web of lies

how many of you have ever told a lie?

can there be lies that are worse than others?  are the lies that we tell ourselves worse than the ones that we tell others?

i simply cannot count the amount of lies that i have told myself over the years:

 1. you’re not pretty enough

2. you’re fat

3. you’re not smart enough

4. you’re smaller than that other girl, so you don’t have a weight problem

5. i can hide my food addiction so it isn’t really a problem

6. i can lose weight quickly, whenever i want to

7. ect. ect. ect. ect….you get the point.

are those lies worse than the ones that i repeatedly told others? things like…

1. i ate this healthy thing and that healthy thing today.  (when i really ate something horrible)
2. i worked out today! (um, no, you didn’t)
3. i slept wonderful last night! (besides that 30 minutes you spent eating in the middle of the night, right?)
4. i am feeling great! (no, actually i am feeling bloated from that fast food that i just ate…that you clearly don’t know about)

i was extremely successful last year at losing weight, i had absolutely no reason to lie about what i was eating or doing because i was doing everything i could do to better myself.  when i took my hyper-focus off of losing weight, the weight came back, and it came back quick.  i was embarrassed, frustrated, mad, angry, defeated.  that’s when the lies started coming back.

first it was lies to others because i couldn’t have them knowing that i fell off the wagon, then it turned into lies to myself.  i let the devil creep into my life and i let him sign a year long lease.

i was a prisoner to the devil and the negativity i allowed him to feed me.  i became someone that wasn’t me, i don’t even know who that person was, well, i do, it was the devil disguised as a person named Emily.

my relationships suffered, my body quickly went back to an un-healthy state and i became a shell of what i once was….all of this while my relationship with the devil was flourishing and thriving.

the devil will keep renewing his lease in our lives until we evict him.  there is no easy fix, no “3 simple steps to kick the devil to the curb” book.  it takes work, and i am in the thick of it right now.

i came to the conclusion that my addiction to food couldn’t start with just simply changing my diet or going for a walk after work.  i needed help, professional help to have a better chance of overcoming this once and for all.  i sought the help of a professional Christian counselor that specializes in addictions of all kinds.

i have to figure out the “head game” part of this addiction.  last year i changed the way my body looked and felt, and i was successful, but i never tackled what was going on in my head.

i don’t claim to have the answers:

but, i KNOW that God is good and He is good all the time.  He is helping me break the lease that i signed with the devil.  He is helping me repair the damage that i allowed the devil to do in my life so that He can move in and sign a permanent lease.

addiction is hard and is generally out of our feeble ability to overcome, but God is always standing next to us willing to help, we just have to ask.

 

 

 

 

 

gimmick

**This post is not meant to offend anyone that represents any of the products mentioned below, this is just my personal opinion**

In the days of social media, I am sure that we have all been inundated with advertisements for products that promise to “get skinny quick” or “take this pill and drink this shake and you will look like this”… those products offend and make me angry.

I would be lying if I said that I hadn’t been intrigued by some of them prior to starting my weight loss journey.  The thought of taking a pill or wrapping myself in plastic wrap to get skinny quick instead of putting in the work with my diet and exercise is appealing.  How could it not be appealing?  What I am doing is hard and it isn’t all rainbows and unicorns, sometimes I just want the “get skinny quick” magic pill because I am tired of watching every calorie that I put in my mouth and making sure that I am staying active enough.

But, the elephant in the room is….do these products really work? or are they just ploys by companies to capitalize on our obese nation and the push to get healthier? It seems like weekly, there is another new product that promises the impossible.

Okay, okay, okay…promising the impossible might be an exaggeration, I should have said, promises the impossible WITHOUT changing your diet and exercise.  If you have to change your diet and activity to get the products to work, then what’s the point? You can lose weight WITHOUT a “magic” option…so wouldn’t that make the “magic” option void?

Ding, Ding, Ding….

A lot of these products don’t mention anything about having to change your diet and the need to exercise until they DON’T work, then it becomes the number one excuse….”Well, the products do work best when combined with a change in diet and exercise…” DUH! You mean wrapping my body in saran wrap isn’t going to make me look like all the “before and after” pictures I see all over the internet??? Common sense would say, no.  Those people wrapped their body in saran wrap, AND, changed their diet drastically, as well as worked out.

Another product that that I simply do not understand is one that claims to make you “happy all the time!” Enticing, right? I want to be “happy all the time!”  But, you have to take a pill, drink a shake and put a patch on to get the results, and if you do not do them all in the EXACT order the company says at EXACTLY the right times, it may not work.  Convenient excuse for the company when their claims don’t pan out, put it back on the customer, they simply didn’t do the process right, sorry! Another thing that concerns me is that it is no wonder the product makes you “happy all the time!,” it has 6 different kinds of stimulants in it.  They say that up to 400mg of caffeine a day appears to be safe for most adults.  Since the ingredients are listed as proprietary, the manufacturer does not have to list the amount (mg) used, so it is therefore unknown how much caffeine/stimulants each product contains.  What no one has addressed, and I have asked several promoters of this product, is how does the body handle the inevitable “crash” when the product isn’t being taken anymore?  With that many stimulants, it seems like a crash and a feeling of “not happy all the time!” is looming.

Well, I have a way that you can save lots of $$$$ and get the same results!  Wait for it…..it’s called HARD WORK.  Whoa, there is a concept that isn’t easily accepted in this society.  I have lost over 50 pounds and in turn have a higher self esteem by good old fashioned working out and changing my eating habits.  Yes, I have used different methods of those things along the way (examples:  Weight Watchers and 21 Day Fix), but I would consider neither of those “gimmicks” because they still involve YOU making the ultimate change, there are no impossible promises.

Dieting and losing weight is no joke.  The weight didn’t come on the body overnight and it will not come off overnight either.  There are no two ways or gimmicks around that, it is simply a fact.  I have worked very hard over the last 6 months to get closer to my end goal and frankly I am offended by the messages that I get that say,

“Emily, you look fantastic! I have this amazing product that will help stimulate your activity level and will make your weight loss easier! contact me for details!”

“WOW, girl, you must be feeling amazing! I am just wondering if you might be interested in this wrap that will tighten your extra skin from your weight loss”

I am not interested in those products, I am interested in working hard and achieving my goals.  I put this weight on my body and it seems as though it is fitting that I have to work hard to take it off, so I KNOW the reality of my old habits.  Quick fixes fix nothing and the odds are that you will need to try another one in a couple months because you are right back where you started, just several hundred $$$ poorer.

I am proud of this “gimmick” free weight loss!

MY hard work is paying off!