A new year, a new game face.

I must admit, for the past couple of weeks, I've felt like a mouse, constantly poking its head head out, scoping out the scene, and retreating back to its hole until it feels safe enough to scurry about in the open. And it hasn't felt safe until now.

As I sometimes tend to do, I've avoided blogging because I've been ashamed of my eating habits over the holidays, which ultimately led to packing on some extra pounds.

I wasn't so much ashamed about the weight gain itself as much as I was ashamed about my actions and behaviors that led to the gain. From the day before Christmas Eve through New Year's Eve, I more or less ate whatever unhealthy food I could get my hands on and ate with complete abandon. I had a few days of healthy eating in between, but if I had the slightest craving for something sweet and/or fatty, I acted on it almost immediately.

I did keep up with my workouts, but they barely made a dent in the amount of calories I was consuming. It was pretty ridiculous. But what's done is done.

I've been back on track since Friday and feeling loads better. It's still hard coming off of the junk food fix, but each day gets easier. My clothes fit better, finally.

I know that prior to the train wreck that was the holidays, I was on the Cheat Your Way Thin soapbox. Well, obviously that didn't last. Even before the holidays, I had stopped losing and actually gained a pound. This was primarily my fault because I did exactly what you're not supposed to do and I let the "cheat" days turn into full out binge days. But on the regular on-plan days, I was hungry, deprived and craving EVERYTHING. Seriously. Even stuff that I don't usually indulge in or care about, I wanted all the time. It was pathetic.

Even though the plan sounded great and logical on paper (which it still probably is), it turned out not to be great and logical for me. Sure, I still need structure in my eating plan, but being allowed to only eat certain foods on certain days was starting to take its toll on me, mentally. And fixing my mentality toward food is something that I've been trying to correct for months now.

Sooo, the past few days, I'm back to not only eating healthy, but eating the Healthy Tamara way. I need to eat in a manner that feels natural to me. And waiting to eat apples until Tuesday or holding off on oatmeal until Friday didn't feel natural at all. My normal way of eating is damn-near perfectly balanced and doesn't leave me anxious, so I'm not sure why I try to fight it so much...

I guess since this was my first holiday season at my goal weight, I panicked and wanted to make sure I wouldn't gain, hence trying some new-fangled plan. I certainly don't regret trying something new, but overall, my attitude and actions led to self-sabotage. I basically doubted myself for no good reason. Again, not the fault of CYWT. I take full responsibility. In fact, I'm glad I gave it a shot because it helped me to recognize what types of things work for me and work against me when making day-to-day choices about food and fitness.

One pretty important change that occurred as a result of trying CYWT was that I finally forced myself to cut back on my workouts while also making them more efficient. And now that I'm maintaining my weight and not necessarily trying to lose (with the exception of the next couple of weeks, heh), I needed to figure out how to break my 6-7 days/week workout habit that was leaving me over-trained and frustrated.

Going on the plan also forced me to pay better attention to my macronutrient breakdown of calories, day-to-day. I didn't completely ignore it before, but I'm much more aware of it now and seeing it over the past few days has been encouraging because everything seems to be in balance. And I haven't had to deprive myself or feel like some kind of crazed, guilty maniac.

Oh, maintenance. You're a tricky little bitch. But you and I will live in harmony eventually.

I haven't been a fan of New Year's resolutions for quite a while now, but I do have one for this year; I want to become a member of the National Weight Control Registry. I want to maintain my loss for a year or more. I do not want to become part of the group of people (what is it, like 90+%?) who gain back most of the weight they lose. F that, I say.

So for now, I'm back to being best buds with The Daily Plate, looking forward to feeling stronger and leaner with each workout (which has been fun and challenging so far, thanks to the 14" jump-box my boyfriend made me for Christmas!) and really, just forcing myself to pause and take a deep breath when I start to feel overwhelmed, be it with food, fitness, work, money or love. Last year left me feeling like an emotional, frustrated mess most of the time. This year needs to be different. My health depends on it.

Checking in.

Helllooo out there. I haven't fallen off the face of the earth, but still felt I should post a brief update.

Things are going well. I'm still following the CYWT plan. Feeling great, still eating my usual favorite healthy foods and, duh, enjoying the day of food-freedom each week. Physically, I'm looking better too. My arms, abs and chest (gasp! tee-hee) are all toning up nicely.

Still not ready to post weigh-ins yet though, and for a couple of reasons: A) I want to wait until I've been on the plan longer to make better sense of my overall progress and B) I'm FINALLY reaching a point where I just don't give a shit about numbers anymore. I've reached a size that I'm happy with, so as long as I'm feeling awesome AND looking awesome in my size 8's, I can't really be bothered with the scale too much. It made me crazy for a lot of months (moving from weekly to daily weigh-ins sure as hell didn't help) and that craziness went on to have negative effects on my diet and workout routines (i.e., over-exercising to make up for overeating).

I think I've finally reached a new level of balance this week. Feels like it, anyway. I've only been working out 3-4 days a week (instead of the usual 6-7) and since I've pretty much done away with counting Weight Watchers points since Thanksgiving (and of course following the CYWT program instead), I'm much more conscious of my food choices and feel like I'm finally treating myself better, instead of feeling like I was constantly being watched by the All Powerful WW Points Gods.

Don't get me wrong- following WW and losing all that weight was awesome, but it feels liberating to eat more mindfully as opposed to constantly asking myself "do I have enough points left to eat this?" It was making me insane during those last 20 pounds to goal and as I tried to move into maintenance.

I'm still tracking everything on The Daily Plate though, just for sanity checks and to see my macronutrient breakdown, which is something that I kinda need to monitor throughout CYWT. And I'm cool with that.

Anywho. I'm finally killing my anxiety toward food and finally starting to see what this maintenance thing is all about. It's sucking a lot less these days, actually. I've fully acknowledged and made peace with how I need to eat and exercise for the rest of my life. I think I used to have a general idea, but hadn't yet fully grasped the concept until now.

Speaking of exercise, I've been doing a mix of sprint intervals at the gym (alternating between the treadmill, bike, elliptical, stairmaster and sometimes, rowing machine), Tae Bo (with Body Bands) and I've re-kindled my love affair with lifting this week. I'm not gonna lie- I'm loving my arms these days. I mean, I'm feeling some serious toning all around, but my arms totally turn me on, haha. Shoulder presses & deadlifts FTW.

I think that covers everything for now. I'm not even fretting over the holidays and the clichéd weight gain. So far, I'm making December my bitch, thanks to the Holiday Calendar Joel made for the CYWT program. I know, I keep plugging it over and over, but it really has made things so much more relaxed and fool-proof for me. Definitely a change I needed to try. Hooray for progress! Hope everyone is doing well.

A few more things...

As if my last post wasn't long enough, I still managed to leave out a couple of things...

-RE: The Cheat Your Way Thin program... No, I did NOT pay $97 or whatever it says on the site... Because I was already on Joel's mailing list, I paid a fraction of that, thanks to some special limited-time-only sale price. And I did get just the basic program, none of the "upgrades." It all just seemed unnecessary.

That said, should you like to get on the mailing list (not just for special offer alerts on the program, but for *free* general fitness/food tips), I would suggest going to his main blog site, Body Transformation Insider first. From there, just sign up for the "Fat Loss Secrets Exposed" thing and that will add you to the list (that's the only way I've figured it out).

Otherwise, you can visit the contact section of the site for his Twitter/Facebook info.

-I discovered Emerald's Cocoa Roasted Almonds this weekend. OMG. I know they've been out for a while, but I forgot about them until our trip to Sam's Club this weekend. Perfect almond option, in my opinion. So far, I've exerted some major self-control and haven't finished off the whole tub in 2 days. Definitely one of those proceed-with-extreme-caution kind of snacks, but worth a try if you're looking for a healthier sweet treat alternative.

Phew. Ok. I think I can shut up for a few days now.

Obligatory Survival Post

Well, the interwebs have been flooded the past few days with blog updates, tweets and articles all about Thanksgiving and post-Thanksgiving eating and recovery. That said, I guess I might as well add to the pile. I wasn't going to at first because of the low points I experienced, but I've made some awesome progress the past few days, so I felt the need to share.

But first, let us back up to Wednesday before Thanksgiving. Oh man. I had just started that time of the month and I was just plain HUNGRY. Insatiable. Well, between PMS cravings and the bottomless pit that was my stomach, Thanksgiving Eve did indeed turn into an all-out junk fest. And I will be honest, knowing that the next day was Thanksgiving, I totally used that as an excuse to overeat. It was a bad move in retrospect, but one positive that came out of it all was that I wasn't guilt-ridden. I just didn't care. No, I shouldn't have ate all of that crap mindlessly and with complete abandon, but the fact that I didn't completely hate myself afterward was kind of a big deal. I'd like to think of it as major progress, with regards to my binging issue.

Thanksgiving Day: Yeah, I felt kinda crappy, but I did some cycling, Tae Bo and weight training anyway. Felt better and was still excited for the big meal. Even though I was still digesting Wednesday's nonsense, my goal was to keep a positive attitude and enjoy the next round of mucho food.

And I did. Everything was delicious and rich. But leftovers later that evening proved to be a mistake. That night, I really packed it in to the point where I felt kinda miserable.

Even though I felt like crap, I was determined not to hate myself and start entering that cycle where I beat myself up, both mentally & physically. At the same time though, I needed to regain focus and control. That's where Cheat Your Way Thin comes in.

Yes, it sounds like a total fad diet. Yes, the information page gives off kind of a cheesy, questionable vibe. Yes, it costs money and therefore poses a risk factor.

So why the hell did I pay for this program? Well, I had been signed up on Joel Marion's (the program's creator) mailing list for about a month or so already, so I had grown familiar with who he was and some of his general fitness/food tips. I think I originally came across him through another personal trainer blog I follow...

ANYWHO. In the newsletters, Joel spoke more and more about his program and I was intrigued. When I found out it cost money, I told myself "No way." I'm not sure what caused me to change my mind that Thanksgiving Day... Perhaps it was desperation... All I know is that the more I read and the more I heard about the program on other personal trainer blogs that I do indeed trust and respect, the more convinced I became. I made a few clicks, paid and downloaded the program materials.

Since I paid for this, I'm not going to go into every last little detail, but so far, I'm soooo pleased. The program is basically built around carb-cycling with a "cheat" day worked into every week. There are of course specific guidelines to keep you from screwing yourself over and making bad decisions (i.e., binging), but not so many that it's not feasible. And the big selling point for me was that Joel created a special Holiday calendar where he basically maps out your whole first month on the plan, starting with Thanksgiving, which is indeed the first "cheat" day. He works in the rest of the month's "cheat" days around other upcoming holidays and potential holiday parties and it's just awesome. Talk about a ton of pressure and anxiety being lifted from my chest almost instantly.

As I read through more of the program material, I discovered that YES!, there is indeed a maintenance phase. After I jumped into buying the program, I worried that maybe there wasn't a maintenance phase and that doing this program would defeat the purpose of making lifestyle changes for the past 2.5 years. But Joel did not disappoint; he breaks everything down to the point where it's basically fool-proof and sustainable for a long period of time (i.e., the rest of your life).

When I finished reading everything, I said to myself, "yes, I can do this." And it all makes sense, really. Perhaps I could have developed a similar approach on my own, but I simply hadn't read the right combination of research to figure it out. (And Joel does indeed do his research; a lot of the science-type stuff he writes about matches up with a lot of articles/books I've read about certain hormones, how they impact your weight and how they're impacted by certain combinations of food and exercise.)

Bottom line: I feel pretty damn great today. Still eating healthy and still tracking what I eat on the Daily Plate, but moving away from tracking Weight Watchers points on top of that. I'm slowly breaking away from OCD-like food tracking methods that were making me insane. This weekend I noticed, probably for the first time ever, that I am indeed capable of making good food choices on my own, without chanting in my head "I'm on Weight Watchers, I must watch my weight, I must stay in control, etc."

I'm not sure if that made sense, but essentially, it's the closest to weight-loss maintenance that I think I've ever been. I was eating for fuel, I was enjoying what I ate and I had subconsciously picked the right combination of foods to make sure it was all balanced and beneficial to my health. And I wasn't freaking out about points or calories the whole time. I wasn't freaking out about anything. I felt, dare I say it, normal.

Moving on- I'm down to 155.8 today, over two pounds less than I was pre-Thanksgiving. Between PMS bloat and binging bloat, I totally saw the 170s on Friday. Yes, I know I didn't actually gain that much in such a short period of time, but it feels soooo good to be back to my "happy" range.

I'm TOTALLY ranting here, I'm sorry. I just feel so much better and so much more optimistic than I have in a really long time. I don't want to be cheesy and say "And I owe it all to Cheat Your Way Thin!", but I'd be lying if I said it hasn't helped put a lot of things into perspective. Just goes to show you that it is possible to become burned out on a certain tried-and-trusted routine, and that it's ok to poke around and find something new to give you a boost and a better chance at success. I'm feeling empowered and much more sure of myself than I have in a long time. (And no, I didn't get paid or receive any free swag for plugging CYWT.)

I'm NOT saying "Oh go out and buy this program because it's only been a few days and I feel awesome and you will too!" Who knows what kind of results I'll have after the first month? (I'll update here, of course.)

I guess I just felt compelled to share my recovery plan and how good it feels to finally give myself credit for how strong I've become. The past few months have seen waaay too much self-hatred and guilt, so it's been awesome to have some moments of clarity the past few days. I will NOT regain 90+ pounds (in a week, in a month or ever) and I WILL live a happy, healthy and balanced life. No freaking out required.