Note to Self: Don't make pumpkin mini-muffins while on a diet.

Top 10 Reasons I've Started This Diet

10. It seemed like a diet that would fit my lifestyle.
9. I don't want the "Healthy Height and Weight" chart to tell me I'm supposed to be 6'8" anymore.
8. I hate taking and/or looking at pictures of myself - "skinny" ones and "fat" ones
7. I want to be in better shape for the things that matter to me - things like camp and trips to Africa and Parents' Weekend at the Academy
6. "Morbidly" and "obese" are two of the ugliest words in the English language
5. Two more ugly words: health concerns
4. I want to live to see my grandkids.
3. I want to be able to play and to do whatever my kids want me to do.
2. For my long-suffering husband who loves me and has never once complained or asked me to lose weight.
1. It's an obedience issue, and I want to obey God in every area of my life...even eating.

P.S. I knew I couldn't do it. I told my sister about this blog. In my defense, she asked to be my weight-loss partner, and I figured she would need access to my thoughts. We all know what this means. Now I have to tell my other sisters as well. :)

Here We Go Again

I can't remember the first time I went on a diet. I'm pretty sure it was in utero...some sort of amniotic fast, or maybe it was a low placental carb diet. As early as elementary school, I remember being mortified by public weigh-ins during our annual health checks at school. I remember realizing I hated "diet" cheese in high school. (That was about the time that three unkind boys - one of them fatter than me - made cow noises behind me in French class.) I remember coming to grips with the truth that Wasa bread is a tool of the devil. And I remember the diet that forever changed my life...for the worse. I had to weigh in every day (shades of elementary school), I had a buisness card sized card with all the foods I COULD eat listed on it, and the "counselors" on this diet were not particularly happy or helpful. One morning when I weighed in, I had gained one-quarter of a pound, and my "counselor" exclaimed, "WHAT did you do?!" I had no answer. All I had done was eat the foods on the card, most of which I had no desire to eat. I started that diet because I believed myself to be a fat cow (shades of high school). In Truth, I was chubby. I'd love to be that chubby now.

So now I'm starting again. I think I'm ready, but I've said that before. I said it most every one of the twenty times I started Weight Watchers. Hence, the blog. My hope is that I will use it as a journal to catalogue my thoughts through this process. I stole the idea from my sister who started hers as a way to journal her family's journey through the adoption process. I like her reason better. She got a gorgeous baby girl in the process. I'm hoping to lose stuff during my journey - stuff like weight and unhealthy habits and bad attitudes.

It's a little ironic that I'm putting this on a public blog. First of all, I hate when I lose weight and people begin to notice that I've lost weight. It's like the kiss of death on my diet! Fortunately, at my weight, people won't notice for awhile. Just to be safe, I don't think I'm going to tell anyone about this blog yet or maybe ever. I know. It makes no sense to publish an un-public blog, but I think I'm more likely to write about my experience if I start this blog. Time will tell. If I get really brave, I may put a "before" picture on the blog. Of course, at this point it is both a "before" and "now" picture. I'm probably not that brave.

By the way, it's 2 pm on Day One, and I'm hungry. Here we go again.