Sunday, August 30, 2009

Something to Celebrate


This week was my birthday. I have always loved having a birthday in August. It is the end of summer time and everyone is trying to still celebrate the warm weather and freedom before the changes of autumn come around.


This year, I decided to give myself a birthday present...I decided to give myself the gift of health, confidence, self-control, and a big thing for me right now...weight loss. I told all of my family and friends that I didn't want food to be a part of any of our celebrations. I was completely surprised at the reactions I got.


Every year I go to dinner with my parents around my birthday. This year, I told them I just wanted to go to a movie instead. My dad was so worried about it. He kept trying to find a way to work some kind of food into our night out. He told me that he knew I was trying to be more healthy, so he wondered if we could go out for a salad. I told him no. No food in our celebrations. Then he asked me if I wanted him to bring me some fruit and we could snack on it during the movie. I told him no. When we were sitting in the movie, he kept trying to talk me into a diet soda. I told him no. It was really hard for him not to want to celebrate with me with some kind of food.


I had countless friends who called me during the week who wanted to go out to dinner or lunch. I kept telling them no, that I would really like to do something that didn't involve food. At first people were at a total loss...but then we thought of a lot of other things we could do. During the week and with different friends I went for a walk, I played golf, I went shopping, I went to another movie, I started planning a vacation, I went and had my palm read, I went to a cabin with a bunch of friends and we ended up talking late into the night.


I really had a great week and learned that I am a strong person. It is really hard not to give in to the social pressures that surround us involving food. We use it to celebrate and to socialize and I learned that I don't need to use it that way. I can enjoy being with my friends and family wihtout having food being the center of the experience. That isn't to say that I am not going to enjoy food and that I am totally taking it out of my socializing, however I am saying that again I learned another lesson in control and in truly giving myself what I wanted for my own birthday. Because of this attitude and decision I lost another 3.5 pounds at my weigh in again this week! Hooray!

3 comments:

  1. Happy Birthday!!!! Sounds like you were very strong and determined to change your celebrations. That's wonderful. It really is hard for some people to celebrate without it involving food. It's just programmed in us at such a young age. It becomes habit. And for so many people, it's there way of nurturing you.

    Keep up the great work!

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  2. I'm behind in my reading, so first off - Happy belated Birthday!

    Celebrations & food - that is a tough combo to break but it sounds like you did a terrific job.

    Congrats on enjoying yourself the way you wanted to insead of just doing what everyone is used to doing.

    Congrats on the loss as well!

    Hope you are having an excellent week!
    Lynn

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