Transformation

Transformation is a beautiful word to me. I love it. What a concept. To take something in one state and change it into something different. When I hear it, it’s almost always used in a positive way — Like the transformation from rags to riches, from caterpillar to butterfly, from Clark Kent to Superman.  So I love transformation stories.

I’ve had a front row seat at an astonishing transformation this week.
I didn’t see it coming, which makes it even more fun. Surprises are not always my favorite, but this is a good one.

My amazing Mr. Smith.

He’s been wanting to reduce-weight this year. I have always remained neutral on that subject.  It’s his body, not mine.  I want him to be healthy and I love to teach him what I know about nutrition and health and yadda yadda yadda… But it’s his body, not mine.  I’m not going to ever step in and try to control what he puts in it.  That’s his stewardship and his God-given responsibility.  Education notwithstanding, he loves binging on huge bowls of ice cream right before bed, and buys all kinds of junk without thinking about it when he does the shopping (Frosted Flakes, anyone?  …. groan…) — We’re just different there and it’s not a big deal to me.  He’ll figure it out.  I hope.

I love him, and that love isn’t riding on the size of his clothes, his hairline, or wardrobe…

Good thing.  If I loved him for his wardrobe, we’d be in trouble because he has even less sense of style than me – if such a thing could be imagined. No, really, it’s true. I have no sense of style, and he has less!

It’s almost like a super-power, actually. The ability to not notice when things TOTALLY don’t match. I think our 8yo boy, D, may have inherited this same super power. I’ll never forget how excited he was when he came downstairs before school one morning, all excited to show me how his clothes “matched” — Because one stripe of his plaid shorts matched another stripe on his completely-different-color-schemed plaid shirt.

[palm-to-forehead]

It’s endearing though, in a way.  Wish I had a picture of that one so you see what I mean.

But I digress.
Transformation.

Mr. Smith is wonderful and I love him.  I really don’t mean this to be a post about all of his weaknesses.  I wouldn’t even have written all of this if it wasn’t part of the story.  So you’d better not stop reading now!

To know the transformation, you have to know the starting point.  He was overweight.  Technically in the “dangerously obese” category, he would tell you, though you might not think it to look at him.  He didn’t really care about what he ate.  And he has been wanting to reduce-weight this year.

Several years ago he dropped his extra 50 pounds with some concerted effort and the help of a weight-reduction program — but gained it back. And then did it again. And gained it back.

I am NOT a fan of yo-yo dieting. NOT a fan.

So when he started making motions like he wanted to do the same program he had done before, I was (cough-cough) not overly supportive. It’s really not good for your body to do that! It’s healthier to just stay chubby than to starve yourself, lose muscle mass, and repeat the cycle again.  I even broke my “neutral” stance to let him know how NOT a fan I am of yo-yo-ing.

“If you’re going to do this again, YOU MUST keep it off.  YOU HAVE TO do the slow transition to “normal” food like they outline.”

But before he went too far down that road, some of our friends found a new program that piqued his interest. He did some research into it and got more and more excited about it.

A New Weight-Reduction Program?

I was skeptical but it’s his body – he can do what he thinks is best. He did his own research and bought into it. I did like that I was hearing words like “organic” and “green” and other healthy, holistic-minded phrases; I liked that they were all about breaking the addiction to processed foods & stuff, but I was a little leery of the “impossible promises” they were throwing out.

I would have thought they really were impossible promises if it wasn’t that we’ve had several friends in the community do it and *all* of them have liked it and had great results. Still. 10 days? How much can happen in 10 days, really?  And yet…
We’ve seen friends drop a lot of weight this summer AND keep it off, which is impressive…

That alone was enough for me to be like, “Okay, Honey, if you want to, it probably won’t hurt,” but -again- I was still skeptical and I didn’t do a lot of research. Still haven’t.

So he started this 10-Day Transformation thing.

Partly I was skeptical because he’s dropped a lot of weight quickly before — twice before — and it hasn’t really changed his junk-food craving heart. I know too much about what happens when your body craves candy, processed food, and the garbage-diet we eat in this country. You can force yourself to eat smaller portions or suffer through eating “green” but if you don’t like it, you won’t sustain it.

Okay, okay, “you” might, but that was, at least, my theory about the amazing, wonderful man I married, based on what I’ve seen before.

So he ordered a ton of stuff from this company – He even bought some stuff for me –  Aw, thoughtful!

and he started his “10 Day Transformation” 5 days ago.

Mr. Smith dropped 12 pounds in 5 days. Cool.

At that rate he should see that number on the scale go down at least 20 pounds.  

But what REALLY has me surprised was how, on Day 3, the kids were having toast for breakfast because Mommy said “not today” when they asked for cold cereal (but Mommy was too slow to figure anything else out) and he said, “Sweetie, maybe you should make them a smoothie real quick so they can have something a little healthier than just toast before they go to school.”

Great idea, it was, and I was glad he thought of it for me since my brain stays in bed long after I pull myself out of it,
but part of me was like, What?

Since when has Mr. Smith ever cared about nutrition? That’s always been my department. And he loves toast. He should have been like, “Yay! Toast for breakfast! It’s your lucky day! I’m so jealous!”

Huh.
Weird.

And then today…

Day 5. I found out that since he started this Transformation he hasn’t ONCE thought candy sounded yummy. At all. He’s got a tub of licorice in his office waiting to be consumed at an event, and he normally sees it and craves it daily. It sits there calling to him and he resists. Noble of him, yes? Amazing self-restraint, he has.  It’s been there for weeks and he hasn’t cracked it open.  Good job.

But now he doesn’t even want it?????
His favorite candy?  What?
He’d rather have CUCUMBERS with SEA SALT, people.
Cucumbers!!

Not that he didn’t like cucumbers before — he did — but never would he ever have been like, “Ooh, nummy! Yay, I get to eat a vegetable!!!”

THAT, my friends, is an absolutely incredible transformation, and one I definitely did not expect to see.

I am tremendously impressed.
Tremendously.  

In fact, I think I just now underwent a transformation myself, from “skeptic” to “believer.”

And given that pretty much all of the friends and acquaintances we know of who have faithfully done this Transformation have found themselves staying on a much healthier track than they were before,

I’m adding Mr. Smith’s transformation from “Junk Food Junkie” to “Health Conscious” to the growing list of incredible blessings God has sent us this year.  That’s far more important to me than the number on the scale.

I am grateful…

So grateful that I took all this time tonight to write it out, to capture this incredible moment and savor it a little longer, while a slightly-skinnier Mr. Smith falls asleep waiting for me to finish so we can pray together before we go to bed.  (He’s so cute.  No, really, he’s kneeling there at the side of the bed snoring away… It’s adorable.)

And if you actually made it all the way to the end of the post (Hi Mom!  Hi Dad!) – I’m grateful for you, too.  Thanks for listening!  🙂  May every day transform us all in one way or another, through the grace of God, to be a little better than we were before.

Tagged as: Mr.Smith, Transformation