Me in early 1986 at my highest non-pregnant weight
I had tried just about everything to lose weight from the time my high school nurse expressed shock that I weighed 128 pounds as a freshman. I already got lots of exercise being on the track team, but I added more working out to my schedule. I also went on a very low calorie diet, eating dry toast and having lettuce with lemon juice dressing. I quickly lost 13 pounds; I regained it even faster.
Every year of high school I tried to lose the weight and ended up heavier than before. Then I went to college and entered a world where eating had no built-in controls. I gained the Freshman 15 in a matter of months. I know I don’t look particularly heavy in that photo, but my extra 30 pounds had become a very weighty issue in my life. I jumped at the chance to take a weight loss class in college. The instructor was really nice and the weekly weigh-ins motivated me. I became a walking caloric encyclopedia. At meals, my friends would ask me for the calorie counts of foods and I knew them. I lost the Freshman 15, but I was very despondent about something our instructor had said. She told the class that people like us would never be able to eat hamburgers, pizza, or ice cream.
The following year I read the books, Thin Within and Diets Don’t Work. I became convinced that dieting had resulted in my weight gain and that I could be at my ideal weight without counting calories or restricting certain foods. Within a very short period of time, eating anything I wanted according to hunger and fullness enabled me to lose another 13 pounds. I was ecstatic, but not for long.
Although I never again returned to my freshman weight high, I also was unable to maintain my ideal weight. I couldn’t understand it. I knew that if I ate according to hunger and fullness, I didn’t have a weight problem. I just couldn’t seem to restrict myself to eating when I was hungry and stopping myself when I was satisfied. This was particularly upsetting to me as a future psychologist. I wondered how I would be able to help others make behavior changes when I couldn’t make them myself.
In graduate school, I began lifting weights and briefly tried dieting with my friends again, but to no avail. When I met my future husband, I became more committed to exercise and when we got married I weighed what I wanted to. The problem was that maintaining it was a constant battle. My weight bounced up and down like crazy. The only thing crazier were the thoughts bouncing around my head. I would get up in the morning, weigh myself, and decide that I would be “good” all day. By mid-morning, I had already blown it, so I would commit to eating like a rabbit at lunch. When I blew that, I would promise to do well at dinner. When that didn’t work, I would spend the evening ruminating about my fat and my lack of self-control.
One day I saw the article title, “Can God Make You Thin?” on a Woman’s Day Magazine in the grocery store checkout. I had to know the answer to that, so I bought the magazine and read the article. I was so excited to read that men and women were combining the Thin Within hunger/fullness philosophy with a reliance on God and were losing weight for good. I ordered materials and offered a class at church. At first I quickly lost weight. Then as the months wore on, I had the same disappointing results. I would eat when I wasn’t hungry or until I was stuffed.
As the class facilitator, I was quite embarrassed that I couldn’t succeed. I would dedicate myself to eating extra slowly and reading my Bible before and after eating. But to no avail. The weight was not only not coming off, it was coming back on. After confessing my sin of gluttony and worshiping the idol of food countless times, and after praying about the problem over and over, I don’t know what finally led me to quit. But that’s what I did. I stood in my kitchen, looked up at God, and said, “I can’t do this! I quit! If you want me to lose weight, you’re going to have to do it, because I’m done.”
For the life of me, I cannot recall how I ate after that. But I do not remember always sitting down, eating slowly, eliminating distractions, only eating when hungry or until satisfied. I really meant that I was done. Three months later I finally weighed myself to discover that I was at my ideal weight. I had no idea how I arrived at that comfortable number. I do suspect, however, that God removed my weight problem without giving me a clue how it was done so that when people ask, “How do you stay so thin?” I couldn’t give them the Melanie Plan. God took away that weighty issue and I remained at my ideal weight for five years when I had another crisis that is a story for another time.
in all your ways submit to him, and he will make your paths straight. (Proverbs 3:6)
Whereas brats rarely feel guilt, rebels are quite prone to it. After all, they aren't rebelling because they want to hurt people for the most part. They're rebelling because they feel they know best and refuse to be constrained by silly rules made by people they don't respect. A rebel will respond to the demands of someone on a power trip with intentional sloth. But give them someone truly in need and they will expend all their effort to help. Of course, the helpee is also much more likely to respect said rebel than the overbearing authority figure.
This is an issue to discuss with respect to getting things done because we intuitively know that guilt works to get our inner rebels moving. Their surprisingly tender hearts will often get them up and busy when nothing else will. The problem is we tend to abuse this strategy to the point that it backfires. Guilt is such a painful emotion for the rebel that if we heap it on, the rebel may just plug her ears and ignore us, even when the guilt is appropriate.
Here are some examples of the inappropiate use of guilt as a rebel motivating tool:
How can you stuff your face when there are millions of people who don't have enough to eat?
There are so many unemployed people right now who would kill to have your job and all you can do is whine about what you have to do
Think of all the infertile women who would love to have a child and all you can do is complain about how crazy yours are driving you
Instead, consider posing these guilt-free questions:
What need are you meeting with food that you could meet in more constructive ways?
Is there a way you could make your job more satisfying or are you ready to look for a new one?
When are your children easiest to be around and is there a way you could encourage that environment more often?
Guilt is effective with your inner rebel, but it should be used sparingly. Use it when your grandma is in the hospital and your rebel wants to finish watching all the episodes of her favorite TV show on Netflix before visiting her.
A good clue that you're using guilt to motivate is the word 'should' and its derivatives. What kinds of shoulds have you heaped on your inner rebel to no avail?
For the past several weeks, I have been leading a Bible study using my book, So You’re Not Wonder Woman. The most popular desired life change in our group is weight loss. One of the Wonder Women in the group said she ate to reward herself. And not only that, it seemed like food was the only really rewarding thing in her life. We brainstormed with her for calorie-free rewards and we prayed that God would be her reward.
We Need Rewards
But in thinking more about rewards, I realized I am in need of more of them in my life, too. Can you relate? I have been so enjoying using Things as my task list on my iPhone. I get great satisfaction from checking off my tasks one by one. While I look forward to checking off my tasks, I feel much less inclined to do the things I have to do every day that are checkmark-free (e.g., teaching, laundry, meals, clean up). In years past, I so desired a reward for completing some task that I grabbed a treat whether or not I was hungry. I no longer eat as a treat, but I’m hungry for rewards just the same. Strangely, my children don’t praise me for each lesson taught, every meal made, and every load of laundry folded. My husband, though often complementary, also can’t keep up with my voracious appetite for positive feedback.
Although it’s true that I ought to be content with God’s approval of my service, I find myself so frequently looking for a reward anyway. Unfortunately, the rewards I seek often draw me away from the schedule that I prayerfully developed to deal with numerous demands. The schedule works and when I don’t use it, I don’t.
A Better Reward
So I decided to try something simple this week. And it wasn’t a new brownie recipe! Though since I keep talking about brownies, here’s a guilt-free recipe:
I decided to add my scheduled activities and regular chores to my task list. Now I have things like “Make lunch and clean up” and “Give kids a bath” in Things to check off. Knowing that I can check it off and subsequently add it to my task log for the day encourages me. I may be disappointed by not getting to everything I had planned. But by recording even routine activities, I see how very much I accomplished anyway. Of course, I would like it even better if I got applause and whistles for each checkmark. Hm. I may be on to something here!
This method of rewarding yourself can be just as effective using any other electronic (the HomeRoutines app is great for this!) or paper task list of your choice. If you have a hard time getting through rush hour traffic, a boring meeting, or your kids’ bedtime routine, add it to your list and check it off with pride. Brownies are good, too, but add to the waistline and the weight of guilt for many of us.
As a fat-free alternative, checkmarks are a delicious treat. Try them and let me know if they suit your tastes.
I’m a Christian psychologist turned homeschooling mother of six. My life can be a little crazy, so I look for sanity-saving ideas to use and share. I hope you’ll read my About page to learn more.
