The Six Week Plan [umm, make that 3 weeks]

This was supposed to be a redemptive post. A post about new beginnings, about a treat free weekend, and about an earnest commitment to salvage what's left of my honor and dignity by seeing through the last three weeks of what was supposed to be our Six Week Plan.

But tonight there is only weakness.

Three or four weeks ago I committed to help Michelle in her efforts to get back to her pre-pregnancy weight. Since the Christmas season we'd been battling [unsuccessfully] the tendency to indulge. Then three months later, in an effort to reclaim ourselves, we swore an oath to live treat free lives for the six weeks or so leading up to my birthday. Apart from the carrot of slimmer figures, we also put some tax return money up as a reward to frivolously spend on ourselves if we met our goals. All we had to do -- or at least all I had to do -- was to go without treats and to exercise regularly.

Michelle has done relatively well these past three weeks [or at least that's what she says.] But my heart has mostly only been half in it -- committed in the mornings, but looking for wiggle room by the evening. Such double-mindedness has lead to minor eating indiscretions at the office [e.g., a single donut two weeks ago, brownie bites on consecutive days this week etc.] and non-treat -- but no less caloric -- bowls of cold cereal late at night. Frankly, it's been the worst of both worlds: too few sweet treats to satisfy me, and yet none of the weight loss benefits of resisting.

Michelle seems to have taken great delight in pointing out my comparative weakness.

Something needed to change, and yesterday morning, feeling familiar stirrings, I re-signed a pledge promising not to eat treats for the next three weeks -- the last three weeks of our six week plan. I told Michelle about it and even made it through the day and evening without indulgence. Since it was a Friday, it was a doubly-difficult feat. I felt back on track.

Tonight, though, we attended a church function. A game night, celebrating St. Patrick's Day. Yes, desserts were to be provided, but we wouldn't partake.

Not three minutes after we arrived, though, I found Michelle with a giant chocolate chip cookie in her mouth. In between chomping the cookie, she mentioned something of getting back at me for the donut I'd eaten two weeks ago [I hadn't told her about the brownies this week.] Two minutes later, she was munching another cookie -- just as large as the last one. What was I supposed to do?

At that moment there was probably someone, somewhere, doing something against all odds to keep a committment they'd made to themselves or someone else.

Alas, it was not me. I started in on the brownie bites, followed up with the oatmeal raisin cookies, and finished with a chocolate cupcake or two. [No, actually I think it was 3 cupcakes, and probably 4-5 cookies.]

So I cannot write tonight of strength and honor, discipline and self-control. I can only write of the oft traveled road of over-indulgence, regret, and the painful reminder of Thomas Jefferson's famous words: "We never repent of having eaten too little."

Hopefully tomorrow I'll be able to make the committment stick.*


* To those of you tempted to counsel me to moderation -- rather than the feast or famine mentality manifested by this post -- thank you for the kind thought. Since Christmas, however, I feel no more capable of moderation than of holding back the tide. So we'll be sticking with the feast/famine approach for the time being.