I gave up

You may recall that a month or so ago I was resisting the world of diets. Looking into my shopping cart, you would find a variety of not terribly unhealthy food items that would tempt and tantalize my palette. However, as the weeks passed, something changed: I gave up.

There are many reasons I joined the dieting world I had brushed aside so certainly just weeks before. There was the ever increasing size of clothing I found myself wearing. Faced with a size 18 pair of jeans, I realized I was dangerously close to not being able to shop in "regular" stores. And then there was that pesky scale; either it was broken or the needle was going up and up because I was *gasp* getting heavier. Yes, those were fairly compelling reasons in and of themselves, as was the chest pains plaguing me, that may well have been anxiety, but with a family history of heart disease like mine, who wants to take the chance. But truly, the most compelling reason of all was diabetes. Not that I bare that diagnosis mind you, but the threat of it was there.

I had been borderline diabetic during my last pregnancy. It was not fun poking myself with a needle 4 times a day to double check that I'd eaten correctly. But it was a good lesson: this is your future if you're not careful! And I got to know my body and how I responded to high blood sugar, I got to the point that I could tell by how I felt if my sugar was too high. So there I was one day, fat and puffy (it was the swelling that first captured my attention), reading online about what could cause water retention. Suddenly it clicked: I felt exactly like I did when my blood sugar was too high. And that frightened me. At age 25 (for the 5th time), being diabetic threatened the whole future of my life. It's one thing to choose not to eat sugar, it's another to know that by choosing to eat sugar you are killing yourself one cell at a time.

So there it was, the swift kick I needed. I jumped on the band waggon and got myself a diet. Atkins is what I chose. It offered a yummy variety of foods, and the lowest glycemic level of any other diet out there. I can eat as much as I want as long as it's "legal" within the Atkins plan. And like a true Internet junkie, I joined a Low Carb diet forum.

So am I miserable? No, actually I'm not. I'm 17 lbs less than when I wrote my waisting away post, and I don't have to go hungry. I exercise daily, and I have more energy than I've had since, well, probably since I got married and started packing on the pounds. And best of all, those size 18s are now so big I'm thinking of sending them back to the goodwill for someone else to enjoy. Perhaps I should slip a card in the pocket to let them know how well Atkins has worked for me so far...or maybe that would just be rude. In any case, I'm glad to say "I gave up!"