Progress Report and Lent

So when I renewed my commitment to restoring my health and reducing my weight on January 1st, I think I weighed about 361 lbs. Does that shock you? I probably shouldn't tell you that my highest weight was 436 lbs at my 5'1" height. It's documented in my medical chart. Not surprisingly, I felt like I was dying. I probably was. So fast forward to now. January 1st I gave up sugar, flour, gluten, processed food of any kind, meat, and dairy. I still eat an occasional egg from happy chickens (my neighbor's hens.) Of all those things, sugar and processed food are without a doubt the hardest. If I want beans, I need to make them from scratch. If I want to make a tortilla out of leftover green smoothie and flax seeds, I need to make it and dehydrate it. And sugar? Sugar is ubiquitous. It is in every product and every recipe. I struggle to find a salad dressing or any condiment that doesn't have it (thank goodness for carrot-ginger dressing! It's already really sweet from the carrot.) I can use dates to sweeten things but I have not done so much because I want to lose the taste for concentrated sweetness. I have also avoided restaurants (saving money plus so hard to find places I can eat) but my sweet sister has treated me to a few vegan meals out. I really love A.N.D. Cafe on Burnside. Cons: it's tiny and you have to wait for a table, and the wait to get your food is really long too. Pros: the food is awesome and they have lots of gluten free options. Anyway, it's been 48 days since I started again. (Yes, I started again. I will always start again. I will never give up.) I weigh in on Mondays and I was 338. This puts me ahead of my goal, which is to take off 10 lbs or more per month. At that pace, I will reach my ultimate goal by Christmas 2016. That will be quite a Christmas present! Since January 1st, that would be about 23 lbs, so right on track with time to spare. It hasn't been easy, but I'm extremely determined. I stayed on track during Valentine's Day. My sweet daughter sent me sugarless gum instead of chocolate, bless her! So that brings me to Lent. I have a theme for this Lent and that theme is Enlightenment. Really, that is my theme for the year! I want to enlighten my body (quite literally!) and lighten up in my possessions and in stress and worry. I am lightening up in debt (they're going DOWN, just like the scale.) I am also going to redouble my commitment to my job that I LOVE and I am so happy and lucky to have. Quite simply, I need to focus on working while I'm at work and not being distracted by checking email,etc. So no non-work related internet period. Truthfully, this should have already been happening but it slipped away from me. I am going to make that my Lenten sacrifice, along with t.v. shows I don't think are pleasing to God. I am going to be transformed by the renewing of my mind. So for the possession enlightenment, I am getting rid of 40 things every day of Lent except the Sabbaths. I will try to sell some at my estate sale, and what ever does not get bought will be donated, but it is on it's way to new homes. This is probably going to be very hard for me because I tend to cling to possessions. But the truth is, if you don't let them go, your possessions will possess you. I have a wonderful friend, salt of the earth (I need to call her, actually!) and she has so many neat things that she has gotten at thrift shops or inherited or bought, but her house is so overflowing with things that you can't appreciate any of it. She has beautiful china that is dirty all over the house and linens that are dirty on the basement floor. She just has one son but they have enough clothes for 10 people. She is not a wealthy person. She is on food stamps and barely getting by. And yet she has wasted money on these treasures that have become burdens. In the past, that was me, too. I had every craft, but no time or place to do it because my house was full of junk. Cleaning anything took 50 times longer because I had to move and arrange so much stuff. My parents passed away and I am tasked with going through their things and getting rid of most of it and keeping a small amount of the useful and the beautiful and the things that just remind me of them so much that I can't bear to part with them: my mother's art, my father's carefully amassed record collection. Getting rid of their things feels like losing them all over again. It is just. so. hard. I have failed miserably at it so far. Now it is imperative that I make substantial progress and get it done. I am working at it every Saturday until it is done. Maybe my plan is too ambitious. Maybe I will fail spectacularly. But I want big results so I am making a big effort. Like my food plan: no one can say that is easy. But I already feel better. I can walk farther. It's working and the pounds are coming off. Through the grace of God I am sticking to it. So I am going to work to make this Lent substantial and meaningful. Bring on the enlightenment.