Beck ... Week Five

Well, I'm five weeks into The Beck Diet Solution and this week has been a little different. Honestly, first of all, I have been pretty busy all week and I felt like I ran through each day's chapters rather quickly. There were truths in there that I had to really think about, but I didn't have the time to give them full attention. So, I have decided that I will be continuing to read and reference this book well past the next week and the technical "end" of the program. I will need to come back and take maybe a week or two to really implement some of the techniques.

Having said that this week was dealing with handling difficult food moments, such as:

• Eating at a party or celebration. Will you eat whatever you want, or will you choose according to the plan you're following? I had this experience last weekend with two different birthday parties. The first one I ate according to plan. A light lunch and only one bite of a cupcake simply for the purpose of tasting my friend's new frosting recipe. It was perfect and I was very happy with my decision. Sunday I ate a little more at the party and then had the cake incident later that night. Not the best way to handle things, but Sundays are always a little different and I would've been fine with what I chose to eat at the party had I not eaten more cake and junk later that night.
• Alcohol consumption. This was by far the easiest chapter for me...because I don't drink. :) At all. Never have, never will. I've cooked with wine once or twice, but that's it. It was nice to have a chapter that wasn't a huge challenge, for once. I can't imagine having to battle the love of brownies and an alcoholic beverage while losing weight. Oh, the calories....
• Emotional Eating. This is something I was already on my way to dealing with, so it wasn't so hard for me to address it this week. My emotional eating problem is boredom and avoiding tasks. I am not a so-depressed-I-ate-a-half-gallon-of-ice-cream girl, more like I'm a so-happy-to-be-enjoying-the-food-and-friends type of girl. A happy eater, so since "happy" is also an emotion I fall in this category very well. I'm learning to either, step away from boredom by reading a book for a few minutes, or making myself get to my task, whether or not I want to instead of munching on food to avoid it. This is still a work in progress, and I have a feeling that it always will be.

So, there are a few things I reviewed and/or learned this week. As I said earlier, I am planning that as I finish up the book this next week I'm going to begin attacking one or two chapters per week in each week following, instead of per day. I think this will allow me to give more than one day to a topic that I might struggle with more than others. Then I can successfully get those new habits and ways of thinking some time to sink in for good. :)

Have a great weekend!