Type 2 diabetes would most likely take up residence with me as well.

When I'm tempted to throw a private "it's not fair" pity party, I am also reminded that when we eat like "normal Americans" we get "normal American" results - 66% of us are overweight or obese!

I think that a lot of us would like to figure out a way to eat "normally" and still get to and maintain a healthy weight, but that's not possible, at least if we define "eat normally" to mean "like we used to eat."

My new reality is that I AM eating normally for someone with my goals. My goal include staying at a healthy weight, BEING and STAYING healthy, wearing fun clothes in small sizes, having the energy I need to do the things I want to do and keep up with my grandchildren (soon to be 8 of them!). And while it may not be fair I can’t eat in the same way as (some) other people, it would be so much more unfair if I couldn’t reach my goals.

It always comes back to the fact that I've made the decision to be healthy.  That is my primary choice when it comes to my health.  To support that primary choice, I will, for the rest of my life, have to make the secondary choices necessary to support my decision to be healthy.  Much like the concert pianist who makes the secondary choice to practice for hours whether he feels like it or not because he wants to be a concert pianist, those secondary choices aren't always what we WANT to do.  But they support what we REALLY want.

If we take our eyes off of what's most important to us, it may not "feel" fair to make those secondary choices, but when we keep our eyes on the prize, we'll find it's much easier to choose wisely :-).