I'm back. I'm still not thrilled with myself but I thought I'd let you all know that I'm still here. I'm still going to lose weight. I haven't given up. I'm not going to quit. I've said all along that quitting is not an option. It's just not. It will never be an option.

I've been in kind of a weight loss haze since Tuesday's weigh in. During my angry run Wednesday night I did go over all the comments in my head that you guys left for me. There was some really great advice tucked away in there and it made me stop and think.

And think. And think. And think. So much of weight loss is a mental game. I've written before about people who say "weight loss is a simple process, it's more calories burned than taken in" like it's this easy child-like formula. If it were that simple, if it were really truly a + b = c then posts like I wrote on Tuesday wouldn't happen. So much of this is an internal struggle of emotions that have nothing, yet everything, to do with food.

I just can't believe that it's over a year into all of this and I am still struggling (at times) to get this right. It makes the task at hand just seem that much more daunting when I have serious periods of mental/emotional struggle. At the same time, I've always known that I would have moments like this along the way. I haven't been totally naive. It's just that when you imagine these meltdowns in your head you're never really prepared for the power of the explosion when it really does happen. It takes your breath away like a kick in the stomach.

I've had time to sit and catch my breath, "regroup" if you will. I don't know what I'm going to change (besides my pisspoor attitude) or how I'm going to make it work but I will change and it has to work. There's just no other option.