I wrote a letter to myself!
Dear Sandra
I am writing to you to remind you why you started out on this journey. Newsflash! You are fat! And it’s not like you like being fat, in fact you absolutely hate being fat. And because you hate being fat you get depressed about it and you eat because you feel bad about yourself. You “try” to lose weight but you give up quickly because you cheat. Then you get fatter and eat more because you are depressed about still being fat.
You decided to do LighterLife because you wanted to do something serious about your weight. You are sick of being fat and you are doing something about it. OK so maybe it won’t be easy, but nothing is going to be as easy as it was for you to eat all that food in the first place.
You are not hungry, you can’t be your body is in ketosis so it is impossible. If you want to eat then there is some reason in your head for it, figure out what this reason is. You are a grown woman so things like “I’ve had a bad day” or “I’m tired” don’t cut. You are not a child, in fact you are a mother now. There is no reason for you to eat until you reach your goal, you are not hungry. And even if you think you are hungry, you’re not! It’s physically impossible so grow up and take some responsibility for your actions. So what if you get bored of the food packs. If you cheat then that just leaves you one step further away from giving up the food packs and eating again.
This eating plan is temporary. Being fat lasted much longer. You managed to stay fat for years but you can fix that in a few short months so stick with it. Then you can learn to eat food appropriately and enjoy the remainder of your life without being fat.
OK, so you might hit a rough patch, but don’t eat, eating only makes you feel bad after you have done it and when you feel bad you are more likely to eat. This is a vicious circle and you have decided to break it so don’t even attempt to draw that circle again.
You don’t want to be stick thin, you just want to enjoy clothes. Imagine being able to walk into any shop and be able to look at clothes without having to sneak a look at the sizes and end up buying shoes or accessories instead because nothing else will fit.
Think of the photos at Sarah’s wedding. Do you want a constant reminder of how you failed at this promise to yourself or do you want to look back and know you looked and felt great?
Think of Julia. Do you want her to be an only child? You are not going to allow yourself to get pregnant again until you lose this weight so if you give up you are giving up on her and on your future children. Do you want her to have the same issues as you have with food and end up fat herself? No you don’t because you know how unhappy you are being fat and the last thing you want is for Julia to be unhappy.
Think about it. Do you want Julia to lose her mother at a young age? At your starting weight you are putting yourself in danger of heart attack, stroke, diabetes, cancer... Do you think your body would be able to cope with a serious illness in its current fat state? No, it won’t!
If you are having a tough day, get over it. You are an adult. All adults have tough days but not all adults are fat like you. Learn new ways of dealing with tough days and really concentrate on the reasons why you are most tempted to eat. Record them and learn to replace this temptation with something else.
Only you can do this. This is the most important thing you will ever do for yourself. You deserve it. You are a good person, you just made some bad food choices in the past. You are a wonderful mother who longs to be able to be more energetic and confident for the sake of her daughter.
You will succeed because you truly want to. Take it one day at a time and before you know it your dreams will have come true and you’ll be a new you.
P.S. If you are reading this letter because you were tempted, congratulations. Instead of eating you decided to read this letter which is already an improvement on eating automatically. Remember how you felt when you wrote this and continue on to your goal.
Love Sandra
