S Weekend FAILURE - I can't do this

gettheweightoff · Post by **gettheweightoff** » Sun Jan 16, 2011 3:38 pm

So I did fantastic all week and then Friday night came where I had a party so I considered it an S day. I indulged and then my cravings came back with a vengeance and before I knew it I was an "idiot" and went crazy. Whenever I binge I feel awful the next day and then start binge eating more the next day because my cravings are all over the place.

Needless to say I had two days of going crazy and falling off the wagon so to say.

I feel like a complete moron and that I just can' do this. What's the point of eating rather healthy in the week, feeling very in control and then a "treat" can set me off into a full out catastrophe.

I know I'm not supposed to make modifications but I just don't think "treats" are good for me in any way because it never seems to be enough for me.

I feel like a failure at this and think this is just another plan that I can't do.

I'm bloated, feel badly about myself and ready to throw in the towel. I am feeling sorry for myself so I sound rash but I know I will stick this through because I like how I feel on No-S days. I just hope to control No-S days in the future.

Did anyone have this problem at the beginning and overcome it because right now I am just so upset to ruin my habitcal with failures and also gain back the 2lb loss I had in my first two weeks.

Urgh, I'm so frustrated with myself.

NoelFigart · Post by **NoelFigart** » Sun Jan 16, 2011 4:14 pm

Stop. Stop. Stop.

Deep breath.

You need to FORGET about S days for awhile. Seriously. They're off the hook, even if you're being an idiot. YOU CANT FAIL ON AN S DAY.

You haven't been doing No-S anywhere nearly long enough to have those N-day habits taking over for your S days. YES YES YES they're going to be a bit extreme in the beginning. THAT IS OKAY. You're letting outraged perfection (as Reinhard puts it) get in your way.

If you relax and stick to this for say, six months, you're going to find that the N-Day habits are going to spill over onto S-days. It is going to take a LONG TIME, and you've really been obsession about minuscule granularity here.

The point of No-S is to let habit take over and put you on automatic. NOT to focus heavily.

Is it scary for someone who has dieted his or her whole life? Yes. It's something Our Founder missed because he WASN'T a lifelong dieter by any self-report I've seen. It's even scarier to someone who reads a lot of magazine articles about health and fitness, because you're going to be strongly encouraged to micromanage your eating. Why? The very profitable diet industry is invested in you being SCARED so that you'll buy their products, fail and then keep buying more. If you SOLVE your weight problem, you're no longer a CUSTOMER. If you've spent 30-odd years dieting, you're scared -- scared for your health, scared for your looks, scared you're just this spineless, worthless mass of appetite.

You're not. YOU aren't. Really. You've just developed a long-term habit that isn't working for you. That's all it is. YOU are a perfectly intelligent person who has managed to use habit to your advantage in many other areas of your life. Those habits are so strong you don't even think about them, though, so you're not giving yourself credit.

If you have kids, do you feed them every day?
Do you wash yourself regularly?
If you have a job, do you show up for work?

But if you've yo-yo dieted, if you've micromanaged your eating unsuccessfully, if you've been in the habit of guilt about everything you've put in your mouth but a dry salad, then you've got that power of habit behind you. See how STRONG that is?

That's the bad news.

The good news is that you can get that to work FOR you, too. The N-days are where you start. Have your 3 (or whatever) meals a day. Don't eat otherwise. After a period of several months, that habit will get so very strong, it will spill over onto S-days. But it won't and CANT do it up front. Utterly impossible with so very many years of other habits tugging the other way. It's okay if you drop the rope for now, really.

You really will be okay. Promise. Just DONT PANIC.

wosnes · Post by **wosnes** » Sun Jan 16, 2011 4:16 pm

Tell us exactly what you did/ate that made you an idiot. I suspect that it's not nearly as bad as you think it is. In reading your posts, I think (and this is certainly my opinion only) that you're very hard on yourself. The first time you wrote about something like this happening, what you described as a binge, I barely thought was a small splurge.

We've all had these things happen, especially at the beginning, and it's just part of the learning curve. I don't think there's any of us who haven't had this happen at one time or another. Also, I think NOT to expect them to happen is unrealistic.

And I want to remind you of something: YOU CANNOT FAIL ON AN S DAY. That's why they're there.

Sienna · Post by **Sienna** » Sun Jan 16, 2011 4:34 pm

First of all, deep breathes. You CAN do this, so stop saying that you can't - you are only psyching yourself out. Remember you are SUCCEEDING at the "hard" part (the N days). You just need to find your moderation for the S days.

I think the biggest piece of advice is to worry about getting the N day habits down solid-solid-solid FIRST, and then (and only then) worry about taming the wild S days.

Yes, that might result in some weight gain while you get the habits down, BUT in the long run it will help you cement this as a lifestyle you can live with. It's like when you are doing massive organization in your house. The first step is often to pull things out of closets and drawers - creating an even bigger mess than you started with! But that is the easiest way to see everything and move forward.

Now, getting back on track can be tricky. I think that the best thing you can do, is to not think about things in time units of days or weeks, but in terms of instants. So no, "Oh, I screwed up, I'll restart Monday/tomorrow/after AwesomeHoliday" But, "crap, that isn't what I was supposed to do. Oh well, restarting now. " This may mean throwing away food you are currently eating. And if you are place where you can do it, even spitting out food.

I remember a day when I first started. It was an S day, so I thought I'd give myself a little treat - a spoonful of honey. I really wanted that super sweet smooth tangy treat. So, I poured myself a small spoonful of honey and put it in my mouth. And as I did that, I realized that I didn't *really* want the honey. I liked honey, but I wasn't doing this because it was a delicious treat or because I was hungry - I was doing it because I was having sweet cravings. So (since I was at home by myself with no one but the cats to judge

) I spit it out. Right then.
And for me, that was a big turning point in the diet. Because it was the first time that I looked at it as a continuous process and as a bunch of tiny individual events and decisions instead of as a bunch of discrete days strung together. So you don't fail a day, you fail an instant (or a few instants), but the rest of the day can still be a success. It made sticking to things and not letting little bumps become de-railing binges a lot easier for me.

Give it time. You'll have your moment too. That one where things just click. Or where you realize that things clicked a month a go without even noticing.

In the meantime, just work on loving and encouraging yourself through this Journey. And taking one second at a time.

Starla · Post by **Starla** » Sun Jan 16, 2011 5:12 pm

I want to second everything NoelFigart said.

I know I've said this to you before, but YOU CANNOT FAIL ON S DAYS!! You can binge and splurge and eat until you vomit, and it is not a failure. It's a learning experience about what eating experiences are pleasurable to you. S days are a release of the pressure that builds up over the week, especially in the beginning when you are adjusting to a new way of eating. I think part of your problem is that you're not truly allowing yourself that release. You're afraid, and you're fighting a constant battle between "I WANT THIS!" and "I CAN'T EAT THAT - IT'S FATTENING!" You don't need to fight that fight on S days.

This is for the rest of your life. Looking at things long-term, do you really think it matters what you ate this weekend? It doesn't.

You can do this!

Summerwine · Post by **Summerwine** » Sun Jan 16, 2011 5:21 pm

Oh dear, sounds like you need a big hug.

You wonder what the point is of eating well during the week. That's exactly the point: you eat well for five days. Would you have stuck to a good eating routine for the whole working week if you weren't working so hard on it? I doubt it. But you have, so well-done, you.

So you went a bit crazy on the weekend, so what? You're allowed to do that, that's the point of S-days, particularly in the beginning. I'm also just starting out, and trust me, I'm stuffing myself right now - but I feel OK about it, because if I wasn't doing the NoS, I would have also stuffed myself on Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday and Friday.

I hope you can forgive yourself for not being a creature of perfection. It's really OK not to be.

*hug*

Summerwine

gettheweightoff · Post by **gettheweightoff** » Sun Jan 16, 2011 5:35 pm

OMG I can't even believe how amazing, nuturing, supportive, caring and helpful you guys are.

You took the time to write such encouraging and supportive words that have really helped me.

I think I just need to relax, calm down and keep going because it will get easier. I really did panick because that feeling of eating so much and such "bad" food makes me feel so out of control.

I started again today as a No-S day and already feel better. Hopefully next weekend will go better.

I really do need to get this "diet head" out of my system and I've been dieting for 27 years so it's not going to go away after 3 weeks!

wosnes · Post by **wosnes** » Sun Jan 16, 2011 6:42 pm

gettheweightoff wrote: I really did panick because that feeling of eating so much and such "bad" food makes me feel so out of control.

Oh, you've hit one of my biggest pet peeves! For your purposes at this time in following No-S, food is neither good nor bad, healthy nor unhealthy. It's food. Snacks and seconds aren't what, but then they're consumed. Sweets are only for S days. But all are FOOD.

Nicest of the Damned · Post by **Nicest of the Damned** » Mon Jan 17, 2011 12:58 am

wosnes wrote:Tell us exactly what you did/ate that made you an idiot. I suspect that it's not nearly as bad as you think it is. In reading your posts, I think (and this is certainly my opinion only) that you're very hard on yourself. The first time you wrote about something like this happening, what you described as a binge, I barely thought was a small splurge.

I want to hear about this enormous binge, too.

Remember, there is no "bad food" on No S. All foods are allowed on S days. Yes, even whatever horribly fattening and nutrition-free thing you're thinking of right now. You could smash the existing world record in a hot-dog-eating contest on an S day, and it wouldn't be a failure. The only foods that are not allowed on N days are sweets. Everything else is allowed, as long as you eat it as part of a single-plate meal.

Right now, your S days are a bit out of control. That isn't always going to be the case. This Friday night (which was an S day dinner for me, since I begin my days at dinner time), I made stuffing. When he was putting up the leftovers, Nicest Husband commented that we're eating less. I made the amount of stuffing we would normally eat, and half of it was left over. There was nothing wrong with the stuffing, it's just that we've gradually gotten used to eating less. My S days were not like that when I started No S. I didn't think, then, that I would ever eat less on S days, not in a billion years. But now, six months in, I do.

Two days of falling off the wagon and going crazy is pretty much exactly what is supposed to happen on No S, at least at first.

Eventually, you won't eat as much even when there are no restrictions telling you not to. Better yet, you won't feel guilty and panicky about eating certain foods, the way you do now. That won't happen right away, but it will happen one day. You're trying to undo 27 years of habit. That's not easy, and that won't happen overnight.

gettheweightoff · Post by **gettheweightoff** » Mon Jan 17, 2011 1:37 am

I appreciate the encouragement more than you will ever know. I was feeling so distraught and mad at myself for feeling like I failed especially since I was really feeling like I had this binge eating under control with no-s.

As far as listing what my "binge" was it would be way too embarassing and humiliating to list everything for both days and I don't even know if I could remember everything since I pretty much ate all day on Saturday and Friday night and even at 3am. I assure you it was a lot of food and pretty disgusting but surprisingly enough it wasn't even as bad as what I used to do to myself before no-s. It was bad enough that I had a "food hangover" the next morning!

I will keep at this and make sure that I perservere. Hopefully one day if I ever see a message like the one I posted I can be like you guys and help them out the way you have helped me!

I'm already feeling better. I was at a family function and had my one plate, no dessert because really isn't two days of going wild enough even though today is technically still an s day.

kccc · Post by **kccc** » Mon Jan 17, 2011 3:04 am

gettheweightoff wrote: I assure you it was a lot of food and pretty disgusting but surprisingly enough it wasn't even as bad as what I used to do to myself before no-s.

Listen to what you said in that sentence. It may have been disgusting, but it was BETTER than before.

I'd call that progress.

And the fact that you had a "food hangover" from it is also positive. That's your body telling you that it's getting used to saner eating, and prefers it.

Part of the learning process. Not all learning is fun, but it is still learning.