Uck! Not again. I’m doing EVERYTHING right. Following the prescripts of this cleanse to a T. Had a lovely 3-pound immediate loss during the first week. What the hell is going on now, at the end of week two? Have I actually gained a half-pound? I’m ready to have a temper tantrum, and my scale is about to be the projectile I get to launch!

If you’ve ever been attuned to the weight loss industry at some point in time, you may have heard how your body reverts to survival mode when you restrict caloric intake. As the saying goes, the first few pounds lost are always water weight. (I guess that accounts for my first 3-pound immediate loss.) After that, good luck! Weight-loss gurus, don’t say that but they might as well.

It’s a morale buster of the highest order. You’ve committed yourself to this process. You envision your success at process-end. You’re married to the image of what you feel yourself becoming. There’s just one thing… the scale’s not in on the dreamscape. With an emptiness in the stomach, my early morning, post-rising ritual begins. Stripped down to the birth-version of myself (albeit 5+ feet taller), I step on my magical, mood-shifter machine. This thing has the ability to make me smile or cry; make me bark out orders or sing a sweet song; look out the window and see gray clouds on a perfectly sunny day; or peer through a similar transom and see a sunny, bright blue sky on a rain-soaked, gray day. The scale, for better or worse, controls me… if I allow it to.

Therein lies the rub. Will I fork over emotional control to this arbitrary device? It’s simply doing the job for which I purchased it… giving me an accurate reading of how much I weigh at a given point in time. Why should it be subjected to my misplaced anger, or my whimsical jubilation? It’s a machine, Maria!

Obviously, the fury or bliss I feel after reading the numbers on the display is my interpretation of facts. My negative or positive reactions are about me and my expectations. Although I would call them realistic prospects perhaps my scale is a pacing device to remind me to regulate my anticipation of the success I feel awaits.

The experts seem to agree that the plateau is an inevitable stage of any and all caloric reduction scenarios–cleanse or not. Plateau time is pump-up-commitment time. Use it as an opportunity to dig deeper, to strengthen resolve, and envision the final “you” at the end of the process, not you in-process. Maybe you step away from the scale instead of stepping on it for a few days. Maybe it’s time to make that choice that shouts: I’m the one who gets to decide my happiness today! Not stepping on and blowing up (if numbers aren’t to your liking and that’s your default reaction, like me) might be the best course of action. The goal is a healthy cleansing of body and mind, and ultimately spirit.

Plateau be damned. I intend to find my personally crafted success in, what I must accept will be, my own time.

Copyright © 2019 María Felicia Kelley