About 16 years ago, I was having problems with my knees and having difficulty walking around our home. At that time, I probably weighed less than I do now, but perhaps was having pain due to lack of fitness, age, or early arthritis. As I hobbled around, I complained and my husband in our twenty plus years of marriage said his one and only criticism of my weight. He said that I wouldn't be in pain if I "did something about it."
I was crushed and full of even more self-loathing than usual. I decided to push myself to exercise harder and do better because I was so upset that he disapproved of me. We had an exercise bike that I used despite knee and back pain, and the consequences were pretty disastrous. My back pain, because of the pressure on my spine from using this particular bike, got even worse as did my knees. I undoubtedly did more damage to my body through pushing myself (damage that may still be with me to this day), and my husband felt terrible that he'd said anything at all and contributed to that result. He never said anything to me like that again, which is much to his credit and a testimonial to his patience and compassion.
Since that time, I've tried to know my exercise limits, but every once in awhile, something really bad happens unexpectedly. Yesterday, my husband and I went out for an extended sojourn which included a fair amount of walking. It wasn't fast paced, but I had mildly strained a muscle in my back about 4 or so days ago and we were just out for too long. The muscle pain was one of those things you don't anticipate where you turn your body in some manner that you'd turned it many times before and suddenly there is pain. Since the initial strain, the pain wasn't too bad and tended to come and go. My daily walks of between a half hour and hour didn't aggravate it terribly, though it did get tender in the evenings. The pull is in my middle back and much higher than my usual back pain. I think it actually is related to the redistribution of my weight now based on weight loss so far. Muscles higher up are being effected differently, but also I move so much more that all of them are being tasked more.
Yesterday's ambitious walking and standing, which probably totaled close to two hours or so of time, aggravated this strained back muscle horribly. I was okay until I laid down to go to bed (though it was very sore during the last half hour of walking). Within about 20 minutes, I rolled over and was in agony. I couldn't lie down or move my right arm without incredible pain. I've had very intense pain like that before with my back, but this set off a strange response whereby I got very cold and my teeth started chattering. The pain was truly overwhelming and I decided to sleep on the sofa so that my labored movement and painful utterances didn't disturb my husband's sleep.
Overnight, the muscle mellowed out some. It's still very painful, but I can now move around more normally without soul shattering agony. That being said, I really need to take it easy for awhile and let this muscle heal more thoroughly. I'm thinking that this means doing nothing more than housework today, and keeping my walks down to less than 40 minutes until the pain is completely gone.
This was a case where I had a little problem that got exacerbated by overdoing it, even though what I did was relatively mild exercise. At my age (45), I need to be more careful with listening to my body's signals even when it doesn't seem that the problem is that serious, but the truth is that everyone needs to be careful about pushing themselves too far too fast. In this age of "The Biggest Loser" and slogans like "no pain, no gain", people think that pushing your body hard despite pain is best, but pain is a signal for damage. I'm not talking about discomfort or aching from using muscles, but authentic pain.
One of the things my earlier experience has illustrated is that a lot of people, including caring, loving, and concerned people like my husband, make the mistake of thinking that you would suffer less if you worked harder (i.e., exercised more) to lose weight. They also don't see health issues with invisible symptoms and show disgust or disdain when they see a fat person take the elevator or escalator instead of the stairs. My knees are still fairly wrecked, and while I do my best to get around as much as I can bear, I have a lot of problems with walking up steps.
Yesterday (and today as I'm still in a lot of pain), I was reminded that I can suffer serious consequences because my back is so messed up. People who see me in public don't know that I go home at night after walking just a bit too much and am in so much pain that I get uncontrollable chills as my body can't manage the intensity of what is happening to it. They just see a fat person who they think should move more. My message to them is that some of us are doing the best that we can, and are in no condition to be doing anything more than we are.
Tuesday, April 6, 2010
Monday, April 5, 2010
Learning Moderation
Some 7 or 8 years ago, I decided to make some changes to my lifestyle for various reasons. I was tired of living in a small home which seemed to have too much stuff in it and I wanted to stop spending money on things which weren't returning enough pleasure or convenience. Frankly, I also just wanted to save more money than we had been saving. I'm not sure if this was my riding the early crest of the simplicity movement, or if it was simply an outgrowing of my materialism, but I slowly started to make some changes.
The first thing I did was start going through the possessions we had crammed into our limited storage and toss out the things which we'd bought that had been used for awhile, then set aside and forgotten. One of those things was a camcorder which we'd paid about $500 for and used perhaps 4 times. It sat in the closet, a piece of antiquated technology, unused and unwanted but kept merely because we'd spent too much on it to simply throw it away. I realized that keeping such a thing in the closet wasn't adding any value to our investment, it was just assuaging my conscience about having impulsively purchased such an expensive item for temporary use. Dealing with that camcorder was a turning point because it was the one thing that made me realize that all the things we owned weren't gaining value by being kept, but not used.
Slowly, I made a great number of changes to our life. I weeded out our possessions, we ate out or had take out food less and less and I cooked more, we stopped taking cabs when cheaper transportation was there (but less convenient), and I stopped buying new things right away because I wanted them and could afford them. Over a period of about 3 years, I made the transition from being someone who freely spent and acquired (though actually I was never a big spender or shopper) to being someone who scrutinized every purchase not only from the money spent point of view but also from the material waste and value view. I won't even spend a dollar on something if I don't need it because I don't want the clutter in my home or to use up resources unnecessarily.
This change in lifestyle wasn't like a light switch. It took some time and mental work for me to give up the "stuff" I'd bought and I had to "talk myself down" from the "I wants" when I went shopping. I'd see a cute household item and want it. I'd talk myself out of it. Sometimes I'd even pick an item up or put it in my basket, but convince myself to change my mind before checking out. The transition was slow, but complete. My mindset has changed completely and I rarely have any pangs of material desire as I once did. The materialism monkey, small as it was for me, is off my back.
This path to frugality, is very similar to the current path I'm treading to moderation with food. I sometimes want to eat things when I shouldn't or in portions that I shouldn't, and I talk myself down from them. The process hasn't been as deliberate as the one I took with material possessions, but it has been very similar psychologically. That is, the first step was the hardest (counting calories one day a week and learning delayed gratification), but the other steps fell into place more quickly and easily once I got through it. I also use a lot of talking myself down or stepping away from food in the same manner that I did for shopping.
I didn't realize how similar the mental processes were until I had a recent exchange in comments on Kaplod's blog in which she said that changing food habits has been easy for her as compared to learning moderation. I feel that I have learned moderation, but it happened rather by happenstance rather than by plan. It occurred to me that moderation is learned behavior and not natural at all, and few of us know how to teach others or ourselves to be moderate, particularly about food which has a profound biological hold on us.
A lot of people talk about how our parents can't be blamed past a certain point for our weight issues, but I think that moderation is something our parents teach us through example, portion sizes, and eating instructions. My husband has always been a moderate eater. He overindulges on occasion, but generally eats "enough" and stops. He thinks nothing of pouring a glass of milk and drinking half or two-thirds of it and tossing the rest away. I'm guessing his parents, unlike mine, never scolded him for consuming what he wished and "wasting" the rest, nor did they serve him heaping helpings or cook too much and encourage him to eat as much as possible to avoid unwanted leftovers.
I think that the focus on diets that are supposed to incidentally encourage moderation (because the food isn't tasty and people lose interest in eating) is part of the problem we have with weight in America. The focus doesn't need to be on the food, but on the psychology. Certainly, the food itself is an issue, particularly when it is designed to encourage ever increasing consumption, but if we learned to simply stop, then it wouldn't matter what sort of food it was. I can eat one potato chip and not want another. This is a skill I acquired in the past 10 months. It's not something magical. It is a learned behavior. What is more, it's something which once learned can apply to all areas of life and does not result in any sort of strict denial of pleasure. Granted, it does result in a reduction in the quantity of pleasure, but given the diminishing returns on food-based pleasure, and the negative consequences of being overweight, it would serve to improve quality of life overall.
Moderation can be taught and it can be learned, but we first have to focus on teaching it and realize that it's not an innate character attribute like "willpower", and we have to stop thinking that it's something we magically muster up when we're "ready". It's a skill to be taught and acquired. If our parents didn't teach us it, we can teach it to ourselves with some great efforts. I did, and I can't believe I did it because I never planned to do so, but I realized today that I have done it twice now; first, I did it with money and possessions, and now I have done it with food.
Connecting these two transitions makes me feel very strong right now because I realized that the way in which frugality has become effortless and free of neurotic concerns about "denial" through the years with repetition and mental training is very likely the same path that my changes in my approach to food will take. If I keep at this long enough and apply myself to it with the same diligence as I took with material goods, I may one day find that moderation with food is effortless and resisting its lures becomes simple. There is the potential for that gigantic food gorilla to one day be off my back.
The first thing I did was start going through the possessions we had crammed into our limited storage and toss out the things which we'd bought that had been used for awhile, then set aside and forgotten. One of those things was a camcorder which we'd paid about $500 for and used perhaps 4 times. It sat in the closet, a piece of antiquated technology, unused and unwanted but kept merely because we'd spent too much on it to simply throw it away. I realized that keeping such a thing in the closet wasn't adding any value to our investment, it was just assuaging my conscience about having impulsively purchased such an expensive item for temporary use. Dealing with that camcorder was a turning point because it was the one thing that made me realize that all the things we owned weren't gaining value by being kept, but not used.
Slowly, I made a great number of changes to our life. I weeded out our possessions, we ate out or had take out food less and less and I cooked more, we stopped taking cabs when cheaper transportation was there (but less convenient), and I stopped buying new things right away because I wanted them and could afford them. Over a period of about 3 years, I made the transition from being someone who freely spent and acquired (though actually I was never a big spender or shopper) to being someone who scrutinized every purchase not only from the money spent point of view but also from the material waste and value view. I won't even spend a dollar on something if I don't need it because I don't want the clutter in my home or to use up resources unnecessarily.
This change in lifestyle wasn't like a light switch. It took some time and mental work for me to give up the "stuff" I'd bought and I had to "talk myself down" from the "I wants" when I went shopping. I'd see a cute household item and want it. I'd talk myself out of it. Sometimes I'd even pick an item up or put it in my basket, but convince myself to change my mind before checking out. The transition was slow, but complete. My mindset has changed completely and I rarely have any pangs of material desire as I once did. The materialism monkey, small as it was for me, is off my back.
This path to frugality, is very similar to the current path I'm treading to moderation with food. I sometimes want to eat things when I shouldn't or in portions that I shouldn't, and I talk myself down from them. The process hasn't been as deliberate as the one I took with material possessions, but it has been very similar psychologically. That is, the first step was the hardest (counting calories one day a week and learning delayed gratification), but the other steps fell into place more quickly and easily once I got through it. I also use a lot of talking myself down or stepping away from food in the same manner that I did for shopping.
I didn't realize how similar the mental processes were until I had a recent exchange in comments on Kaplod's blog in which she said that changing food habits has been easy for her as compared to learning moderation. I feel that I have learned moderation, but it happened rather by happenstance rather than by plan. It occurred to me that moderation is learned behavior and not natural at all, and few of us know how to teach others or ourselves to be moderate, particularly about food which has a profound biological hold on us.
A lot of people talk about how our parents can't be blamed past a certain point for our weight issues, but I think that moderation is something our parents teach us through example, portion sizes, and eating instructions. My husband has always been a moderate eater. He overindulges on occasion, but generally eats "enough" and stops. He thinks nothing of pouring a glass of milk and drinking half or two-thirds of it and tossing the rest away. I'm guessing his parents, unlike mine, never scolded him for consuming what he wished and "wasting" the rest, nor did they serve him heaping helpings or cook too much and encourage him to eat as much as possible to avoid unwanted leftovers.
I think that the focus on diets that are supposed to incidentally encourage moderation (because the food isn't tasty and people lose interest in eating) is part of the problem we have with weight in America. The focus doesn't need to be on the food, but on the psychology. Certainly, the food itself is an issue, particularly when it is designed to encourage ever increasing consumption, but if we learned to simply stop, then it wouldn't matter what sort of food it was. I can eat one potato chip and not want another. This is a skill I acquired in the past 10 months. It's not something magical. It is a learned behavior. What is more, it's something which once learned can apply to all areas of life and does not result in any sort of strict denial of pleasure. Granted, it does result in a reduction in the quantity of pleasure, but given the diminishing returns on food-based pleasure, and the negative consequences of being overweight, it would serve to improve quality of life overall.
Moderation can be taught and it can be learned, but we first have to focus on teaching it and realize that it's not an innate character attribute like "willpower", and we have to stop thinking that it's something we magically muster up when we're "ready". It's a skill to be taught and acquired. If our parents didn't teach us it, we can teach it to ourselves with some great efforts. I did, and I can't believe I did it because I never planned to do so, but I realized today that I have done it twice now; first, I did it with money and possessions, and now I have done it with food.
Connecting these two transitions makes me feel very strong right now because I realized that the way in which frugality has become effortless and free of neurotic concerns about "denial" through the years with repetition and mental training is very likely the same path that my changes in my approach to food will take. If I keep at this long enough and apply myself to it with the same diligence as I took with material goods, I may one day find that moderation with food is effortless and resisting its lures becomes simple. There is the potential for that gigantic food gorilla to one day be off my back.
Today's Snack
Only after I took this picture did I notice that I'd only given myself 4 pretzels. I added one more in after the picture was taken.This is one of my favorite "substantial" snacks. When I say "substantial", I don't mean that it's healthy, but rather that it's more filling and causes me no blood sugar problems (as fruit often does).
This is pretty straightforward in terms of contents. This snack is more about how it's done than what it is. Those are sourdough pretzels and the cheese is Gouda. The drink is 8 oz. of Coke Zero. I always measure out portions and put them on a plate in this way in order to give it a sense of being something planned rather than something I cram in on the run. This helps keep portion sizes in line and stops mindless eating.
The cheese is sliced with a "cheese planer", which makes paper thin slices. You'll notice that you can see through the slices where they overlap the green table cloth. This not only allows me to get more slices (which makes it seem like a lot of cheese and prolongs the enjoyment compared to eating cubes or blocks of cheese), but it also enhances the flavor experience. Putting a paper thin slice on your tongue and holding it in your mouth for several seconds while it touches your palate gives you a much better sense of the cheese's sublime qualities. The more surface area of your tongue that the cheese touches, the greater the taste experience.
The sourdough pretzels are more flavorful than regular ones, but I like all sorts of pretzels just fine. The texture and saltiness, as well as the smell of the yeast and bread-like qualities are quite nice. I encourage you to smell them and concentrate on these qualities if you're a pretzel fan.
5 sourdough pretzels: 110 calories
1 oz. Gouda cheese: 101 calories
total: 211 calories
Saturday, April 3, 2010
Q-Tips
Actor James Marsters, who is best known for his role as “Spike” on the television series, “Buffy the Vampire Slayer”, once said that casting directors favored actors who looked like Q-Tips. He said they wanted people with big heads on skinny little bodies. He also has said things that would lead one to believe that he had to remain about 10 lbs. or so below his normal weight when he appeared on Buffy (because of all of the shirtless scenes, no doubt).
I also recall a very long time ago reading one of my grandmother’s large stash of old “Star” and “National Enquirer” magazines about how frustrated actress Stefanie Powers was when people told her how much they envied her "naturally" petite physique. She complained that she worked hard for that body, and chose things like apples over other more enticing treats in order to maintain her body in its slender state.
I think that both of these actors are relatively rare in speaking about their efforts to keep their bodies extra trim, possibly below their natural weight set point, in this manner. Most actors tend to emphasize their working out rather than the other sacrifices. Of course, I personally think the truth for some is a bit grimmer than exercising with a trainer everyday and eating healthily. I think there are a lot of people who smoke to lose weight (as Janeane Garafalo has admitted to doing) and others who binge and purge (as one 80’s actress who was viewed as a goddess in her heydey is suspected of doing since she has been reported to have purchased several bottles of Ipecac at a time when she was childless and had no real fear of accidental poisoning).
My point in this post isn’t to talk about slender celebrities or whether their healthy or unhealthy ways are what keeps their physiques at a size that makes casting directors cast a favorable eye on them. Frankly, I don’t care what celebrities do now that I’m no longer 12 and in my grandmother’s basement amusing myself by thumbing through her old gossip newspapers. My point is to talk about what it takes to maintain one of those idealized Q-Tip bodies and the sacrifices that it takes.
I've been thinking a lot about the end of the road on my weight loss because I think that that is actually more important than the path between now and that time. There's no point in losing a lot of weight just to find that you can't keep it off. A lot of women who have lost a lot and are now maintaining talk about having to eat between 1600-1900 calories a day just to stay at weights around 120-130 lbs. and a lot of them are either very fanatical about never putting a sugary treat in their pie-holes again or (at least a little) bitter about losing access to said treats forever. I wonder if this bitterness is part of what makes them so angry and judgmental of people who complain that they can't make the same sacrifices to lose weight rather than empathic. I would like to make clear that I'm not criticizing them or their feelings. We all make choices, and I'm not going to question those of others. They have their priorities and I have mine.
The question for me is about sacrifice and rewards for those sacrifices. For actors and actresses, whose careers ride on their appearance, the reward for having a body which is underweight relative to their bodies' homeostatic state has multiple advantages. For someone like me, trying to force my body lower than it might naturally be on a regular basis by eating 1600 calories a day forever would have relatively few advantages compared to having a little more pleasure with food on a regular basis and not feeling hungry all of the time. Eating 2000 calories per day offers a lot more wiggle room on the food pleasure front.
And, yes, it's no sin to enjoy food. One thing I'm tired of is feeling guilty for liking food and taking pleasure in it. Humans were built to enjoy food that tastes good, as are animals. Let's not minimize the fact that there is pleasure in good food to be had and sacrificing that pleasure for a tiny little body isn't easy or even necessarily natural. Our biological nature is to stuff our mouths with the sweetest, fattiest food we can find, not to care about how we look in a tiny cocktail dress.
I'm not sure what my natural resting weight is going to be, but I'm sure that I'm only willing to sacrifice so much on the altar of thinness. I'll eat as healthily as I can manage, and I'll lose as much weight as I need to to feel stronger, fitter, and healthier (and to end the constant abuse I take every time I go out in public - let's not forget that that is a huge motivator in what I'm doing - I've been essentially emotionally beaten into submission), but I'm not going to push myself to abandon all pleasure in food so I can look better in clothes and marvel at my incredible trimness. I'll leave that to actors and those who are willing to trade in one type of pleasure (food) for another (satisfying their vanity).
I also recall a very long time ago reading one of my grandmother’s large stash of old “Star” and “National Enquirer” magazines about how frustrated actress Stefanie Powers was when people told her how much they envied her "naturally" petite physique. She complained that she worked hard for that body, and chose things like apples over other more enticing treats in order to maintain her body in its slender state.
I think that both of these actors are relatively rare in speaking about their efforts to keep their bodies extra trim, possibly below their natural weight set point, in this manner. Most actors tend to emphasize their working out rather than the other sacrifices. Of course, I personally think the truth for some is a bit grimmer than exercising with a trainer everyday and eating healthily. I think there are a lot of people who smoke to lose weight (as Janeane Garafalo has admitted to doing) and others who binge and purge (as one 80’s actress who was viewed as a goddess in her heydey is suspected of doing since she has been reported to have purchased several bottles of Ipecac at a time when she was childless and had no real fear of accidental poisoning).
My point in this post isn’t to talk about slender celebrities or whether their healthy or unhealthy ways are what keeps their physiques at a size that makes casting directors cast a favorable eye on them. Frankly, I don’t care what celebrities do now that I’m no longer 12 and in my grandmother’s basement amusing myself by thumbing through her old gossip newspapers. My point is to talk about what it takes to maintain one of those idealized Q-Tip bodies and the sacrifices that it takes.
I've been thinking a lot about the end of the road on my weight loss because I think that that is actually more important than the path between now and that time. There's no point in losing a lot of weight just to find that you can't keep it off. A lot of women who have lost a lot and are now maintaining talk about having to eat between 1600-1900 calories a day just to stay at weights around 120-130 lbs. and a lot of them are either very fanatical about never putting a sugary treat in their pie-holes again or (at least a little) bitter about losing access to said treats forever. I wonder if this bitterness is part of what makes them so angry and judgmental of people who complain that they can't make the same sacrifices to lose weight rather than empathic. I would like to make clear that I'm not criticizing them or their feelings. We all make choices, and I'm not going to question those of others. They have their priorities and I have mine.
The question for me is about sacrifice and rewards for those sacrifices. For actors and actresses, whose careers ride on their appearance, the reward for having a body which is underweight relative to their bodies' homeostatic state has multiple advantages. For someone like me, trying to force my body lower than it might naturally be on a regular basis by eating 1600 calories a day forever would have relatively few advantages compared to having a little more pleasure with food on a regular basis and not feeling hungry all of the time. Eating 2000 calories per day offers a lot more wiggle room on the food pleasure front.
And, yes, it's no sin to enjoy food. One thing I'm tired of is feeling guilty for liking food and taking pleasure in it. Humans were built to enjoy food that tastes good, as are animals. Let's not minimize the fact that there is pleasure in good food to be had and sacrificing that pleasure for a tiny little body isn't easy or even necessarily natural. Our biological nature is to stuff our mouths with the sweetest, fattiest food we can find, not to care about how we look in a tiny cocktail dress.
I'm not sure what my natural resting weight is going to be, but I'm sure that I'm only willing to sacrifice so much on the altar of thinness. I'll eat as healthily as I can manage, and I'll lose as much weight as I need to to feel stronger, fitter, and healthier (and to end the constant abuse I take every time I go out in public - let's not forget that that is a huge motivator in what I'm doing - I've been essentially emotionally beaten into submission), but I'm not going to push myself to abandon all pleasure in food so I can look better in clothes and marvel at my incredible trimness. I'll leave that to actors and those who are willing to trade in one type of pleasure (food) for another (satisfying their vanity).
Friday, April 2, 2010
Today's Lunch
I love grilled cheese, as do most people, I imagine. Even when I successfully lost weight in college so long ago, I never stopped eating things like grilled cheese. The only difference was that I ate it on whole wheat in college and now I eat it on whole wheat and eat about half as much as I did back then. I had tuna salad around from earlier in the week, so I made this into a tuna-melt-style sandwich instead of straight grilled cheese, though it's common for me to make a cheese sandwich with 2 ounces of cheese. The soup and the pickle help make this more filling, though it is a small meal. Ironically, I've found that reduced calorie margarine actually grills whole wheat sandwiches better than real butter, so I get lower calories and a nicely browned sandwich.
This tomato soup is one of my absolute favorite things to have around to snack on or accompany meals because it is warm, filling, savory, and low in calories. It's also cheap to make. Note that not all bouillon cubes are the same so you may have to experiment with the number and type that you use. You may need more or fewer depending on the size and flavor intensity of the cubes and your tastes. I prefer to use chicken-flavored cubes, but beef is okay as well. Generally speaking, I use cubes intended for making soup by dissolving one cube in 8 oz. of water. I usually use Knorr brand.
tomato soup:
- 1 tsp. oil (40 calories)
- 1 medium onion, diced (44 calories)
- 2 small garlic cloves, cut into quarters lengthwise (9 calories)
- 1/3 large carrot sliced, chopped (10 calories)
- 1 large tomato, roughly chopped (33 calories)
- 1 can diced tomatoes (77 calories)
- 2 chicken (or beef) bouillon cubes (20 calories)
- dried parsley, salt, coarse black pepper to taste (I use 3/4 tsp. parsley, 1/2 tsp. pepper, 1/2 tsp. salt)
- 3 cups water
Heat a medium-size soup pot over medium heat. Add the oil and swirl to coat. Warming the pan first then adding the oil allows you to get more coverage with less oil. Add the onions and garlic clove pieces to the oil and cook until the onion is softened. If it starts to brown too quickly, lower the heat to medium-low. Stir in carrot pieces, parsley, pepper, and salt and allow to cook for about 5 minutes. Add the chopped fresh tomato and cook for a further 5 minutes. Finally, add the canned tomato, bouillon cubes, and water. Cover and cook at a vigorous simmer for 30 minutes or at a normal simmer for an hour. The soup is done when the carrots are tender. Cooking it longer just develops the flavors more, but isn't absolutely necessary. Puree the soup with an immersion blender and taste to see if it needs more seasoning (usually, you'll need to adjust the salt). This makes about five 8-ounce (1 cup) servings at 47 calories per serving.
grilled sandwich of (1/2 serving) tuna salad, 1 oz. Colby Jack cheese on (1 slice) whole wheat bread: (71 + 110 + 80) = 261
1 cup tomato soup = 47 calories
reduced fat margarine (for grilling) = 30 calories
pickle = 0
total = 338
This was obviously a very tiny meal, and is not really an uncommon choice for me. Later, I had a banana and full fat yogurt (with sugar) as a snack. This is a fairly classic example of my meal splitting to eat my calories spread out throughout the day more in order to not feel as hungry.
Thursday, April 1, 2010
Another Progress Pep Talk
Lately, I've been noticing some more changes to my body which indicate progress being made. Some of this comes under the heading of "too much information", so squeamish sorts may want to bow out before they reach the end (I'll issue a warning when the time comes). Nonetheless, if this is to be a record of all of the way weight loss is going for me, and improvements I'm experiencing, I want to be relatively thorough.
The biggest thing I've noticed physically is that there has been a profound change in the way in which I perceive the "layout" of my fat. The way I'm saying it makes it sound bad, but it's actually a good thing. In the past, my belly felt like a tire that went all the way around my body, and it still is a bit like that, but lately I've had more of a sense of it hanging mainly from the front of my body. This means my stomach is shrinking. It's pulling up from the sides such that I can see more of my thighs. I'm getting some sense of my true body structure as it follows my spine rather than feeling like some sort of amorphous blob. Oh, I'm still plenty fat, but things are changing in a noticeable way.
When I was walking around shopping today, I caught a glimpse of myself in a full-length mirror, as I occasionally do, and felt as though I was definitely much smaller than I once was. I still am very pear shaped (and big bottomed), but my upper body in particular is much, much smaller. No one is going to mistake me for anything but morbidly obese, but I've shrunk a good 10 inches all over by now, and more in some areas.
The size 44 bras I bought last year which started out quite tight are now getting loose. I have to have the straps at their shortest to keep my breasts from wanting to fall out of the D cups. I couldn't use my 60-inch tape measure to get my bra size over a year ago, but now I can use it. The size around my body under my breasts is now roughly 42 inches. I'm hoping to deal with these bras until I reach the size of the 38C I've got in reserve. Bras are expensive, so I'd rather not splurge on interim sizes.
Though I never had much of a double chin for someone of my weight, the little bump of flesh under my chin is starting to flatten out a bit. This sounds good, but it looks bad to me. I'm 45 and it looks a little wrinkled at the moment. I'm wondering if I'm going to end up with some sort of turkey neck after I lose as much weight as I like. This certainly wouldn't stop me from deciding to lose weight, but it's not a happy ending to this process.
My legs have always been fat and I expect that they always will be, but I've noticed that they are starting to get smaller as well. I'll never have lovely, shapely legs, but my calves don't seem to be quite as obscenely huge as they used to be. My feet are also starting to feel too small for my shoes, which I believe were stretched out when my feet were fatter.
I've also noticed that I no longer need to lean on various things in order to clean difficult to reach areas in our apartment. I also used to have to sit while vacuuming because my back hurt too much to stand all of the time. Now, I only infrequently experience the sort of discomfort that prevents me from moving about and doing cleaning work in a normal way.
On the negative side, I continue to experience swelling in my hands when I walk, and I think it's related to overdoing weight lifting. Sometimes my hands feel like stuffed sausages after (and during) a walk. This is definitely a new thing, and I quit weight lifting for the time being to see if it abates, but I'm not liking it. I've also developed a "runner's toe" on my left big toe. It is black and blue and gets fluid under it. I think this is happening to me because my shoes fit badly, but also because my body is weak and not accustomed to so much walking. Still, these are minor issues, and I'm in so much better condition than before. My back problems are such that I can walk for about an hour now, and even then the main issue isn't my back as much as my joints or hips aching. I still wake up stiff in the mornings, but it isn't as painful as before and passes much more quickly.
Finally, I'm getting to the "TMI" section, so nervous types might want to close the browser tab or window. Before I started this, I had a lot of problems with irritable bowels. I would urgently have to defecate in the mornings shortly after waking up and had excruciating pain from my back while dealing with this. Often, I'd have diarrhea-like bowel movements and more often than not I'd have them 2 or 3 times in the same morning. I also had some hemorrhoids. All of this has gone away. In fact, now, I occasionally have difficult bowel movements, but I think that is related to water retention and hormonal changes. Nonetheless, my body is not accustomed to having to "force" a movement, and it's quite difficult trying to work those muscles now.
There's another toilet-related issue, and this one is quite humiliating, but I'll say it anyway. Because of my belly apron's size, back stiffness and difficulty bending and the narrow layout of my toilet (which prevents me from opening my legs wide), I have not been able to wipe my backside from a seated position for over a decade. I have always had to stand and prop my foot on the seat and wipe myself in that manner. I realized this week that my back has healed enough and my belly has shrunk enough that I didn't have to do this anymore. I can now wipe from a seated position like most people do, even in a narrow toilet space.
I also have found that my periods, which went away for about 2 years, have returned (note that this happened to me before - I didn't menstruate for a year in my early 30's and no cause was ever found). I thought it was perimenopause, but I think that my weight simply arrested menstruation. Now that my weight is between 250-280 (not sure of the number now since I rarely weight myself), they're back more or less on a regular basis.
On the brightest side of all, my husband has given intercourse another try after years of not wanting to for reasons I already discussed. He didn't do this because I was losing weight, but neither of us can deny that it is much easier now than before. I'm not pinned down by my weight and he has much easier access because my belly isn't in the way as much and I have greater flexibility. This is something which we're still working at (because it wasn't entirely only an issue due to my weight), but I'm much more hopeful now than before that we'll get back on track to something closer to what we once were (which was much more active and confident on both our parts).
There are still some changes I'm very much looking forward to, and some of them are embarrassing things. I know it may seem that I've already talked about the worst of it, and I may have, but there are a few more. One thing that has been happening for many years is that my belly apron catches on the lip of the toilet seat when I lean over to get up and off, and it sort of grabs it and picks it up a little and it falls noisily back down. This still happens, but not all of the time. I think that it should stop by the end of this summer as my belly size should soon be small enough to not get a good enough grab.
There's also a narrow doorway leading from our bedroom to our kitchen which I'm too fat to walk through. There's another entrance that is wider that I can use that is not far away, so I always use it. My husband uses the narrow one, and I want to be able to use it, too. Of course, I'm also very much looking forward to the day when I don't outweigh him.
The biggest thing I've noticed physically is that there has been a profound change in the way in which I perceive the "layout" of my fat. The way I'm saying it makes it sound bad, but it's actually a good thing. In the past, my belly felt like a tire that went all the way around my body, and it still is a bit like that, but lately I've had more of a sense of it hanging mainly from the front of my body. This means my stomach is shrinking. It's pulling up from the sides such that I can see more of my thighs. I'm getting some sense of my true body structure as it follows my spine rather than feeling like some sort of amorphous blob. Oh, I'm still plenty fat, but things are changing in a noticeable way.
When I was walking around shopping today, I caught a glimpse of myself in a full-length mirror, as I occasionally do, and felt as though I was definitely much smaller than I once was. I still am very pear shaped (and big bottomed), but my upper body in particular is much, much smaller. No one is going to mistake me for anything but morbidly obese, but I've shrunk a good 10 inches all over by now, and more in some areas.
The size 44 bras I bought last year which started out quite tight are now getting loose. I have to have the straps at their shortest to keep my breasts from wanting to fall out of the D cups. I couldn't use my 60-inch tape measure to get my bra size over a year ago, but now I can use it. The size around my body under my breasts is now roughly 42 inches. I'm hoping to deal with these bras until I reach the size of the 38C I've got in reserve. Bras are expensive, so I'd rather not splurge on interim sizes.
Though I never had much of a double chin for someone of my weight, the little bump of flesh under my chin is starting to flatten out a bit. This sounds good, but it looks bad to me. I'm 45 and it looks a little wrinkled at the moment. I'm wondering if I'm going to end up with some sort of turkey neck after I lose as much weight as I like. This certainly wouldn't stop me from deciding to lose weight, but it's not a happy ending to this process.
My legs have always been fat and I expect that they always will be, but I've noticed that they are starting to get smaller as well. I'll never have lovely, shapely legs, but my calves don't seem to be quite as obscenely huge as they used to be. My feet are also starting to feel too small for my shoes, which I believe were stretched out when my feet were fatter.
I've also noticed that I no longer need to lean on various things in order to clean difficult to reach areas in our apartment. I also used to have to sit while vacuuming because my back hurt too much to stand all of the time. Now, I only infrequently experience the sort of discomfort that prevents me from moving about and doing cleaning work in a normal way.
On the negative side, I continue to experience swelling in my hands when I walk, and I think it's related to overdoing weight lifting. Sometimes my hands feel like stuffed sausages after (and during) a walk. This is definitely a new thing, and I quit weight lifting for the time being to see if it abates, but I'm not liking it. I've also developed a "runner's toe" on my left big toe. It is black and blue and gets fluid under it. I think this is happening to me because my shoes fit badly, but also because my body is weak and not accustomed to so much walking. Still, these are minor issues, and I'm in so much better condition than before. My back problems are such that I can walk for about an hour now, and even then the main issue isn't my back as much as my joints or hips aching. I still wake up stiff in the mornings, but it isn't as painful as before and passes much more quickly.
Finally, I'm getting to the "TMI" section, so nervous types might want to close the browser tab or window. Before I started this, I had a lot of problems with irritable bowels. I would urgently have to defecate in the mornings shortly after waking up and had excruciating pain from my back while dealing with this. Often, I'd have diarrhea-like bowel movements and more often than not I'd have them 2 or 3 times in the same morning. I also had some hemorrhoids. All of this has gone away. In fact, now, I occasionally have difficult bowel movements, but I think that is related to water retention and hormonal changes. Nonetheless, my body is not accustomed to having to "force" a movement, and it's quite difficult trying to work those muscles now.
There's another toilet-related issue, and this one is quite humiliating, but I'll say it anyway. Because of my belly apron's size, back stiffness and difficulty bending and the narrow layout of my toilet (which prevents me from opening my legs wide), I have not been able to wipe my backside from a seated position for over a decade. I have always had to stand and prop my foot on the seat and wipe myself in that manner. I realized this week that my back has healed enough and my belly has shrunk enough that I didn't have to do this anymore. I can now wipe from a seated position like most people do, even in a narrow toilet space.
I also have found that my periods, which went away for about 2 years, have returned (note that this happened to me before - I didn't menstruate for a year in my early 30's and no cause was ever found). I thought it was perimenopause, but I think that my weight simply arrested menstruation. Now that my weight is between 250-280 (not sure of the number now since I rarely weight myself), they're back more or less on a regular basis.
On the brightest side of all, my husband has given intercourse another try after years of not wanting to for reasons I already discussed. He didn't do this because I was losing weight, but neither of us can deny that it is much easier now than before. I'm not pinned down by my weight and he has much easier access because my belly isn't in the way as much and I have greater flexibility. This is something which we're still working at (because it wasn't entirely only an issue due to my weight), but I'm much more hopeful now than before that we'll get back on track to something closer to what we once were (which was much more active and confident on both our parts).
There are still some changes I'm very much looking forward to, and some of them are embarrassing things. I know it may seem that I've already talked about the worst of it, and I may have, but there are a few more. One thing that has been happening for many years is that my belly apron catches on the lip of the toilet seat when I lean over to get up and off, and it sort of grabs it and picks it up a little and it falls noisily back down. This still happens, but not all of the time. I think that it should stop by the end of this summer as my belly size should soon be small enough to not get a good enough grab.
There's also a narrow doorway leading from our bedroom to our kitchen which I'm too fat to walk through. There's another entrance that is wider that I can use that is not far away, so I always use it. My husband uses the narrow one, and I want to be able to use it, too. Of course, I'm also very much looking forward to the day when I don't outweigh him.
It's Not About Being a "Good Girl"
It's not uncommon to read blogs or forums about weight loss and see initial statements, introductions or "pledges" from people who have had enough and are ready to buckle down and lose weight. More often than not, there is either a subtext or overt statement to the effect that one has been "bad" and now one wishes to be "good".
You see this as a pattern as people report their behavior and report satisfaction for boxes on their mental check sheet under the "good" column - drank a gallon of water, worked out, ate a ton of vegetables, resisted sweets and salty treats. In support forums, others pat them on the head for their good choices and following their plans. You find that there is also a fair amount of confessing about trivial lapses as people scold themselves publicly for being "bad". I've seen people scold themselves for eating a pickle even though they have nearly zero calories. They want a hand slap because of the salt.
People also set up elaborate reward systems which remind me of my childhood. When I made the honor roll, my mother gave me $5 as a reward for being a good girl and doing well with my grades. When I memorized each row of the multiplication table, I was given a mini candy bar by the teacher and when I memorized them all, a big candy bar. Women who lose weight reward themselves with manicures, perfume, trips, and items they desire for every x number of pounds they lost or for reaching some arbitrary number. These gifts remind you that you were a very good girl indeed.
One of the things I have realized, and this realization comes in part because I have been "warned" on occasion that I can't possibly succeed if I allow myself chocolate, cake, cookies, ice cream, and salted goodies on a regular (okay, daily) basis, is that people make this harder on themselves than necessary by making narrow definitions or categories of "good" and "bad" and shoehorning their behavior into them. I'm undeniably succeeding, but I'm not doing so as a "good girl", so therefore my methods are not acceptable and to be regarded with skepticism. I'm bound to fail in the long run because I'm not following the rules or the accepted definition of what "good" weight loss behavior is.
I think talking about being "good" or being "bad" is part of what ends up sabotaging people's weight loss efforts as the terms are so black and white. Food and exercise have to also be seen in very absolute terms. I've read about people who exercise when they feel like crap because they want to be "good" despite their poor state. The irony is that these same people claim to subscribe to the philosophy of taking care of themselves and putting themselves first. To me, forcing yourself to exercise when you feel very tired, a little sick, or just plain crappy isn't looking after yourself. If your body feels bad, you rest it. You don't push it to make a tick mark on your chart which says you exercised today.
Of course, there are good reasons why many people turn to such absolutes. They can't touch a chocolate without wanting to eat the whole bag. They can't not exercise on a day that they feel like lying down and doing nothing because it'll set off a pattern of behavior where they make excuses about not feeling up to it more often than not. That being said, I think moderation in all things is the key to long-term success, and the "good girl" approach is simply another form of excess.
I'm not a "good girl", but I've come to realize that that isn't what this is about. It's about learning to eat and have habits that can be sustained and not cause me to be unhealthy. The great thing about this is that I hate myself a whole lot less now than I used to because not being "good" means I also don't have to see myself as "bad."
You see this as a pattern as people report their behavior and report satisfaction for boxes on their mental check sheet under the "good" column - drank a gallon of water, worked out, ate a ton of vegetables, resisted sweets and salty treats. In support forums, others pat them on the head for their good choices and following their plans. You find that there is also a fair amount of confessing about trivial lapses as people scold themselves publicly for being "bad". I've seen people scold themselves for eating a pickle even though they have nearly zero calories. They want a hand slap because of the salt.
People also set up elaborate reward systems which remind me of my childhood. When I made the honor roll, my mother gave me $5 as a reward for being a good girl and doing well with my grades. When I memorized each row of the multiplication table, I was given a mini candy bar by the teacher and when I memorized them all, a big candy bar. Women who lose weight reward themselves with manicures, perfume, trips, and items they desire for every x number of pounds they lost or for reaching some arbitrary number. These gifts remind you that you were a very good girl indeed.
One of the things I have realized, and this realization comes in part because I have been "warned" on occasion that I can't possibly succeed if I allow myself chocolate, cake, cookies, ice cream, and salted goodies on a regular (okay, daily) basis, is that people make this harder on themselves than necessary by making narrow definitions or categories of "good" and "bad" and shoehorning their behavior into them. I'm undeniably succeeding, but I'm not doing so as a "good girl", so therefore my methods are not acceptable and to be regarded with skepticism. I'm bound to fail in the long run because I'm not following the rules or the accepted definition of what "good" weight loss behavior is.
I think talking about being "good" or being "bad" is part of what ends up sabotaging people's weight loss efforts as the terms are so black and white. Food and exercise have to also be seen in very absolute terms. I've read about people who exercise when they feel like crap because they want to be "good" despite their poor state. The irony is that these same people claim to subscribe to the philosophy of taking care of themselves and putting themselves first. To me, forcing yourself to exercise when you feel very tired, a little sick, or just plain crappy isn't looking after yourself. If your body feels bad, you rest it. You don't push it to make a tick mark on your chart which says you exercised today.
Of course, there are good reasons why many people turn to such absolutes. They can't touch a chocolate without wanting to eat the whole bag. They can't not exercise on a day that they feel like lying down and doing nothing because it'll set off a pattern of behavior where they make excuses about not feeling up to it more often than not. That being said, I think moderation in all things is the key to long-term success, and the "good girl" approach is simply another form of excess.
I'm not a "good girl", but I've come to realize that that isn't what this is about. It's about learning to eat and have habits that can be sustained and not cause me to be unhealthy. The great thing about this is that I hate myself a whole lot less now than I used to because not being "good" means I also don't have to see myself as "bad."
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