Surviving Dieting

            A lot of people have congratulated me on sticking to my diet and a couple of people have even asked how I’ve managed it. Short answer is that I’m not entirely sure; every time I walk past a drinks machine sporting a rainbow of colourful, vibrant labels and holding the promise of carbonated, sugary goodness I cry a little inside and I have the most intense craving for battered food. It’s so strong that I can’t trust myself with looking into my local chip shop and the guy who runs it, who I previously stopped and chatted to regularly, has asked my friends if he offended me somehow. At some stage I’m going to have to brave it and go in and explain, but I’m going to wait until my withdrawal has run its course.

            The simple answer to the question, “How do you maintain you diet restrictions?” is by constantly saying no to myself, but doing so with a positive attitude. I very quickly accepted the fact that for this to work, I was going to have to commit wholeheartedly and adapted my thinking to suit. I’ve spoken to a lot of people who feel they’re missing out or being cheated some how out of enjoying food because they are dieting, and I’m sure everyone’s heard someone who shared their sentiment. This dooms your diet to failure – maybe not immediately, maybe not even after a couple of months, but it will happen and your diet will be abandoned like a first born girl-child under Chinese single-child policy.

            So how have I managed not to lose hope yet? And why do I think I will keep to my diet when others might fail? Going back to the wonderfully politically-correct single-child policy metaphor, I have cut my girl-child’s hair and dressed her up in boy clothes. Translated, I turned the diet into something I wanted rather than something unwanted. This was not an easy process, I will freely admit, but I acknowledged the fact that sacrifices would have to be made if I wanted to avoiding needing to buy two tickets if I went on a plane. I think this is one of the most important stages of getting on the diet wagon (which has no sugar content and is constructed mainly from tofu) and, subsequently, one of the most difficult. As such I will try to (briefly) explain how I did not succumb to despair and leave my diet in a ditch somewhere.

            I am quite a habitual gamer and I really enjoy problem solving and/or strategically planning my way through obstacles. So my first response to making the decision to go on a diet was to phrase it differently:

LEGENDARY CHADVENTURES:

Mission Slay Gregory

             A brief explanation of this title and why it helped. A while ago my youngest brother came home drunk and greeted me with, “All right bro? Good? Good. And how’s Gregory?” After a short but confused exchanged he explain that he had decided my stomach deserved its own name and he had chosen ‘Gregory’ because we didn’t know anyone by that name. The rest of the name appeals to my sense of the dramatic and my ego. I also liked the coining of ‘Chadventures’. This made the diet three important things – a challenge, fun and mine. The challenge made me approach it laterally and made it more interesting. By making it enjoyable – this blog, gym session jokes, outrageous descriptions the effects of eating certain foods, etc – I enjoy and don’t lament the things I deny myself (so much). By making it mine, I put myself in control of it. By making allowances here and there, such as aiming to balance each week rather than each day, not giving up all the foods I enjoy and allowing myself to exercise into more food, I keep control of the diet and it becomes part of my life rather than taking it over.

            And that is the central part of why I can keep motivated, I think – the diet isn’t everything in my life. It’s part of it, but it just means if I want a pub dinner I have to walk the mile or so there and back to make sure I can keep within my limit. I don’t have to give eating out or fast food a blanket ‘NO!’ when considering my options (although I pretty much have with fast food). If one day I go over my limit, or two or even three days I go over my limit the diet (and my life) haven’t fallen apart because a) I can still exercise to work it off later in the week, b) even if I don’t I can still go back to it and c) the diet is not my life. This allows me to escape depression when I, for example, go to Cornwall for a weekend and subsist on bacon and rum which clearly wasn’t a healthy diet. But I had written it off knowing I could get straight back into the exercise/diet regime when I got back, and I have.

            So mostly I keep motivated by being able to deal with failure. The other part of it is I really don’t want to be fat any more; this really strikes home when a friend dresses up as you by literally shoving a pillow under his shirt. So I keep motivated by dealing well with failure and not wanting to consist mainly of very saturated fat; a combination of self-disgust and indefatigable egotism. When I reach my goal all that will remain will be the latter, which I’m sure will be wonderful for everyone around me.