Diet Doesn't Mean Die

I am officially on a diet. Yes, I know that's die with a t. And I know that diet is considered a bad word and diets don't work and...

Yet, I'm on a diet, and I'm enjoying it.

Oh, quit twirling your forefinger around your ear and shaking your head. Yes, I said it. I'm enjoying my diet.

I spent years starving myself to fat, yes starving. It's a long story which I'll tell some other time, but it involves having a body that has a very high survival instinct, so that if we were all stranded on an island together and there was no food, I would grow fatter and you would all wither up and die off and I wouldn't even have to resort to cannabalism. I've tried to eat properly and never quite figured it out because if I had I'd be thin and gorgeous the way Inner Anna constantly claims I am.

I'm finally following a program that tells me exactly what to do and what to eat because, darn it, I need someone to do that and since I can't hire a personal chef and trainer, and Oprah won't come to my house in spite of repeated emails, this will have to do.

And I'm enjoying it.

The Curves diet works in phases and I'm in phase one right now. Fourteen hundred calories and the food is good. It's real food. No pre-packaged stuff. No excess chemicals. And next week I get more calories per day for the next three weeks, and then more calories for a month because it's all about raising your metabolism.

See, I left my metabolism somewhere between the Rockies and the deep blue sea and I've been searching for it ever since. I WANT IT BACK!

Things I like about my diet:

1. The food tastes good.
2. I'm pleasantly surprised by how big some of the servings are.
3. I love the control I feel I have.
4. I'm trying new foods and new combinations.
5. I can label foods "Mom" and have a good chance that no one else will eat it.
6.It's not special food so I can eat it for the rest of my life and I don't have to sell any of my children to be on it.
7. I have support whenever I go to the gym. They always ask how I'm doing. There are other women who are doing the same thing. And the Curves staff keeps track of my numbers. Plus it doesn't cost me anything extra, just my fees for the Curves gym.

Things I don't like about my diet:

1. No pizza
2. No chocolate - hold it, there is a chocolate protein shake. So I do get chocolate. Okay, no chocolate bars.
3. Sometimes I'm disappointed by the serving size.
4. Raisin bread calls out to me. So does hot buttered toast. Simple stupid things like that.
5. I have to cook.
6. If someone dares touch my food then I have major freak outs. As in "I can't eat all the stuff you can so when you eat my food you're telling me that you want me to starve to death!"
7. I don't know what to eat when I go to Boston Pizza with my friends.
8. I'm obsessing about food. I've never been a foodie (hence the starvation technique) and I don't like to think about food, but now I'm thinking about it all the time.

And so here it goes. There are a myriad of reasons for me to lose weight. Now if I can just convince my body to let it go.

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Read my review of "My Not-So-Fairy-Tale Life by Julie Wright