Wednesday, July 8, 2009

Deprivation

In an attempt to not go home and start eating, I decided to go window shopping. So basically I decided to deprive myself of food by putting myself in a situation where I knew I would have to deprive myself of all the consumer good I desperately wanted to consume.

How is shopping - now wait that is a huge overstatement - how is looking, desperately wanting, a good substitution to not eating? I'm sure anyone out there reading this who doesn't know me is thinking, wow this girl has problems. Well, I'm here to tell you that those who do know me who are reading this will confirm.

But honestly, I am just really trying to be good, both with my money spending habits and my intake of food. But it seems almost impossible to find things to do that don't involve either of these things. If I simply go home, there are pop tarts, cheese (lots of cheese), chips, alcohol ... Must I continue? Listing these delicious food items is just making this process harder. But if I stay out of the house what is there to do that doesn't involve money (or food)?

The gym idea has been suggested, but I am a morning runner. I don't want to go running first thing in the morning and then go to the gym after work. Who does that? Not me. But if there is someone who does this, I think they might be more sad than me.

So why am I depriving myself of everything good in the world? Well, the food deprivation comes from a lot of places. I finally have the activity part of weight loss in place. The part I can't quite master right now is the food part. I am always hungry, but the healthy stuff never seems like a delicious option. So I revert to all above mentioned items. Wouldn't you choose those things too?

In addition to just wanting to be making better food decisions in general, I have a vacation coming up. A vacation where I am going to be surrounded by a bunch of beautiful people. First off, in general I am not categorized as one of the "beautiful people" and secondly, I have to be around these people in the worst weather environment I could possibly be in. Humidity. The bane of my existence. I really don't do well in humidity. I am already a sweater. Humidity just exemplifies that. And I'll be inebriated. Most likely very, very inebriated. So, I figure that I should try my hardest to have as few issues working against me as possible. If I feel fat, sweaty and drunk ... I'm screwed. I think I can deal with two of the three. I have no control over the sweatiness. And I'm straight up not willing to go it without the liquid courage ... so that leaves the fat part that I should be working against.

The shopping, money saving, part comes in play because we are buying a house in a matter of a couple weeks (cross your fingers). I don't want to spend any money I don't have to because I know that once we get into a brand new house, I will want to buy a whole bunch of house stuff. So the shopping will come in time, I just need to be patient, which is definitely something I struggle with.

So there's why I'm depriving myself of all the good things in the world (or most of the good things in the world). But the thing is, even though I am working toward two very tangible situations (a vacation and a house) I still would like to be better at making better decisions when it comes to eating and spending money. So, I need to make life style changes, not just temporary changes. I'm in the process of trying different things and seeing what works and what doesn't for me, but what do you do to stay away from the things that tempt you? What are your tips and tricks? I need all the suggestions I can get.

1 comment:

Unknown said...

I think the best thing to do would be finding a physical activity that you don't mind doing. One that can be done at home. And you can always just walk. Walking is a great activity that doesn't take much exertion.
Another good idea is to find things that are time consuming. Such as reading a book/ writing for your blog. T.V. is something we should all avoid because it takes no actual thought to perform meaning your mind will try to occupy your attention with food.
Great Post as always
Jason