Your cheatin' heart...

[William] I've asked my younger sister Joannie to help a brother out and write a post for me on what she does to motivate herself to stay on track. Like me, my sister has struggled with her weight for most of her life. Happily, the last few years have been spent alternating between being pregnant and losing pregnancy weight. She's a stay-at-home mom to a pretty awesome brother-in-law and three beautiful children and spends her days attending to three little mouths and six little hands.

Today is a glorious day! The children are visiting their Yaya and Yoyo and my husband is working! Do you know what that means? That means I am the only one in the house! Bliss! Joy! Peace! Quiet!

Uh-oh. I sense diet disaster ahead.

Today is one of those rare days when I get to do anything I want and that means I will eat anything I want because I don’t have to share it with anyone. If I want an apple, I can eat it in the middle of the living room instead of having to hide in the closet so that I won’t have to peel three others. More importantly (and more dangerous to my diet) I can have a bowl of ice cream without having to share a single spoonful. I can already tell I will not be getting a star on my Cheat Chart.

I made the “Cheat Chart” because I don’t go to WW meetings and I need a way to track progress. The chart is very simple. Each day I stay in my Points range I get a star. At the end of the week I record my weight, weight loss/gain for the week, and total weight loss to date. This easy process helps me to identify my danger spots (weekends) and reminds me of my total success.

As you can tell from the picture, I cast off my diet at almost every opportunity. But I know from months of Cheat Charts that if I get 3 or 4 stars for the week I will maintain my weight. If I only get 1 or 2 stars, I will gain weight. If I get 4 or more stars, I will lose weight. You’d think I’d aim for 4 or more stars a week but things are not always so easy. I have three small children and they can make dieting both easy and difficult, BTDP (but that’s a different post).

I would probably have no trouble dieting if I could pick one food that was free of Points. I’m sure everyone on WW has thought about this. If you could have any one food magically become free, what would it be? Go ahead and think for a minute but you’ll quickly realize my idea is best.

My ideal free food is flour. I’ll be you’re wishing you’d thought of that. Think of the possibilities! Think of all the things that require flour -- pasta, bread, cake, cookies. The list is endless. Homemade bread requires only four things – flour, water, yeast, and salt. That means a whole loaf of bread would be free! Homemade pasta requires flour, water, and one egg. That means a whole batch of pasta would be two points! Think how much you could eat if bread and pasta were free! Desserts would still be high in points because of the butter and sugar (which are 2 and 3 on my list of free foods, respectively) but I’m sure I could find a way around it.

I have other really great wishful thinking ideas. You see, I spend most of my day hanging around doing very little. The children oftentimes don’t want to play with me, they want to play around me. They want me to sit with them, doing nothing, while they play. This is very boring but it also gives me time to think. I know what I want if I could have only one wish (free shopping at Walmart), one Super Power (telekinesis), and one skill (read, speak, and write every language in the world). See, I’m brilliant. I bet you wish you’d thought of that.

[William] Kudos on the dino stickers! And for the record I'd pick pork (food), 28 hour days (wish), ability to fly (superpower) and the ability to kick a 105 yard field goal with 100% reliability (skill). But that's just my opinion...