Each time I leave my therapist’s office, she gives me homework assignments. This last time I saw her, one of my assignments was to look up the calorie intakes for two versions of me: me at my ideal weight, me at my current weight.

What an eye opener.

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It was shocking to learn that in order for me to maintain my ideal weight, I would have to consume 650 calories less than what I was currently consuming to maintain my current weight.

That’s like a meal and a half!

Part of me doesn’t think I could’ve been consuming that much. But at the same time, how else could I have reached the weight I’m at right now? It didn’t magically show up on me overnight.

Long story short, I’m back to calorie counting. Before I was just eyeballing my portions, occasionally counting calories here and there, and listening to my body for signals that it’s satisfied. But being aware of my weight every day has shown me that it’s important to be cognizant of my progress. Not only do I have to be aware of what I’m expending, but I also have to be aware of what I’m consuming.

Essentially I’ve put together the following calorie budget for myself:

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So far it hasn’t been too difficult to stick to, except for the occasional run in with potential de-railers like donuts this morning at the office and fudge brownie sundae’s yesterday for March birthday celebrants. I haven’t given in (significantly) yet. I did have a mini Toblerone that one of my coworkers brought back from her trip to Europe, but it was a tiny indulgence, no bigger than the size of my thumb, which I noted.

Sometimes I feel like I’ve been going around in circles with this weight thing, like I’ve been down this road before, like Googling some cryoslimming near me would just fix everything. I’m worried that I’ll hit another brick wall. But I think that’s only because I’m still at this weight range I was in when I first started trying to lose weight 10 years ago.

There’s this magic number in my head where my weight loss stopped and reversed itself back then. And each time I realized I was out of control, my weight was higher each time. I need to get past that number. I guess I have it in my head that once I get past it, I’ll know I’ll finally be out of the woods.

I just have to remember that once I get past it, I can’t stop. I have a long road ahead of me if I want to get down to a healthy weight.