Jenga!

Since I've stopped working with my trainer, I've been having kind of a tough time. I was only working with her once a week, but I think even that limited amount of accountability was enough. I haven't gone hog wild or anything, but it's just been that little bit here, little bit there. Without the overall goal of the challenge to work towards, it's been harder to stay motivated.

I'm still working out consistently, and I'm going to try a new class at my gym - Maximum Sculpt. It's an hour long weight training class. I've been doing my own made up circuit training combined with interval cardio, and I think that I'm just getting to the point where I'm a bit bored and my body is adjusting to the level of activity. I need something new.

My eating has been the real culprit here. A couple times a week I've been eating to the point of discomfort. It's almost been on accident, but the "accidents" are adding up. Last week was our second wedding anniversary and we went out for a really nice dinner. At the time I didn't really feel like I'd overdone it, but the food was really rich. Around one in the morning I woke up just beyond miserable. For the rest of the week I felt like I was recovering from this one meal. Then this weekend I did it again on Saturday when we went out with some friends and I had late night beer and pizza. Last night I had my in-laws over for dinner and I had an unplanned cocktail, lots of appetizers, spagetti and meatballs, garlic bread, and cookies for desert. Blech. Again, my stomach is still in recovery.

It's just unacceptable, but you fall into that slip sliding pattern. It just builds on itself. It's kind of like that game Jenga. Anyone ever play that? Where you stack up all the little pieces of wood, piece by piece, for a nice stable tower. Then you start pulling pieces out of the tower and stacking them on top. The goal is to not be the person unlucky or unskilled enough to pull out the piece that knocks the whole thing over. You spend a lot of time hunting for the pieces that are a bit loose, the one's that aren't the weight bearing pieces, so they're easy to pull out. They don't really seem to affect the stability of the whole thing. But over time, all those easily pulled out pieces are still adding to the instability of the whole. They don't seem like it at first, but with each one pulled over time, the tower becomes like swiss cheese.

That's the stage I feel like I'm at right now. I'm not doing anything to REALLY compromise how far I've come, but I'm cutting corners. I'm taking those easy ways out. I'm indulging for a day or two, and trying to make up for it the rest of the week. It makes for instability. That's not the journey that I want.

So, what's the plan? Back to tracking. Aaaauuughhhhhh! I keep thinking I can escape tracking what I eat. The truth is that if I want to keep my weight down I will be doing this on and off for the rest of my life. It's frustrating, but comforting too. I already know that it works. I try to avoid it, but it does the job. And that's exactly what I need.