Today, in History

What happened on this date in history?

Barack Obama was inaugurated as 44th US President (2009)
Australia beats India 2-0 to win the Wold Cup (1992)
First federal holiday honoring Marting Luther King, Jr (1986)
Pittsburgh Steelers beat Los Angeles Rams, 31-19 in Pasadena and Terry Bradshaw was the MVP (1980)
“Meet the Beatles” album is released in the US (1964) (I have an original copy!)
FDR is sworn in 4th consecutive term as US President (1945)
Hostilities cease in US Revolutionary War (1783)
First English Parliament was sworn in by Earl of Leicester (1285)

And in 2012, I reached my weight loss goal!

And they all lived happily ever after, never regaining an ounce.

Yeah. Right.

Oh, please don’t misunderstand me. I am still wearing my new size in clothing. (Specifically, my shirts went from 3XL w/18″ neck to Medium w/15 1/2″ neck, my waist 48″ to 34″, and my suit from 54 Portly to 42 Regular.) They are not even tight (except for that one shirt–there is NO WAY that neck is actually 15 1/2 inches as labeled!) Over the past 2 years, I lived in my “success range” which is about my goal plus or minus 3 pounds. Actually, for about the first year, I actually slid down another 6 pounds from my goal, and was living at “G minus 6 pounds”. That was fine. But towards the end of 2013, my weight started to climb. To G minus 3…then G…then G plus 3. Still…I was within my success range, so it was all good, right?

Wrong!

I was getting complacent. Not lazy, but relaxed. I haven’t regained too much, but I am at the top of what I consider to be successful. I don’t have any more room to wander up. So, what am I going to do differently?

Nothing. And everything.

I never really stopped measuring and logging my foods…but I also starting overlooking those extra couple hazelnuts or walnuts at the holidays. I love nuts, and seeing a bowl of them was an “attractive nuisance”. And since I only ate one or two nuts (at a time), well, maybe I didn’t bother logging them. Of course, the problem was that I would walk past them several times a day, and the “one or two” became “10-15”.

And I know that having two HUGE bags of candy in the garage was a mistake. We had a bag of “Christmas Crack” was simultaneously terrible and delicious, and I know I didn’t honestly log everything I ate from it. After all, how could a small handful hurt? I mean, it is only Chex mix, with butter, brown sugar, corn syrup and cashews? (Oh, I can almost taste it yet.) I also found it difficult to walk past the Caramel Puffcorn without doing “quality control”. Every day.

Here’s how bad it was: I remember Tammy coming home from work one day, and she asked me about my day. I told her that I felt it was successful, because I spent the whole day at home, and I didn’t eat any of those treats.  Guess what I did that night immediately before brushing my teeth prior to going to sleep? (But it was only small double handful!)

Fortunately at least this year we didn’t make our Hot Buttered Rum mix! (Ice cream, butter, powdered sugar and brown sugar.)

I am back to carefully logging everything. I put the nuts away. (The Christmas munchies are thankfully long gone!) I am staying on budget. Not under budget. Not over budget. But at budget.

It’s deja vu all over again. Measure. Log. Move.

Success is possible. Success is an eternal quest, and it can be fleeting. If you forget, even for a little while, old habits can come crashing back. I’m not telling you this to scare you, or to make you feel as though this challenge is impossible. I am telling you so that I remind myself that this challenge is just that: a challenge. It only becomes impossible when you surrender to it.

Today, I am still within my official success range. And I am going to stay there.