We all want to hear it is not our fault.

It’s those damn carbs!

I ate to much dairy!

Gluten caused this!

People in my family are obese so I must be meant to be this way!

All the fat caused me to gain weight!

Low fat products are bad and I ate them!

It’s impossible to lose weight as you get older.

Now before you bring the pitchforks out know that I know some people really do have issues with  these things.  I know I myself have used several of these excuses over the year.  I wasn’t successful until I came to one solid conclusion:

I was fat and it was by my own doing.

It wasn’t until I started eating a balanced, portion controlled diet that I had two shocking but very important revelations:

1. I am not big boned.
2. I do not have a slow metabolism.

Whodathunkit?

The reason this is being brought to the forefront of my brain today is the fact that I lost more weight.

3 pounds to be exact.

I’m supposed to be on maintenance.  Before anyone gets all worried I am physically fine and more towards the top of my healthy goal range so  health wise it’s okay to lose a little more weight.

I’m eating 36 Smartpoints a day and all my weeklies.

One thing has changed though, and that was my decision to exercise at least 3 times a week.  I’ve also been leading several fitbit challenges over at my Weight Watchers Tough Love Facebook Group and I’ve definitely been getting way more activity.

Nothing crazy mind you, as I decided early on I’d was not going to do anything that I couldn’t do the rest of my life.  It is always what derailed me before.  If I was truly going to make changes it needed to be forever, not just until the weight came off.

So I also made the decision that 36 Smartpoints is enough.  It is something I can live with for sure, and not so much that it might lead me to falling off the wagon.

I don’t need the big volume anymore.

In my last post I stated that I don’t always trust recommendations by other people on Weight Watchers because how many Smartpoints are in an item seem to influence the value of the food.

Quantity over quality.

That thinking is what got me 64 pounds bigger.

I’m going to share a little story with you all about the first time I fell off the WW Wagon.  The person I started with had quit, and we had WW @ Work available so I decided to do that.

It worked great at first, but getting out early/late screwed with the meeting times, and then they moved it to a different location.  It wasn’t as consistent as my normal meeting, and my weight loss slowed.

We came to an end to one of the sessions (you re-upped every 6 weeks), and our fitness coordinator at work decided we were going to try this new program called Think Thin! or something like that.

So we all filed into the new meeting and were greeted by this lady that looked as though she should gain a few pounds.

Totally not into thin shaming, but this lady looked anorexic.

She starts explaining how this program is so much better than WW, and lists off all these foods we should never eat blah blah….portion control….blah blah….bad food bad….blah blah…

So one of my co-workers explained that we like WW because our leader knew what we were going through, could relate to us.

The lady then explains that she too could understand us because she had once gained 2 pounds and had to lose it.

Seriously?  If that woman gained 2 pounds she would look so much healthier.

Anyway so we started getting a bit disgruntled that this skeleton was comparing a two pound weight loss to a group of people that needed to lose A LOT MORE THAN THAT.

Then my friend Cindy asked a question I and will never ever ever forget what this woman answered.

They had some kind of exchange type deal for their program and Cindy asked “How much is popcorn?” Popcorn was king with WW back then, and a big go-to snack.

This woman asked why she wanted to know, and Cindy said, “It helps keep me full and on track.”

With a condescending smile on her face Skeletor answered, “Eating like a glutton is the reason all of you are here.”

Wait, what?

Did she just call us pigs?

You don’t want to weight 75 pounds and piss off a bunch of fat people by telling them that they are gluttons.

She tried to salvage it but we were in full blown offended mode and that was it.  No one ever went back, and I decided that I could just “do this on my own” and we all know how that turned out.

So why am I bringing this up now?

I guess this small, very small hesitant voice in my head has to admit she was a little bit right, even though it could have been said it much more diplomatic way.

Dammit!

Every single person that is alive in this day and age in America (and probably elsewhere) has been gradually increasing the portion size of most things we eat.  Our busy lifestyles have added to much more eating out, and the portions at restaurants are ridiculous.

So we are used to eating that much and continue to do so even when we are cooking at home.

When you first join WW or change your diet to include some kind of portion control most people are truly shocked by what a serving is.

Have you ever seen what a serving of cereal really is?  The size of a pasta serving will bring tears to your eyes.  Meat?  Forget it.

I think that’s why some people like the low carb stuff.  No measuring, weighing involved.

You are still restricting your calories, and even though I did low carb once and failed by dinner I can imagine that eating mostly meat and cheese would get old, so you would eat what you need, not what you want.

Bravo to all of you that can do it by the way.  I made it a total of 7 hours I think 🙂  What’s important is to find what works for you, because it all comes down to this:

You have to eat less calories than you burn to lose weight, and you have to consume the same amount of calories that you burn to stay the same.

So if you are older and not active, or have a slow metabolism, you eat less.

It sucks, but it’s the truth.

A funny thing happens once you do start eating what your body needs.  You get used to it.  You find that when you are being mindful you are not reaching for that snack or that extra helping because you are actually hungry.

You may be upset.  You may have had a bad day.  You may just be used to eating that much.

It is important to find those reasons and deal with them.  Will you be perfect?  God knows I wasn’t and I’m still not but I do a hell of a lot better than I did before.

So I’m not going to get myself geared up on the slippery slope that is volumes of food.  I’m never hungry, I eat better than I ever have in my entire life, and most importantly I feel INCREDIBLE.

If the weight loss doesn’t stop I may decide to add more Smartpoints, but for now I’m content to see where this takes me.

To keep up with me:

Follow my blog with the link in the left hand side bar (or bottom of the page if on cell).

Follow the My 30 Point Life Blog Updates on Pinterest

Follow and like me on my Facebook Page.

Join my Instant Pot Healthy Recipes group on Facebook.