Body Image....Ugh.....

I know it isn't just me who has issues with body image. Why is it that the images we carry around in our heads of how we look NEVER matches what the mirror says?

I mean, it works both ways. Back about a gazillion years ago, when I lost 50 pounds, I was the slimmest I had ever been. I still don't think I would have been described as "thin," though. "Fit" maybe. But in my head I was still overweight, obese, fat. No wonder it's so easy to pack the pounds back on. One of my students offered me a cookie one day at school and I refused, saying, "I didn't lose 50 pounds just to put them back on." He looked confused and said, "You mean you used to be FAT?" I just stared at him, trying to see if he was making fun of me. (He wasn't.) I couldn't figure out the "used to be" part. I thought I still WAS.

And now that I've lost 35 pounds in the last year, I've tried to change the image in my head to a thinNER person (not necessarily a "thin" one). Sometimes I'm more successful than others. I know what size I wear, and I'm STILL amazed when I get something out of the closet and it actually fits. Seriously, I start to pull on a pair of pants and I think to myself, "These are going to cut me in two." Or I'm afraid they will look like my mother described it when I was about 10 years old and had a wonderfully cute new shorts outfit that had a tie belt with it. "You look like a sausage with a string tied around the middle," she said.

Thanks for THAT visual, Mom.

And even though the clothes still fit (some of my new things are actually a little too big, and that's just a little too damn BAD), I can't wrap my head around the fact that I am truly smaller than I was. It's a nice feeling when I can button a pair of pants without sucking in. 

Every now and then, though, I see a picture of me taken recently, and I'm discouraged. I don't want to be rail-thin (good thing, since it ain't EVER going to happen), but I want to have a nice shape. In pictures I still look round, just maybe basketball-round instead of beachball-round. I saw some pictures of me on Rozmo's Facebook page, and I cringed. Still with the belly. All the chins.

I'm trying to use those pictures as incentive to get past this dang plateau I've been on for four months. I've gotten away from exercising in the mornings, justifying it by saying since I have to go so early to take care of my mother-in-law that I deserve those 30 minutes to crochet every morning. I need to get back on that program of early-morning cardio, because I fully believe that (for me at least) it jump-starts my metabolism for the whole day. Then if I can ride my bike in the afternoons (until it gets too cold), that exercise will be a bonus.

I just want to lose the rolls.

Burned (Bummed?) Out.......

I've been feeling a little burned out about blogging lately. Or maybe I'm just bummed out in general. Looking back at the past few years, I think I get this way around this time of year. It's not yet Spring Break, and it feels like it will neverrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr get here. I get frustrated at school because it always feels like we are spinning our wheels, and the Warrior Princess isn't there anymore to keep me grounded. And entertain me. And give me a place to escape to when I want to get out of my classroom.

A couple of years ago, I couldn't even get motivated to do any cycling in April or May, and it was around this time of year that I decided I couldn't do BRAG. I did do part of it, but it wasn't the same as doing the whole week, and 2009 turned out to be my lowest cycling year since I started keeping up with it.

Maybe it's the weather. We've had a tiny cool spell, and we had rain and thunderstorms all afternoon. Hubby couldn't play golf; I couldn't go ride my bike. It's not like we sat around and groused at each other. We went out for breakfast, bought groceries together (I love having someone help me carry them in the house), went to the home improvement store with the big orange sign and picked out a few thousand dollars worth of stuff we want/need but left empty-handed, grilled steaks for dinner rather than go out to eat, sat around and read. He even tolerated my playing Mario on the Wii a couple of times. I did laundry, washed the sheets on our bed, and Hubby even helped me make it up. Without me asking him to. I worked out on the elliptical, since I couldn't ride today.

It could be that I'm still in a lot of pain in my upper back/neck, and it's frustrating that nothing seems to help. I've put ice on it to lessen the inflammation, I've used that heat stuff you rub on, and it still hurts. It hurts worst when I'm lying down in bed or reclining in my recliner. Guess what I like to do best when I'm stuck at home on a rainy day? I just can't get comfortable.

I could be bummed (still) because I gained a pound last week. I did everything right (seriously, did that one little piece of cake I had at the tailgate last Saturday really sabotage all my other efforts?), worked out every day, twice a day most days, and three times on Wednesday, and I GAINED a pound? The intelligent part of my brain realizes that's part of the process and there are bound to be ups and downs. The emotional part of my brain still thinks it's unfair and wants to be angry at someone.

On a positive note (because I insist that there be one), I'm still working on my knitting. I even have a little contest in mind to give away my creation(s) when I finish. Just as soon as I learn how to change colors.

Sorry for the blah-te-dahs. I hope to be fresher tomorrow night. I'm supposed to run another 5K tomorrow afternoon (weather permitting - I ain't THAT dedicated), and I have a time to shoot for. Maybe that will make me feel better.

More Weighty Issues......

Don't worry, I'm not going on about my own personal battle with weight all my life, nor am I going to recant recent tribulations (and triumphs) associated with that battle.

During our walk in the park today, though, I thought about two very different stories associated with weight and how it affects people differently.

I taught on a 9th grade team with two other girls, one of whom fought her weight constantly, as did I. We commiserated, we walked together, we weighed each other, and it seemed that was all we talked about. Our other team member was a girl who taught science, and she was a tiny thing. She was about the same height as Teri and me, 5'2", but she was rail thin. You know how some women gain weight when they get pregnant and never seem to lose it? (You can put your hands down now.) Not Kim. Even after two children, she still looked like a kid herself.

As if teaching high school and raising two children (who were very close in age) weren't enough stress on her, Kim's husband decided to enter medical school. Approximately a thousand miles away. (I don't know how much stress that caused HIM, since he wound up hooking up with a floosie he met in med school, but that's none of my business. I guess.) So then Kim was a SINGLE parent for all practical purposes, and her stress level skyrocketed.

I know that stress causes some people to stop eating, or not to eat as they should. I have no personal knowledge of this, since I have never, ever been too tired/rested, sad/happy, stressed/relaxed, cold/hot, manic/depressed, nervous/calm, angry/pleased to EAT. When I was a senior in high school and we suspected I may have mono, the doctor asked about my appetite. "Don't you worry about her appetite," my mother told him, "what's wrong with her?"

Kim's stress caused her to continue to lose weight, though, and one morning she came into Teri's classroom with tears in her eyes. She had stepped on the scale that morning (she probably avoided it as much as I did), and she weighed 88 pounds.

I'm not kidding, 88 pounds. A grown woman with two children.

Teri immediately started railing at Kim, telling her she wished she had HER problems, and she didn't want to hear it, and a lot more things that only someone as insensitive as Teri was could come up with. I finally stopped her and said, "Kim's weight problems are just as real as yours and mine, and you need to hush." I would have told her to shut her damn fat mouth (emphasis on mouth, not on fat, since I really didn't have room to throw rocks myself), but we had to teach together.

Another time I saw some eye-opening dynamics associated with weight was when I was a Weight Watchers leader. A mother and daughter came in together, and they were faithful about attending every week. The girl was home schooled, so she didn't have the problem of staying on the program while she was at school. Neither of them was extremely overweight, but I guess the mother didn't want her daughter to develop a problem in her teens that would be hard to deal with in adulthood.

The mother lost weight faster than her daughter, and pretty soon she was at her goal weight. Then she was at the bottom end of her goal weight range. And she kept losing. Then she was 5 pounds below the bottom of her goal weight range, and the Weight Watchers instructors' manual said I couldn't continue to weigh her. When she came in the next week, I told her she was below a healthy weight and I was no longer allowed to weigh her. She looked at me with tears in her eyes and said, "But what do I do? If I eat, she eats."

I didn't know what to tell her. They didn't cover the psychology of family dynamics as it relates to weight loss in moms and their teen daughters in the 8-hour blitz course I took to become a WW leader. Pretty soon they stopped coming altogether, and I have wondered what ever became of them, particularly the daughter. She probably has daughters of her own now.

I don't know where I'm going with this topic. I think the whole food issue is a major design flaw in our make-up. Why do we have to LIKE food? Why can't we get JUST ENOUGH to survive? I mean, we don't suffer from an excess of AIR, do we? We breathe just enough to get by, maybe a little more in high-pressure situations or during heavy exercise, but breathing in extra air doesn't affect our health or our looks. I have often said that if I could quit eating the same way I quit smoking - cold turkey - then I wouldn't have a weight problem. Knowing the difference between just enough to keep living and too much is the problem. I have an "all or nothing" mentality.

Which may just explain why I opened four boxes of Girl Scout cookies today and put them on the table in the center of my room and told students to help themselves. I knew I could have just one Samoa and not do any damage with its 70 calories. It was the other 14 cookies in the box that would have done me in.

Forgot to Post the GOOD News.....

After whining shamelessly a week and a half ago, lamenting the fact that I only lost eight tenths of a pound in a week, I can't believe I forgot to post the better results after last Thursday's weigh-in.

I lost 2 pounds in a week. Not as much as I would like, but better than eight tenths. And in realize in my BRAIN that 1-2 pounds per week is a healthy rate at which to lose weight. It's my HEART that wants to take off 5-6 every week.

One of my team members lost 1.2, and the other lost 3.

I weigh every day, but I'm definitely not a slave to the scale. I realize that weight fluctuations are bound to occur, and I don't get down in the dumps (much) if there are bumps in the road.

When I'm in a "competition" of sorts, though, I don't want to let my team members down. I arrived at the "Y" right behind one of my teammates last Thursday, and when we were in line to weigh, she handed me her WATCH to hold, for crying out loud. When I took off my heavy sweater (HEY, I had on a tank top underneath), my necklace came off with it. She offered to hold the necklace for me. I said, "No, I think I have to draw the line somewhere."

Back when I was a Weight Watchers leader (sigh), some of my members would look kind of sheepish when they removed their jewelry. I would always say to them, "Hey, a truck load of those rings would weigh SOMETHING, so by all means take them off if you want to."

When I was approaching my goal weight (I lost 50 pounds back then), naturally the weight didn't come off as quickly as it had at the beginning. And it was November, so the weather had changed. I was accustomed to going to my weekly weigh-in wearing bicycle shorts and a t-shirt. When it got cold, though, I had to wear more clothes. Imagine the look on the face of the (male) substitute leader when I approached the scale and started removing my jeans. I had on bicycle shorts underneath, but he had no way of knowing that. I wasn't about to wear those jeans on the scale.

I have no idea how those 50 pounds found their way back onto my body. And some of them brought their friends. But I'm working on it again.

I really didn't intend for this to become a "weight" post.

Dear Fat Gods.......

Those would be the Gods of Fat, not corpulent deities.

Seriously?

SERIOUSLY?

Aren't you taking this middle-aged metabolism thing just a wee bit too far?

For the last week I have done everything almost perfectly. I have not had one bite of chocolate, nor have I had a beer. I had ONE glass of wine on a night when I couldn't sleep. But other than that I didn't cheat. And even that's not really cheating, is it? Aren't I allowed ONE STINKIN' GLASS OF WINE?

I worked out every day....except Tuesday. But on Saturday I ran/walked in a 5K AND THEN came home and rode my bicycle 29 miles. Shouldn't that counteract the not working out on Tuesday?

I mixed up my exercise. I ran, I walked, I bicycled, I did water aerobics, I did the elliptical. Doing water aerobics caused me to break out in a horrible rash ON ALL MY TENDER PARTS (you're welcome for the visual on THAT one - does anyone out there realize how hard it is to scratch one's NIPPLES? Sorry......) because I'm allergic to chlorine and our podunk YMCA didn't think about .... oh perhaps using a salt system .... when they installed their fancy schmancy new indoor pool. Don't I get bonus points for my pain and suffering? And itching and scratching?

I ate rabbit food all last week. To give myself a treat I sometimes put chicken on it. And I used FAT-FREE DRESSING! Which I abhor! We had a baby shower after school today. You want to know my contribution? A veggie tray.

VEGGIE TRAY!

"Dessert" these days isn't the no-sugar-added low-fat ice cream sandwich that I used to enjoy. Oh no, that would be way too decadent. Now my after-dinner treat is a banana popsicle. I guess I'll have to give up those FORTY CALORIES too.

Because with all my hard work and my diligent attention to what I ate and drank, my reward when I went for my weekly weigh-in last night was:

.8

That's a decimal. And an eight.

Eight tenths of a pound.

Twelve ounces and some change.

Really?

If that's to be the rate of my weight loss, I will reach my goal weight sometime around my ninetieth birthday. Why not just die fat at an earlier age? It's really all the same to me.

To make matters worse, did they HAVE to assign a size-zero little twit to do the weigh-ins? Yeah, did they train her to say quite chirpily, "Well it's better than nothing! You lost half a pound!"?

IT'S EIGHT TENTHS OF A POUND, BONEYARD, AND I WANT CREDIT FOR EVERY SINGLE TENTH!!!!

Her advice? Try the exercise of the week: push-ups. Instead I tried MY exercise of the week: a right hook.

Her other tip: Try not drinking sweet tea and sodas next week.

My tip? Try asking me first if I do EITHER OF THOSE THINGS TO START WITH.

Eight tenths of a pound.

Good grief.

Willing to make a deal with the devil for a higher metabolic rate,

Bragger

Self-Indulgence......

****WARNING: HEAVY SELF-PITY AND WALLOWING AHEAD****

I have long acknowledged that I'm overweight. In terms of "standards" (whatever those are), I qualify as obese. Not chubby, not overweight, not heavy, but obese.

I don't FEEL obese.

I received proof in the mail yesterday, though, in the form of some pictures. My friend VT sent some pictures of me and Katydid on the tandem that the BRAG photographer took. There I am, waving at the camera, smiling, having a wonderful time.

With a huge belly hanging over the top tube of the bike.

I could ignore it if it were one picture, but she sent three different shots. Three different days, three different outfits. Same huge belly. I would scan the pictures in and post them here except that I'm afraid the reaction would be, "Well damn if she isn't right....That's one huge belly."

I wouldn't be so inclined to whine about it if I didn't already try my damnedest to do the right thing. I exercise almost every stinking day, except for the days when I exercise TWICE. I eat right for the most part, since Hubby is diabetic and I have to watch what he eats (though I have to admit we've been lax about that lately). Still, I don't pig out on a regular basis. I talk about beer a lot more than I actually drink it; most of the time I drink water. We don't eat a lot of junk.

Seventeen years ago I joined Weight Watchers and lost 50 pounds. Now I weigh 10 pounds more than when I joined WW. I was successful enough that I became a WW leader, but over time I stopped being diligent, then I stopped being careful, then I stopped caring I guess, and the weight all came back.

I realize I'm almost 50 years old and my metabolism has crept away stealthily, but I'm TRYING. Everything I read these days says that in order to lose weight at my age, I need to exercise 1-2 hours every day. Great. Now I need to get up at 4:00 AM instead of 5:00.

I'm not just going to wallow in self-pity (tempting though it may be). I am going to give WW another try, especially since I can do it online now instead of going to weekly meetings. I know I will never be rail-thin, but maybe I can get to the point where it doesn't ruin my whole day to see a picture of me on a bicycle.

Damn getting old. Damn having these genes. Damn being 5'2".

Finally Seeing Some Results.........

When I decided to get serious and drop some of this excess weight I've been carrying around, I was adamant that this NOT become another weight-loss blog. There are some wonderful ones out there, and they are very inspirational. This one, for example. I am in awe of the fact that this woman lost over 100 pounds. She hasn't posted since she reached her goal, however, and I am curious to see how she's maintaining it. Sometimes that's harder than losing it in the first place.

Initially I started another blog, and my intention was to chronicle my weight loss journey there by blogging every day about what I ate, the exercise I did that day, my attitude, obstacles, etc. That lasted all of one day. And then I "hid" the blog. It's still there, but I didn't want to become that person who thinks of NOTHING every day but food, weight, and how to have some of one without a ton of the other. Pun intended.

Sixteen years ago, I was at what was THEN my heaviest. I joined Weight Watchers, and I lost 50 pounds. I still think their goal weight was unrealistic, but by George I reached it. I became a Weight Watchers leader, and I kept the weight off for a few years. But when I was striving to reach my goal, I was obsessive. All I thought about, cared about, talked about was how many "points" I had eaten on any given day and how many fractions of a pound I might lose. When I neared my goal, the weather was changing into fall. I had grown accustomed to wearing bicycle shorts and a t-shirt to my weekly weigh-in, but then it got too cold to do that. One week I wore jeans, but I wore bicycle shorts underneath, and when it came time to weigh in, I stripped those bad boys off right there in front of God and everybody. And we were in a church, so that's not really sacrilegious.

When I first joined WW, I lost something like 12 pounds just in the first two weeks. But that was sixteen years ago. Now I'm sixteen years older, in case you are struggling with that math.

Every time in recent memory that I've decided to get serious and lose some weight, I have become discouraged immediately by the lack of results. I'll stick with it for a week or two (or three) and then throw up my hands and say "To hell with it!" because the scale simply isn't budging.

For some reason, this time has been a little different. When I went to the doctor right before school started, I saw a scary number on the scale that I hadn't seen since right before I went into labor. I got serious (again), and once again I became discouraged when I didn't see results right away.

But I stuck with it, and now, six weeks later, I am finally seeing some results. I have lost about 12 pounds since school started, and the sacrifices aren't feeling like sacrifices anymore. I have continued to exercise every day, not only with the goal of losing weight, but also for the mental therapy it provides. I'm also trying not to be obsessive about it, which is why I won't write another blog post about eating, exercising, losing weight, etc. for a good long while. I am allowing myself the freedom to miss exercise if it just doesn't happen on any given day. I will allow myself a piece of chocolate at lunch if I think it will keep me from killing a student during fourth or fifth period.

I have sworn off alcohol, and I don't miss it. Much. Contrary to popular belief, it IS possible to have fun and be happy without an occasional beer. Or margarita. I don't promise that I will never have another beer or drink, however.

Part of my problem in the past has been that all-or-nothing attitude. If I ever missed a day of exercise, or if I succumbed and had a small piece of chocolate, or if I went out to eat and splurged, I gave up because I had "blown it." I had a bad habit of doing that even when I was a WW leader and telling other people not to do that.

Hubby has been mostly supportive. I used to try to avoid eating "diet" food in front of him, and I don't know why. I realized long ago that the only thing he really cares about is that HE gets to eat. And since he was diagnosed with diabetes, he's better off eating my kind of food anyway. Last week, when I was very ill-tempered (not at him), he didn't even notice when I put his dinner in front of him and didn't eat anything myself. [It's VERY rare that I'm that ill-tempered. It usually has the opposite effect.] It's funny, though, the things that men do. We have been in the habit for a couple of years of having a sugar-free ice cream bar after dinner every night. Then we started sharing one, and we take turns going to get the ice cream and cutting it in half.

When I started on this latest effort to lose weight, I began to cut his half waaaaaaaaaaaaaaay larger than mine [yes, I realize that makes it not a half -- college calculus be damned, I do have SOME math smarts]. But when he goes to get the ice cream, he refuses to cut my half smaller. He still makes the pieces equal, even though I have asked him not to. Some WW people would consider that a form of sabotage, but I think he just can't bring himself to cut it unfairly. A thought just occurred to me -- maybe he's trying to trick me into ALWAYS being the one to go get the ice cream. Damn, I'm slow.

At any rate, the little bit of positive results that I've seen so far have been a huge boost to my psyche. They took their sweet time getting here, but maybe now that I've started losing, I can keep it up. Down. Whatever.

We now return to our regularly scheduled sarcasm-laden blog.

Scary Numbers....

I went to the doctor's office on Friday because I was out of refills on my blood pressure medicine. I have been monitoring my weight ..... watching it go UP, I mean ..... but I was still unprepared for the scary number I saw on the scale at the doctor's office. It was only 3 pounds less than when I went into labor. Unless I can manage to give birth to another 7.5 pound tumor, I'm in trouble.

I'm an avoider. Normally I don't even look when they weigh me at the doctor's office. I just look down while they keep sliding that heavy, noisy thingie across the top of the scale. Looking down was what got me in trouble this time. They have a snazzy new DIGITAL scale, and the display is located somewhere below the beltline. I guess it's slightly less humiliating that every person in the room can't see your weight.

What I can't figure out is why THAT number was scary. And all the other ones in between a healthy weight and the scary one weren't scary themselves. Why hasn't every single number higher than the number before scared me into taking some kind of action?

I wish losing weight meant DOING something instead of NOT doing something. I was already trying to depend on daily exercise to overcome what I put in my mouth every day, and that obviously isn't working, not at this age. I'm a DOER. I get things accomplished by DOING. It's so hard to lose weight because I have to AVOID doing something. Not easy for me.

I'm embarrassed to say that I lost 50 pounds once before. It was 16 years ago. I don't know how I managed to let myself gain that first 5 pounds back, never mind the 45 that followed it.

The scary number, however, has prompted me to reevaluate. Or perhaps evaluate. I've got to stop relying on exercise as my only means to lose weight. I've got to reduce the number of calories I eat and stop making excuses.

I would like to say I've struggled with my weight all my life. What's closer to the truth is that I've let it win.

I don't know why I have such a problem with food. Whether I'm at a buffet or one of those posh places where you get tiny (appropriate?) portions, I have this fear that I'm not going to get enough food. And once I get it, I feel obligated to eat it. All. And more.

This has got to stop. While I consider myself healthy because of the amount of exercise I get, it can't be good for my heart to have to squeeze blood through all this blubber.

Time to turn over a new leaf. Fifty pounds by the time I turn fifty. Fifty by fifty. It doesn't have to refer to my dimensions.