Is Balance and Maintaining Achievable?

There are always days of self doubt when you are on a journey to saving your life. There will always be those days that make me wonder, will I always be able to maintain what I have achieved so far.  Or will I fall backwards into my old habits and reverse the amount of sweat and hard work I have put in over the last 2 years.

When I had written the summary of my journey in November I was at the lowest weight I had been at since high school. I was weighing in at 160 pounds and feeling great. That was a number I honestly never thought I would see, it wasn't part of my original goal and I was shocked when I hit that number.  However, the struggle came very quickly though of how to manage through the holidays. 

• How do you decide if it is okay to let loose over the holidays with your family and friends and not worry about the calories you are going to consume over Thanksgiving or Christmas?
• How do you decide if it is okay to have those few days to do so and that it doesn't mean all of the work is over?
• How do you learn to not worry about what the scale might reflect after enjoying those extra calories?
• Is there such a thing as maintaining and not feeling like you have given up and will go back to your old ways?

These thoughts are always in the back of my mind and I struggle with them a lot. It isn't just over the holiday season either. I have a huge fear of ending up back to the person I was. Being the unhappy and self-conscious person that I was. Sneaking food because I was too embarrassed to let my husband see that I was scarfing down cookies or a huge bowl of ice cream. I don't ever want to be that person again, but life sometimes gets in the way and it is a daily struggle.

I have to fight those little negative thoughts in my head on a daily basis. I almost always have temptation around me when it comes to maintaining healthy eating. It could be at home or at the office or just having an outing with some friends. I can't plan every day the way that I want to and I have to find balance. I have to remind myself that the one burger or the one Krispy Kreme isn't going to ruin everything that I have accomplished. That I can log that treat and know that I'm not going to gain 93 pounds back by just eating that one thing. It might taste good but it doesn't determine everything. The one day of not staying on track 100% isn't going to start me over at day 1. It just means that when I wake up the next day I don't focus on what I had the day before and I focus on the new day. It means that I can have balance and not feel guilty about enjoying the foods I no longer eat on a regular basis. 

I'm not going to lie and say that I don't weigh myself as often as I did the past. I get on the scale now more than I wish I did but because that fear of going backwards is always on my mind. I don't want to see that number go up. I don't want to feel like I have given up on me. I feel like I have to prove to myself that I can maintain now and still enjoy life. 

There are truly so many struggles in life and things will get the best of us. But it happens and it is life. But I have to take it one day at a time and know that it is okay. I am maintaining and I'm not sacrificing anything.