Getting to know me Part 1: Stress

I've decided that the first step to any type of lasting lifestyle change or weight loss is to get to know me, what helps me succeed and what my triggers are to sabotage my efforts. Once I have examined these areas of my life and developed a plan to maximize the positives and minimize the challenges we can move onto step two - implementation.

The first part of Step 1 is an examination of stress. Today I began to examine the most stressful part of my day. While many mom's both working and those at home will agree that mornings are no picnic, I do believe that the most stressful part of my day is the time between getting home from work, getting everyone fed and settling down into an evening routine.

The two biggest barriers to a successful evening are: figuring out what to cook for dinner (and getting on the table fast) and not destroying the house in the process.

A few weeks ago I started to take some steps to minimize my meal prep stress. I started to use Sunday afternoons as an opportunity to cook a variety of meals and snacks to keep in the fridge and freezer. For 2 weeks now "what's for dinner" may be a question my kids ask, but not one that I'm worried about. Last night was a roast that I cooked the night before. Tonight is chicken fajitas with a roasted chicken also prepared in advance.

The second challenge is keeping my house in a condition where my door bell ringing does not through me into a full blown panic attack. Luckily my meal prep has helped to keep my kitchen clean this week and I've realized that having the dishes clean and my prep bowls and utensils available also helps to relieve stress. Its much more pleasant to cook and clean dinner when there is not already a sink full of dishes.

The unexpected bonus, driving home tonight from work my husband called and said that there was an unexpected issue at work and that he needed to work late. Now when my stress is high, this would also send me into a panic attack trying to figure out how to feed the kids and get through the evening routine, but I knew that the kitchen was clean and dinner was 2 minutes in the microwave away from ready so my dear husband was pleasantly surprised when I said sure honey, see you when you get home.

My Clean kitchen, ready to make dinner

More Than Just the Numbersa

9 Months ago I started a daily blog - The Year of the Shrinking Mommy. The idea was to chronicle my weight loss journey and to motivate me. The inherent problem was that this blog centered around my weight loss so what happened if I didn't lose weight.

Well 20lbs lost and again found I stopped writing and I miss it. The problem was that when I wasn't successful in my weight loss I didn't want to share it with the world, but the template for my writing left me with little where else to go.

The Solution, a forum where I can write about weight loss, but also about life and other challenges that I face day to day. I am 31 years old and have struggled with my weight for about 20 of those years. I expect that this is something that will challenge me for the rest of my life. That does mean that I give up, but it does mean that I am going to stop putting my life on hold waiting for the time when I lose weight.


That's what More than Just the Numbers mean. I resolve to no longer be ruled by the scale. Do I want to lose weight - yes. Why? I want to be healthy and hell I want to look better, but withholding other positive things in life like: nice clothing, or a beach vacation because it will be better when I am thin really just contributes to the problem. By depriving myself of these things I further compound the problem and further lower my self esteem. Then I eat. This cycle continues often unconsciously.

I still have goals and I do vow to return to the gym, but I am also going to live my life and to start I am going to love me too.


So this is me at my current weight with a plan to take one day at time and to enjoy them all.