Self-fulfilling Prophesy

Well, it's been five weeks since my last post.  The result... I'm down to 302.2 lbs, which means I've lost another 6.4 lbs.  That's a total loss of 26.8lbs since September 1st!

Here's a quick summary of the last five weeks...

• I was able to stick with only drinking water except when I chose a drink as my dessert of the day.  
• For the most part I cut my meals down to about one plate full, though there were a few instances when I didn't.  Pizza's a killer.  
• Only twice did I have more than one dessert a day.  I also had a few days in which I had no dessert.  
• I got a decent amount of exercise for the first couple of weeks.  The last three, not so much.  
• The 66 day Bible reading challenge came to a screeching halt a week into it.

Here's my plan for the next five weeks...

• Start exercising again.
• Drink only water.
• Add more veggies to my diet.
• Try a few new recipes.  
• The only dessert I will have is one small piece of dark chocolate a day.  They say in small quantities it's good for you and complete denial of all sweets is a little too scary to me at this point.
• EDIT: I changed my mind.  I'm going to see how many days I can go without having any but if I absolutely have to have something, then I'll allow myself one piece of dark chocolate.  I wonder if I can go the full five weeks.  Hmmm.
• Take a daily vitamin.  I'm thinking gummy vitamins count as medication, not dessert.  :-)
• Read the Bible every day.  Even if I don't have time for 18 chapters, I can still read something every day.   
• Originally I had mapped out that at this point I would begin to record all my calories every day, but I am going to save that challenge for down the road.  I really think I'll have enough to worry about with trying to get exercise and avoid junk food and desserts.  I don't want to stress myself out too much.  

A couple of weeks ago I had a very pleasant experience at Goodwill.  I had realized that I no longer had any nice red or green shirts and as I was doing a Christmas tour with my church choir I was looking for a nice Christmasy shirt.  

At Goodwill I went straight to the 3x section of shirts, but  I didn't like any of them at all.  At this point (and this really was the first moment this occurred to me) I realized that I may have lost enough weight to fit into a smaller size.  So I grabbed a few 2x and 1x shirts, and went to go try them on.  They almost all fit!  There were a couple of 1xs that didn't look right, but I found a few 2x shirts, a 1x, and even an xxl that all look great on me!  (Well, okay, the xxl is still a little tight, but I loved it and I was stoked that I could get it on my body, so I went ahead and bought it.  I figure it won't be too long until I can wear it!.)  My favorite one is a red velvet 1x; I've already gotten a number of compliments of how I look while wearing it.  

My sisters, Hannah and Lauren, have both had dreams now in which I lost so much weight I was as small as them.  They tell me I looked great!  Hannah said, "It's a sign!"

Two weeks ago it dawned on me that Hannah is expecting that this is the last time I have to try to lose weight.    She really believes that I can do this; that even though I have so often tried and failed I can make permanent changes to live a healthier life.  This really got me thinking.  It wasn't until then that I realized that I didn't really believe in myself.  Not fully.  Sure, I had hopes, but hopes aren't the same as expectations.  I HOPED I would be able to change to a healthier lifestyle, but I EXPECTED that at some point I would fail and give up.  That's what I've always done before.  

So I decided that instead of saying "I hope to make a permanent change to my life" I would change my attitude and say, "I WILL make a permanent change to my life."  

That's the battle now.  I want a self-fulfilling prophesy, but a good prophesy and not a bad one.  I'm still struggling to believe that I can do it.  Prayers are VERY much appreciated.