Here We Go Again, Same Old Shit Again!

I’ve been away for too long again, but mostly that was by design.  I felt that I didn’t have anything productive to add, and I also felt that I all I wanted to do was bitch about how I keep gaining weight and how unhappy I am.  I didn’t want my writing to turn into the sort of “woe is me” type bullshit, when my unhappiness with my physical appearance is due almost entirely on the way I approach food.

Recently, I have been bitten once again by the fervor and obsession with losing this weight.  I have been scouring the internet, running numbers, scenarios, and planning my “next move”.  This all began at the end of August, when I feel like I officially hit rock bottom.  I had gained more weight (ugh!) and was on a trip to Vegas with my husband, my BFF and her boyfriend.

We were in the hotel room, watching a little TV while we got ready to go somewhere.  I was sitting on the corner of the bed, and across from me on the wall was a large mirror.  I saw something out of the corner of my eye. It was me.  And I looked horrible.  I had never seen myself from that angle.  I can go on about how grotesque I looked, how I knew I was fat, but God DAMN!!!  Holy Shitballs.  I couldn’t believe what I was seeing.  This was the pinnacle, the top, the rotten core of me, on display.  I did the only thing I could think of.  I took a selfie.

I will not post it now.  It is too much and too real, and I don’t need it spreading around on the internet as a meme.  As hard assed as I am, that would destroy me.  But I admit to taking other pictures of myself that showed me in the worst possible light.  I can’t explain why I do it.  Years ago, I would have said I did it to further beat myself down.  Now, I feel like I do it because it’s like an expose.  I can’t deal with it if I’m not honest about it.  I can’t deal with myself if I’m not honest about what I see.  I made a hard goal for myself then, and that was to lose 40 lbs by the end of the year, and I had 4 months to accomplish that goal.

So, I made that awful selfie my home screen on my new phone, and I chose a picture of Amanda Latona for my lock screen and a picture of Misty Copeland as my S-Health background pic. Every time I unlock the phone, I see this glaring reminder of my reality, and every time, I am struck not with despair, but with motivation.  Motivation to change myself.  Motivation to keep going. This month, I focused on trying to change my habits and eating less, especially at work. I started using the tools I had invested in, starting with logging my food regularly, and exercising regularly.  I managed to lose 6 pounds-the only weight I’ve managed to lose since starting work here!

The hubs and I have been fans of the Biggest Loser show for some years.  I know that the show isn’t realistic as far as losing weight, but the struggle of these people is real, and so many of their stories really touch me.  I can relate to many of their struggles. During a commercial break, they had the coaches selling their pitch for the Biggest Loser Boot camp.  Now, I am a cynic and a skeptic, but like anyone who struggles with their weight, I can’t help but pay attention.  So, I looked it up, and the hubs asked if I would be able to commit to something like that.  Of course, I wanted to sign up right away, but the hubs was right.  I was going to pay big bucks for this, was I going to be able to stick with this for the whole 8 weeks?  The eating, and the exercise, and the checking in?

After all, my track record for this sort of thing is pretty abysmal. Right now, I need that more accountability and that more structure this boot camp will offer me.  I feel like the start date was the perfect time to begin, because it’s the start of my week off and I will be working a regular schedule for the month of October.  The program ends right before Thanksgiving.  Previously, I spoke of the planets aligning, and everything falling into place, and I feel like this is exactly what has happened. 

It seems pretty solid.  So far, I have completed all the “Prep week” tasks.  Today was the first day, and so far, so good.  I haven’t done the prescribed exercise yet, but I did walk my kid to school this morning, and I had already planned to do this in the afternoon.   I’m excited, and I’m nervous. I want to succeed and I feel like I am finally going to make it.  I am determined not to make this phase feel like deja poo!

Just like starting over….Again

I will just warn you now, I’m going to be cursing and carrying on a bit in this one.  So, if I’m going to offend your sensibilities by doing so, skip this post.

---

Earlier, I mentioned not trying not to get into the mindset that I am “starting over”, but trying to convince myself that I’m just “picking up where I left off”.  Which is such bullshit.  I am starting over, and my starting point is so much farther back than before.  Picking up where I left off would imply that I never gained back this 30 lbs.  Starting over means I have to start at the beginning.  This wasn’t a race where I had to stop to pee halfway to the finish.  This was a marathon that I feel like I turned around and went back not just to the starting line, but maybe I went all the way back to my childhood home and now I decided to walk back and finish the race.  Okay, that’s a bit of an exaggeration.  But anyone who has struggled with their weight knows that this *is* exactly how it feels.

 I got on the scale today and took my measurements and they are disappointing and sad, but overall have not changed much all summer.  I updated my menu planner-it’s just a simple spread sheet I print out and fill in.  I took pics a few months ago, but I guess I should take some updated ones so I can mark my “true start”.  Is it obsessive?  Absolutely, but it’s what I know I need to do to keep myself straight.  A month ago-yes, I’m a slow starter-I made out a list of sorts that I titled : “Things I need”.  It is more than a wish list.  It is a map of sorts.  I started with obviously, what I need, which is mostly time.  I had to ask myself what is holding me back and what I wanted what I really want and how I plan on getting there.  I really tried to get into my head and be totally honest when I was writing about the things that are holding me back.

And the biggest thing at this point is my past, which is never more glaringly obvious than the fact that my birthday is coming up very soon and I have yet to meet one fitness goal I made for myself 8 freakin years ago.  8.  Fucking. Years.  What. The. Fuck.  So, yeah, it’s hard not to beat myself up over my failures, or the fact that my goals are even farther away than they were back then.  It’s hard to let go of the past when I make goals and I just see myself walking backwards from them without really understanding why I sabotage myself that way.

I figured out that one reason is I am afraid of being successful, of winning, of achieving something great just for myself.  See, I’m not a competitive person in the way that some people are, where they have to be the best, or #1, or first.  I just honestly don’t care about that kind of shit.  What I care about is being the best that *I* can be.  Me. Only me.  But I look back and see that most of the time I’m just being a mediocre me, or below average me.  Am I being too hard on myself?  Maybe, but as they say, we are our own worst critics.  That’s the other reason.  I have a terrible, awful, horrible inner bitch and she likes to tear me down

So part of my “moving forward” and “starting over” is just that: moving on. A friend of mine recently decided to leave Facebook because she had had enough drama and was in a too fragile emotional state.  A lot of the comments I read after her post were her “friends” telling her not to give up and to stick it out, that signing off meant that she was letting him win.  I sent her a message that despite what some of the commenters said, she wasn’t giving up or giving in, she was moving on.  I realized later that I needed to follow my own advice and lay the demons to rest so I could carry on.  Maybe this time I can move forward.

Till next time.

I’m baaack!

Yes, my friends, after an unexpectedly long hiatus, I have returned! With an extra 30 lbs, natch, but hey I’m here. All the times I told myself that I needed to start the ol’ blog back up, and all the new “likes” and new followers compounded my guilt until I was forced to come to terms. I do so need you guys to keep me accountable! Knowing that there are people out there reading my shit, and following my progress motivates me to keep up with my workouts, to eat right, and to keep moving forward. You can cut to the chase if you don’t want to read the drivel!

Some days, it’s a constant struggle with me. I’ve always been a bit of a perfectionist, but I’m realizing that some of my “perfectionism” is really “avoidance” and “rationalizing”. Like I kept telling myself that I can’t write my blog because I don’t have anywhere to sit down and do it. Or, I don’t have any privacy. Or my personal fave: I don’t have any time. The truth is that I just can’t wait around for the sun to be in retrograde with Venus when the moon is in it’s third day of waxing and the wind blows less than 5 knots from the east. I am teaching myself that if I wait for the ideal conditions to do something, I will never do it. I am teaching myself the hard truth: there will never be any time if I don’t make it and whatever time that is, is the perfect time and there are plenty of places to sit down and bang out an entry when it’s time to write.

I fully admit I fell into a bit of a funk a little after the move. There were days that I did nothing but read. And read. And read. There were days that I spent all day away from home, trying to track down stores where I could buy this last little thing I felt I needed so we could be officially settled. But then, we were settled, and I was feeling pretty good. I had amazingly only gained 3 lbs during the whole move. I was able to stay active by riding my bike with my oldest to and from school, and then I started going on extended rides after he went to school. I was pretty stinking proud of myself! I had had this bike for 12+ years, and this was the most I had ridden it in all those years put together.

Things were going pretty good and then….I got a job. Which was totally awesome because it meant that we could get out of the financial toilet we’ve been in the last few years. The sucky thing is my hours are wonky as all get out because some of the time I work shifts for about three weeks at a time, and the other part of the time, I work more normal hours. My job doesn’t allow cell phones, and there are limited computers to use, which doesn’t matter in the long run because I wouldn’t be able to blog anyway (policy and they block a lot of sites). My co-workers are funny, and I feel we get along pretty well. There are 9 people in my particular office, 4 of whom are diabetic. You would think we would be a lot more health conscious. But no. The pink bakery box is a common occurrence in our office. I also admit there are times when things are slow and I get the boredom munchies. This is even worse when we move to shifts. I was working the swing shift, from about 4 p.m. to midnight, but then I started working overnights. Oddly enough, it was easier to control the snacking during the overnights, but I ended up eating more because of my wake/sleep schedule so either way, I felt screwed! I’m currently back on the swing shift but there are a few days here and there when I have to be in at different hours.

I also quit smoking. YES! I know! All this time, I was a total smoking fool. But I finally bit the bullet and decided to quit, not just for my health, but to set a better example for my kids. I feel better about myself, sure, and I love that I don’t reek of nicotine and smoke anymore. However, up till the time I quit, I had finally managed to stop eating my way through my shift. After I quit, I gained another 12 lbs to bring my grand total to 30 pounds. Boo to that! But it is what it is, and the most important thing is that I have quit and I am not going to start that shit again. Previously I had quit for nearly 2 years and started back up-bad judgement on my part.

It’s been incredibly difficult not to get in the mindset that I have to start all over from the beginning. I try to tell myself that I’m not starting over, I’m just picking up where I left off-it’s sort of working. I’ve been sporadically exercising in an effort to establish some sort of routine. So far, this is the routine: I start working out, and I make it about 4 days. Then, something happens to disrupt my schedule and I can’t go to the gym or work out at home and then a week goes by before I can get back on track. If I don’t have to be at work early, then I prefer to get my work out in before the day officially starts. However, if for whatever reason I can’t do it, no matter that I say I will work out later, I just can’t seem to make it happen. Sooooo, the best thing for me is get my ass up and exercise first thing, except when I work regular hours and that’s where it gets complicated. I will discuss this in more detail later like on Whiny Wednesday because it sure is a whine more than anything because I just can’t seem to get my shit together and be more flexible.

And I guess the other big change was I started logging my food a couple months ago. Wow-now I can totally see why I have a hard time losing weight-you should see the crap I just randomly put in my mouth and the crap that I put in there on purpose. Sometimes I feel like I have no will power when it comes to food. I took one of those random quizzes the other day purporting to name my psychological problem. Guess what mine was? Food Addiction! I was all, well, I really didn’t need a quiz to tell me that! I was just bitching the other day to the hubs that I felt like I was on the “seefood” diet, you know, I “see food and I eat it”. Yeah, I know, I crack myself up. I started logging my food and exercise back in March. I haven’t made any progress as far as losing weight, but I’ve also managed not to gain anymore, despite my poor eating and exercise habits. In relation to that, I will say that restarting Shakeology has been a lifesaver for me.

 

CUT TO THE CHASE:

Last year, we moved to this wonderful desert. Here’s a shot of the boxes that were outside for like a month. It was the middle of a heat wave and it was like 115 for a week when we moved in, but it was another 2 weeks before we got our furniture. My poor dogs didn’t know what to do with themselves. We spent a week organizing the garage and going through every box as we set our house to rights. Sometimes I hate that we have so much stuff. Part of that is I have a lot of interests/hobbies that require supplies that I don’t have time to use as much as I would like. The other part of that is that we have successively moved into a smaller house each move and it has gotten increasingly difficult to find a place for our furniture and our things. On the plus side, since my kids have to share a room here, we were able to downsize their toy hoard considerably. We also were able to get rid of more stuff that we didn’t unload when we moved the previous year because we didn’t have room for it, or I was finally able to convince the hubs that we didn’t need to keep something around for another 10 years.

I got a job a few months after we moved here. The work load is easy, but it’s hard to stay on track with my diet and exercise because of the hours I sometimes work and also I have a hard time saying no to food I should not eat. A combination of work related eating habits and quitting smoking caused a 30 pound weight gain over the last year. Which now I have to convince myself that trying to is not starting over but continuing on my journey to a lifetime of health. This psyching myself out doesn’t really work because I’m a realist, but I’ve resigned myself to repeating it as a mantra as a sort of “fake it till I make it”.

To help me maintain my “nutritional honesty” I’ve started logging my food and exercise with an online program. It has helped me see that even when I was eating the right things, I was sometimes eating too much or not enough. When I wasn’t mindful of the food I ate, and ate the way I would have normally eaten, it was incredibly clear why I wasn’t losing weight. It’s also a good way for me to see what I’m eating in relation to the number of calories I’m burning during exercise. I am working on being consistent with my eating habits and eating better.

As far as exercise, I have been doing it sporadically, but am working on being more consistent with my efforts because it is part of my bigger plan to be a successful Beachbody coach. I had to let my Coach membership lapse last year because I couldn’t afford to keep it up when I didn’t have any customers. My job allows us a little more financial freedom while we meet our other financial goals, so we are able to get our delicious Shakeology again. I absolutely love this stuff because it’s made from whole foods and helps me meet my daily nutrition goals.

Until next time, then.