People say there's nothing better than a little healthy competition- and I'm pretty sure everyone that signs up for DietBet would agree. That was certainly my mantra when I signed up. However I totally underestimated my competition... myself.
I'm statistically defined as morbidly obese which realistically requires modifications of workouts and adjusted expectations. Yet there are times I'm still pretty convinced this almost 300 pound body can do what my 180 pound high school body could do. Not the most realistic- which needs to be another blog in it of itself.
Anyway, I started out with DietBet excited that the goals were "do-able". I trusted in my knowledge of weight loss "rules" and by making one or two minor changes to my lifestyle- winning money would be like taking candy from a baby. And at first I did well enough- with regular exercise and dieting I was able to consistantly loose 1.5-2.0 lbs per week. I was estatic and happy with my progress. Then the deadline approached and some simple math told me I was going to be short if I kept going. A week out from the round 1 weigh in and I needed 3.2 pounds. I remember the panic setting in as I calculated my required daily weight loss and realized it was more weight than I had lost any week thus far in the competition. It was quickly followed up by that familar sinking feeling of not being good enough.
Desperation set in and in that moment that's when it changed from a healthy competition to an unhealthy competition. They say desperate times call for desperate measures and I was despirate to hit it hard and cross that finish line. Looking back now I had the right idea but my execution- well let's just say it was a little reckless. And when weight loss meets recklessness- it quickly escalates from safe healthy weight loss to dangerous unhealthy methods in an instance.
In my case- it went from healthy and stable to dangerous in the in the span of 24 hours. After calculating my burn requirements I decided in some drastic measures. Instead of eating 3 healthy 400-600 calorie meals a day for a total of 1200-1800 calories/day. I slashed my daily allowance to less than 1000 calories/day. To meet that insane goal I was skipping meals and trying to squeak by with somedays as little as 700 for the entire day. My workouts went from doable to I'm lucky I didn't injury anything as I doubled my walking distance from one mile to two miles. Doubling up on workouts from 1 every other day to every day and even 2x per day. Instead of checking the scale once a week- it went to once a day then to twice a day and in the last two to three days before check-in I was stepping on my scale every time I passed it.
By Thursday I was starving all the time and nursing major shin splints but that afternoon the scale read 184.1 a full pound below my round one goal and I was through the roof. Cue Saturday night football at Buffalo Wild Wings. Do you know what happens when you leave a starving overweight girl in a bar/resturant for 3.5 hours with nothing to do but watch TV? I do- she gets bored, hungry and tempted from everything around her. Her willpower lasts for a certain amount of time until that rumbling tummy is begging for something to eat and she gives in. Yeah- you think I was toxic the week leading up to the weigh in? Imagine my despiration Sunday morning when I was up 7 pounds.
The whole weigh in week I had lost all hope of dropping those binge pounds and depression set in leaving me crippled with "not good enough" revolving around in my head. I finally coughed up the courage to weigh in this morning and was only 0.2 pounds less than the week before weigh in.
Part of me is still a bit depressed about missing the mark; another part is frustrated at my stupid dangerous tactics. But after sitting down and writing for the last 3 hours I've come to terms with it all and the part of me that's front and center is the quiet voice of self assurance that I've so often over looked.
She's whispering, "you've learned your lesson, you are wiser because of this experience and now you know what not to do. You have not failed because that number does not define you- how you recover from your shortcomming is how you are defined. Now it's all up to you- how does this story end?"