If God Created Food, then the Devil Created Bathing Suits

I put on a bathing suit today for the first time this summer. It wasn't great, but it wasn't terrible. Keep in mind that, after the age of about 10, I never wore a bathing suit without a big t-shirt over it until I was in my early 30's. At that point, I had lost a lot of weight for my best friend's wedding and, when we spent her bachelorette weekend at the shore, I wore...get this...a BIKINI!! Of course I was self-conscious, but looking back at pictures, I looked great! It's doubtful that I'll ever wear a bikini again, but I'm ok wearing a bathing suit in public without a t-shirt (although sometimes I'll wear swim shorts, and am much more comfortable that way.) I still feel like everyone is staring at me and judging my thighs if I walk anywhere, so I try to go from my lounge chair to the pool or ocean as quickly as possible. If someone stopped me and wanted to have a conversation, I think I'd probably have a panic attack. I still consider this huge progress from where I used to be. I hope that one day I'll love how I look in a bathing suit, but realistically that probably won't happen. I did have a bit of a revelation today though. I went to the gym this morning, and then ran a few errands. When I got home, I went into the bathroom and happened to glance at myself in the mirror. I was wearing lycra capris and a fitted tank top, and I looked fine...and I had been wandering around in public that way, and thought nothing of it. Because I looked fine. A girl who spent 75% of her life hiding under big shirts and baggy sweaters running weekend errands in fitted gym clothes...and looking FINE. Pretty cool.

Today was a great day! I had planned on doing 30 minutes at the gym, but then I started watching the Men's Finals at Wimbledon and couldn't pull myself away. 30 minutes turned into 60, and I was psyched about that. I came home and prepped Salsa Chicken to have for dinner, and then went to my pool with my brother, sister-in-law, niece and nephew. The chicken was very easy to make, and good if you like spicy. The recipe called for red pepper flakes and cayenne pepper, but said to leave out the cayenne if you don't want it hot. I should've left out all of the pepper, or put in significantly less red pepper. It came out way too spicy for my taste...my mouth was on fire! I'm not throwing it out, because I have a ton left, but I dumped out all the extra liquid in hopes that some of the fire will be extinguished!!

Tonight I watched Silver Lining Playbook...SO good, and highly recommended! Tomorrow starts Week 3, and I would be half-way through if I was only doing a W30. Instead, I'm about 1/3 of the way through. My goal this week is to cut out snacks after dinner. Last night I finished the last 5 dried apricots, and found myself justifying it by saying, "If I eat them now, they won't be here for me to eat tomorrow." That's always been one of my crazy ways to allow myself to overeat junk food, and there is just no (reasonable) logic there. Tonight I decided that I wanted an iced coffee (on W30 it is suggested that you don't drink caffeine after noon...I've never managed to stick to that.) When I was in the car on the way to DD, I thought to myself that, if I wasn't doing a W30, I'd be on the way to Boardwalk for a peanut butter shake float with vanilla ice cream...and I REALLY wanted to go. But I didn't. Clearly I need to continue working on having a healthy psychological relationship with food. That is one goal of the W30, and for me it's definitely the hardest to achieve.