I took a deep breath . . .

and calmed down a bit. The more I read in the official Thin Within forums the more I see that many others have gone through exactly what I'm going through. For instance, the list in this thread would be identical to mine, except substitute "McDougall" for "Atkins" and "Foodmover" for "Zone."

And the feelings about not being deserving of a thin body that's in this thread looks very familiar - I probably felt this way for decades.

After yesterday's rambling post I spent a lot of time obsessing over "healthy eating" and choosing the "right" foods to eat, going as far as making up a pot of soup because I felt that was all I deserved to eat. I made plans to go back to strict McDougalling, heck, maybe even forgoing my pasta and going on MWLP to jumpstart the weight loss. Then I thought long and hard and realized I didn't want to go back on that food plan because it might lead to weight loss again, as it did once in the past when I followed the super strict form of it.

No, I wanted to go back on McDougall because it's an "eat to satisfaction" food plan and I could fill my stomach again. I like the sensation of being full, even if it is only veggies and rice. Thin Within eating leaves me hungry even after a meal because we're to stop at a 5 out of 10, eat only half of what we usually eat to start, to live in a constant state of hunger. To live the rest of my life with a level 5 being the fullest my stomach ever gets would be sheer torture. I would constantly be thinking of food and how much longer I have to wait until I finally get down to zero again so I could eat again.

This web page compares and comments on some of the popular diet plans out there, and the author has some harsh words about plans like WDW and TW:

Similar to Weigh Down, Thin Within tells members to only eat when they are hungry. The program tracks eating patterns based on a hunger scale where 0 denotes real hunger and 5 denotes fullness. The scale is a way to gage "God-given signals of hunger and fullness." There are no dietary restraints or forbidden foods uses.

According to Gerbstadt, fasting can be unhealthy especially for people who have diabetes and who have a history of binging.

"Food plans that don’t have you eating three to five hours is probably not going to give you a lot of energy – you’re going to have highs and lows in your blood glucose," states Gerbstadt.

"So, any diet that tells you to wait until you’re hungry and it happens to be in six to seven hours, you won’t be at your optimum whether you realize it or not. I’m not against the idea of waiting until you’re hungry but you should be within every five hours."

Because I do have a history of BED (binge eating disorder) and hypoglycemia, and because I can go 12 or more hours without my hunger hitting a zero (and because I feel hungrier after eating than before), I think Thin Within may not be right for me.

As I wrote the other day, I will continue to read the books and see where it takes me, but right now the tide seems to be taking me in a different direction.