Habits

Good habits, bad habits ... once formed, they provide a sense of ease with which you go through the paces of the day.

I have been consciously trying to re-form some habits of mine these past several weeks. One small step at a time, I seem to be succeeding at this challenge I have placed before myself. One habit at a time.

It seems that the secret to my success thus far, is in adding good habits into my life.

Getting up early to exercise seemed like it would be a hard habit to get back into, after replacing exercise with extra sleep and nurturing myself in the mornings. But as I started sleeping longer, I lost the extra time that I used to make for myself before I started my day.

In the 3 weeks that I've kick started myself into some form of exercise in the morning, I have had more time to myself than I did before I started exercising. I have unaccounted time left over at the end of my morning routines. And I love it!!!

This weeks challenge has been curbing the eating at night habit. To make this more attainable, I challenged myself to not eating after 7:00 pm. To tell myself that I'm not eating after supper sounds too hard. Giving myself until 7:00 feels like I have the choice to have a little snack if I want to. The amazing thing is, that I haven't even wanted to! I have succeeded at this goal for 5 nights now.

Keeping busy at night makes the evening snacking challenge at bay. I heard that night time eating is emotional eating. And I believe that. When the day is done and it's time to kick back and relax, I admit that I am most likely eating when I would rather be enjoying the quiet company of another adult human being. I crave my alone time, but I do remember how good it used to feel to sit back in the arms of the man I loved and not say a word. Just exist in quiet harmony.

That is not my reality right now and I am perfectly okay with that. I just have to find a substitute for that nurturing that I crave in the evenings. It is tricky because having a conversation takes energy so I'm not really inclined to pick up the phone and call someone. My tendency is to nurture myself with TV or a book. Both are good options ... but both go very well with a snack!

One of my other emotional eating habits comes to play during the day. Surrounded by kids all day, every day I have found myself getting in the habit of having a very, very large bowl of ice cream after my lunch (after the kids have all been tended and I have 10 minutes that I can sometimes call my own). The soothing sensation of that rich and creamy ice cream (with M & M's or chocolate chips stirred in, to add to the calorie overload) soothed my frayed nerves. I was in no way hungry for anything other than that sensation of taking care of 'me', in the middle of my day.

I ran out of ice cream last week and didn't replace it. That helped to ease me out of the ice cream treat in the middle of the day (topped with an ice cream treat at night, if I was feeling needy). I have since replaced the ice cream (Kurt likes to have the ice cream option) and I haven't been tempted. It is kind of akin to taking that one drink ... or that one cigarette, after you've kicked the habit. Sometimes 'one' is all it takes to get back into the habit.

For every habit I am trying to break, I find the need to add a new habit into my life. These past weeks of breaking habits seems to be succeeding because I am adding something into my life, for everything I am taking away.