To what shall you be true ?

It was a good week for the guys- they lost 2.4 pounds together, which is their average loss. As a female , I have different biological functions to deal with that make my own consistency a rather inconsistent thing. Twice a month I must deal with hormonal shifts that cause my weight loss journey to stall or go in reverse. This week I gained 1.8 pounds, and after reviewing my weight loss records, I spot the monthly pattern. It is normal for most women to experience a gain with TOM, but in my own body other factors accompany , and it seems to turn the mid point in my cycle to another gain, no matter how on program I am.

I deal with adrenal stress as well as Mr Toad's Wild Hormonal Ride ( aka peri-menopause), and it makes the rules for my own weight loss program different from that of the rest of my household. I cannot eat any more than 3 servings of starchy carbs ( I.E.bread, pasta, rice) per day , and they must be whole grain. I cannot eat any more than 3 servings of fruits per day , and better it be if they are low sugar fruits like berries and apples. And then , if that was not challenging enough to live with, I must get at least 7 hours of sleep a night. If I get less, my body is flooded with stress hormones and could gain weigh by looking at pictures of lettuce. Relaxation and enjoyment are as much a part of my own weight loss moves as watching what I eat and moving more.

Last week was a disaster for me because of stress, and the mistake two days of opting to eat garbanzo beans on a salad instead of chicken breast( vegetable protein is a starch , as opposed to its animal counterpart). This fact seems to break the rules of so many diet plans and health experts. We are told to eat low fat, high fiber and opt for plant based protein meals twice a week. They will present you with many studies and figures to back up this position. Then I come back to my own facts and figures- formed by carefully weighing and measuring every morsel that goes into my mouth, recording it all, calculating everything, exercising 45 minutes a day and experiencing a gain because of following the recommendations of experts. I ask myself if it is more important to remain true to a theory based on mathematical results , or to be true to my own flesh and blood based soft machine . Obviously the answer is the latter. I have to keep that fact foremost in my mind when making the choices of how I eat, move and sleep. The goal is the objective here- not adherence to any specific plan.