Balance

Hope ya'll had a great 4th of July! We had a lot of fun in my neck of the woods. Down here in Nashville we take our Independence Day ve-ry seriously!

My crew went to our local park for music, bouncy activities, and a family picnic followed by the symphony and fireworks show. So I made homemade Carolina pulled pork BBQ as the entree, hubby made homemade salsa, and mom-n-law made her famous potato salad. It was a fabulous feast with lots of other fixin's as well. So even though food was going to be an important part of this event, I brought along magazines, books, cards, dominoes, a camera, and football. I wanted plenty of other things to do other than snacking and eating my way through the evening. So I enjoyed my meal and then moved on to other activities-I also abstained from dessert and perpetual chip noshing... I'm almost nervous to say this...but I think I achieved...balance. Food had its place. We gave it the attention and praise it deserved, but it wasn't the main focus. And ultimately this is really what I want to achieve with the lapband-the skills to enjoy food in small doses at the right times-and then be ready to move on to the really important stuff. Making food my purpose and joy is really an empty experience-even when I'm stuffing it in. I wanna be done with that. And last night was just a small taste of that freedom.

Aside: decided to enjoy a diet Pepsi for the holidays after a few weeks of abstaining. Only drank 4 sips. The first burning sip was almost overwhelming. But after that, I really just lost interest... I'm thinking this is getting easier...

Weekly Goal: I still need to work on my 7 PM snacking deadline and be more conscious and deliberate about saying NO to this useless emotional habit.