Talk is Cheap - Time for Action

I've been "laying the foundation" (mentally) in preparation of this latest weight loss effort.  I've been trying to get my head in the right place - although it still seems miles from here - but at least I'm still working on what I consider to be my biggest stumbling block.

But I've also decided that I need to add some hard facts to this equation, like what exactly am I eating day-to-day.  Oh yeah - that.  So for the next few weeks I'm going to track the amount of calories I'm taking in just to finally face up to the fact that it's probably a whole lot more than I really need.  I'm going to be as objective as possible about it too - I won't get caught up in the whole shame/berate/loathing mode.  I just want to see what needs fixing in the food department.

Probably not such great timing (I am FAMOUS for my bad timing) as we're going on vacation Saturday for a week at the beach.  I can't wait!  We'll have our own kitchen so I'll be able to track most of the calories I'll be eating.  Plus, I expect to do A LOT of walking on the beach - is there anything better?!

So that's the plan for now.  I realize I need to keep it in front of me and be consistent if I'm going to be successful.  Will report back soon.

Murphy's Law Meets Gigi's Law

Hello fellow bloggers!  It's been a while since my last post - my sins are....Oops!  Wrong venue.  But then again when you've been forced to your knees by Murphy's Law, it's easy to get confused as to why you find yourself in a kneeling position (and I mean that in the best possible way, of course.  This is a family blog.)

So what was so awful, you ask?  I'm embarrassed (but relieved) to admit that no one is sick, mangled or otherwise in compromised health.  Nothing was devastating.  It reminds me of that TV ad for Stamps Online, or something to that effect, where one of the people giving a testamonial states that "there is nothing worse than standing in line at the Post Office."  Really?  I know it's just an ad but somebody really needs a venti-sized cup of perspective.

In my case, it was just a little death by a thousand cuts: 
- My laptop crapped out and needed a new hard drive (all email addresses are now floating somewhere in the ethersphere, along with some files)
- Our will got lost and when we called our lawyer for a copy because we wanted to make some changes, he discovered he'd lost it too.  A new one is available at half his usual fee - $750! 
- The "waterfront, oceanview" cottage we're renting at the end of the month turns out to have another cottage right between us and said waterfront - which we never actually found out from the owner herself - only from Google Earth-ing it ourselves - unfortunately too late to do anything about it.  The ad, in our opinion, was fraught with deceptive language and photos, always careful never to show the cottage in context.  Lesson learned.  And while I have a very difficult time biting my tongue on this one (because I'll probably want to rent her actual waterfront cottage next year!), I have no problem with running her a/c with the windows open for the entire week; carbon footprint be damned.  Passive-aggressive?   Who? Moi?
- I had my physical and my doctor, whom I've had for 15 years, suggested I try bariatric surgery - not as a first option, she said to soothe my ruffled feathers, but because she knows I've been struggling with the weight for so long.  Gulp - I never considered myself big enough for that but I seem to have reached the outer limits (in more ways than one, apparently!!).
- I just turned 55 and wear a size 22.

Bleh!

But the good news is there's nothing here that can't be solved.  That's where I turn Murphy's Law ("Anything that can go wrong, will, and at the worst possible moment") into Gigi's Law ("Sh*t happens but is also biodegradable").  In other words, the bad times don't last forever (even though they may sometimes feel like they do!).  In spite of life's little unpleasantries, I have kept my spirits up with my nightly reading of my affirmations book and my umpteenth reading of Geneen Roth's Women, Food & God.  I've really been focusing on improving my inner workings and not allowing life to grab me by the tail and swing me around the room so much.  In the not too distant past, I was the one who would fall apart at the slightest sign of trouble.  No - check that.  I may have gone to pieces on the little stuff but, man, I can tough it out for years on the nitty-gritty, long-term stuff like chasing down every expert, resouce and remedy possible for my kid and my mother to improve their lives.  But the little things?  Remember Alien 2, the movie, where the stuff start hitting the fan and everyone's keeping their cool except for this one Marine who starts shouting, "Show's over, man!  Show's over!!"  That was me.

I wasn't liking how I felt on the inside so I'm working on changing it.  I think feeling bad on the inside is directly related to looking bad on the outside.  I'm giving myself a breather on "dieting" because it's such a toxic word to me now, but will still eat sensibly, knowing that each meal is most certainly not my last so I needn't eat like I'm going to the chair anymore.  Exercise is still in the mix too.  But the most important work I'm doing is dealing with the emotional hunger that's landed me in this hole.  Why do I eat when I'm not hungry?  Instead of my knee-jerk reaction of running to the kitchen when that urge suddenly grabs me by the tail, I sit quietly and try to identify the feeling or emotion that is driving me to behave this way.  It has been a mixed bag so far - but I've only just started.  I expect to get much better at this now that I'm focusing all of my energy on it.  I expect to trust, know, like and forgive myself more than I ever have before.  Fingers crossed.

Losing by Quitting?

Losing by quitting?  It seems I've tried just about everything else so why not this. 

So here's my current situation:  I've got at least 50 pounds to lose and my metabolism has gone the way of the covered wagon - I mean, it's just not there anymore.  For my birthday last year I asked my husband if I could join this pricey gym that offered small group personal training, as it too seemed to be one of the last things I hadn't tried in my varied weight loss schemes.  So I joined but was surprised that they also had their own eating plan too - and that's when I froze.  I was going for the exercise aspect - not looking for yet another food plan.  My membership expired last week and while I didn't GAIN, I most likely took the prize for least amount of weight lost.

I tell my husband I'm really struggling and he suggests joining Weight Watchers together.  I jump at yet another chance to lose by following someone else's plan.  Since February of this year, the husband lost 22 pounds (of the 25 he wants to lose) - I lost 8.  Hmmm - what's my problem with formalized weight plans?  I really gave this a lot of thought and I think it comes down to this feeling I get of being scrutinized and judged.  I always felt like my mother and her thin friends were looking over my shoulder, making sure I followed everything to the letter.  I'm hard enough on myself without that Greek chorus adding their two cents.  So the more scrutinized and pressured I felt to lose weight this way, the more I rebelled - even though my two most recent blood sugar tests came back "pre-diabetic".  So I quit Weight Watchers.

I suppose I sound like one of those good-intentioned people who has more excuses than solutions - and maybe that's so.  The good news is that I'm using my food journal and exercising every day.  I've even starting blogging again.  But the other piece of the puzzle I'm adding that I never thought to before is becoming more interested in my life again.  Sounds crazy, I know, but for the past ten years my focus has been on a child who was frequently operating at Def Con 3 - it's been like waking up to a live grenade every day - I wasn't quite sure when he was going to go off but he always did.  Thankfully, he's in a much better place this year and it has caught me offguard.  Now that I actually don't have to spend my days putting out fires and talking with people who have judged me according to my teen's behavior, I find that I've lost a lot of myself in all that drama.  I had to push it all aside to keep my teen from that tipping point that tipped the wrong way - and, fingers crossed, I think he may be past the worst of it.  So this last part of my "Plan" is going to revolve around enjoying life again and finding that happy spirit that I know is in me somewhere.

Twas Beauty Killed the Beast

Do your weight loss efforts feel a little like a monkey on your back?  In my case, it's more like a gorilla.  Fay Wray's got nothing on me.  That big gorilla hand has got me firmly in his grasp.  And if I let him, this big fugly gorilla will get the best of me.  But if you saw the movie, you'll remember "twas the beauty killed the beast" - not the other way around.

No, I'm not calling myself any beauty but rather am referring to the beauty within us that we've perhaps forgotten we have.  And we all have something - a gift, a talent, a way with people, a penchant for kindness - you name it.  Whatever your "beauty" is, it may have temporarily gotten obscured by the beast of low self-esteem, criticism, loneliness, frustration - any number of emotions or circumstances that turn us away from our better selves.

Last week, I saw a photo of a couple who I knew a very long time ago.  They were in great shape and their smiles seemed to express that not only did they look good, they felt good too.  Given I haven't been in good shape since - well, um - 1991, the green-eyed monster made a brief appearance and I started feeling badly about myself.  Good Lord, I thought, if they saw a picture of me today, I don't think they'd recognize me!  And that's when a light inside me went on.  No, I certainly have not achieved the physical condition these folks have, but I have achieved plenty of other things in my life that I've lately been giving short shrift to.  I've only been focusing on what I don't have rather than what I do have and it has made my weight loss journey that much more difficult.

Finding that beauty within will help sustain you during these trying times when that monkey on your back is beginning to feel like King Kong.  Find out what you like best about yourself and keep it in front of you as often as possible, along with your goal, and you'll soon find that beauty indeed will kill the beast.

Messages From the Movies

"I'd rethink the ankle socks with pumps deal if I were you.

But I mean that in the nicest possible way."

                                                                                     
Dorothy: Oh, will you help me? Can you help me?
Glinda: You don't need to be helped any longer. You've always had the power to go back to Kansas.
Dorothy: I have?
Scarecrow: Then why didn't you tell her before?
Glinda: Because she wouldn't have believed me. She had to learn it for herself.

Oh yes, I've been playing Dorothy for most of my life, always looking to someone else for help and the answers.  Yes, I have finally learned for myself (refer to last post) that nobody's going to lose this weight for me.  And while I know I must have the power within me somewhere, I cannot for the life of me seem to access it.

Dave: Open the pod bay doors, please, HAL. Open the pod bay doors, please, HAL. Hello, HAL. Do you read me? Hello, HAL. Do you read me? Do you read me, HAL?

HAL: Affirmative, Dave. I read you.

Dave: Open the pod bay doors, HAL.

HAL: I'm sorry, Dave. I'm afraid I can't do that.

Dave: What's the problem?

HAL: I think you know what the problem is just as well as I do.

Dave: What are you talking about, HAL?

HAL: This mission is too important for me to allow you to jeopardize it.

Okay, so now I'm feeling a lot like Dave from "2001 - A Space Odyssey" - begging HAL to open the pod bay doors for me.  I think my pod bay doors are jammed, too, when I engage in this endless cycle of self-sabotage and denying myself the things in life I really truly want.  I have figured out the emotional reasons why I am overweight (thanks in large part to Geneen Roth's "Women, Food & God") but feel I'm still missing the part that will ultimately help me get unstuck and moving forward - the stuff behind the pod bay doors.  I might also be part HAL - not trusting myself enough to accomplish this important mission.

I hate to say this but I am taking one last stab at a self-help book that seems to address just this issue called "The Tools".  The authors claim that their tools will take the reader beyond the "why" of their problems to "how" they can teach themselves to break obsessive habits, like self-sabotage and rumination of past problems.  Couldn't hurt - even though I'm kind of going outside myself for the answer.  But I think the difference here is that they're directing me back to myself to identify and drop some bad habits, and learn to develop some good ones.  Sigh - anyone interested in joining my support group for people who read too many self-help books?

I'm really struggling not to backslide any further.  I'm trying to establish some kind of beach head here and it's taking everything I've got.  I think I've got most of the bad stuff out of my head but cry almost every night out of sheer frustration at not being able to move forward with the good. To loosely quote another favorite movie,"A League of Their Own":  "Crying?  There's no crying in hardball."  (P.S. yes, my fellow purists, I know the real line refers to "baseball" - please allow me a little blogger's license.)

Quiet on the Set!!!!!!!

"                                "
Couldn't have said it better myself.

For as long as I can remember, I've always had some background noise filling up the silence - the radio, the TV, the stereo (the what?).  Some of that habit started when I was single and living by myself in a big city, which could be very isolating at times.  I had a great job with great friends but once I went home and it was just me, I felt I needed something or someone - one dimensional as they may have been - keeping me company.

Fast forward some twenty-odd years later and I was still filling my head with all the wrong things.  How did I know they were the wrong things?  The fact that I haven't been able to lose all this weight over the course of about 15 years.  Something, I concluded, was very, very wrong if all these gym and (multiple) Weight Watcher memberships couldn't help me accomplish that task. 

One day, not so long ago, I asked myself if the problem might be more on the inside than it was on the outside. After countless requests to my brother about keeping me informed as to family news, I had just had a huge falling out with him about his unwillingness to do so.  I live about 1 1/2 hours away from our hometown; he, about 20 minutes.  We still share a very sick mother.  After Mr. Big Stuff informed me that he was just too busy to call or shoot me an email, he quickly devolved into calling me names, stirring up unpleasant memories, mocking painful losses in my life - the whole Charlie Sheen magilla - via email of course.  The chump didn't have the cajones to step out from behind his keyboard.

Well, I thought, who needs this bullshit, as I deleted every trace of him from my computer and personal records.  My "family" was now completely in pieces.  I know I'm not the first this has happened to.  But then it hit me that if I was no longer a sister or a member of this family - things I'd always identified with, obviously too much so - then who the hell was I?  It occurred to me that most of the focus of my life had been outward - attaching myself too much to others - rather than being content with who I was on the inside.  And that was the crux of the problem - I'd hadn't taken the time to be still with myself and listen to that "inner voice" (I apologize if this is sounding too crunchy granola for anyone.  I've already insulted you enough with the mime.).  All this time I've been distracting myself with useless noise when I should've been paying more attention to the silence.  Okay, I'm no monk but I have racked up an awful lot of mileage without too much self-examination.

In my case, the overeating is just a symptom.  I believe that if I can "just" be more at peace with myself and figure out what I want to do with my life then I won't feel the need to distract myself with food for not having done it yet.  Still so much learning to do.....

#4 - Is There Any Such Thing As Wanting It "Too Much"?

When I was a junior in college I developed a wild crush on a dorm mate named Mark.  He was tall, good-looking and had a great sense of humor - usually way out of my league.  As we became good friends, I continued to sense a deeper connection with him - if only either one of us had the courage to speak about it openly.  Seeing as he didn't appear to be in any hurry, I decided to take a risk and ask him to a semi-formal dance.  He accepted and I thought we'd soon be a couple.

What's that saying about best laid plans?  Almost immediately after the dance, it was as if I had become radioactive to this guy.  He was suddenly frosty and distant and I thought I had blown it for good.  I was SO sure he felt about me the same way I did about him, but apparently my radar was malfunctioning.  There was nothing more I wanted in this world than to be with this guy.  Nothing.  But I had taken my best shot and although deeply disappointed, was able to walk away knowing I had given it my all.  His loss, I figured.  I stopped trying so hard, let it go and moved on.

I guess you could say I gave it up to God when I left school for the summer break. My heart was broken but I figured time and space would heal the wound.  I waitressed all summer long and joined Weight Watchers for the first time - losing 25 pounds in three months (oh, to have a metabolism like that again!).  I did it for me, of course, since Mark was now just a distant memory.

When I returned to school in the fall, Mark was still there but I no longer treated him like he was so special anymore.  I was still friendly but didn't make plans around him or myself too available - I did as I pleased and went wherever the moment was taking me. Oddly enough, Mark came to his senses and asked me out on a date - just the two of us - to my favorite place on earth - Watch Hill, RI.  I had my guard up - I wasn't going to allow him to break my heart twice.  But by the end of the evening it was clear that that connection I had felt with him earlier in the year was indeed a two-way street and we fell madly in love.  He said he'd been attracted to me from the beginning but a buddy of his was also interested in me and he didn't want to horn in before it had played itself out.  Men!

Anyway, to make a long story even longer, I'm feeling very much the same way with my weight loss efforts these days - I am wanting it too much.  Huh?  How can that be?  I am focusing all of my gnat-like attention on it which is creating huge feelings of deprivation and making me crankier than Kim Kardashian with a thong wedgie.  I need a little perspective here and have to stop over-thinking it so much - but not to the point that I start gaining weight again.  Micromanaging is best left to rocket scientists and Martha Stewart.  I keep feeling that if I could stop trying so hard, it would come more naturally to me, as if waiting for me on a platter.  Now if I could only figure out the "how" part of it ....