I am still losing weight, but now I am writing about it at www.anewweighofliving.wordpress.com. Join me!
29 Aug
The Tipping Point
I smoked my first cigarette at age 11. A Memphis girl, I had relocated, with my family, for only one semester to the San Francisco Bay Area so that my father could fiddle around at Stanford University while on sabbatical from his job as a college professor in Memphis. That place was another world I tell you. I was a goofy little skinny girl with glasses from Tennessee, of all places. To the kids in Palo Alto I was a bit of a curiosity, a real life country bumpkin from the South! I worked hard to lose my accent, and finally I made a few “friends”. I really don’t remember much about Heidi except she had really straight blonde hair and about as much parental guidance as I did, except maybe less. They were menthol, the pack was green and I was scared to death as we hid behind a bush at the Episcopal Church of all places and lit up. I was excited to be trying something that I saw the adults in my life suck away on each and every day. With the first drag there was coughing, dizziness and nausea. I remember asking her where she got them and she said “I stole them from Safeway.”. I knew right then that I had to get back to Memphis quick!
I smoked a couple more times with Heidi, but then we went home, back to Memphis. I was in high school before I touched them again, though at the time I lived in an ashtray of a house, with my father and his wife puffing away. It is hard to imagine this now, but at my public high school in Memphis, there was a “smoking porch” where kids could light up before and after school-how insane is that??? When I did pick up the habit, I smoked for many years, most of those years spent hopelessly addicted. For a long time, each and every Monday morning there was a plan to quit, but by Monday afternoon I was puffing. When I finally did quit for good it was amazingly easy. I had reached the tipping point, the place where my hatred of smoking was greater than the pain of withdrawal. I actually learned to enjoy the withdrawal symptoms, because the pain reminded me of what I was leaving behind.
I believe I have finally reached that tipping point with my weight. I know what OBESITY is all about and what it is slowly doing to my otherwise fabulous and healthy self. Obesity, like smoking, is a self-inflicted health problem that can kill. It causes heart disease, diabetes, wears out your body, and raises your health care costs. It also damages self-esteem, lowers energy and I could go on and on. And it is epidemic-something like 30% of all Americans are obese (while less than 20% smoke). The more I learn about obesity and feel the effects on my own health, the greater my desire to leave it, like smoking, as part of my past, not my present. Whatever small and fleeting comfort I get from overeating is far outweighed by my desire to be healthy and strong. Have you reached YOUR tipping point?
25 Aug
Weigh-in #7-The Fat Won’t Scat!
Weight at last Weigh-In (7/19) 185.6
Weight today (8/26) 183.2
Weight lost 2.4 lbs
I have (pretty) faithfully been keeping a food journal and tracking my WW points for the past week. I have been exercising almost every day (3 to 4 miles, mostly walking, still too fat to run much), and I am happy to be down a bit. Yay!!!
22 Aug
Weekly Weigh-Ins Went by the Wayside
As the two or three of you who read this blog have already surmised, my lofty and ambitious goal of losing my corpulence has been compromised. When I returned from my vacation over a month ago, I got off track. Well, to say I got off track is putting it mildly. I completely gave in to my old habits, exercising when I felt like it (about once a week) and eating what and when I felt like eating. I blamed it on circumstance. I came home to what I percieved at the time as a stressful situation, and that was my excuse for not doing what I needed to do. It was too hard to get up and go out every morning and sweat, too difficult to handle my stresses without stuffing my gut. As I have tried and failed SO many times before to lose weight, I felt defeated and had that old familiar feeling that I just couldn’t do it, that I would NEVER be able to do it! Completely ruled by my feelings, I was incredibly disgusted that this positive change that I wanted to make seemed out of my reach.
Well, I can get down and out, but I never stay there for long. Like a Phoenix rising from the ashes, like Scarlett O’Hara, raising her fist to the heavens, like Kirstie Alley, well nevermind…Anyway, I am back on my plan, rolling along, and will have my first weigh-in in over a month on Thursday. I am back to logging my intake in a journal and getting exercise (walking / slow jogging for about an hour) at least 5 days a week. I have placed a few post-its around my house reminding me that if I only accomplish 2 things each day, they must be keeping track of points and getting in the exercise.
I don’t have any expectations for Thursday’s weigh in, except that it will happen. Thanks for reading, please keep me in your prayers as I am too weak to do this alone!!!
19 Jul
Weigh In #6-My Vay-Cay Was Cray-Cray!
This is getting downright silly. I started this blog back in June to chronicle my successful weight loss, and it is turning in to a public airing of my failings and shortcomings in the self-control arena. But I am not going to quit, either the blog or my quest to lose this heinous fat that is plaguing my otherwise perfect life and georgeous self. So I went on vacation and gained two pounds. I now weigh 185.6.
I was on the Redneck Riviera with a couple of dear friends and our kids for the annual beach week. I went for four morning runs on the beach. I ate Grape Nuts and bananas for breakfast, apples for snack and salads for lunch. Then, in the late afternoon, after a day of fishing, swimming, sunning, playing, reading and lounging, it began. There was beer, Ooey Gooey Butter Cake, Mississippi Mud Cake, Sausage Mushroom Dip, quesadillas, burgers, spagetti, fried squash, Swiss Rolls, Oatmeal Cream Pies and Doritos.
I am not really that upset about gaining the weight-what’s done is done. Today I am pulling up my bootstraps, dusting off my food journal, and lacing up the running shoes. It is a new day. Wish me luck, pray for me and keep going at whatever it is you are trying to achieve, whether it is weight loss or anything else that challenges you. Thanks for reading-peace out and love…
8 Jul
Weigh In #5-Zippo!
Zippo, Nada, Nyet, Zero, Nothing, None, Not Any! That’s how much weight I lost. Am I happy about this? YES! And here’s why-4th of July neighborhood gathering, Mexican dinner out with friends, ice cream, days of no journaling and no exercise, throw in some good old life stress, a couple of kids out of school for summer vacation, a very undisciplined woman trying her darndest to lose weight, and there you have it-a week of holding steady on the scale. I am ok with it-it is what it is and I am moving on. I weigh 183.6 today.
Moving forward, I am going on vacation tomorrow. My goal is to hold steady until my next weigh in, which will be 7/17. When I return I want to weigh 183.6 or less. Please pray for me as I cannot do this by my weak, undisciplined self and I refuse to give up!
1 Jul
Weigh-In #4-Tragedy Strikes!
Ok, so when I started this blog about a month ago I weighed 183, and as of my last weigh-in I was down to 179. I was really glad to say buh-bye to the 180′s and felt that my weight loss, though slow, was at least happening. I was talking to a neighbor, a truly lovely person who happens to be one of the few readers of this blog, and she shared with me some information about her very successful weight loss from a few years back, which she has kept off and looks fabulous. She asked me a question that I hadn’t given much thought to, but has proven to be a very important question that I neglected. She asked and I quote “Do you have a good scale?” I said that it probably wasn’t very good, and she said “You need to have a good scale.” The one I use is about five or six years old and it’s digital. I swear the battery hasn’t been changed in all those years, but it hasn’t been used much either. I assumed it was ok because a plausible weight pops up when I stand on it. My family has used it and it seemed accurate enough, but as you will see it has proven not to be. My neighbor tells me that she has a very accurate scale that I can use-like the ones in a doctor’s office. A few days later I used her scale after weighing in on mine at 179. And to my great sadness, hers read 183. I went home and mine read 179. I decided to forget about it, I was going to go ahead and use the reading on mine because I liked it better and I had already said buh-bye to the 180′s! But that 183 on her very accurate scale nagged at me. I felt, in my clothes, bigger than 179. So I decided, before investing in a new scale, to invest in a 9 volt battery. I splurged, not buying the much cheaper Walgreens brand batteries like I usually do, but spent like 8 bucks for one top of the line Energizer. I put it in this morning, got on the scale and it read 183.6.
When my head stopped reeling, I got it together and began looking at the positive side top this-it looks like I may not have to get a new scale! As for my weight loss, though my scale was wrong and I am solidly back in the 180′s, I still have to BELIEVE that somewhere amongst the numbers I really did lose 4 pounds. Another lesson I am learning-this weight loss thing is a marathon, not a sprint. There will be setbacks, and I will keep going, not giving up…Please keep me in your prayers as I need ALL the help I can get!
1 Jul
Drunk Drummer Disses My Drumsticks
So I’m down on Beale at a party and an old blues band is playing. The guys finish up their set and start packing up. I’m hanging out near the back wall, quietly enjoying the surroundings-an unusually fresh, cool summer night, the Memphis heat temporarily blasted away by an explosive thunderstorm earlier in the evening. We’re under the pavillion in Handy Park, and the park is coming alive again after a break in the action for the storm-Saturday night on Beale is happening-vendors, another band starting up in the park, tourists and locals- a lot to see and enjoy. As our band is packing up, I notice the drummmer is mighty thirsty and is hitting the keg pretty hard. A few minutes later he walks up to me as I am minding my own business and says this to me with a big drunk grin on his face and I quote…”You got inner tubes on yo’ legs? You look like you got inner tubes on yo’ legs!” I have to admit I was thrown for a loop and was not sure what to say back to him. I mean was this his idea of a conversation starter? So I, feeling really annoyed that my peaceful reverie had been busted by this guy saying THAT, tried to ignore him, but began wondering if my legs looked like they had inner tubes on them and how horrendous that must look. A little later I saw him again, and he POINTED at me and said and I quote…”You the one with the inner tubes!”, laughing and smiling to himself like the thought of my inner tubes was really humorous to him. And that is the story of how the drunk drummer dissed my drumsticks…
28 Jun
A Tale of My Tail
So I have a rather large butt. Some days it gets a lot of attention around here in Memphis, TN and I have always been chagrinned at this, but lately have been trying to just embrace and love my body as it is in its current state. And then this happens. The other day I was at Schnucks and the “security guard” was sittin on the basket return thing in the parking lot in a postage size bit of shade, just chillin and sayin hi to the customers, saying how it was sooo hot and he was trying to stay cool, out of the heat. He chatted with me, and I could just feel his ole nasty eyes lookin at my hind quarters as I sashayed into the store, with my large butt swinging behind me. When I came out he chatted with me some more, and I could just feel him lookin at my behind as I was loadin my groceries into the station wagon. Well after I Ioaded my groceries in he motions me over to him. I was just a tiny bit curious what he was gonna say so I walked over to him sittin on the metal basket return thing just as a 60ish Memphis Country Club type lady was loading her groceries into a brand new Acura SUV right next to us. He asked me real seriously and I quote “Are you mixed with anything?” I looked at him and laughed and said “No, I’m just a regular ole white lady with a big behind. Did you think all white ladies have flat butts?” He and I just laughed and the country club lady looked like she had never rushed so hard to get her stuff in the car nor tried so hard to not look at somebody in her life. As I sat my wide rear down in the car, cranked up the air and sped away, I hoped I had embarrassed him just a little bit, that ole nasty thing, but I doubt it. And that’s a tale of my tail.
23 Jun
Weigh In #3-Buh-Bye 180′s and Don’t Come Back….
179. My goal this past week was to get out of the 180′s and I did it. But I want MORE than one pound a week for all this suffering, all this food journaling, running, sweating, denying myself the foods I love….I want instant results, instantaneous, right now! I wanna go shopping this afternoon and be in the size 6′s instead of 14′s and 16′s. I want running to feel good and flowing, not arduously, rediculously slow and exhausting like it is now. I mean I am carrying the equivalent of a first grader on me!
On the bright side, where I always go after the pity, it’s good. I lost a pound, I am stronger, healthier and feel better than I did a week ago. I am confident that it will get easier and that keeps me going. I like things to be easy….
