My Ride on The Struggle Bus

It appears I bought a 3 month pass to ride the struggle bus. I have had a rough time since February. I have had little motivation to track my food and basically have been eating everything. Way too much of it!  I often start out the day strong but then by the afternoon, the wheels on the bus have fallen off – one flat tire turns into a total tail spin.

Okay, enough with the bus puns. I know what I should be doing but why am I not?

I am in my 5th year on Weight Watchers. I started with Points Plus, then switched to Smart Points. That was a slight adjustment for me and my loss slowed down but overall I did well on SP. I got to goal and became a Lifetime Member.  Now, I am on the new version of Smart Points known as Freestyle. I love the idea behind the plan. Having over 200 foods that I do not need to put in my tracker is great. I honestly do not know if it’s Freestyle that I am now struggling with or if it’s just my mindset lately. I tend to think it is more my mindset.  For me, after tracking every bite for so many years I became too liberal with not tracking when Freestyle started. Prior, I used to track EVERYTHING except for my splurges, when I was on vacation and the other time I fell off the wagon for several months in 2015. Side note, I often ended up tracking my splurges because I was curious about the points.

This year, I noticed myself starting to not track foods that should be. Then, my portion sizes increased. I know the size of a correct portion... I have been measuring and weighing long enough. But, I started to add a little extra here and there. Next thing I knew, I was not measuring, weighing or tracking anything and I was eating everything.

Should I lay the blame on Freestyle? Nope! I own up to what I did and I know had I followed the plan as intended, I would not have arrived to the point where I am at. I am up on the scale, clothes became too tight and I physically started feeling bad.

I do feel that the timing of the roll out of Freestyle with where I was at in my journey may have played a role in my trip on the struggle bus. I was in maintenance and at a point where I would have still liked to have lost a little more weight but at the same time wanted to start living with less tracking. Unfortunately, it catapulted me back into my old ways when I became too lackadaisical.

So, now what? I am literally taking it day by day. As of today, this is my 3rd day back on track (and even getting my blue dots). Woohoo!! For those of you not on WW, that means I stayed within my point allowance for the day. We like to see blue dots on our app calendar! Last month, I started back for about a week getting blue dots and well, that didn’t last long.

I have decided from today, I am not looking back, only forward. It is the best I can do at this point. I refuse to give up and lose all that I have worked so hard for. I am trying not to be hard on myself. I know I am not at my lowest weight but the scale doesn’t define me. I refuse to let that set the tone for the day.

If you are struggling too, please know that you are not alone. It is a journey and it will have ups, downs, twists and turns. We have to just keep going.

– Monica