The Unfair World of Dieting

Vince Lombardi once famously said this:

"Winning is not a sometime thing; it's an all time thing. You don't win once in a while, you don't do things right once in a while, you do them right all the time. Winning is habit. Unfortunately, so is losing."

 

Your friendly neighborhood FatMan would like to put a new spin on that quote:

"Dieting is not a sometime thing, it's an all time thing. You can't diet once in a while, you don't exercise once in a while, you do it all the time. Dieting is a habit. Unfortunately, so is spinning your wheels and remaining a fat-ass for the rest of your life."

 

OK, not quite as pithy as the ol' ball coach but believe me my quote is every bit as true. I've run into a dilemma this summer that I can't seem to shake. I will totally commit myself to this diet and do everything right... for about 3 days. Then I find myself at a theme park eating a donut, or at my restaurant scarfing some extra pizza and the whole thing gets blown to shit and I press the restart button. This has resulted in, well, very few results. 

 

I am going to the gym on a more consistent basis, and during my July 4th trip to Universal Studios and a nearby fireworks party I somehow walked 12 miles. And while that is all well and good, you might remember the tirade I went on recently about how working out is a nice thing to do, but won't actually lead to you losing weight. This week I have proved that theory to be utterly, painfully true. I've busted my ass, yet it remains the same size.

 

Now, part of my problem is the blatant unfairness of human anatomy. Regardless of your religious beliefs, whoever you think "created" mankind totally screwed the pooch when it came to weigh loss/gain. Simple math will tell you that 3 days of dieting should outweigh 1 day of binging. Yet somehow one trip to a Chinese buffett can somehow counter-act days and days of trying. How is this possible? Does God suck at math or something? 

And I am still of the firm belief that we, as humans, should get some sort of extra-diet bonus points for resisting temptation. If I eat chocolate cake, I get fat... this I understand. But if I'm offered chocolate cake and don't eat it... nothing happens. This is pure crap. If I turn down a piece of cake, I should automatically lose the weight I would have gained if I had actually eaten it. Any truly kind and benevolent God would have worked these kind of details out. 

 

Now the upside here is that these days I'm getting bent out of shape because I've only lost 4+ pounds in the last month and I'm still 206 pounds. It's a far cry from the days of being 250-260 and waddling to work. But still, I'm impatient and I want it all now... and I still want the ability to eat a donut and not look like Homer Simpson after it.

 

I have a feeling Vince Lombardi would not have liked me very much.