I didn’t want to be a blimp. Or a semi-blimp…or anything in the blimp family.
Blimpdom doesn’t happen overnight. It starts with a pressing, sudden need for clothing in a larger size. And then one day that larger size is squeezed to the limit and a still larger size is required. And on and on it goes…till Scareyland. So when I had gone up two full dress sizes from the dress size of my slender youth, and a third still larger size was–yike!–all too clearly and perilously in the cards, I finally stopped fooling around and made out a hit list.
Goodbye to all my lovely chocolates (groan): brownies and chocolate chip cookies and (sigh) Cadbury dark chocolate candy bars. Goodbye to ice cream (say it ain’t so). Goodbye to king-size, midmorning snacks and tea time binges of English muffins or toast slathered in butter and marmalade. And adios to corn chips and potato chips and all those other great narcotic nibbles.
Essentially My new diet killed off dessert sweets and around the clock snacks, which were replaced with fruit and yogurt.
For years I had been leaning toward a Mediterranean diet with little meat and lots of fresh veggies, so the rest of my meals remained essentially the same, minus the sweets, junk food and overeating.
Older fat doesn’t give up easily and it took what felt like a century to lose ten pounds. But in the process, I exchanged that loss for a couple of nice gains. The first, thanks to a leaner improved diet, was more energy. Second, more speed. Face it-carrying that extra fat was like carting a comatose ten-pound monkey around 24/7. Third was the satisfied feeling of being in control. When those little demons had demanded, “Gimmee some ice cream! Gimmee a chocolate bar-I’m dyin’ here! Gimmee a brownie-I want a brownie–I deserve a brownie–I need a brownie!” I brushed them off. “Buzz off Gang!”
The pluses also involved numerous savings. Not buying all those sweets and junk food and butter by the bucket put a lot more bucks in my purse. The money savings were further compounded by not having to buy a new wardrobe in a bigger size. I also didn’t have to buy any new jeans. My old too tight ones, having established long time residence in my closet, were finally brought out into the light and worn again.
My body and brain made the savings list too. They were spared from further assaults of sugar and carb pig-outs in a long cycle that had finally been broken and booted out the door.
More on Healthful Chow
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- Thanks Mom and Dad for not making me fat
- High Five for Jamie Oliver’s Food Revolution
- 20 Low cost slimming snacks
- Cheap Rich Proteins
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