A Good Start...

I suppose if I'm going to put myself out there about my weight loss journey, I should be completely upfront about what my weight actually is.  If I were truly dedicated, I would post a Facebook announcement to make everyone in my little world aware and try to embarrass myself into not failing!  But I'm not quite that bold yet, and there's still that nagging doubt in the back of my mind - "Will I really do this?  Am I going to give up on it like I have every year for the last God-knows-how-many years?  Do I really want to risk publically humiliating myself if I do?"  The strong person would do it.  I will admit I am not that strong!

A blog feels safer!  On Facebook, I know of at least 30+ people who will definitely see it, and possibly over 100.  With a blog, I have no idea if anyone will actually see it.  I can choose to make it public or wait and see if random people find it.  And you know what? I'm ok with that.  This is not about a grandiose plan of losing weight.  Well, ok, it is...but the main point of this is to work out and write about my feelings, struggles, and successes in my weight loss journey.  It's main purpose is for me!  So I don't feel the need to announce it to the world.

So here goes...I started out (this time around) at 268 on the nose.  That was 2 weeks ago.  This morning, I was 261.8!  I haven't seen that number on the scale in at least a year!  I'm off to a good start, losing 6.2 pounds in 2 weeks!

While I'm excited about that, I'm also keenly aware that I stay motivated when weight is coming off in large chunks like that.  It's when the scale slows down, and the weight loss is minuscule or non-existent (God forbid I have a gain!), that's where my resolution starts to fall apart.

And I know that the weight loss will slow down.  It's normal - completely normal!!  And yet, every time it does, I start to waver.  Same with exercise.  I know the benefits of exercise.  I also understand that when you start out, you may see a gain on the scale.  Again, it's completely normal.  But those little "setbacks" have always been enough to derail my efforts.

One of my Batties, Debbie, once said that in her weight loss journey, whenever she had a tiny loss or a gain, she just had to keep pushing forward, because what was the alternative?  I have to try to keep this in mind.  A small gain on the scale is just that - a small gain.  If I keep trying, I am only doing good things for my body.  If I stop trying, I absolutely will gain back more weight and do bad things for my body.  Seems so simple a concept, and yet so hard to follow in that moment!

For now, I won't worry about exercise.  I haven't been cleared to exercise post-partum yet anyway.  So I'm just going to focus on making the best food choices I can, and worry about exercise later!