struggling

I just wrote a long email to a friend who had surgery the day before me. She is struggling. It's hard to hear. I know she doesn't have any support. I'm sure she is bored and she is falling back into old habits.

It is so easy to do. Eating the easy food is easy. It's usually prepackaged. It's usually pretty tasty - think sugar and salt. It's usually justifiable in some way (I exercised today. I'm so hungry I just need to eat something. One won't hurt.) I'm pretty sure we all have done it. I know I have done it - even today.

The thing with surgery is that when we are super morbidly obese, we just want something that will work. We just want the nightmare of our lives to be over. Surgery seems like the one thing that will work. And it does. That is until we overtake the "tool" and make it bend to our will rather than the other way around. When we follow the rules, surgery will work marvelously. But there are ways to eat around the pouch. There are ways to gain weight back after we have lost it. There are ways to be as big as when we started. I know I need to remember this and constantly picture my old life so I don't forget it. So I don't end up back at over 300 lbs struggling with every step and breath.

So, my big scale victory of the week was "Onederland". Yup. I hit 199. It is a milestone that I haven't quite wrapped my head around. I still look at the scale expecting a "2". I am getting smaller and people are noticing even more so now that I am at work. I had someone come up to me today and ask if I am still losing weight. Even though the numbers aren't moving that much, I guess the fat is moving around!

I can't remember if I talked about this before - and I don't want to read my whole blog to find out! - that I feel like I have followed a puzzling command in the Bible. "If your eye causes you to sin, gauge it out. If you hand causes you to sin, cut if off." That is what I feel I have done to my stomach. It was causing me to sin. I have cut it out. I think that is neat. I have a caveat. As I get further out from surgery, my hunger is returning and I am eating more emotionally. There is a chance that soon, it won't be my stomach causing me to sin with overeating, but my mind. I will have to practice self control before that happens.

I was reading a parenting book and it talked about using the word "self-control" to your kids and because it is the Word of God, it does something different in your kids than just using any old word. Also, self control is a fruit of the spirit. If I have the Spirit, which I do, then He has given me self control. I have it. By using it, I can also help it grow in me. Self control will play a big part of my future if I want it to be different than my past where self control was truly lacking.

I must go to bed now. I am typing with one eye closed because I am so tired.

I hope you are well. Blessings to you.