I wish!

I watched a lot of TV over the week between Christmas and New Year's Eve. A lot. Yesterday I even went so far as to watch about 10 hours of the Deadliest Catch marathon on Discovery. One thing about watching just one channel for so long is that you tend to see a lot of the same commercials throughout the day. Yesterday there was an ad for Publishers Clearing House where they claimed the sweepstakes were paying the winner $5,000 a week for life. Man, could I use that money. So of course I entered. Duh. I didn't buy anything, though. I'll tell you what I would buy, though: a house, a car for my husband, lipposuction (yes, I would), a treadmill, a massage and a facial. And last but not least, I'd put my stepson through college. No financial aid bullshit or loans. Straight up paid for so the kid wouldn't have to worry about anything. The rest of it would just rot away in a bank (FDIC insured, of course), gaining interest. At some point I would probably feel comfortable enough to donate regularly to a charity.

I'm a pretty pessimistic person, but every once in a while I allow myself a few "what if" wishes and dreams like this. I sometimes wish that Oprah would somehow discover me and help me lose weight, donating a trainer and personal chef. Or that Richard Simmons was giving away free spaces on his fattie cruise. Or that some producer from Extreme Makeover would somehow bump into me on the streets of New York. Or that I got on The Biggest Loser and lost a hundred pounds in 3 months.

There's always a slim chance, right?

"You may say I'm a dreamer, but I'm not the only one." Though, unlike John Lennon, I use those words for purely selfish reasons.

Hating on the Skinny Chicks

I can't remember when it happened, but somewhere along the way I became a fat woman and began hating the skinny, pretty hipsters that all of a sudden seemed to surround me in abundance. I find the phenomenon both interesting and scary at the same time.

When did everyone in the room start getting younger, skinnier and prettier than me? Once I noticed that I got angry at all of them. Or so I thought. I guess what really happened is that I got angry with myself for not being them. Then I got even angrier and depressed because I didn't value myself enough to take care of my body. And we all know that kind of thinking is dangereuse, as the French say. It certainly lead me down a path of delightful goodies not unlike those in the first room in Willy Wonka's chocolate factory.

I can hardly stand to go out anymore. I inevitably feel uncomfortable, like I stand out (which I do a lot of times -- these women in Connecticut are really in shape and it seems like they're all wealthy enough to buy clothes from Ann Taylor or Nordstrom). In being uncomfortable I begin resenting the other women in the room, and sometimes the men, too. I begin feeling very defensive and am only inches away from an argument. I then take all of this out on my husband whom I somehow expect to know exactly how I'm feeling, and how DARE he leave me sitting alone at the table to go off and take pictures of a band, literally exposing me to the potential judgment that surrounds me???

So I hate on the skinny chicks. I latch onto any flaw I can find in them. If I can't find one, I'm almost sure to make one up. "Look how much she flips her hair -- she's pathetic!" "Supermodels have no tits." The men who salivate over them are also fair game. And truth be told, even when I was skinny I couldn't stand pathetic, transparent guys who made picking up women at bars their sport of choice. But now I've reached a new point in disdaining them. Even though I've never wanted that kind of guy to look at me, I'm mad because I'm not the type they want to look at. Jeez, could it get any more convoluted than that???

There are people who think (and say out loud) that fat people just need to stop eating. They don't realize that the dopamine release, the numbing our brains give us is what we seek from the food because we feel pretty shitty virtually all the time. I mean, what's the alternative to that? Pot? Cocaine? Alcohol? Painkillers? A lot of us turn to getting prescription antidepressants from our doctors, but ironically enough those pills make people gain weight. None of those are attractive options for me.

I wish I could wave a magic wand and make all of this shit go away, but I can't. I pray that someday I find my lost confidence.** I pray that someday I will not project my hatred of myself onto others, and that includes skinny chicks.



**Even if I find that confidence I reserve the right to hate troll guys at bars.

Back in the Swing of Things

Slowly, but surely I'm turning things around. I had an honest conversation with my husband (who does the grocery shopping) about my need for him to buy healthy food for me, and he seems to have accepted it. I'm hoping it leads to him buying better food for himself and his son, too. Supposedly it costs more to eat healthy, but I'm sure I can put together some meals for all of us that are good for our hearts and our wallets. If only I could get them to try whole wheat pasta!

On January 2nd I'll return to Curves and go every weekday until February 6th when I have a sort of high school reunion. After my trip in February I'll use my summer vacation at the beach as a goal. I'm sure I'll trip up before then, but what matters most is my ability to accept my faults as a fat girl foodie and get over it.

I sort of lost my head about food and exercise between Thanksgiving and Christmas. Let's hope I've regained it until at least Thanksgiving 2008! :)

Today, to start with...

Since I've been so far off track recently, I'm going to have a mini goal of making today a good day. I will hydrate, drinking at least 66 oz of water (I have a 33 oz bottle). I will not partake of the chocolate chip cookies that some lovely person brought into work and placed approximately 3 feet from my desk. As much as it kills me, I will limit myself to one small sliver of the boy's birthday cake tonight (and will not have any at all after that).

Now that I've read what I just wrote, it doesn't seem too hard. Here's hoping I don't let myself be swayed!

So where's my control???

Before Thanksgiving I swore to myself that I'd be fine during the holidays and would stick to my healthful eating guns. Well, I haven't. In fact, I've been so damn bad that I'm almost ashamed. I've decided to write it all down here so I can be faced with what I've eaten and take ownership of it. Here goes...

Cookies - all kinds of them
Cupcakes - only 2 (but they were really, really good)
Pudding - banana with nilla wafers and whipped cream in it, about 2 cups so far (maybe more)
Pot stickers - only 2
Pumpkin cake - was assured it was lowfat, but I have my doubts
Pepperoni bread
Cheese puff appetizers

I'm out of control. I've got to buy some celery and carrots pronto. I'm also not drinking my liquids or working out (gear's in the car, but I pinched something in my neck and can't go just yet).

Help!

One step away from tweaking?

Yesterday I was at a Christmas Chorus rehearsal at work. I do this every year with a group of other employees and it's always a blast. Something that I noticed after last year is that while I'm in the process of rehearsing or performing I seldom look as if I'm enjoying it. And that's because my self-esteem is basement level low and has been for years. Anyway, one of the directors said to me last night, "I'd like to say you're a diamond in the rough, but really what you are is a brightly polished diamond that's afraid to shine." My response, "I know!!!!" His comment struck me in two ways: 1) he recognized that I have talent; 2) other people notice that my self-esteem is lacking and that it's holding me back from doing things I love.

I've been faced with this before. The self-esteem thing has kept me from feeling good enough to do things like finishing school, having a career, going out with my husband, etc. These are pretty major things, and they're all because I judge myself so harshly. I also have a tendency to judge others harshly, most likely because of an inferiority complex.

These issues seem to be deep rooted, and I'm trying to do some soul searching to unearth their origins. When did I start feeling like I wasn't worth anything? When did I start holding myself back because I was riddled with doubt? When did I become afraid? I can tell you that after just writing those three questions I was able to answer "When I was just a little kid" to all of them. Apparently as an adult I found solace in eating, something I didn't find when I was younger because other people controlled what I ate. When I was on my own with food choices I walked right into the loving arms of a chocolate cake. And the chocolate cake hugged me so hard that it still hasn't let go.

I want to walk into a room and have no fears about being noticed. I wonder if all these amazing people out there who have lost 100+ lbs. reached a point when they no longer felt like a freak when they walked into a room. Or do they still feel that way because of underlying self-esteem issues?

I've always been concerned that saying "I feel like everyone is looking at me and judging me when I walk into a room" is one step away from paranoid schizophrenia. And now that I think about it, fat people with no self-esteem have a lot in common with paranoid schizophrenics. We think everyone's looking at us and talking about us. In fact, a lot of us have inner voices, too, only ours aren't giving us commands. Our voices just tell us we're worthless. And instead of rocking our bodies back and forth we stuff food in our mouths for a moment's peace. Pretty freaking scary, isn't it?

Dude, I am soooooo going to write a paper on this for college. (I'm going back to college in January, voices be damned.) Who knows, maybe it will lead to a rewarding career in psychology!

PMS, MS and Dieting

OK. This is a cruel joke from above as far as I'm concerned. You're dieting, exercising, basically doing well and the next thing you know you're eating everything in sight for a week and flogging yourself mercilessly for it. When PMS is over it just becomes MS (Menstrual Syndrome). You start to forgo movement for laying on the couch pumped chock full of ibuprofen to watch something that will make you cry and hope like hell that your husband or child doesn't deign to start an argument over something because you know it will turn into a full blown rage. Your pants are tight because your stomach now looks like you are with child. If you're anything like me you retain so much water that your ankles and fingers swell. You may even have to call out of/late to work because it seems someone somewhere has got a voodoo doll of you and they are stabbing said you-doll in the stomach with a mini machete, leaving you no option other than to curl up in the fetal position and beg for mercy.

Ladies, it's really hard to remain positive after having gone through the self-sabotage mentioned above, but it's important to remember that this is a temporary thing. If you blew your diet during PMS/MS, know that it's not the end of the world. Know that you can hop right back on the food wagon and nobody should fault you for your relapse, not even you. I'd even urge you to try exercising once during your monthly visitor's visit, because, truthfully, exercise actually lessens the symptoms. I've always just lain in bed and not moved for hours, but now I've found that both my cramps and frame of mind benefit significantly from exercising.

Be careful not to weigh yourself while in the throes of "the syndrome" because it could lead to even worse eating behavior when you've noticed 4 or 5 more pounds on the scale. Water weight's a bitch.

Well, I'm off to read a few articles online about women who commit heinous crimes during their periods so I can feel better about eating a piece or five of chocolate cake last week. Be strong.