Longtime JFW readers may remember that I went through a period of about 9 months in 2003 in which I gained weight at a rate equal to scotch-taping a Twix bar to my body every day, and that subsequent efforts to use the online forces of shame to slimnify myself were dismal failures, as have been less public (and, well, less committed) efforts. So, now, I have plunked down money for the virtual counsel of virtual professionals. Besides, much enthusiasm for WW was earlier expressed by JFW readers, so I'm putting my money where your mouth was.
Wish me luck (or, more pertinently, wish me willpower and perseverence). I'll keep you apprised of how this goes.
12 comments:
Best of luck, Jeremy. My mom, who has even less willpower than you (0<.0000000000000000000000000001), has been on WW for the last 3 years and has lost almost 100 pounds.
Just be careful when you get to Boston. If you think Madison has a great restaurant scene....well, you ought to have your head examined, but Boston has some of the finest cuisine in the country.
What comes to mind at a time like this is a scoop of vanilla ice cream, I mean a large scoop of the very best, on a slab of cherry pie right out of the oven, and I'm talking about a made-from-scratch kind of pie with cherries off a tree and not out of a can, made by a real pastry chef. Let's see what you got when you come face to face with oven-fresh caramel rolls, and we are talking 1/2" thick oozing caramel on top of a roll 5x5x3" the smell of which can be detected at 10 meters, with a mug of hot gourmet coffee on the side. And I'm not going to even talk about a pile of Canadian bacon in the morning with 2 big belgian waffles literally swimming in Vermont maple syrup with honest-to-god Wisconsin butter by the glob and a 12 oz glass of ice cold whole Wisconsin milk right beside that platter the next morning either. Red rover, red rover, we call the dieter Jeremy over... it's your mind and what you create that counts, not how you look - why suffer like this???
LDM
Oh, Jeremy, Jeremy. Weight Watchers? Just read your blog of recent travels. Lay off the booze, ol' boy. Eat and be merry. Drink and be Jerry (of extra poundage).
All of you people who are not being supportive need to back the hell off. Efforts to lose weight are difficult enough without other people telling you what to do or how to do it.
Unknown 11:56pm is absolutely right.
What is Jeremy going to do when he comes face-to-face with a 3 layered chocolate cake proffered by some mother who tells him her daughter thinks he is God's gift to Sociology? What advice do you thin ones have for this, huh? Wishing him to become Prof. Anorexic is not as simple as it sounds.
LDM, you are e-vil!
Seriously, losing weight is hard. Trying to lose weight with people around you who are trying to trip you up is harder. Weight Watchers will work. I know you can do it!!!!!! (I'll email you my diet blog link, if you need extra support!)
-jnsys
So much as one french fry in a careless moment or one damn crumb from a brownie or even a wet finger tip applied to the powdered sugar of a gourmet donut and it's all over. I've seen it a hundred times. You think you can stare down a chocolate shake and you will go so far as to order one and set it in front of you, but this will happen far away from colleagues and people that know you. You will face this enemy in some remote ice cream parlor on the outskirts of Madison. You will do this just to prove to yourself that you are stronger than sugar. Sure, you will be able to walk away from it the first time but that shake will visit you often at night, rest assured of that. You will surround yourself with thin people but deep inside there will be smoldering resentment as they gorge on crispy cremes, smacking their lips in sheer delight while you gnaw on tree bark pretending to be happy. Evil ,jnsys, is a hot lemon bar smothered in real, pure whipped cream when that bag of tree bark is forgotten in haste on the way to work, not me. It's the topping that always pulls the hefty ones down, baby. I can talk of custard that wins awards for taste, texture and presentation, but it's the garnish that will catch his eye and break his resolve. He stands alone on this one, all by himself in an open field, facing a line of pies, cakes, ice cream, lemon bars, french fries, milk shakes, pudding, candy bars, with Captain Twinkie behind his troopers their arms linked, taunting, challenging him with the eternal, sweet, alluring chant of, "Red rover! red rover! we call the dieter Jeremy over!"
LDM
Jeez, LDM. I knew you were a total freak, but I didn't realize you were to freakin mean! Have you no faith in Jeremy? Do you think he can make it all the way from small-town Iowa, to getting his Ph.D., to getting tenure, but he can't lose weight? What's wrong with you?
Familiarity, routine, comfort zones, the faces of good friends all plague white collar workers when it comes to shedding a few pounds. He is obviously not obese nor does he have any serious psychological problems, so I suspect when he moves on to Harvard, all that is new and challenging and demanding will bring about the shedding of the pounds he wants off, with or without Weight Watchers.
Anyway, my will is not going to be broken by posts about delicious food. Whether it will be broken by actual appearances of delicious food remains to be seen.
I have a lot of friends who do the WW thing and it seems to work for them. The people who do points seem to really like the flex points option since it means you can still eat dessert, just less of it.
I also have a friend who lost an incredible amount of weight (like a life-changing amount) through a major change in diet and lots of hiking and biking, etc. He still goes out to eat a lot (and has introduced me to some really fabulous restaurants). He still eats dessert. The only thing is that he doesn't really like greasy food anymore because he eats it so rarely that it tends to make him feel a bit sick.
So basically, what I'm saying is that willpower is possible. And also that changing how you eat doesn't necessarily mean abandoning everything you used to love (hence making willpower easier).
Good luck!
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