Well, I told Scott I'd address this in another post, so here I am.
Addressing it.
In another post.
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First though, I've been visiting a ton of blogs by people who are much much better at this writing thing than I am. Like, say,
Scott's blog. Or the
Queen of Dysfunction, who is now totally my idol in blogging about family matters and such. That chick knows how to bring the funny. Seriously. And although I know it's difficult to contemplate, I think she has a better grasp on profanity than even
I possess.
I have an English degree (which I've mentioned once or twenty times here). All I can think when I look at this blog is that my professors must have been on some
serious crack.
And then there are all the clearly focused blogs, like
Mostly True Stories (labor and delivery), or
any one of Angel's blogs (chronic headaches, weight loss, hurricanes, quilting, and crafting, in that order), or
Stan's blog, which chronicles his adventures in
Chantix land and the aftermath thereof.
Me? I'm all over the place. Rants? Got 'em. Family silliness? Got it. Bleeding forever without dying? It's here. Smoking? Yep. And now the quitting smoking and
Chantix stuff.
I'd link it, but, well... you can find it in the archives if you're interested.
And to all this
mish-mash, I'm adding weight loss issues.
Oish.
So if any of you come here hoping for some kind of consistency in the nature of the posts, I'm very sorry for disappointing you.
I mean that sincerely.
Hell, sometimes I wonder why I do this myself. I'll notice readership going up, get all freaked out, and wonder if I should even keep inflicting this mess on a small but slowly-increasing segment of the unsuspecting public.
But then I screw my head on straight and figure, well, I
like blogging. I liked it before anyone even read this damn thing (I have
two other ancient blogs to attest to this). And apparently, it's good enough for some folks to read.
I just question your judgment and mine in my more dark and introspective moments ;)
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Anyway, on to weight issues!
I was always a very skinny little kid. Or slender. Whatever. When I was four I had my tonsils out and scared my parents out of about ten years' growth by my impersonation of an ambulatory skeleton for about six months after the surgery.
Mom was very conscious about feeding her family healthy food. I remember once in mid-elementary school we were learning about what happens when food goes bad. It must have been related to a book the teacher was reading us or something. But anyway, one night Mom was serving us meatloaf and I spied something,
uhm, "off" in my slice of loaf.
"Mom! This meat is bad! It's... it's...
green."
"That's just a spice, sweetie."
Uh-huh. But gullible child that I was, I swallowed her lie.
And the freaking
peas that she'd ground up and put into my Holy and Sacred ketchup-drenched meatloaf.
I hate peas. Hate them with a passion unequalled. I came home from class one day to find my husband (who is well aware of my hatred of these particular legumes) feeding our precious-and-then-only son this vile vegetable.
The little ingrate was gulping them down with great relish.
Since that time, when the man cooks? He makes peas as the vegetable. And I,
conscientious mother that I am (I
will set a good example, dammit), shovel them into my mouth in HUGE spoonfuls, hold them carefully on my tongue, and then swallow them down whole with a huge gulp of whatever liquid I'm happening to drink that night.
If it's wine, I'm good and buzzed by the time I have to do the dishes.
When #2 son was born, I stared the nasty beast of engorgement dead in the eye. What was the solution to the agony of my breasts? Frozen. Freaking. Peas.
God, I can still smell them thawing/cooking on my chest. I saved them for after-care for my husband's vasectomy-that-has-yet-to-happen.
I probably should toss them, along with the frozen
breastmilk that's been gathering dust for four years.
And then there's the placenta from Son #2's birth, which we really meant to plant/ bury somewhere. But we didn't, and as it's a
biohazard we're supposed to take it back to the birth center to dispose of it. So there it sits, taking up room in my freezer...
oish.
Anyway...
Brought up eating healthily, even if slightly against my will, skinny kid, blah blah blah... which brings me to high school.
I was in the high school orchestra with Angel's husband. Our director was an interesting individual. One time I was wearing a skirt that clearly showed my rather narrow waist (it was twenty-two inches back in the day), and our conductor said, "Do you ever
eat?"
Uhm, yeah. Actually, I did. I had a rather healthy relationship with food. My parents had given up trying to serve me peas -- it helped that I ate just about any vegetable that
wasn't a pea -- and when it came to hunger, I ate. When I wasn't hungry anymore, I didn't eat.
You know, reasonable stuff like that.
But with this being orchestra, and with various evening performances and eating afterward, it was like some sort of eagle eye was upon me.
We'd go to Pizza Hut and I'd eat a slice of pizza or two, and all I'd hear was, "Good lord, eat girl! You're going to waste away to nothing!"
No, no I wasn't. Yes, I had a very narrow waist, but that isn't where I gain my weight. First place any excess weight goes on me is to my thighs and butt (the song
Baby Got Back was so written for me). Saddlebags are the bane of my existence. In a full skirt with a narrow waist, sure I looked like a toothpick. But put me in jeans, shorts, or a straight skirt and it was very VERY clear I wasn't skeletal.
Still, I was at that whole "craving approval" stage, so I ate on command.
Over time, I got used to eating more than I should, just so no one would look at me with that "She's anorexic, we must feed and/or institutionalize her" expression in their eyes. Luckily, at that point my metabolism kicked all kinds of ass, and I stayed within the 122-127 range.
Unfortunately, over time my metabolism slowed. And over time my stress increased, and I dealt with stress by cramming more and more food down my gullet. After all, eating gained me approval. Approval felt good. Ergo, stress was relieved by eating!
Brilliant, eh?
Still, I managed to hold my weight around 140 or 150 up until I hit my early thirties. I wasn't totally happy at those weights, but my husband met me at 140 and thought I was the most beautiful creature he'd ever met (have I mentioned how insanely brilliant he is recently?), so I was content.
But then I went back to work. And although working was definitely a stress reliever in some ways (I didn't have to potty train my second son --
hah!), it brought stress in other ways, especially the whole "Dealing with clients who are getting divorced/ dealing with CPS/ looking at prison sentences" thing.
And so I ate, and ate more. Because it felt good.
Then I was out trying to buy something to wear for my brother's May 2006 wedding. Holy cow, everything I tried on made me look fat!
I was wearing my size 18 "immediately post-
partum" jeans by then, but still, they were clothes I already owned, so I hadn't really paid attention to the increasing girth of my body.
The pictures came back from the wedding. Ouch. I'd weighed myself sometime within relatively recent memory and had seen that I was weighing about 180. Not good.
But that "recent memory" had been several months in the past.
Finally, in August of 2006, it happened. That "Eureka!" moment. The moment I knew I'd crossed the line from "rather curvier than usual" into "fat."
It was a Saturday. I was at
Publix with my kids. My elder son got on the scale to weigh himself -- it's a hobby of his -- and then I figured I might as well see the bad news.
I didn't have to see it. The dear boy broadcast it for the entire store.
"Mommy, you weigh 200! Isn't that quite a lot?"
Shit.
"Yes, honey, it is quite a lot."
My mother had noticed my weight gain more than I had up until that point, and had said that she'd pay for a month of
NutriSystem for me if I wanted to try it out. She wasn't pushy (she's never pushy with stuff like that), but she let me know the offer was there.
I e-mailed her the following Monday and let her know I was ready.
I stayed on
NutriSystem for three months, and lost 27 pounds on it. After that point, I decided to do it on my own. And besides, Lean Cuisine is really rather tasty, in a "good Lord, would they just give me MORE FOOD" kind of way.
So since that time I've been counting calories, and have attempted to keep my daily intake between 1200 and 1500. If I go over it, eh, it happens. And if I'm under 1200, I eat until I've made it to 1200. I don't want to totally freak my body into starvation mode or anything.
Besides, cheese is really
really good at 10:00 at night.
Hee.
So now, about a year later, I weigh between 159 and 160. It's hugely different from the 200, but it's still a far cry from the 150/140 I was accustomed to, and even farther from the 122-127 range I used to enjoy.
I don't need to ever hit the 120's again. But I wouldn't mind dipping into the 130's. So I keep going, keep counting, and keep hoping.
So anyway, that's my whole "Amanda Gains and Then Loses Massive Amounts of Weight" story. Yeah, it's "only" forty pounds, but folks, it's FORTY FREAKING POUNDS. That's EIGHT 5 lb. sacks of flour.
That's the weight of my four-year-old.
So hell yeah, it's an accomplishment. And I'll shout it to the rooftops.
And that, dear readers, is why I'm panicked about gaining weight while I quit smoking. It's not totally rational, but I hope this makes it a bit more understandable.