On food and exercise
Jun. 15th, 2003 11:29 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
yendiWhile overeating tonight, I came to a conclusion about why no diet really works for me.
Diets are aimed at folks who eat because they are hungry, or eat absentmindedly (i.e., they eat a combo meal at McCraptastic for lunch without even tasting it, because it's there). I do those, of course. But I also eat because I enjoy food. I love new tastes, new textures, new combinations. And if I know something is yummy, I find the idea of wasting it to be a shame. If there are fifty pieces of sushi on a platter, what kind of person would I be if I let one of those go to waste (yeah, we all know what layer of hell I'd end up in, if I believed in it).
But I don't stop there. I also eat because I'm bored. I eat because I'm nervous. I pig out when I worry about someone, or when I'm having a shitty day.
That's the reason Atkins came as close as anything to working for me -- it allowed me to do all that. If I didn't actually like food, it would have been a perfect diet for me.
But in the end, any diet that says that all the wonderful sauces, all the desserts, every fucking potato dish, etc, are verboten, just ain't something I can handle.
I need to be realistic. I can cut back on food to an extent, as I've done in the past. But exercise is what I really need to focus on. Cleaning my room out today revealed my old dumbbells (I call 'em Dick and Dubya). Fifteen military presses with 'em revealed how far I have to go. But this is summertime. I can actually take a couple of hours during the day to hit the gym, like I used to. I'm not expecting the flab to melt away (with the current layer I've got on my gut, I'm not sure the sun could melt 'em away that quickly), but I know that going is a hell of a lot better than not going.
Diets are aimed at folks who eat because they are hungry, or eat absentmindedly (i.e., they eat a combo meal at McCraptastic for lunch without even tasting it, because it's there). I do those, of course. But I also eat because I enjoy food. I love new tastes, new textures, new combinations. And if I know something is yummy, I find the idea of wasting it to be a shame. If there are fifty pieces of sushi on a platter, what kind of person would I be if I let one of those go to waste (yeah, we all know what layer of hell I'd end up in, if I believed in it).
But I don't stop there. I also eat because I'm bored. I eat because I'm nervous. I pig out when I worry about someone, or when I'm having a shitty day.
That's the reason Atkins came as close as anything to working for me -- it allowed me to do all that. If I didn't actually like food, it would have been a perfect diet for me.
But in the end, any diet that says that all the wonderful sauces, all the desserts, every fucking potato dish, etc, are verboten, just ain't something I can handle.
I need to be realistic. I can cut back on food to an extent, as I've done in the past. But exercise is what I really need to focus on. Cleaning my room out today revealed my old dumbbells (I call 'em Dick and Dubya). Fifteen military presses with 'em revealed how far I have to go. But this is summertime. I can actually take a couple of hours during the day to hit the gym, like I used to. I'm not expecting the flab to melt away (with the current layer I've got on my gut, I'm not sure the sun could melt 'em away that quickly), but I know that going is a hell of a lot better than not going.
