Let’s talk about a journey today. No, not Journey. Small town girls living in lonely worlds. Do they even have midnight trains? I’m sure they do, I’m not worldly enough to know for sure, though.  Anyway, the journey I mean is the one to better health. You could call it a weight loss journey, or a health journey, whatever you want to call it.  I’ve packed for this journey many times. I’ve gotten out the door, down the street, I’ve hopped the county line, and somehow gotten turned around while insisting I don’t need a map, and made my way back to where I was in the first place.

I’ve done this more times than I can count, especially in the last few years.   I’m starting this journey again, though. I tell myself, it doesn’t matter how many times you try and recede. You can do it as many times as it takes. What matters is the time that sticks. That’s when it counts. No one is keeping score. I can’t just sit and feel bad about the times it didn’t work out, I have to think about what I learned from those times, and take away the things I can do better.

What I can do better is this. A couple of days before the New Year started, I decided to set a personal challenge to myself. No fast food for as long as I could keep it going, on into infinity maybe. This has worked for me in the past, when I gave up soda completely. I had to sneak my body into it, though. I had to tell myself “I just won’t drink soda today” every day for a week. Then I told myself “Well, you haven’t had soda for a week, don’t have it for another week. Hey, two weeks, let’s go for three! The whole month! TWO months! You’ve put in all this work, you’re not gonna have a soda now, are you?”

I’m going to do that again, but with fast food. What gets me and sets me back is compromising. I can’t compromise with this, I can’t do it “in moderation”. I’m not saying it can’t be DONE using moderation, but I can’t do it that way. I’m not built for it, I’m an addict. Going into Wendy’s and getting a salad or a baked potato for me would be like going to a heroin dealer and saying you just want to buy some ibuprofen. Maybe in the future I’ll be able to do such things, but right now it’s not going to happen if I want to see this through. I think blogging regularly about this stuff will help me keep chipping at it, even if the only thing I write is “I want a McDonald’s cheeseburger” eight thousand times like some sort of Jack Torrance pastiche.

So be prepared for more blogging from me, about this. If anyone is ACTUALLY reading this and going on their own journey, please feel free to chime in! Tell me what it’s like for you, share the road awhile, let’s catch up!

One more thing before I sign off, here are the official rules of my Don’t Eat Fast Food 2018 Challenge:

1. NO fast food. That means no McDonald’s, Wendy’s, Carl’s Jr., Chipotle (SOB!), Subway, Farmer Boys, Burger King, etc etc.

2. Sit down restaurants are acceptable. Once a week only! (Who goes to a sit down restaurant more than once a week? Not this poor human! But still…)

3. Log everything you eat in MyFitnessPal. Eeeeeeverything! Even when it yells at you, log it.

4. Drink as much water as possible. Juice and lemonade are treats. Water is life.

If anyone wants to add me on MyFitnessPal, my name there is kirstenasaur2!

Good luck everyone! Take that midnight train goin’ anywhereeeee.