Less really is more, where I live now.

A topic I've been meaning to post on surfaced this morning in my combox.   Margaret (of the doctor's orders to stick to a low-carb diet) commented on my last post that she  chose to have a Double Stuf mint Oreo cookie last night:

I don't think anything has ever tasted so good.

Great!  So, it was... a treat, right?

One of the markers, I think, of having settled on a workable, sustainable way of eating:  I can enjoy real luxuries, indulgences, without ever feeling like I'm cheating or giving in to my weakness or failing.  Some mornings-after, I step on the scale with a morbid curiosity, true, but I don't beat myself up over it.

Why?  Because my treats, luxuries, indulgences, are smaller now, and on the whole, made of better stuff.

Remember, I spent months carefully planning my days' meals to stay within a narrow range of calories. I became aware of the "cost" of every slice of bread or spoonful of yogurt.  I had to accept that it wasn't enough to give up "extras" like sweets, or to skip buttering my toast;  I had to change "1 cup of plain yogurt" to "0.5 cup of plain yogurt" and "3/4 cup baked butternut squash" to "1/4 cup baked butternut squash" and "2 ounces turkey breast" to "1 ounce turkey breast."  I had been eating too much healthful food, readers.   One of the things I had to cut way back was bread, not to be low-carb, but because bread has a lot of calories per bite.

After a while...  a half-piece of whole-wheat toast with butter next to my boiled egg became a rare pleasure to savor.  

Once upon a time, two pieces of buttered toast were nothing special at all; but now... one-half, or one, piece of toast with breakfast is just incredibly good and satisfying.  

I mentioned that I nibbled on the kids' frosted shredded mini-wheat last night.   I had maybe a dozen pieces, but I felt like I'd eaten A LOT.  Not in an  I'm-so-weak-willed I-can't-believe-I-ate-that-much way, but in an I-got-enough-to-be-satisfied way.  I'm aware I can't have a bowlful of frosted cereal every night.  I'm aware I enjoyed a treat.  Once I might have had two bowls of cereal with milk and not really noticed.  These days, a few bites of cereal is something I notice, and enjoy.

On Thanksgiving my sister-in-law brought (for 6 adults and 3 children) one triple-layer red velvet ice cream cake and one HUGE frozen-pumpkin-custard pie, slumping under its load of walnuts and caramel sauce. The cake, which must have weighed two pounds, was pre-scored into six pieces.  I cut my own slice, one finger wide, leaving part of it in the pan.  "That's not a piece!" scoffed my SIL, and I said, "It is for me."  I had a similarly small scoop of the custard pie.  (I raved extra-loudly, but honestly, about how good they were, hoping to make up for the offense of having served myself only a little!)  And I ate them slowly, with my coffee, and enjoyed every bite, especially the walnut-caramel topping, and felt like I'd had A LOT of dessert.

What about really overeating?  Totally pigging out?  That looks different too. 

• Overeating is one whole sandwich instead of a half. 
• Overeating is a second helping of the main course at dinner, and feeling uncomfortably stuffed.
• Overeating is a whole OUNCE of dark chocolate, over the course of a day.  Did that a couple of days ago.  Can't do that all the time.
• Overeating is ten or twelve gumdrops.  That's "boy, I ate too much candy, I couldn't help myself with the candy dish just sitting out like that." 
• Overeating is "I had some chips and salsa, and I didn't pay attention to how many chips it was... might have been 20 chips."  

Whereas overeating used to be a whole bag of gumdrops, or half a bag of chips, or TWO sandwiches, or a big slab of cheese between two slices of bread any time I felt like it, or two burritos from Taco Bell's drive through, or an entire salt bagel (three hundred twenty calories!), or four full plates of dinner.

It took time to get here, but it's absolutely true:  I enjoy eating more than I did when I ate to support 48 extra pounds.  I am paying attention.  

One cookie  doesn't have to be "poor me I wanted to have six but I can't" and it doesn't have to be "weak stupid me I gave in and ate something bad."  It can be... one cookie.  One cookie is a lovely thing.

Comments

[Margaret in Minnesota]

Satisfying. Yes. That is totally the word for that Oreo cookie. One was all I needed, too! Thanks be to God for graces big and small,and stopping at one cookie last night was a great big GRACE.

Oh, and just because I'm a big anal thing, I feel compelled to mention that I am not under doctor's orders to follow a low-carb diet. Rather, I expressed concern about my rapid weight gain and she *recommended* a low-carb diet.

Still. Stopping at one cookie is ALWAYS a good thing.