...said one of my co-workers this morning, then added, "You look great!"
Am I really supposed to take "wasting away" as a compliment? Makes it sound like I'm dying of consumption. How glamorous.
Wednesday, October 29, 2008
Saturday, October 4, 2008
Dangerous Leaps
I realize I'm making up for lost time, here. Blogging is new to me, as are the changes happening to my body, and sometimes I'm not quite up to looking either one in the face.
I've lost a little over 50 pounds, now. I weigh about 200, depending on at what hour I step on the scale. 200 was my goal for the end of October, so getting there a month ahead is a bit startling. It's not just a number -- I seem to have leapt forward all at once. I lost more than 6 pounds in two weeks. All of a sudden, none of my clothes fit. Nothing. I had to buy new bras (and I know I'm not the first to say this, but I did not sign up for losing a cup size!) I had neither time nor money to go clothes shopping, but I had to do it anyway. And people started noticing. I lost 20 and 30 and 40 pounds and pretty much no one said anything -- a couple people thought I was tan or had cut my hair or something. But in the last two weeks, everywhere I go, people are commenting on my weight loss -- my co-workers, who I've seen every day all along (including one person who never speaks to me), friends I hadn't seen in awhile, friends I see all the time. And suddenly, I feel like I'm walking around in a different body. It's not entirely comfortable. It's weird. Maybe a little scary. Weight loss is a loss. Part of me, a big 50 pound chunk of me is gone now (and where did it go? seriously, I'd like to know) and that frightens me in ways I don't entirely understand.
This week, after losing 6 pounds so quickly, I actually tried to eat a little more -- I was never starving myself. I always ate all my daily Weight Watchers points and a few more due to all the working out. I have always indulged here and there in pizza and cupcakes. But this week, I did a little more indulging. I ate heavy dinners Monday and Tuesday nights when I had friends visiting from out of town. I found myself craving heavy food on Wednesday and ate several mini-chocolate bars at work, plus lots of after dinner snacks. I was in a grumpy mood all day Friday and ordered greasy Chinese food for dinner. Now, Monday and Tuesday, I was deliberately relaxing, allowing, even urging myself to eat more because I wasn't comfortable with my rapid weight loss. But the second half of the week the indulging has felt more emotional, a little out of control. Part of me wonders if this is where I will start sabotaging myself.
Once before I lost about this much weight and stopped right here. Here as in October. Here as in 200 pounds. This might be the place I'm afraid to go past. But I do feel different this time. The few people who know I'm trying to lose weight will occasionally say that I'm working so hard. It doesn't feel like it. I hear that and it sounds wrong and I point out that I'm not doing anything I'm not happy with. I love working out. I'm happy, really, entirely happy with my food -- happy with the veggies, happy that I'm able to do pizza and cupcake just often enough, and happy that I'm not hungry. And that feels different. It's hard to sabotage something like that.
The other thing is, I don't feel so alone. I have always felt really alone with my food/body struggles. My friends are thin, and mostly have pretty healthy relationships with food and their bodies (and I'm kind of proud that I've gravitated toward people like this). My sisters are thin, as is my mother. My mother has not been helpful -- I'll write about this some other day. So whether I've been frustrated with my size or working at trying to change it, I've always felt I was in that alone. My body, my issues, nothing anyone else could help with or understand. It felt lonely, and feeling lonely makes me want to eat cookies. It was trying to get away from that loneliness that inspired me both to join Weight Watchers (which as you know I have mixed feeling about) and to hire my trainer. Going to Weight Watchers meetings is helpful. I haven't made friends, have rarely spoken to anyone outside of group discussions, but I feel them there, working on the same stuff, and that helps. And my trainer just rocks. It helps that he's all about getting me in shape, getting me stronger, and not about denying me food or making me thinner. I like focusing on strength. And I like knowing he's there. Yesterday I was at the gym on my own, not paying him for a session, and he snuck up behind me (not hard to do, as I take off my glasses and put on my headphones when I work out) and raised the incline on my treadmill. I growled at him, but kept the incline where it was and kept running. I was thinking about it all day and smiling. I realize the reason it made me so happy was because it felt like someone was watching out for me. It felt safe.
I've lost a little over 50 pounds, now. I weigh about 200, depending on at what hour I step on the scale. 200 was my goal for the end of October, so getting there a month ahead is a bit startling. It's not just a number -- I seem to have leapt forward all at once. I lost more than 6 pounds in two weeks. All of a sudden, none of my clothes fit. Nothing. I had to buy new bras (and I know I'm not the first to say this, but I did not sign up for losing a cup size!) I had neither time nor money to go clothes shopping, but I had to do it anyway. And people started noticing. I lost 20 and 30 and 40 pounds and pretty much no one said anything -- a couple people thought I was tan or had cut my hair or something. But in the last two weeks, everywhere I go, people are commenting on my weight loss -- my co-workers, who I've seen every day all along (including one person who never speaks to me), friends I hadn't seen in awhile, friends I see all the time. And suddenly, I feel like I'm walking around in a different body. It's not entirely comfortable. It's weird. Maybe a little scary. Weight loss is a loss. Part of me, a big 50 pound chunk of me is gone now (and where did it go? seriously, I'd like to know) and that frightens me in ways I don't entirely understand.
This week, after losing 6 pounds so quickly, I actually tried to eat a little more -- I was never starving myself. I always ate all my daily Weight Watchers points and a few more due to all the working out. I have always indulged here and there in pizza and cupcakes. But this week, I did a little more indulging. I ate heavy dinners Monday and Tuesday nights when I had friends visiting from out of town. I found myself craving heavy food on Wednesday and ate several mini-chocolate bars at work, plus lots of after dinner snacks. I was in a grumpy mood all day Friday and ordered greasy Chinese food for dinner. Now, Monday and Tuesday, I was deliberately relaxing, allowing, even urging myself to eat more because I wasn't comfortable with my rapid weight loss. But the second half of the week the indulging has felt more emotional, a little out of control. Part of me wonders if this is where I will start sabotaging myself.
Once before I lost about this much weight and stopped right here. Here as in October. Here as in 200 pounds. This might be the place I'm afraid to go past. But I do feel different this time. The few people who know I'm trying to lose weight will occasionally say that I'm working so hard. It doesn't feel like it. I hear that and it sounds wrong and I point out that I'm not doing anything I'm not happy with. I love working out. I'm happy, really, entirely happy with my food -- happy with the veggies, happy that I'm able to do pizza and cupcake just often enough, and happy that I'm not hungry. And that feels different. It's hard to sabotage something like that.
The other thing is, I don't feel so alone. I have always felt really alone with my food/body struggles. My friends are thin, and mostly have pretty healthy relationships with food and their bodies (and I'm kind of proud that I've gravitated toward people like this). My sisters are thin, as is my mother. My mother has not been helpful -- I'll write about this some other day. So whether I've been frustrated with my size or working at trying to change it, I've always felt I was in that alone. My body, my issues, nothing anyone else could help with or understand. It felt lonely, and feeling lonely makes me want to eat cookies. It was trying to get away from that loneliness that inspired me both to join Weight Watchers (which as you know I have mixed feeling about) and to hire my trainer. Going to Weight Watchers meetings is helpful. I haven't made friends, have rarely spoken to anyone outside of group discussions, but I feel them there, working on the same stuff, and that helps. And my trainer just rocks. It helps that he's all about getting me in shape, getting me stronger, and not about denying me food or making me thinner. I like focusing on strength. And I like knowing he's there. Yesterday I was at the gym on my own, not paying him for a session, and he snuck up behind me (not hard to do, as I take off my glasses and put on my headphones when I work out) and raised the incline on my treadmill. I growled at him, but kept the incline where it was and kept running. I was thinking about it all day and smiling. I realize the reason it made me so happy was because it felt like someone was watching out for me. It felt safe.
Heavy Lifting
It was chilly last night. I got out my down comforter and wished the cold air wasn't coming in through the vents in my window air-conditioner. In past years, including this spring when I put it in, I have depended on my brother in law to lift it into and out of the window for me and put it into storage. This morning, I moved some furniture out of the way, lifted it out of the window with my very own muscular arms, and carried it out to the trunk of my car to put it into storage. Not only could I lift and carry it with relative ease, but I knew ahead of time that I'd be able to. It's nice to be aware of my own strength.
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