What a Long, Strange Trip It's Been

Five years ago today, February 11, 2008, I ended a year of dieting and reached my goal weight of 145 pounds; I’ve been maintaining a 100-plus-pound weight loss, give or take, ever since.

Sometimes, in the day-to-day slog that is maintenance, I forget how ecstatic I felt that day. Life seemed unreal and magical. Everything I’d always wanted was in my grasp. I remember it as a time of enormous energy and enthusiasm.

A lot has changed since then. I suppose it had to. Maintenance is hard, folks, really hard. It’s not easy to sustain that initial rush of euphoria when everything around you appears hell-bent on enticing you to eat all of the foods that made you fat. The basic message has seemed to be this: if you want to stay at this new and lower weight, YOU must make whatever accommodations are needed; asking for changes in the environment, well, that’s just downright unreasonable. After all, it’s only one little cookie, right?

But I’ve decided that five years of struggle is enough. My goal for the next five years is to find a new paradigm for weight maintenance, something more peaceful and uplifting. I don’t know what that looks like yet, but the thought is pretty intriguing. And invigorating. I’ve also come to see that the last five years have taught me something and I don’t think I could have learned it any other way:

Being healthy is a journey, not a destination.