I've reached my breaking point

Yesterday morning I stepped on the scale, 181.6. What the heck am I doing to myself!? I honestly don't understand this self-sabotage. Yes, I'm beating myself up about this because it's about time someone did. I'm angry for letting this happen, and it has to STOP!

I've been down this road so many times in my life, lose a ton of weight and gain it all back. This cycle has been repeated numerous times in the past 40 years. This time I refuse to be defeated. Not again.

The best advice I ever heard on losing weight
About two years ago I was in a Weight Watcher meeting when our leader said something I've never forgotten. He said we get the best results when we make drastic changes. Little changes give us little results. No changes, no results. Big changes, big results.

When I think back to each time I lost weight consistently, I was tough on myself. I weighed and measured my food, I ate within my Points, I tracked everything, followed the healthy eating guidelines. I tried to be perfect every single day.

I was a Nazi with my eating. Nothing past my lips that I thought might hinder my weight loss. Every week for months I consistently lost weight. Maybe a small gain every few months, but I was the poster child for Weight Watchers.

When I hit 85 pounds lost I thought, as we all think, I WILL NEVER GAIN THAT WEIGHT BACK! NEVER! Famous last words.

Some people might say who can live a life like that? Always watching what I eat, always trying to be perfect. That's the point, "try" to be perfect. I know I won't be perfect all the time. There will be times I'll eat junk I shouldn't, or eat too much, but I have to at least make the attempt. Lately I haven't even been trying that hard. I kind of do, then I kind of don't. Enough already.

Rules
I need rules. I'm a big rule follower in my normal life. I need to set rules for myself for weight loss. Rigid, solid boundaries, and I need to adhere to them.

Rule #1 - Weigh and measure everything I eat. After all this time I should know how much is a cup of milk or 4 ounces of chicken without the measuring cup and scales. Actually, I do know, but I want to eat more so I cheat. Kind of silly when you think about it. The only person I'm hurting is me with my cheating. No more guessing.

Rule #2 - Stop eating at 9pm. No more binge eating at midnight. Fight the urge with everything I've got.

Rule #3 - Drink water! This is so easy, but somewhere along the line I stopped drinking water.

Rule #4 - Cut out the processed crap, like Weight Watcher ice cream bars. It's crack!

Rule #5 - Treat my Points like gold. Budget them, make the most of them.

Rule #6 - Get some sleep! I'm running on 4 to 5 hours of sleep a night. Very bad. I have a new bedtime. 10pm or earlier.

Exercise
I'm good on the exercise but I can still be better. I read an article today in More magazine about stepping up the exercise. The article was Are you pushing yourself hard enough? It said even if you may think you're working out hard, but you could probably work out harder, and should to get the maximum health benefit.

You have to keep pushing yourself, heavier weights, different exercises or different variations of the same exercises. The book I bought at Costco, Women's Health The Big Book of Exercises, is the best $12 I've ever spent. I love this book!

My plan for exercise is to have a plan before I get to the gym. I spend too much time deciding what I want to do. I should know what I want to do when I walk in the door, not plan as I go. I could probably squeeze in another exercise or two if I had a plan. Pick out the strength training exercises before I get to the gym.

Conclusion
I can do this. I've done it before and feel confident this is doable. My first goal is to get down to 172 by April 15. Eight pounds in four weeks. I know that's aggressive, but I'm making some aggressive changes.

Update - 3/12 6 a.m.
Yesterday was the first day of my new plan. It was a success! I even slept eight hours last night.

I'll admit I felt kind of hungry most of the day, a feeling I'm not use to anymore.

I measured and weighed everything. 21 Points isn't very much food, so I used 5 of the weeklies and 4 of my Activity Points (I earned 7 yesterday). Still didn't seem like a lot of food.

No night binge since I was in bed by 9pm. I'm down to 180.0 this morning. Down 1.6 from yesterday.

I also started wearing my pedometer again, trying to get in 10,000 steps a day (Of course, I don't wear it at the gym :). I didn't even come close yesterday, only 3,000. I'll try to do better today.

I'm feeling 100% more like myself today. I wonder if a good night's sleep had anything to do with it. :)