Because I am better then this

Do you hate your body? There were times when I’d go days without looking in the mirror because I didn’t want to see what kind of person I’d become. Whenever I had the courage to look down, I’d grab at my donut of fat around my tummy in disgust. I’d yearn for my old healthy fit body, and take out my anger on my current one.

The other day when I finally dragged myself back on a treadmill after a week off, I felt my body giving up halfway there and I was going to shout at it in frustration again. But then, something made me stop. I slowed the treadmill down to a walk and finished up my hour just slowly walking and feeling my body move. I know it sounds strange, but have you ever thought of how amazing our bodies can be, even with all the crap we put it through? I realized I couldn’t take my anger out on my body, demanding it to perform the same way it did when I was 30 lbs lighter. That’s not fair. *It* didn’t make *me* this way - *I* made *it* this way. You get what you give. You are what you eat. If I want my body to go back to its healthy ways, I need to treat it better and stop using it as a punching bag for my emotions. I also need to appreciate it now – as is. Thinking back to everything I’d done to it in the past 6 months (the yo-yo dieting, the massive binges), it’s amazing that it’s still functioning and I haven’t collapsed with a clogged artery or something.

Dear Body –

Thank you for doing what you do to keep me alive and moving every day. If you’ll stick it out with me for a little bit more, I promise to pull myself together up here and get us *both* back into the shape we were meant to all.  Please don’t hate me.

Much love,

the Head

I don’t know why I let other people affect me so much like this.

I did a 4 mile run yesterday.  I ate exceptionally well all day.  I was just finishing up a light dinner before heading off to the gym (while thinking excitedly of the 1lb lose I’ll be recording tmw) when my mom came home and we had a little talk.  In my head, little alarm bells were ringing off urging me to run away, but what could I do?  She’s my mother.  I love my mom to pieces and she’s actually very supportive of me - however being a naturally thin woman who only eats to live and has no cravings whatsoever she has no clue as to the emotional and physical turmoils of being overweight.  I try to explain calories in and out…about how losing weight takes time…about how it’s more then “…just don’t eat that much.”  It’s so so much more and so so much harder then she thinks, but I can’t get her to understand that.  She’s genuinely puzzled about why I keep gaining the weight.  The confusion and general lack of understanding sometimes leads her to accidentally say some hurtful things.  Tonight was one of those nights.  After my “conversation with her”, I threw my hands up in frustration and ran to my room with a box of comfort cereal in hand (and now…a half-full box..).

She needs me right now - I know that, but is it selfish of me to want to get some time away so I can better myself? I want to be there for her, but being around her is definitely not good for my mental health right now.  Is it selfish to want to spend some time focusing on just myself for a little bit? UUGGHHH I don’t know.  Being home is probably another reason why it’s so hard for me to lose the weight this time around.  last time was easy because I was living on my own and didn’t have to answer to anyone, but myself.

Anywhos…on a less whiney topic - I read somewhere (sorry, I don’t remember where) someone mentioning wanting to “be fit for the New Year”.  I think this is an awesome idea!!  I hate making “New Years resolution”. No, this year I’m not going to make any resolutions.  I’m going to BEGIN the year in the best shape of my life!! I don’t know if I’ll make my goal weight by then, but I sure as heck will try my hardest.

My GOALS for the rest of this year:

• Not skip more then 1 Day at the gym in a row
• Track my food intake (being honest with myself and not going over calorie limits)
• Not let other ppl/stressful situations unravel me (this is going to be my hardest one..

Here’s to everyone who’s struggling on this journey too.  Let’s buckle our heads down and really give the last of 2009 all we’ve got! Let’s really begin 2010 with a BANG!

Jen @ A Prior FatGirl is having this awesome Motivation MatchUp thing and originally I was excited to join, but then I thought about it and realized it probably wasn’t for me.  The way I see it, sure, having someone motivate and encourage me on for a few weeks or even months would be a big help in holding me accountable and maybe the push I need to finally reach goal - but they can’t be there always. In the end, the only person who will always be there is me.  So I want to learn how to be my own strongest motivator.  Nothing wrong with using crutches, but knowing me, I’ll learn to lean on those crutches and so when it’s finally time to take them off, i wouldn’t know how to walk w/o them anymore.  Does that make any sense…or am I being weird again?

Anywhos, I’m happy to say that my absence was actually because I’ve been working extra hard. :)  Regular gym workouts and sleeping early (to curb those late night binges).  It’s really weird though because my legs continue to shrink (they fit in my old size 4 pants now) but my waist/tummy area is still in the size 10 range (doesn’t that look weird? it sounds like I look like an ice cream cone 0_o).  Is it what I eat?  Asian meals are always paired with white rice and my breakfast is cereal so that’s probably a lot of carbs.  It’s hard cutting back on carbs though because my body’s so used to it, I always feel really hungry without it. *sigh*

This whole process is such a Catch 22.  When I’m doing well and see progress, it’s so easy to make good food choices and I exercise with more vigor. But when I’m not progressing as well, I start to not take as good care of myself which leads to feeling more depressed and prone to binges..and everything starts to downwardly spiral.

Reason #3 to Lose Weight: so I can stop sitting out on family activities I want to enjoy.

Back story: Awhile back, I was at the mall with my parents for an eye appointment  Afterward, we had to wait for their glasses to be made and my mom wanted to browse the stores.  Of course, since I feel horrible in all clothes right now, I’m avoiding those stores like the plague.  My parents noticed my sour mood and asked if I wanted to go home.  I didn’t want to ruin their day so I said they could stay and I’d come back to pick them up in a few hours.  And that’s how I ended up at home angrily chomping on peanut butter cookies when I should’ve been at the mall enjoying some quality time with my parents.  I don’t even want to think about our beach trip this year when I spent the entire time sitting on the sand or in the hotel room because I was too embarrassed to put on a bathing suit.  I WANT MY LIFE BACK!

One of the positive things about this whole experience (weight loss, weight gain..image issues etc.) is this amazing community I’ve stumbled upon. You ladies (and gents ^^) are really incredible people.  Everyone’s so sweet, supportive and *willing* to give a helping hand/word to people you don’t even know.  Honestly, I never expected to get any comments on this blog (as you can tell from the haphazard ramblings..) so I’m totally floored to see ppl replying and encouraging me on.  Your comments mean the world to me and have saved me from sabotaging myself quite a few times.  So, to everyone who has replied, thank you *so* much.  If you return (and for future responders), please leave a blog address (if you have one) so I can return the favor. ^^

Once I’ve established a “rhythm” to it, I’m usually good about sticking to plan to the end.  The harder part for me is getting into that rhythm in the first place.  I’d have a few goods days, then a stressful day comes and an indulging moment leads to indulgent days.  The next day, I try to brush myself off, learn from my mistake, buckle down and try again. But after so many bruises from the falls, it gets harder and harder to make yourself get back up because in the back of your mind you feel like you’re just setting yourself up to fall again.

But what can you do, right? Even if the road is tough, there’s only one way to get up a mountain - by climbing over one painful rock at a time.

This time though, I’m not just doing it for myself, but for my family too.  I see the pain that I bring to my mom when she sees me giving up and wasting away on the couch.  I’ve tried to shut it out of my head by occupying myself with more food (ah, the self destruction), but lately its gotten too loud for me to block out.  She wonders where that bright, youthful energetic little girl that she sent off to college went.  The one that was ready to take on the world.  I want to tell her that after 4 yrs, she was beaten down by life, but that little girl is still in here…and she’s praying to get out too.  So please don’t give up on me yet because I’m not going to give up on myself!

I’m *very* happy to report that I survived the buffet.  As planned, I ate nothing but veggies and some soup.  it helped that the Chinese food was pretty bad, but resisting unlimited ice cream definitely took some work out of me. But I did it!

Its inspired me to issue a 7 day challenge for myself.  7 entire days of healthy, binge-free eating. Baby steps right?

I’ll be back to report in 7 days - wish me luck! ^^

It started out as an awesome day.  I managed to control myself even when the stress started to get high at work (my weak point when it comes to binges).  I ate well all day and even managed to stare down a cookie before walking away.  I did a step class *and* ran 2.5 miles.  I haven’t felt this good and energized in awhile.

And then, somewhere in the night as I was trying to do my night crunches - I crumbled.   The rest of my body is shrinking back to a normal person size….why can’t my stupid stomach? I was beyond frustrated and starting to feel like the gallon lady (remember those awkward things they made us draw in elementary school to learn our quarts and cups?). I think it was a combination the layer of fat around my stomach area that’s refusing to go away and the secrecy of the night…the feeling oh…”hey…everyone’s asleep..even if I will pig out, no one will find out” …that caused my lost of resolve.

It started with the bag of honey bbq chips that’s been staring *me* down all night.  With every bite it was getting saltier and since there was no water nearby, the only solution was to eat something sweet to counter the salty aftertaste (riiigghht…..). A slice of pound cake and 4 crackersn’cheese later, I’m miserable and angry at myself for ruining a perfectly good day.  Now all I can think about is how many laps I’m gonna have to do to burn off all that awful food that didn’t even taste that good in the first place. All because I didn’t have more self control.

I guess the bright side of it is that I’ve had binges way worse than this so in a way this was an improvement.  I’m just angry and disappointed with myself.  I work so hard during the day…so when I do stuff like this, I feel like I’m letting myself down and wasting all of my earlier efforts.  No wonder this process is taking forever….when I treat it like this…I can’t blame my body for not responding the way I want it to.

My counter-attack plan to handle these moments from now on is to

1. *Always* have water with me.  Attach it to my hip or something.  Water probably would’ve been able to stop me after the chips.
2. Before I put anything to my mouth - breathe….and ask myself if I really should be eating this.  Hopefully that momentary pause will curb any impulsive bites.

Today, we’re going out to a Chinese buffet for a coworker’s birthday.  My mentality for buffets have always been, “I’m paying good money for all of this….so I must get my money’s worth of food!” But if I really think about it, I’m paying way more in gym membership. A couple of dollars worth of food that’s going to cost me more extended gym membership money is totally not worth it. I have a closet full of winter clothes that I was able to fit into before the craziness of this year happened.  Having to spend money on a new winter wardrobe is not worth it!

My counter-attack plan for this event is to have to

1. Remind myself that the trip isn’t about the food, it’s about the social interactions and talking with the people.
2. Sit as far away from the buffet as possible
3. Sit with my back to it (so I’m not distracted by the sight and smells when I try to talk to a coworker)
4. Think about how happier my body is going to feel in the old pretty winter clothes I can wear again and how happier wallet will feel when I don’t have to shell out monthly gym payments.

I’m going to think about all this and realize a couple of dollars of buffet food is NOT WORTH IT.

“Baby are you down…down…down,..down…dooowwn”  Here’s to the falling of the numbers.  I’m excited ^^

10/22/2009 - 145.0

10/29/2009 -

Why do I keep sabotaging myself?  It’s like deep down, this goal feels so far fetched.  The image of a healthy skinny me is more like a dream then something achievable.  What, me? Pretty?  Who am I trying to kid? So every time I come across a hurdle or succumb to a moment of weakness, it’s like I hear an “Ah ha, I knew you wouldn’t be able to do it” in my head.  Proof of my doomed failure.  And so I drown my sorrow in more comfort food.

But you know.  This so called “comfort” food has now become the source of my stress.  This has got to stop.  I *CAN* do it.  I’ve done it before.  I have got to stop comparing me now to the end result that I envisioned and then faulting myself for not miraculously making it there in a day.  I didn’t gain all this weight in a day, so how can I expect for it to come off that way?  Sometimes the progress is not noticeable in the scale, or measurable in numbers at all, but its mental progress as well.  The taking back control of your relationship with food - of your life!

You CAN do it!  You CAN make it to goal!  You CAN feel beautiful and confident again.  You CAN and you WILL and you DESERVE IT.  Don’t let anyone cheat you of this dream.  Not even yourself.

I knew Day 1 was already going to be an “off” day because I was having a mini-reunion with some old high school friends.  A friend’s leaving for grad school in another country so we’re all sending her off.  What I hate is that because I knew it’d be an off day before “the change”, I spent the whole day binging…like I was preparing myself for starvation or something.  I felt compelled to eat everything I could in sight.  I guess I have to start drilling it into my head that there isn’t an “end all” moment.  That these changes are going to be permanent so I need to take this slow, but firm.  There won’t be any drastic actions so no need to pack up the fat as if preparing for a crash course on the wild outdoors.

Reason #1 To Lose Weight: So people will stop giving me that, “Wow, you’ve changed” look.  You know, the kind where their eyes noticeably enlarge and become more round. And then when they notice they realize it, they backtrack and try to phrase their surprise more politely “Oh, it’s just because I haven’t seen you in so long. Everyone’s changed so much since high school”.  LIES. Yea, I know I got fatter whereas everyone else got prettier.  I’m tired of getting that look from my old friends, especially since they’ve all grown so much during the college years.  Everyone’s moved on from that awkward teenage phase and have transformed into confident working women.  I know that I’ve matured and changed on the inside too…and now I want to look the part.

Day 2 was better.  It was such a gorgeous day outside (we’ve been having nasty cloudy weather for the past week) so I actually enjoyed being outside and running again.  I never thought I’d miss the feeling of being able to comfortably job 3 miles. My tip today for myself is to not weigh myself everyday anymore.  I’ve been failing lately because I’d work so hard for a couple of days, but when the scale refuses to reflect my hardworking, I lose confidence and start slipping again. So, I will do weekly weigh-ins just to make sure I’m headed in the right direction, but no more OCD over the numbers on the scale.  This is more then just about numbers, it’s about how I feel about myself.

Reason #2 to Lose Weight: so that I can hold my head up high when I jog around the track.  So I don’t feel bad about making eye contact with other people and wonder if they’re thinking, “Hey, look at that fat girl that’s trying so hard.’ Instead, I want to imagine that they’re admiring my physique and how healthy I look.