The Switch

Years ago, I was a smoker.  I mean, a real smoker, not just one or two puffs here or there, or only when I was out, although that's how it started.  No, I was one of those people who woke up in the morning, made a cuppa, and had a cigarette.  I smoked while driving (blech), while talking on the phone, while reading, during work breaks. It was ingrained into my daily living.  And it was crazy.  For someone like me, who started life with serious health issues, including multiple bouts of pneumonia and chronic bronchitis, to smoke, that is cray-cray, as Chickadee #1 would say.

And then, one day, I wasn't a smoker.  It's not just that I stopped smoking, although I did.  What I mean is that, something had to happen mentally before I could think of myself as a nonsmoker, rather than a former smoker who struggles against a tobacco addiction and is in danger of falling back into the clutches of the demon weed.

I've described that smoker/non-smoker mental magic as a "switch" to people who ask me how I quit.  I can honestly say that I didn't really quit -- I just stopped.  I never had a craving that I can remember (other than one particular day when someone was driving me crazy) and only twice since then have I put a cigarette to my lips -- throwing it away after one or two puffs in disgust.  So, what happened?  It really was like a switch had been thrown.  What had seemed so impossible was possible.  What had seemed so unlikely was reality.  I wasn't a smoker.  I didn't want cigarettes.  I didn't have cravings.  I wasn't in a bad mood.  I was just a non-smoker, living my non-smoking life.

I bring this up because I went to bed yesterday, praying that the way I am currently feeling means that "the switch" has been thrown.
I feel happy, y'all.
I feel powerful.
I am doing fairly easily staying well within the caloric limits that are outlined on Sparkpeople (1400 to 1700 calories per day).
I'm drinking my water.  All of it.  Every day.
I'm even eating the right kinds of foods, as you can see in the charts below (this is one of my favorite Sparkpeople features -- a daily nutrition report that shows how you are doing along a number of parameters).

I've signed up for The Color Run in November in Charm City and enlisted my lovely sister and some cousins to join me. Training for that, I started Couch to 5K (podcasts courtesy of the National Health Service in England) and, although it nearly killed me, I completed Day One (Day Two is today).

Before the run

After the run.  LOL

I even didn't react in disgust when the scale this week showed that I'd regained 3 of the 4 pounds I lost last week.  I know that I did everything and more that was required of me last week and that, if I truly have gained weight, it's only from retaining water (cue "I Enjoy Being a Girl,"  a song my college roommate would sing ironically every 28 days or so), if you know what I mean.  Prior to "the switch" having been thrown, I would have been really depressed and angry about the gain and would most likely have accompanied my morning coffee with a cinnamon roll or a danish, rather than a nice healthy bowl of oatmeal.

Of course, I have to bring in U2 to this discussion.  I know they are publicity hounds and annoying to a lot of people.  But, heavens, they speak to me sometimes -- I can't think it's coincidence.  They recently released a new album, "Songs Of Innocence".  Immediately, the standout track for me was "Every Breaking Wave".  This video from rai3 (Italian tv) has a live performance with just Bono and The Edge.  If you can ignore the really annoying moving graphics in the background, the lyrics are just breathtaking.  The parts that really speak to me are the refrain and the bridge.  

The refrain says, in part:

Baby every dog on the street

Knows that we're in love with defeat

Are we ready to be swept off our feet

And stop chasing 

Every breaking wave.

The bridge says, 

The sea knows where are the rocks 

And drowning is no sin.

You know where my heart is

The same place that yours has been

We know that we fear to win

And so we end before we begin...

This time, I'm not going to end before I begin.  I'm not -- Bono tells me, and I must obey, LOL.  

So, I'm still hopeful.  I'm still liking SparkPeople.  I'm still drinking water.  And I'm going to do my podcast run thing tonight.  

Go me.  

:-)