Bloggers Remorse

Yesterday, I published a post in my blog that I truly regret.

The blog post was inspired by my daughter Lila, who is seven years old and has been gifted with an unshakable, completely beautiful, strong and amazing spirit and confidence.  Despite being clinically overweight and living in a country where being fat is popularly perceived as less healthy than smoking cigarettes, my daughter dares to love and accept herself completely.  At seven years old she is wiser than just about every adult I know.

I wrote my blog post because I admire my daughter.  I fear that as she gets older she will lose the self-esteem and spirit that she has.  Already, I hear her classmates discussing weight and dieting, and I do not every want my daughter to feel like she's anything less than completely perfect.  She is, after all, a very healthy child- no matter what number appears on the scale at her pediatrician's office.

So, several weeks ago I bought my very first bikini.  I took some "before" pictures and intended to take "after" pictures when I felt I looked good enough to wear it in public.  Initially I intended to post my transformation pictures in my blog and part of a fitness segment that I've been trying to keep up with.

But Lila inspired me to take a look at myself and try to show the world that as a normal weighted, fully healthy person, I have plenty of meat on my bones without being fat.  So, I decided to publish my flawed pictures yesterday and posed the question "If you are not thin, are you fat?"

I wanted people to think about the fact that we culturally call healthy weighted people names that are associated with being overweight, such as chubby, chunky and thick.  People like Marilyn Monroe, Christina Hendricks and Tracy Dimarco, to name a few.

I really wish that I hadn't done this.

My blog post has had more views in the last 24 hours than any of my other posts has ever had.  Though I had no public comments, I had plenty of messages from concerned friends.  Now most of these messages came from a place of love and I don't want to dismiss or discredit that, so if YOU are a person who sent me a concerned message, please do not feel like I am angry with you or am attacking you in this blog.

Sadly, the point of my blog post was completely lost, burried beneath those stupid pictures. My entire post became about how I look in a bikini to people and about how I view myself.  This really makes me feel angry, because that entirely defeats the purpose.  I got messages from people accusing me of hating my daughter, disgusted because I said that she was overweight.  I got messages from people worrying about my self esteem and telling me not to be so hard on myself or so obsessive about my appearance and I got messages from people who wanted to know why I don't know that I'm thin.

The post that I meant to be empowering suddenly became the opposite.  And I hadn't expected this.  I hadn't meant for these pictures to be the focus of my post, but instead thought that they'd be an addition to it.  A support for it.

I did worry about posting my pictures, mostly because when you see people in a bikini they are generally in great shape.  I, though entirely healthy, do not have a particularly thin or athletic body.  But THAT is the very reason that I thought it was important to do it.  People chose to be mean in a whole different and unanticipated way.

Of all the messages I got, no one had anything to say about what the post was actually about- which is a mother wanting to preserve her daughters self-esteem and break the cycle of shame.

I'm really sorry that the message that I intended to come through was largely swallowed by my bellybutton.  I am not sure why it happened, but I regret the whole post.

If You Are Not Thin, Are You Fat?

  

My 7 year old daughter is overweight.  Since she was a toddler, she has been much larger than other children her age.  

The doctor's often marveled at how chubby she was.  At 12 months old she was about 30 pounds.  She was so roley-poley that she never actually crawled because it was tough for her to get her belly off the floor.  Our pediatrician said that she would likely be a late walker because of her large size, but low and behold, she was an early walker.  At ten months old she picked herself up and began moving.  

As she's gotten older, she has gained a real appreciation for food (sort of like her mama).  She likes buying it, chopping it, preparing it, cooking it and of course, eating it.  She's a pretty healthy eater also. It's not unusual for her to ask me to pack her a salad for lunch or to choose and apple or grapes to munch on as a snack and her vegetables are always the first thing she eats.  Just yesterday she was telling me that when she grows up she'd like to open a really fancy salad restaraunt with a huge salad bar (because I'm a responsible mom I explained to her that really fancy restaurants don't have salad bars ,to which she scoffed and said, "I don't care.  Mine does.") I'm not going to claim that she doesn't love her sweets, because she does... she's seven, after all.  But we don't have a house that is packed with candies and cookies.  

So, as far as her body goes, my daughter is probably always going to be a little bit overweight.  It's just the way she is.  And that is quite normal for her.  She is healthy, active and most importantly, she really likes herself.  

As a person who has struggled with her weight and who has let her weight define her value as a human being for all of her life, I am worried about passing my unhealthy perceptions and attitudes about weight onto my confident and happy child.  I suspect that my struggles with body image and self-esteem regarding my weight is one of the first things that people associate with me, sadly.  This quality in me has become, unfortunately, definitive across the boards.  

Many will say, "well, it doesn't matter what you do, because the world will make her feel badly about herself anyway..." and I have given this a lot of thought.  At this point, children have pointed out to my daughter that she's larger than they are.  All kids note differences.  And my daughter says things like, "I really experience the joy in being chubby," or, "I wouldn't be so cute without my adorable chubby cheeks," or (and I squirm as I write this,) "Look at my fat belly, it's from all those healthy foods I eat."  She is aware that she is a larger person and she truly loves herself and accepts herself.

So, everything concerning the way my daughter feels about herself and her health is wonderful, but the world is a pretty fucked up place for women. And I wish that I could take her to a different world where as she grows up, everyone and everything isn't going to insist that there is something wrong with her.

My child deserves to live in a world where she is ENTITLED to like her overweight body. My child is ENTITLED to feel beautiful at a weight that society has arbitrarily deemed "too much."  I deserved this as well, but it was not the hand that I was dealt.  I will be damned if my daughter is going to experience the shame that I have felt without seeing me in the front lines fighting for the preservation of her self-esteem.  

All of the women in the pictures above are generally thought of as big, thick, chunky, chubby women.  This makes me wonder, if you are not thin, do people think that you are fat?  If you are big, are you fat?  Is there anything truly wrong with being a little bit fat? Or, having some meat on your bones? Is it less attractive?  To who? Is it less healthy? According to who? 

Frankly, I have seen women who outweigh me by 100 lbs run faster and harder than I can.  With far better endurance as well.   

I am 36 years old.  I have 2 children.  I am 5'10.  I weigh 150 pounds.  I wear a size 8 to 10.  My BMI is 21.5 and I work out more often than I don't,  yet the world makes me feel like I'm a little bit big.  I am, in every respect, totally normal.  

Now, because I am on fire right now, I am going to do something brave.  I am going to post the bikini pictures that I took and intended to post after meeting my goals and transforming my body.   This is really hard for me to do.  Even taking the picture was diffiuclt.  I can not imagine going out in public while wearing this.

I am posting these pictures because I want to make the point that THIS is what normal is for me.  This is what healthy looks like on me.  Do I have meat on my bones, YES!  I have a little extra chub in a whole bunch of places.  I am also stronger than ever.  I am in better physical shape than I have ever been in.  I have a healthy diet.  I am a totally normal, average person...  and that, my friends, is not thin for me.

This is what average looks like for ME.  

This is what I look like.  This is how I wear "healthy."  

And I am really sick and tired of living in a world that says average and healthy is chubby.  

I want my daughter to live in a world where she can be her own size.  She can define what is comfortable with her and not be criticized and told that there is something wrong with her.  And because I can not take her to a different planet, it looks like I'm going to have to change the world.

And that starts with changing myself.  

And now I'm going to go and have a good, long cry.  

Feeling Good

I am feeling pretty good!

 It's been about a month since I started working out in a gym regularly. In this month, I've only lost 5 lbs, but I'm feeling much stronger than I had been. I am also beginning to see a significant difference in my body and my overall perspective on health- both emotional and physical health.

 When I began working out a month ago, I was only doing 20 minutes of cardio and then maybe 10-15 minutes of weight training. Now, I am doing workouts that are generally 40-45 minutes of cardio and 20-30 minutes of weight training. All in all, I aim for at least 150 minutes of cardio per week and weight training at least 3 days a week. On a great week, I do 200 minutes of cardio and am on weights 5 days. Unfortunately, that doesn't always happen.

For instance, today I dropped the girls at school, picked Jay up from the train, dropped him off at home and only had time for 40 minutes at the gym. I did 20 minutes on the treadmill and 20 minutes on the elliptical machine and then managed to squeeze in some ab work before scrambling home, showering and having to run to the school to celebrate Lila's birthday with her classmates.

 I've noticed that when I work out I am much hungrier than I am when I do not. I have been trying to keep my calories at about 1500, but on days when I work out they often go up to 1700 (and sometimes beyond). I'm really excited to start my raw vegan cleanse on 9/1. I hear that I'll have a lot more energy and much better workouts. I'll be sure to let you now how it goes.

 Here's a picture that I took this morning before heading to the gym. I am really starting to see some results!!!

Why I Joined A Gym

I am absolutely not the type of person who goes to a gym.  I loathe that person.  She's vapid and smug.  I am the type of person who reads books and doesn't stress about eating french fries (yeh, right) I am the type of person who works in her garden instead of working out on an elliptical machine.  People like me don't internally mingle with people like her.

I do not have beautiful training clothes, I have sweats.

I do not have a trainer to push me because I don't really want to find out what my limit is.  Comfort is sort of  my thing, actually.

And the sneakers I wear are for fashion and were designed to be worn sockless and are cute.  They are not sturdy and I can barely balance on one foot when I wear them.  They are only a tiny bit more functional than the platform, backless sneakers I wore back in 1998 (Really.  It was a terrible time in my life for fashion).

So, what in the world possessed me to walk into the new gym that just opened in my town and sign myself up for a year?

On April 12th I started a weight loss journey.  When I left for our spring break I was mortified to learn that none of my clothes from the previous summer fit me any longer... and they were mostly size 14.  After moving to California, I had taken to wearing lots of leggings, dresses and over sized shirts.  I didn't really know what size I was and I went away on my vacation with very little to wear.  During my vacation I knew that I needed to make some sort of change.  I enjoyed my vacation, ate whatever I felt like, drank as much as I wanted... but mentally prepared for the fact that I was going to change my life when I went back home.

And by "change my life," I only meant "lose some weight."

When I got home and hopped up on the scale I was mortified to see how much I had gained.  Since my fertility treatments last year I had put on about 45 lbs.

Chew on that.

I wanted to blame my thyroid, but I knew that the problem was really just food.  I ate my way through infertility.  I ate my way through one stressful move.  I ate my way through the next stressful move.  And then a few months later I ate my way through the following stressful move.  At this point, I wasn't thinking much about the problem.  Because the problem was not the weight that I had gained.  The weight was just a symptom of my actual problem.

When I came home I started the Atkins diet, which has worked miracles for me in the past.  I honestly believe that sugar and flour are poison for my body, and kicking them to the curb is one of the healthiest things that I've ever done.  So, I started low-carbing it and stopped gaining weight, but I wasn't losing either.  I was just staying the same and it was frustrating.  That's when I found a calorie counting sight that has pretty much saved my life and has taken me on an amazing journey.

The pounds began to come off.  I've been journaling it somewhat consistently here. I eat a diet that is roughly 70% raw, though not as a rule.  I very rarely will eat anything made with flour, but from time to time I do.  I actually don't have any hard rules about things that I can and can not eat.  I just eat what is nutritionally rich and what makes my body feel good... and on days when I eat unhealthy things, I don't' sweat it.

The pounds that were coming off became way less important than something else that started to happen.  I began to notice my nutrition and to really care about it.  And as I lost weight I became less hungry for weight loss and more interested in how my body felt.  All at once, food became nearly insignificant to me, while simultaneously being the most important thing.  What I mean by that is that I stopped caring about how the foods I ate made me look and started caring about how the foods I ate made me feel.

Here's something else that happened.  I stopped feeling guilty about food.

And then, I stopped eating to soothe my emotions and I learned that eating to celebrate is a great part of life.  By painstakingly and somewhat obsessively focusing on this part of my life... this compulsive, unhealthy relationship that I had with food... I was able to unwind a lifetime of emotional issue that were all tied up in food.

And the 45 lbs that I've lost since April 12th are so petty in comparison to the important change that has happened within me.

My biggest problems has been that I eat and overeat and compulsively eat to deal with emotion.  When I was young I smoked.  Then I drank.  Then I ate.  I have always needed to do something physical to work through my emotions.  When I ate, I smothered them.

And I learned that when I get on a treadmill, and I lose myself in my thoughts, I push through my feelings.  I can put things in perspective.  I push and I sweat and I think about things that I haven't dealt with in years.  It's uncomfortable and satisfying and relieving.  It helps me. I am going to go so far as to say that I love it.

So, I didn't join a gym to be healthy.  I didn't join to tone up.  I didn't join to lose weight.

I joined because it's my goal to use working out as a tool to deal with stress.

I am 11 lbs away from my goal weight now, and I don't care when I get there.  I actually don't care if I ever lose another lb.  I feel happy.  I have a peace of mind because I know that the weight I lost is never coming back.

Quite dramatically, I am free.

Weight Update 14 Weeks

I have been feeling really great lately!  For the first time in so long I feel happy, healthy and in control of my life.  This has been a very tough, painful journey for me and I have learned so much about myself.  I am acknowledging things about myself that I have ignored and have hidden for most of my life.  In the process, I am  healing and accepting and becoming healthier and more self-aware.  Though this began as a weight loss journey, I have done far more than lost a few pounds.  I have faced demons and tackled flaws and slayed dragons (dragons who breathe cheese fries).  A few pairs of my smallest jeans fit again and I'm technically only 1 pound overweight!

Mentally I've been in a great place this week.  I have been eating a diet of mostly raw vegetables, lean protein, vegetable fats (lots of avocados and olive oil) and lots and lots and lots of tomatoes.  Tomatoes are my favorite thing these days.  Honestly, I think that there is very little that is as delicious as a sliced tomato dripping with olive oil, sliced garlic and sprinkled with pepper.  YUM.  I'm also snacking on things like cherry tomatoes dipped in hummus and mixing chick peas in my salads.

I feel great and I know that my nutrition grade is a B+ or higher each day on my calorie count ap. I am getting very close to my calorie target each day, sometimes going a few calories over and occasionally coming in a few hundred calories below.  Really, it depends on how active I am each day.  I am finding that planning my food ahead of time is incredibly helpful to me, as one of the traps that I tend to fall into is mindless eating and a poor concept of portion. When I pre-assign an amount that I should eat, I am less likely to take seconds or pick here and there as I'm cooking.  Also, I have stopped eating the food that my children leave behind on their plates (something that I am so guilty of) by asking them to scrape them in the trash when they are done eating.

All in all I had a great week.  I did a weigh in today and I actually took off a lot of weight, which s strange because I maintained my weight for so many weeks while fewer calories.  The body is a funny machine.  I'm not sure why I lost so much weight all of the sudden, but I am not worried because I have been super healthy and in a good place!

Now we are off to the Redwoods for a camping trip!  I love California!  There's so much to explore.  I am bringing a bottle of white wine and am looking forward to sipping a few glasses by the campfire after a day of hiking and swimming and exploring.

Weight Update 13 Weeks

My post yesterday says just about everything, so I don't have much to write today.

I am feeling much better than I was three months ago and am just generally really proud of myself for making healthy choices and not beating myself up when I have a little splurge here and there.  I am learning that splurges and treats are a valuable part of life and so long as I am honest about them and I plan them, they are well worth it.   With some hard work I am wearing down my all-or-nothing mentality and honestly I am feeling pretty good about myself for a change!

This week I lost 1 pound, which brings my total to 32 pounds in 13 weeks.

Today we are leaving for a camping trip and I'm trouble shooting a potential food trap by planning my food ahead of time.  I have allotted myself lots of great treats and even a couple of beers, but I am staying within my calorie target.  I find that it helps me a lot to know how much I can eat before I sit down to a meal.  If I have boundaries, I normally will not overstep them.  When I don't, I miscalculate how much I can/should eat.

Health and Weight Reform

I am feeling so proud of myself.

For the first time in my life I feel like I'm beginning to get a good hold on my body image, weight and health.  My yo-yo'ing has left me feeling desperate and hopeless, motivating me to lose weight by fear of being fat.  In the past, very little thought has gone into my health, other than using the blanket "being fat is unhealthy" statement.  I have started fitting back into my old clothes and though I'm still around 25 lbs above what I'd love to be ideally, I am slowly but surely creeping down to "normal."  Sure, I'd like to be thin, but right now I'm feeling pleased to just not be particularly overweight.  I am able to put on clothes that I haven't worn in two years and feel happy and healthy and pleased with the way they fit me.

But something else is happening too.  I have been working really hard at making wise choices and getting my mindless eating and portion control in check.  I have been choosing to forgo fatty meats and dairy, flour and sugar and instead eat things like raw vegetables and hummus or salads sprinkles with chick peas and fresh veggies from my garden.  I have always loved salads, but previously I'd smother my veggies in eggs, cheese and creamy dressings (which I really do think is delicious).   The meal that I have the most trouble with is dinner, but slowly (and not without some internal struggle) I am eating smaller portions, skipping the starch and loading up on steamed vegetables (sans butter, because I was saddened and shocked to see the amount of cholesterol and saturated fat in a few pats of butter).  I had a big victory over dinner the other night when I took one piece of meat and cut it in three equal portions, giving one to Bunny, one to Lila and had only one myself.  Previously, the whole piece would have seemed small to me, and I was mortified when I weighed it and saw that it was 12 oz.  I know that I don't need more than 4 oz and am sort of horrified by the fact that I could happily eat a portion that is 16 oz and not even be that full.  ('Fo REAL).  Every bite I take I ask my body if I need it and what will it do for me.  If the answer is no or nothing, I know that I'm done with my meal.  I've been doing things like weighing food and using a table spoon to measure the amount of dressing or the amount of hummus that I'm eating.  At night if I am hungry I steam a little bit of zucchini (which we have an abundance of) and eat that.

I've also been getting more exercise, gardening and going for some nice walks with the girls.  I will never be the sort of person who loves working out.  Frankly, working out is stressful for me.   I am pretty comfortable with the amount of exercise that I'm getting, though it won't give me a super flat belly of nicely defined arms.  Oh well.  That's not really my thing.  The one thing that I do want SO badly, is one of those grown-up tricycles with a basket.  I would totally zip around town doing errands in it and think it would be fantastic exercise.  One thing that I loved about living in the city was that I walked to do my errands.  I live to far away from/it's too hot/it would take too long to walk to do my errands here, but if I had a big tricycle, I could totally put my groceries in the basket!

So, I am restructuring my weight loss goal.  I would like to lose 25 lbs over the next year.  That will slow my weight loss down from a bit over 10 lbs a month to 2 lbs a month.  I know that I could begin seriously restricting my calories and amping up my exercise and could have this weight off entirely in 10 weeks or less if I put my mind to it... but I have been down that road before.  Here's what happens.  I get crazy, weigh myself three times a day, feel horrible every time I eat and cry myself to sleep with self loathing every night.  Inevitably I give up, give in, console myself with food and defensively decide that I don't care if I'm fat and follow it by gaining every pound back (and then some).  I convince myself that I can eat bottomless portions of foods that are dense in calories and fats simply because they have some healthy properties and then wonder why I am gaining so much weight.

I just don't want to do that again.  I feel that I need to learn how to maintain my weight.  I need to learn how to put the most nutrients into 1500 calories a day as possible.  I need to learn how to eat and learn how to eat for health instead of pleasure (though it doesn't hurt for the experience to be pleasant as well). I believe that losing weight slowly will likely enable me to gain a better relationship with food and as a result, this will be the last time that I'm in this situation.

And after I meet this goal (which I am going to cut a week short and say I'll do it by the 4th of July 2013), my next goal will be to stay within 2 lbs of my weight for a year.  I think that will be much harder for me than losing the weight actually is.

Wish me luck!

Diet Tip

I like a tomato as much as the next guy, I suppose.  I mean, I love tomato soup, so long as it has plenty of cream and is covered in cheese-itz.  I like tomato juice, so long as it is one part vodka, a little bit spicy and has a celery stick and toothpick stacked with green olives climbing out of it.  And I like raw bitty tomatoes, just so long as they are dipped in hummus.  And I like tomato sauce, when it's made from scratch (by moi) and smothering a bowl of spaghetti.  I never imagined that I could like tomatoes enough to drink a glass of v-8.

Any-who, I am working pretty hard at making good food choices lately, which has meant making the most of my calories.  I use this online calorie count program that gives everything you eat a grade from A-F and then gives your day an overall grade and tells you what percentage of nutrients you earned.  In my quest to find better health and to not only lose weight, but to gain control of my nourishment, I am trying to use the calories I get each day on nutrient laden foods instead of on sometimes more delicious, but nutrient barren foods and drink.

I have discovered that it is pretty-stinking-beneficial to drink an 8 oz. glass of low-sodium v-8 between meals.  Not only is it filling and satisfying, it's loaded with awesome stuff that I tend not to get enough of (like vitamin A, vitamin C and potassium).  I am not a fan of fruit, so I tend not to get enough vitamins and this is actually pretty filling.  It really takes the edge off of my between meal hunger.

Weight Update- Week 12

We had our bbq last night.

I'llbedamnded if I didn't drink my own weight in homemade sangria!

I burned the burgers and then didn't put more on (a decision made post-sangria-consumption) and I'm sort of horrifyingly embarrassed about it today, but otherwise I will deem the day a success.

I ate pretty well, but my friend Amber is the most amazing cook and brought these little vegan spring rolls and a corn/black bean/avocado salad that were out of this world and I might have overdone a little bit.  I ended up dabbling here and there and picking at a bunch of different things... but I'm not feeling guilty and not stressing it.

I don't know if I lost any weight this week.  I suspect that I lost a pound or two.  I am pretty bloated from all of the corn and beans that are sitting like a rock in my belly. hahha.  Not to mention all of the sangria that I drank!  The scale told me that I weigh exactly what I have weighed for the past two weeks, which means 31 lbs in 12 weeks.  Like I said previously, I was getting really obsessive about my weight loss and it was seriously effecting the way I felt about myself.  So, I have been really working on health, instead of weight loss.  I want to be able to maintain as well as lose.

I will check in again on the scale in a few days and let you know if the number significantly changes.

A weigh in post bbq is not the smartest thing to do :)  But, at least the number didn't climb!

Today we are off for an adventure!

Weight Update- Week 11

Okay, I am feeling much, much, much better about things today.

I know that my last weight post was a little bit dramatic, but I'm  having a lot of ups and downs on this journey and it's been pretty hard on me emotionally.  Somedays I feel hopeless and on the day of my last post I was feeling emotional, hormonal and having one of those pre-menstral cravings to eat everything in sight.  Fighting this urge was very difficult.  Deciding to snack is the same as giving-in to me, which is very scary because I'm overwhelmingly all or nothing in respect to my diet.  Which, of course, means that I'm either eating everything or practically nothing.  I have never been much of a snacker or the sort of person who wants to eat five small meals a day.  So, on days when I am hormonal and hungry... it messes with my head a bit.

This week I really worked on being healthier.  I felt myself going to war with food and was filled with guilt every time I ate something.  Quickly, I understood that this was unhealthy and not sustainable.  I wanted to change the behavior, but it's been my pattern to shut-down my diet whenever I am faced with control issues (in reference to food) and just not think about it anymore.  When I don't think about it I feel okay, but I also gain a shit-ton of weight because I am just allowing myself to eat whatever and whenever and end up smothering a lot of boredom and bad feelings in foods.  I definitely am guilty of using food as a coping mechanism for a lot of things.  Food brings me joy in many ways.  I love buying it.  I really love preparing it.  I love tasting it.  I love the way it feelings in my belly.  Truthfully, I just find joy in food.  But, I don't like the feeling of losing control of eating or eating too often in an effort to feel more joy.  I also don't like the feeling of withholding food and feeling guilty for eating every time I put something in my mouth.   It's my opinion that overeating will kill you faster than restricting calories too aggressively... but both are unhealthy and I really do want to be healthy.  I'm fighting for it.   Really, I just want to be healthy and normal.  So, that's what I struggled with this week... but I am feeling much better.

This week I didn't lose any weight.  I weigh exactly the same as I did last Thursday, which is great.  I lost 13 lbs in 2 weeks and 31 lbs in 11 weeks.  I am okay with hanging out here for a week or two, focusing on portion control, keeping my calories in a good place and my nutrition up.  I am working on neither surrendering to food to feel better about ANYTHING or letting food and eating make me feel badly.  I am just making nutritious meals, eating small portions, getting exercise and not racing towards weight loss.  I plan my meals well in advance and I'm going to continue to do so.  Tonight I am even going to eat a potato, which is something that I haven't done since April.  Okay, okay, so I have total carbohydrate phobia and I'll admit that I am going to TRY to eat a potato, but I might not be able to bring myself to do it.

I have ten more pounds to lose before I am technically in my weight range and I am still going towards that goal, but not at such a fast speed.  If it takes me ten more weeks to lose this weight, I am fine with that.

Weight Struggle at 10.5 weeks

After my difficult week, I have been working hard to reevaluate my eating habits and straighten my head out a bit.  I see myself going in a dangerous direction, almost uncontrollably and my feelings about this are conflicted.

I am just going to be honest.

My reality is that even though I have lost 30 lbs, I could truly use to lose 30 more.  Technically, I'm only 10 lbs overweight, but my frame is small and I could benefit from losing an extra 20 lbs to feel entirely comfortable. I don't even want to be skinny.  I just want to be normal.  I want to be the sort of person who can just blend in and who people don't look at and automatically judge.  Because of this, it is difficult for me to see food as anything other than an enemy, something that makes me fat.  I REALLY do not want to be fat.  I sincerely wish that I was okay with being fat, but I'm not.  I am okay with OTHER people being fat, but I am sadly trapped in the distorted web of poor self esteem and inflated value in terms of my weight.  I have fought this battle for years, giving in and just eating myself into a plump reflection of the person I want to be, all while liking my hair and enjoying my crafts and being proud of the good friend I am and doting on my children and being loving to my husband.

My terrible reality is this: no matter how much I value the different parts of my person... the things that make me special... the way I work hard to be a good person/mother/friend/wife... I hate myself when I am fat.  HATE.  I look in the mirror and all I can think about is how ugly and disgusting I am.  I am ashamed to see people.  I don't want to go anywhere.  I don't want to have to meet or see people that my husband knows because I am so scared that they'll feel sorry for him for having to come home to such a disgusting fat ass every day.  I wish that I could unzip my body and crawl out of it.  I wish that I were just some other person who didn't have this problem and could just like herself and feel good about herself.  But I don't and I can't.

I try to talk to people about it and even though they say that they understand, I know that they don't.  I know that other people don't feel such desperation and such self-loathing in respect to their weight.

So, this week... since my emotional weight loss last week, I have been trying to slow my weight loss down, and for the above reasons, this is very emotional for me.  And when I am emotional I want to eat.  But I am trying to be healthy.  The last thing that I want to do is surrender and give in and give up.  I am trying to eat more, while still staying between 1200 and 1500 calories.  Last week I was eating between 500 an 800 calories per day, which I know isn't healthy.  But even those calories were making me feel awful and I had to resist the urge to make myself throw up every night.   Last night, I had to fight myself to snack on steamed summer squash instead of corn chips and cheese dip (which is what I really wanted).  I am totally that person who eats when I feel sad and then hates myself for doing it and feels worse and then wants to eat more.

Today, I am, instead of sitting down and smothering these sad feelings in pizza, I am writing this blog.  I am really trying to do healing things instead of turning to food.

I know that I am very unhealthy in my thoughts, but after 35 years of being totally fucked in the head over french fries, I am honestly doing the best I can.  I don't know that there's any hope for me.  I can only hope not to pass this terrible self esteem onto my children.

Weight Update- Week 10

I've had a difficult week in respect to my weight and my efforts to lose weight.  After my big drop last week I had this bizarre inner struggle.  First, I know that it's not healthy to lose 8 pounds in a week.  And last Thursday I tried to make peace with the fact that the number on the scale must not even be real, it must be some sort of fluke.  But I wasn't able to accept it and I got on the scale every day this week, not so much to be sure that the number went down, but more to be certain that it didn't go back up.  It's difficult to have a good relationship with a scale, and though weighing in once a week is a useful tool, over-weighing can become an obsession of mine.  The number on the scale can really make or break the way I feel about myself, which is very unhealthy and disordered thinking.

This week, in conjunction with over weighing, I also developed a terrible amount of guilt after eating anything at all.  Mostly, I hate myself for overeating.  There were several times this week when we sat down to eat and I felt like I overdid it a bit, particularly when we went out to dinner for father's day.  I really love guacamole and we went to a South American restaurant and the guacamole was to die for.  I didn't eat any of the chips that went with it, but I found myself eating forkful after forkful of guacamole.  And then I hated myself for it later. Lately it seems that instead of looking forward to a meal, dreading it and worrying about the way I will feel after I eat it.  The girls and I are going into San Francisco this evening to a fun event at the new Twitter building and I am already worrying about all the food and drinks that will be present.  Jay does a lot of bragging about how delicious their every-day food is, but today is a special day, so I am sure that it will be more and better.

I honestly wish that I could just quit food altogether so that I wouldn't have to have all of these negative feelings about it.  I wish that it wasn't something that I had such a hard time controlling and had such a direct effect on the way I feel about myself.  It's so horrible that food is a thing that's purpose is to nourish me and to keep me alive and healthy, and yet every time I take a bite of something I feel like I'm poisoning myself.

I feel really emotionally drained from my stupid diet.

But I lost 5 more pounds this week, which bring my total to 31 pounds in 10 weeks.

I also added a multi-vitamin for women because my online food journal gives me a breakdown of the nutrients I eat and I have been consistently coming up short on several vitamins.

Sorry this is such a depressing post.  I realize that I should be celebrating because I lost 5 lbs, after all.  I am extremely happy to lose the weight, believe me.  I just wish that I felt better about myself and I wish that my relationship with food and my weight were easier and healthier.

I wish I was a person who liked myself just as much when I'm fat as I do when I'm not.  That is the kind of person I want to be, but it's not who I am right now.

Weight Update- 8.5 Weeks

I woke up this morning to that wonderful post-period, non-bloated, about to have two weeks without camel-like water retention feeling in my belly.  When I hopped on the scale I was, indeed, 2 pounds lighter than I was on Thursday when I did my weigh in.

I can not lie, I am the biggest fan of salt ever.  I can put it on my pizza (like I ever eat pizza), my tortilla chips and I even eat the salt off of the bottom of a bag of pretzels.  I think that salt is the most delicious thing in the world.

But I have given salt up.

Around 4 weeks ago I was complaining to my friend Julia about how hard I was working and how slowly the weight was coming off.  Knowing of my love of salt she asked if it could be water retention.  I decided to do a little experiment and stopped adding salt to my food.  That was the week that I had a huge weight loss.  I also stopped adding it to my recipes as I cook.  This has been difficult for me but I have gotten used to tasting food without salt and though I'd be lying if I said it was as delicious to me, it's okay.

It seems that I retain more water than the average person.  Especially when the weather is hot I notice that my feet get a little bit swollen at the end of the day, which can be quite uncomfortable.  Even though I've given up salt, I'm noticing how puffy I get, more and more.

But that's beside the point!

The point is that I hit my 20 pound mark!

I am officially half way there!

Weight Update- Week 8

It's been 8 weeks and I've only lost 18 pounds.

I was really hoping to hit my 20 pound mark this week, but I didn't. I have only lost 2 pounds since my weigh in last Thursday.

I'm not sure what happened.  Maybe it's because I have my period (but I'm at the very end so I don't think that I can blame it).  I worked pretty hard.  I went over my caloric limit by 200 calories two days ago, but that shouldn't be enough to make a difference.  Because I've been recovering from being sick I've been less active.  Maybe that's the problem.

On the bright side, I will definitely hit that 20 lb mark by next Thrusday.  Also, I am really starting to see the difference in my clothes.  I can fit into things that I haven't been able to wear from last summer.

I started really worrying about my weight before I went to Florida in April.  When I tried to pack and took out all of my clothes from last summer, none of them fit me.  I knew that the stress of two big moves in five months had gotten to me and I'd eaten my way through it.  I'm like that.  This week was stressful in a few respects and I felt the pang to drown my sorrows in bagels and ice cream.  I didn't do it.  But I had to really resist doing it.  I sort of recognized that it was happening and decided not to eat.  I didn't eat something else instead.  I didn't have "just a bite."  I just didn't do it.  Because it's not healthy to eat because I'm stressed or upset.  I am proud of myself.

So, I didn't reach my goal of losing 4 lbs this week and hitting a 20 lb loss, but I made it half way and I'll get there next week.

Have a healthy week!

Getting There

Slowly but surely!

I haven't been able to wear these jeans in ages.  I am starting to see results!

Weight Update- Week 7

Oh Dear! I am getting sick.  My nose is stuffy and my throat hurts.  I haven't been sick in ages, so I guess I'm due, but with the end of the school year here, I don't have the time to be sick.  This started two days ago and I'm afraid I haven't felt like working out too much. I've been doing a lot of decorating and reorganizing inside of my house, but haven't been outside to do anything beyond my regular watering.

Also, it makes sense that if during my 4 week weigh in I had my period that during my 7 week weigh in I'd be just about to get it.  And I'm bloated.  And gross.  I am having the sort of PMS that makes me irritated with my own voice and self and brain and feet and face and makes me wish that I could unzip my body and crawl out of it.   I swear, the moment you decide that you're done having children nature should KNOW and stop the suffering of it.

Okay, that's the end of my ridiculous menstrual rant.

This week I kept up my hard work.  I did very well at monitoring my portions, keeping my calories low and watching my carbs.  It seemed a little bit easier this week.  I felt less hungry and less grouchy.  Last week was a real challenge, but this week felt pretty natural.  I ended up losing 2 lbs, which brings me to a total loss of 16 lbs in 7 weeks.

Here's how I feel about that.  I KNOW that 2 lbs is a totally healthy amount to lose in a week, but it's not enough for me.  I am working SO HARD.  In my life I've never had much of a problem gaining weight if I didn't watch it, but I have also never had a tough time losing weight.  I feel like I'm fighting for every pound right now.  It's so discouraging.  A couple of years ago I did Atkins and probably lost 16 lbs in my first 2 weeks, and I was eat a hella lot more than I'm eating now.

It is what it is.  I'll work even harder this week and hopefully I'll hit my 20 lb loss at 8 weeks.  Wish me luck!

Weight Update- Week Six

I worked extra hard this week.  I think that I've adequately expressed my sour attitude about the slow and at times nonexistent progress that I've been making in terms of my weight.

My strategy until now has just been eating low carb with lots of veggies. This type of diet never makes me feel deprived, always keeps me full and has given me excellent result in the past.  Let's face it, flour and sugar are just awful for our bodies as it is, so it makes sense that eliminating them would instigate quick results.

Not so much this time for me, unfortunately.

So, this week I took it one step further.  This week I also began counting and restricting calories.  I started measuring the amount of cream that I use in my coffee because it really adds up.  I can't use a lower calorie option because they all have too much sugar. I've also started measuring my other food and monitoring portion control, which is always a problem for me.  I am completely guilty of doing things like sampling as I cook and not counting it.  Or, finishing something on my daughter's plate and not counting it.

It all worked out because this week I lost 4 pounds!!!!!!!!!!  Thank God, I have found the answer!  This brings my total to 14 lbs in 6 weeks.

This couldn't have come at a better time because I woke up feeling like a pudge ball.

I've been thinking about seeing some sort of therapist about my weight.  It seems like I am constantly gaining and losing the same lbs over and over and over.  I yo-yo continuously and I'd really like to stop.  I know that I use food to comfort and cope, which isn't a healthy attitude.  And when I'm not treating it like it's my friend, I'm definitely treating it like it's my enemy.  Food is never just something to eat with me.  There's something wrong with me, I swear.

Weight Update- Week 5

I am on week 5 of my great weight loss challenge.

This week I was active, made exceptional food choices and started exercising greater portion control.  I worked.  I mean, I worked hard.  I got out there and I let myself work up a sweat in the sunshine.  Instead of getting a snack, I went hungry (I don't care what people say about snacking being  healthy and aiding weight loss.  That whole concept just doesn't work for me).

My only real digression was when I drank a bit of white wine last Friday night.  Honestly, I love wine. I miss wine.  I think having a bit of it once a week is reasonable and if it's the only cheat I'm having and aids my life in being enjoyable... it's really not the end of the world.

Today was my weigh in and I am sorta pleased to say that I am down 2 more lbs.  This brings my big, fat total to 10 lbs in 5 weeks.  I worked so hard that I was hoping for a bigger number.  I was hoping for and would have been happy to have a loss of five lbs.  But, I'm not 25 anymore, I guess.  I'm 35 and 5 pound losses don't happen in a seven day period for me anymore.  Sigh.

I will keep up the hard work this week and hope to report at LEAST another two pound loss next week.

Weight Update 1 Month

I did really well this week.  Last Friday I indulged in a few skinny girl margaritas, but other than this transgression, I have eaten well and moved a lot.

I am also deep in the throws of a terrible and heavy period (sorry, if that's tmi) which is hopefully why when I got on the scale for weigh day today I was up one pound.

And now I feel like crying.

How can I be working so hard and GAINING weight.

The potential culprits:

1.) My period.

2.) Jay bought diet pepsi at the grocery store.  I normally don't drink much soda.  Occasionally I'd get a diet soda if we're eating out, but otherwise it's not something that we normally have in our house.  Because I'm not eating sugar, the sweetness of the soda tastes really satisfying and I've been drinking them up.

3.)  Iced coffees.  Lots of em.  Milk has too much sugar, so I've been drinking them with half and half.  No sweetener, but I've been making them pretty light.  Now that I've given up wine, iced coffee is the one delicious treat that I have in my life.  I guess I'll replace them with water and see what happens.

Other than these three things, I am doing everything right.

I feel so discouraged.

Why does this have to be so hard?

Weight Update #2

This week wasn't quite as productive for me.

It was a very busy and stressful week, which is a clear danger zone for me.

Mid-week I began to feel myself slipping.  No huge back peddling, but my busy schedule made me tired and disinterested in exercise and I felt myself eating more than I have been.

Also, I read The Hunger Games and Catching Fire, which made me somewhat more stationary, where previously I had been gardening more in my free time.

That said, I weighed in 1 lb less than I did last week, which puts me at a total of 9 lbs lost in 3 weeks.  It's not perfect, but I'll take it.

I am going to work harder this week.  I'm going to exercise more and eat smaller portions and no snacks.

I look forward to seeing my weight loss go into double digest next week.  It will be my one month mark and I think that losing 10 pounds in one month is entirely honorable.  Keeping this up will have me at my goal weight in just a few months!