Yes, I’m Exactly That Easy.

So, last time we met I shared a bunch of resources and data and junk.

Then… I totally disappeared.

See, this is one of my bad habits that I am working to change just a tad. I am terribly easily distracted.

LOOK! A kitty!

Heh.

But seriously, one of my go-to excuses for not taking the reins when it came to my health and my weight was “Life just gets in the way!”. Classic case of I-Don’t-Finish-What-I-Started-itis. Note that nowhere in that last statement did you see the word “can’t”. Nope. I certainly can finish things. But I was always and forever getting distracted, saying whatever it was was “too haaaaaard” or changing my mind mid-stream. Lucky for me that I managed to keep my head out of my nether regions long enough to get the knack of living a healthier life. That is one thing that I am proud to say I finished.

So…an official apology for my unexpected seven month hiatus. No excuses. I am back…and I am not only going to finish this journey for your entertainment…but I’m going to do something even better, which you will have to wait until the end of this particular story to discover.

You’ve followed along as I was gloriously irresponsible, suffered the results, injured myself with furniture and stumbled upon a path to maybe not spending the rest of my life feeling so uncomfortable. I was, at that point, finally at least O.K. with being photographed (no more not so stealthily tripping over pets, furniture and small children in my haste to leave the room)…even if I did somehow always find a way to wedge someone or something in front of me. Then…suddenly…my “go” button got mashed. HARD! That sweet meeting leader at my Weight Watchers meeting reminded everyone that, when a person reaches certain goals, there are rewards!

PRIZES!!!!!

I am, evidently, a six-year-old.

We’re not talking PRIZES…like cars, boats or luxury vacations.

No. That would make my seat-dancing excitement quite understandable.

We’re talking gold star stickers! Magnets! And the FABULOUS KEY FOB!!!

I know. I’m beyond ridiculous. But those little star stickers were my carrot-on-a-stick that made my donkey-ass get it in gear!

That key fob?

It was my holy grail.

And did I mention? I would also be rewarded with CHARMS to hang ON the FABULOUS KEY FOB. One for each goal after I reached my first BIG goal.

CHARMS I SAY!

Yes, I am exactly THAT easy.

Now, I know this all seems pretty silly. But, the point I’m trying to make is, you have to find something to motivate you. Rewarding yourself (or if you have a partner, THEY can reward you) with material things or non-food treats (remember, you’re trying to unlearn that food-is-the-prize way of thinking) for reaching  small goals makes the process much easier and fun. Seriously, it takes a bit of time to really get things rolling to where you are rewarded with looking and feeling slimmer and healthier…so finding something to use as your carrot-on-a-stick. Something to keep you going, and encouraging you to try, when maybe you aren’t seeing or feeling tangible results yet. Or… when you have a couple of weeks where you don’t gain …but you don’t lose either (a plateau).

Sidebar: Those plateaus are a bitch. But you’ve got to remember…your body is having to relearn how to operate the way it was meant to from the get go…before you took it on a “no cookie left behind vacation” *wink*. Every now and again your body will get frustrated and dig its heels in…effectively saying “This is different. I need to think about this for a bit so I’m going to sit right here and not move”.

We’ve all been there. But your body WILL wake back up and start burning again…if you are giving it the fuel it needs and continuing to move around regularly (ie…not sitting on the couch and eating healthy portions of sensible food).

Bottom Line: Prizes GOOD!

Here’s proof (at somewhere around my initial main goal weight of 165):

Now…I mentioned not sitting on the couch. I think I stated this before…but, if I didn’t, I totally did not become some crazed and sociopathic gym-rat. Nooooo. I’ve known the crazed gym rats of which I speak…and they are kind scary. And not in a really good way.

Nope.

Like you, I have a life. And the life I had when I was starting the whole weight-loss adventure did not afford me the time or money to join a gym. So…I walked. Three times a week. A little longer walk each week.

That’s it.

When I started seeing some results, and feeling better about myself, I sort of drifted into being more active. I played frisbee on the beach. My husband and I joined a bowling league. I parked in the far reaches of the parking lot when I shopped….simply for the exercise. I just took a portion of the time I had free to walk (usually just before dinner…when I would have been sitting on the couch watching reruns of reruns of FRIENDS). After awhile I started carrying small hand weights with me…doing arm exercises that I found on this here “interweb”… as I chugged along. I can only believe that this helped me avoid some extra arm-waddle when I finally got down to my goal.

Simply put: Any amount of not-sitting-on-the-couch movement…three times a week for at least 30 minutes (as your goal. My first walk was barely 15 minutes…so don’t give up!) IS exercise.

This is not saying that those who have chosen the whole gym routine as their life are wrong. I’m simply stating that there is no rule that you have to run out and join a gym to get enough exercise to lose weight. So…do what feels right for you. Whatever you try (yoga, pilates, Zumba, the gym, walking, swimming…whatever) try to avoid throwing yourself into a 7 day a week workout until you are certain you really are THAT in love with whatever it is you choose. Manic and obsessive workout schedules kind of set you up for a big old case of burn out.  So, try whatever it is that you want to try to get moving two or three days a week for a while. There is no shame in deciding one method of exercise isn’t for you…as long as you try something else when you make that decision.

I did do the gym route for quite a while a year or so ago…long after I hit my goal…simply to learn some new exercise methods and tone up after recovering from a surgical procedure that left me feeling a little lazy and gooshy. I needed something to get me back on track…and my little affair with the weight machines did the trick. Plus, walking on the treadmill while watching TV in a nice air-conditioned gym is a hell of a lot better than stomping around out in the Florida Summer heat.

(And for those looking for a non-muscle-head, non-threatening gym I can recommend the Planet Fitness gyms. They have a good staff who really are interested in teaching you how to use the machines safely, AND will help you design a workout that will help you on your quest for a healthier you. All for about $10 a month. My mother suggests Curves gyms, where she works out every week. If, at 77, she can get out there and move, so can you! ;-).

Anyhooo…I enjoyed it for about a year. But then realized that, after moving out to the country, I could get plenty of exercise at home through yard work, house work and my trusty XBOX (Dance Central ROCKS!).   But, it was a great experience that helped me prove to myself that I can totally do the gym thing when needed. I’m actually still considering a treadmill or joining the gym just to use the treadmill…because I kind of dig the whole walking-miles-while-enjoying-the-AC-and-watching-House-Hunters-International thing.

Okidokie. This is where I’m going to stop for this entry. Next up…

The Big Reveal – Can someone actually keep weight off for good without eating only tree bark and only drinking from those annoying bottles of water everyone seems to be carrying?

And…Where I go from here: the planned evolution of this blog.

Here’s a clue, as promised up above:

FOOD!

To those who hung in there and knew I would come back; so much has happened since January. Some good, some bad…and some that will remain in the vault. Thanks so much for coming back and reading. And a double thanks to those who have shared my blog. I hope to have you with me here when I slide this baby in to home base 🙂

Don’t Blame The Baker.

Deciding to lose weight/get healthy was the easy part, I came to realize. So, this is where I clue you in on some of the odd reactions to expect if you choose to venture down the same path, as well as some tips and such that could make your journey just a tad easier.

First off, I love food. That is something that will never change for me. And honestly? Why give up something you love, right? No…my key to chugging toward my goal started with food journaling. Sounds like a cliché’ phrase, but it worked for me. I honestly had no idea how much food I was mindlessly grazing on. Try it. Take a week and write down everything you put in your pie-hole. I was shocked…and I’ll bet you will be too. Not just about the amount that I was eating, but about how sporadically I was eating. Nothing all day, and then macking out on the majority of a large pizza at night? Skipping lunch so that I could justify all-you-can-eat night at the local Mexican restaurant? And it became apparent that I almost never ate breakfast. This is where I learned a ton about listening to my body. Not eating all day was basically treating my body like some sort of concentration camp survivor. It was being denied nutrition so, when it was presented with food, it gorged and hung on to every single fat gram…every single carb…every calorie that it had been denied.

Clue phone: RING! Eating smaller amounts on a regular basis keeps me out of concentration camp mode, makes me less prone to hungry-crankiness and enables me to not pull a Miss Piggy when presented with a menu and a fork and knife.

Me.

Not that guy who brought donuts to the office. Not that girl who sits next to me with the cheesy potato skins and the double martini while we wait for our table to be ready. Not the people advertising tasty baked goodness on late night TV.

Me. I made the choice to eat like it was an Olympic event for a number of years. I was the one who was going to have to address the results.

So…this is where I talk about the notion of blaming other people for weight gain. If you do try Weight Watchers…this is the only common problem I see with the program.

Evidently…cake? Is evil. People who bake cakes? Evil. People who bake cakes and bring them into an area close to someone trying to get control of their weight/health? Way evil.

I don’t buy into this. Not one bit. Equating people who bake to drug pushers is just plain nonsense.

This became glaringly apparent to me during a Weight Watchers meeting. One of the other members, we’ll call her The Cake Hater, shared that she was angry that a woman in her office baked a cake for every employee’s birthday. The baker brought the cake into the office, where a small birthday celebration would take place during the lunch hour. The office staff, including the previously mentioned Cake Hater, would gather together…sing the birthday song…and then share the cake. The Cake Hater took this as a personal attack on her attempt to lose weight. In her mind, it was intentional sabotage! She HAD to eat cake EVERY SINGLE TIME someone had a birthday.

I sat there, listening to her share this experience, until she was red-faced and sweaty with rage.

“Ummm, couldn’t you just sing the birthday song, take a super small piece and…you know…enjoy the treat?” I said. “Or maybe sing the song, take the cake and pop it in the trash at your desk…you know…just to be polite? Or, hey, just say “No cake for me, thanks…but happy birthday!” and go on with your day?”

This was met with a glare from the “All tasty foods are evil” side of the room.

And yes, there will be people who feel that, to lose weight, one must never again let anything joyful and tasty touch their lips. I. personally, find them way cranky and lacking in even the most basic self-control. And I do believe this is due to the lack of baked goods. Just sayin’.

Some discussion and heated debate ensued…ending after I said…”Ummm, you chose to eat that big piece of cake. Nobody held a gun to your head and MADE you.” And then the meeting leader changed the subject, fearing rioting from the cake-deprived set.

So…here’s the thing. IF you are making the decision to change your life, don’t suck all of the joy out of it. Or out of anyone else’s life. Lots of people are happy as clams, just as they are. Let them be. Don’t harsh on their happy with a higher-than-mighty attitude about food. YOU are responsible for you. Own it. I know I did. As much as I would have liked to blame my weight issues on other people, the media, drive-thru restaurants and Nabisco displays…I made the choice to make them such a huge part of my mis-balanced diet. Nobody was standing down a dark alley going “Pssst, you want some good stuff?” And even if they were…I had the choice to ignore them. They weren’t pushing food. No. I? Was drinking the Kool-Aid all by myself.

So…yep. I totally think anyone who wants to change their life can. They just have to really want to. Unfortunately, you might come to find that, when you make positive changes in your life…some people will have not such nice things to say about it. Good friends will cheer you on. But it will be quickly apparent who your not-so-good friends are by the way they react. Those of you who have been down this same path know….and it can be a bit of a bitter pill. So be prepared for people who will insinuate that you have an eating disorder…or that you are wasting your time. Stick with the people who encourage you and you’ll be good.

Did some people drift away from me as I lost pounds. Yep. Did the women in the office I worked in at that time stop asking me if I wanted anything when they ordered out. Yes. Did it bother me? Of course. But mainly because I expected everyone to be as thrilled for me as I was. That just doesn’t happen. Some people are threatened that you start looking slimmer and better. Others might be upset that you can do something they can’t…or won’t. I dealt with this…and still do, when I run into people who haven’t seen me since my heavier days. I have heard second-hand that I “obviously had Weight Loss Surgery”…or that someone whispered “You know she doesn’t eat ANYTHING” or better, the very encouraging “You know you’ll gain it all back”..right to my face. Yep, people will talk. But I had to rest confident in the fact that I knew that I did it the healthiest way possible, and that I held the control over my own success or failure. I tried to remind myself of the time when I, a fat girl, sneered and said not so nice things about “the skinny girls”. I tried, when I could, to reason with the person who was being negative about my positive. Sure, listen to the feedback. Someone might catch you being a little too manic with your dieting…or excercising too much…and stop you from hurting yourself, but some are simply unhappy that you are happy. Those who cheer you on are keepers. Those who try to throw a wrench in the monkey-works, for no other reason than that perhaps your feeling good about yourself makes them feel bad about themselves….well…they should have been tossed out long ago.

Bottom line? Own your fat…and, if you are so inclined, own the way you go about getting rid of it. You worked hard (even if you don’t realize you did) to gain the weight, and you’re going to work hard to lose it. Be proud, but don’t be self-righteous. Do what you know is right for you, but don’t expect everyone around you to follow suit.

And, most important?

Don’t blame the baker.

A world without cake is not a very happy world at all.

Underwear that’s (not so) fun to wear.

A person can be amazed by so many things. The big things, well, people warn you about them. Or they go on at length about what you have to look forward to in the future. But, where peole might forget to give one a heads-up would be on those little, teensy details. Here’s one of them: As a person loses weight they MIGHT want to check into thinking ahead and sizing down their undergear.

To be more blunt; your panties/undies are going to go all granny-like. It happens all of a sudden. Sure I was browsing the interweb with my glimmer of hope to someday shop outside the plus-sized section. I looked at jeans and cute tops, at sundresses and even *gasp* bathing suits. I was giving myself goals. What I did not consider was that, as I got smaller, my underwear was kind of seeming bigger. Less clingy. Less elastic-digging-into-me-ish. I just knew I was more comfortable, and comfortable is always good, right? But sometimes there is a TOO comfortable.

I came upon this little nugget of info, that certainly someone should have mentioned, split seconds after I experienced a man-sized sneeze…

…in a busy department store…

…while wearing a skirt.

My big-girl-panties had headed south like the bullet train, and I was left struggling with a mixture of shock, the urge to jump for joy and a debate with myself about how I should go about returning my undies to their rightful place…ie…not on the floor in front of a department store make-up counter. Bending over would certainly scar someone in my hind-view for life. Squatting didn’t seem like a good plan either. But someone was going to notice if I just stood there with my big, old bloomers around my ankles, right?

I managed a quick flip with my foot, snatched them off of my shoe and stuffed them in my purse.

I know I was beet red, grinning like the Cheshire Cat and a little bug-eyed dealing with all those emotions while trying to pay for a tube of lip gloss that I know the saleswoman thought I was way too emotional about…but one woman’s embarrassment is another’s triumph. For the first time in forever and a half…

I needed SMALLER undergarments!

So, you’re probably asking yourself “When does this happen?”. Well, let’s look at the record of my progress:

While I will say that I dug all around for ALL of my Weight Watchers records….I was missing one. The one with the really big number on it from the first day I walked in.If it hasn’t turned to dust from wear and tear…I’ll track it down. But…this was from about the time gravity swept in to remind me that it is all powerful. At twenty five to thirty pounds down is where an underwear purchase is necessary. Comfy as they may have been, those granny panties were a thing of the past. Or at least in the car-cover size I had been wearing.

As we continue on here, I’ll share the rest of my nifty little records so that you can see that weight loss really is a journey that takes time, if you do it the healthy and sensible way. But it is SO very worth it.

But wait…more wierd and kooky stuff was changing. And this next one was going to be a heart-breaker.

Scales, Gold Stars and Riding with The Crazy Train.

So…where were we?

Oh, yes…the parking lot in front of the Weight Watchers meeting place.

This is me extending an apology for blinking out for a bit.I was momentarily distracted by some family drama. I’m back now 😀

Let me first say this; having a Weight Watchers office behind a Burger King and next to a Publix grocery store that pipes all of the golden, yummy smells from their bakery into the parking lot? A little bit mean. Right? You actually have to drive past the Burger King drive-thru to get to Weight Watchers. I found this half cruel…and half funny as shit. That’s just me.

Anyhow, I marched myself straight in the front door and announced that I was giving them another chance to help me and my fat ass.

Yep, I’m like that. I do not blend into the background. Auntie Mame and I would have gotten along just fine. Better to be looked at than overlooked and all that.

Well, this is where I found out that “fat” is a non-word at WW. “We don’t use that word here” the very nice girl behind the counter whispered. This puzzled me. I mean…why not? That’s why we’re all sitting in this storefront full of sturdy chairs…right? But I didn’t say that, because I really did want to give this another chance, and my overalls were digging into my sides…reminding me that I really needed to make this work. So I filled ou the enrollment stuff, and the questionnaire and paid my membership fee. The counter I stood at was lined with scales…but no read-outs to see the weight. The girl behind the counter explained that they did this so that those who were really touchy about the numbers could keep it to themselves. Only the WW rep, behind the counter, could see the actual weight numbers. They would write the number in a little booklet that each member carried, and indicate there if there had been a gain or loss…then fold it up and discreetly hand it back to the person. I rolled my eyes (which I do a lot) and thought…”GEEZ people are so touchy! It’s just a number!” But I kept my yap shut, kicked off my shoes (which I figured weighed at least a pound) and stepped on the scale. The WW girl looked, scribbled something on a little booklet, slipped it into a plastic case and slid it across the counter me…quietly saying “Welcome to Weight Watchers. We’re glad you’re here!” I thanked her, grabbed my shoes and went and found a chair next to the person I arrived with, then slipped my little booklet out to see where I had weighed in.

247.

Two Hundred and Forty Seven pounds.

I kept staring at the booklet.

The person I had arrived with glanced over. “Wow! That’s a big number! You outweigh me by a bunch!”

This is where we come to a very important lesson in weight loss.

Don’t join Weight Watchers with a psychotic/sociopathic nut job.

I mustered a “Yeah” and something like a chuckle, but outside of that I was without words.

I knew I was heavy. I thought maybe 180. Possibly 200…as that was the last number I had remembered seeing in the scale. But 247? Ouch.

So I sat and listened. Really listened. I listened and looked through the books and guidelines that had been provided to me. I listened and gazed around at the other people in the room. Some were older than me. Some were younger. Many were much heavier than me. Two people were confined to wheelchairs and another two…one my age…used walkers to support the weight that they could no longer move around the world themselves. There were a lot of people in that room. All of them trying to change their lives and be healthy. I had felt like such a loser…and so alone in my fat-ness. But here was a whole room of people who were, basically, just like me. Suddenly I felt not so alone.

I listened on as the plan was described. No exercise for the first couple weeks. Just follow the points-plan (a calculation that combines fat, carbs, fiber, etc..and comes up with a point value for foods) that would be worked out for me at the end of the meeting, and write down everything I put in my mouth. Simple…and no “Get out there and join a gym!”. Nothing was off-limits. Just the amount of anything that I ate was governed. So…I could have anything I wanted, as long as I came in at or under my total daily points.

O.K…I could do that. I would do that.

After the meeting I met one on one with a counselor, who asked my ultimate goal (I said 165) and then calculated the first step in my plan. All I needed to work on right now was losing 10% of my body weight. Once I managed that, the numbers would be refigured to lose the next 10%…and so on. I was also given a bookmark. Every time I lost weight, or shared in the meetings…I would get a gold star. For certain landmark losses (10, 20, 30 lbs…etc) there were reward prizes as well. The first…a key chain.

Yes…this totally did it for me. I love prizes. Give me a sticker or a dime store trinket and I am giddy. I am that easy.

So…off I went, riding in a car with the nut job, back toward home.

I decided right then and there, listening to the nut job rattle on about “all those fat people”, that this was my challenge. Nobody else’s. And there was NO way I was going to succeed with The Crazy Train as my partner. I would drive myself to meetings and work the plan on my own.

Now I just had to break it to The Hubster that I needed to make some changes in how we…or at least I…ate.

Revelations and a Butt-load of Lace

So…let’s back up a bit. Or, more accurately, let me share some of my frenzied investigation after receiving the news that I was well on my way to *gasp* morbidly obese. Gastric bypass surgery was all the rage at the time. A girl I bowled league with had recently undergone the surgery. Hers was a life or death decision. Being just over five feet tall, and weighing in at close to three hundred pounds, her body had just about had it. Her doctor had indicated to her that, due to her legs being just about ready to throw in the towel and a plethora of other weight-related health issues, she would be in a wheelchair before her young daughter graduated high school. She would not see her daughter graduate from college. Her overworked heart was already throwing up warning signs that a cardiac ward was going to be a regular stop in her life very soon. Excercise was impossible, as she could barely walk short distance without having to sit and rest. There were no options for her outside of surgery and a drastic change in her life. She found the best surgeon possible, mortgaged her home and had the surgery.

I talked with her about her experience. The surgery was grueling. The medications she had to take had side effects. The post-surgery meal plan was restrictive and she had to make regular trips to Miami to follow-up with her doctors for at least the first year after the surgery. She had regular psychological counseling to attend and physical therapy to track her progress and monitor her health. But…it gave her a chance at maybe living to see her child grow up. The weight she had carried for years had done damage to her body…but the surgery at least gave her a chance.

So, then I dug in to research. The surgery was not for everyone. I read stories of people who had the surgery and ignored the after-care. I won’t even go into the details…but it wasn’t pretty. Especially the stories of people who were not morbidly obese, and had the surgery as a “simple” fix to simply being overweight. The recovery was not pleasant or quick. Not addressing how they became overweight in the first place, and returning to the same eating habits, often resulted in worse medical complications than just simple being fat. Add to that, the expense of the surgery (which at the time, if one saw a reputable specialist) was huge. Giving up what little we had, simply so that I could find a doctor who would do the surgery…even though I really wasn’t a candidate, seemed selfish to me.

So…I talked to everyone I knew who was trying to, or had succeeded at, losing weight. My conversations ran the gamut from people who were (no way to put this nicely) hooked on speed masquerading as diet pills to people whose lives had become consumed with obsessing over every morsel that touched their lips. I talked to people who had become gym-junkies, working out six days a week and who could talk of nothing but their battles with the bulge. I talked to people who had tried but given up…accepting their being overweight, yet living with the knowledge that, in the future, health would become an issue. They seemed defeated and angry. I talked to plenty of people who were on the same diets, diet pills, supplements and TV-advertised “miracles” that I had already tried. And I talked to a few people who attended Weight Watchers. Some were happy with it, some were not…but all of them had seen some success.

The one defining factor with everyone I talked to was that they all wished they had tried to do something prior to turning forty.

I was on the horizon of seeing forty…so if I was going to make a real effort to shed the weight, it would seem now was the time.

So…I made a list. I listed the things that my weight was stopping me from doing and the things that my weight made uncomfortable. Everything from the superficial to the embarrassing. I couldn’t shop in mainstream stores due to size restrictions. I had to consider the sturdiness and width of chairs I sat in. Running, after or away from anything, was not impossible…but resulted in much sweating, wheezing and most usually toppling over at some point. There were parts of my body I hadn’t been able to see in quite some time. My love of pretty underwear was trumped by my need to buy granny-panties. My digestive issues had me constantly worried about where the closest restroom was and worrying about who would hear me when I was using one. Sex was, to put it delicately, a dicey and somewhat stumbling affair. Yearly bathing suit shopping always resulted in my crying in a dressing room. Family members either tip-toed around the issue of my size, or jokingly made mean comments. The list went on and on. To be fair I made a list of the positive points as well.

That I was perceived as “jolly” and had a “pretty face” did not outweigh the cons.

Finally, I went back to the photos. I hadn’t always been heavy. It had slowly crept on over the years. I hadn’t been born this way. I was the master of my own creation. I had gone from your classic kid…

to your average high school student…

to a college student full of adventure…

And somewhere I had lost control…or maybe just ignored simply being sensible. I just stopped paying attention to me, and got lost in worrying about everything and everyone else.

My first realization, albeit a fleeting one, was captured in my wedding photos. This…is a whole butt-load of lace.

This kid, who wanted to be an Olympic swimmer/actress/model/vet/model/writer/princess…

did not deserve to end up being this woman…

…who was currently afraid of cameras, mirrors and folding chairs…and had stupid coffee-table-induced injuries simply because bending over restricted blood flow to her stubborn brain.

It was now or never. So…on an early Saturday morning I found myself, feeling beaten…embarrassed…angry and a little bit excited… climbing out of a car in the parking lot in front of a Weight Watchers meeting center.

And yes…I was wearing those overalls.

When Pants Explode

Waiting really is the hardest part. And, being me, I dealt with it in the most head-on manner. If there was a potential that I was sick, then I needed to get on the ball and get appointments to check up all areas of my health. I made appointments with my eye doctor, my dentist and even my gynecologist (in hopes that he would find some big, benign cyst that could explain away everything…be removed and prove Dr. McCute wrong).

Ahhh, my old friend Denial…steadfast and loyal, yes? Comfortable, reliable and always supportive.

“I mean honestly”, I thought, “I’m not THAT fat. I’m just a big girl. And I wear it well”.

To reassure myself of all this, and keep me busy between check-up appointments while I waited for the phone call, I started searching for recent pictures of myself. Two from the previous Christmas season…

I looked cute! And happy. My husband and I were, obviously, not missing any meals…but we looked jolly. Yes, this was my first notice of my multiple chins, but hey….look at that cute hair.

Granted, I did have a majorly hard time finding a dress for that event…but I did find one that I liked…eventually.

And hey….the family picture is happy and festive! The chins were there again…and maybe my sweater was buttoned up to hide that my jeans wouldn’t button…and if I recall correctly, I was more leaning on than embracing everyone because I was not feeling well after the holiday meal. But hey…it was a holiday! Everyone over-eats on a holiday!

Perfectly good excuses from a very productive and rational person. I was feeling better already. The call from the doc would most certainly come, and he would say that he had made a mistake…been in a bad mood that day…that I was perfectly healthy and not at all at risk.

Yeah…this looking at pictures idea was brilliant!

So I went to the dentist and was proclaimed cavity free. No signs of anything amiss. Hah! Take that doc!

The eye doctor was another win. My eyes showed no damage or evidence of diabetic issues, although it was pointed out to me that I would be needing glasses in the future. Of course I would. Most women in their mid to late thirties start to notice how much the squint to see the fine print. SO…I was perfectly normal. Double hah!

I hit the gynecologist appointment on a major high and made a point of letting him know that my GP had silly concerns about my weight. Could he fax my exam results over to Dr. McCute? Certainly.

Four days after my appointment with Dr. McCute the phone rang. I was having a little snack of bite-sized Oreo minis and browsing yet more photos to prove my point. Getting older? Sure? Not the skinniest girl on the block? Of course not. But still looking goooood. I had a photo in my hand when I picked up the receiver.

Dr. McCute’s nurse’s smiling voice asked me to schedule an appointment to meet with the doc. THIS was not the norm. All test results were delivered by phone or mail. I had never been called back in. I agreed, and hung up. Then I glanced at the photo in my hand.

The picture had been taken just a few weeks previously. We were on the river with another couple, having an awesome time. I felt good, and thought I looked slammin’ in my black bikini. I was sexy and outdoorsy! Looking at the photo with a somewhat changed perspective…I saw something else.

This was not the me I saw in my head when I looked in the mirror. I looked bloated, exhausted….and squint-eyed. I had back-fat that was visible from the front and my head was way out of proportion to the rest of my body. WTF?  And again…the crushing fear was back. I looked…sick.

When my husband got home from work that evening there was much discussion. Much moaning about having to go on yet another crazy, restrictive diet. Another bank account sucking plan that would provide me with tasteless food products and a Nazi diet plan that would make me miserable, and ultimately I would give up and feel like a loser…and then have to start the whole cycle again. My husband, who I’m certain was OVER hearing me boo-hoo, mentioned that the wife of a friend of his was going to try Weight Watchers…why not buddy up with her and see what it was like. I remembered trying Weight Watchers, sometime back in the late 80s. Weighing everything I ate? Being restricted from so much food that I loved? No. Thank you.

I got up from where I had been lounging in my now blood-free overalls and headed for the kitchen for the last of the Oreos.

My husband glanced up as I passed in front of the TV and said, “Did you know the side of your pants are ripped?”

I glanced left then right. Ripped they were. Right where the buttons on the side held them together. I tugged and tugged to try to see if they could be fixed. I couldn’t even get the pieces to meet. The fabric had given way out of sheer exhaustion from trying to contain what was evidently more of me than the apparel was suited to hold.

I continued on to the kitchen, got the Oreos and proceeded to eat them in silence alternately glancing at the side of my shredded overalls and at the river-bikini picture on the coffee table.

My meeting with Dr. McCute sealed my fate. I was not dying…or sick…but he was right. I was well on the road to reaching those twisted goals. The bonus? My gynecologist reported back that I had fibroid cysts. They were common in overweight women.

Crap.

Weight Watchers, no matter how horrible, was better than having regular pants-blow-outs and girly-part issues.

A Visit to Dr. McCute

So of course, by morning when my call was returned and I was less of a sobbing mess, I had scoured  the internet and Web MDed myself into being confident that I had some sort of disorder. Some imbalance that was causing my weight gain, dizziness, intestinal distress and the previously mentioned passing-out-coffee-table incident.

Note: Unless you are of a sound mind (not hysterically sobbing and wailing) and have some medical knowledge, walk away from Web MD and call your doctor in these situations. There’s a reason they make the big bucks and have all of those fancy diplomas on the wall. Telling a medical receptionist that you may very well have self-diagnosed their previously overlooking your obvious case of some obscure and long ago eradicated disease will only make them talk to you in an overly calming Mr. Rogers voice after which they most certainly hang up and roll their eyes.

My doctor’s office scheduled me an appointment for later that day, after I impressed upon them the size of the goose-egg on my head, still insisting that maybe I did have some rare disease that might need to be contained. I love my doctor’s office peeps, simply because they really do just stay strong and carry on no matter how psychotic a patient may be. Plus, the doc himself is cute. That helps in most situations.

Anyway, I arrived for my appointment and was weighed and ushered into the cheerful examination room that overlooked the tree-lined parking lot. I felt better already. Doctor McCute would diagnose whatever was causing me to be all bloaty, and prescribe something or send me to get tests…or whatever, to solve my list of problems. I sat there on the table, swinging my legs and watching a storm begin to drift in from the coast. The doc arrived, greeted me warmly (and cute-ly), looked over my chart and asked for my rundown of what had happened. After I finished the dramatization, he leaned back in his chair and gave me a warm, yet concerned smile. Like in movies….when they tell someone they have six months to live, or that they have a rare disease that doesn’t even have a telethon yet.

My heart skipped a beat and I braced myself.

“Kim, you have two choices.” Dr. McCute said, flipping a page on the chart forward to note some detail and then directing his eyes back to me. “Either lose weight, a lot of weight, now…or start saving for a wheelchair and some very expensive and painful surgeries that will only extend the time you have between now and an early death.”

Bam. Just like that. I wasn’t dying of some rare, exotic disease. Nothing strange or newsworthy at all. I was simply eating myself to death. Granted, this is why I like Dr. McCute. He’s a straight shooter. And he had mentioned my escalating weight before…but not like this. It had been about a year (maybe more…as I hate going to the doctor, and only did so when I was REALLY sick) since I had last seen him.

He showed me on his chart the number of pounds I had packed on since my last visit.

It was not a small number. It wasn’t even a medium sized number. It was a biggie with fries kind of number.

Next he very gently, but firmly, explained that…yes, his scales were calibrated regularly and in proper working order, and that the body I was given was built to function properly at and carry around  about X-amount of weight.

That number? Nowhere near the figure filled in beside “Current Weight” on my chart. Not even in the same zip code.

Dr. McCute (and now McSerious) explained that not one, but ALL of my symptoms, were due to my choice to eat like a high school football team and support the equivalent of a whole other person on my internal workings and infrastructure. My stomach issues? My aching knees and ankles? My dizziness? My headaches? My sweating? My shortness of breath? All because of me. No disease to blame. No imbalance. No organs or big-bones to point a finger at and sigh. So…no disease. Yay, me! Right?

“BUT” he said, looking even more stern, “Looking at your last set of blood work results, you are well on your way to diabetes, high blood-pressure and high cholesterol…and maybe, if you’re really unlucky, a massive heart attack. You aren’t there yet, or at least as of your last visit, but YOU WILL GET THERE.” I tried some “buts” and some “what ifs”, to no avail. In the back of my head I sort of remembered a suggestion that my weight was becoming an issue and that yes I did need to adjust my eating habits and maybe get my ass off the couch now and again. Sure thing, doc! I’ll get right on that!

I believe, after that last visit, I had gone to Steak N’ Shake for a large chocolate malt to hold me over until dinner and to reward myself for being a grown-up and willingly going to see the doctor. Yay me.

I was sent packing with a script for blood work, after a very detailed description of what I had in store if the blood work came back bad. Bad as in, sick…bad as in, prescriptions and multiple specialists and hospital stays in the very near future…bad as in handicapped parking place and possible forklift removal of my lifeless body from my home.

Given an inch and my mind will run with it until it reaches Absurdville, population: Me. But the doc wasn’t kidding. He made that crystal clear.

I made it down to the car and through the drive to the lab, and even through all of the peeing in a cup, poking and blood-sucking. Then it hit me. When I called the doc that morning, I had been all prepared to have something wrong with me. Something that could be fixed with a shot or a pill….or some sort of treatment.

But now…NOW?

I desperately wanted very much for nothing to be wrong.

And I was going to have to wait five to seven days to find out.

A Landslide….with cheese!

You’re about to tune out on this blog, aren’t you? You’re thinking to yourself “Oh hell, another boo-hoo for me I had bad things happen blog”. Well, give me one more entry to prove you wrong. Of course bad things happen to people all the time. But that isn’t what my main focus is here. I mention the bad things, not as an excuse, but simply so that you can see how I got to the “passed out and bleeding” stage. So I’ll make the transitional-bad-thing short and sweet:

After a long battle with AIDS, my Dad died. And then my husband and I both were laid off from our jobs.

So, as our incomes went *poof* and our meager savings dwindled, we discovered the wonders of cheap food. And even better…bulk cheap food. Five burgers for five dollars? Brilliance! Cici’s pizza? Why didn’t I think of that? Oh…and potatoes and pasta week!  Oh…and even off-brand foods taste awesome with enough imitation cheese sauce! Cheap and filling, yes? Filling is gooood. Filling makes you happy. More is better, and certainly makes me feel better about having less and less…maybe just a little. There were many swaying bridges crossed and many treacherous mountains climbed over the years after “the bad things”. I will not bore you with the details. It was bad. Food stamps, hospitals and almost homeless bad. Let’s just say we survived, mostly intact…and certainly with more to love.

We eventually got new jobs and started to put it all back together. Having to buy new wardrobes…yet again a bit larger…was a stretch. No more cute clothes for me. Remember, this was before Plus-sizes had made a peep in the mainstream. I shopped with an eye for dropped waists or billowy A-lines for my office job. More and more, when at home, size XXL men’s pajama bottoms and sweats were my attire. “I just don’t like things that bind!”, I would declare, implying that anyone who wore tight-fitting clothes was an idiot. “The dryer is shrinking my clothes again!”, I would shout from the laundry area on the back porch. Actresses and models became the target for my increasingly famous barbed comments. “Nobody is that size by choice!” I would stomp and snort, “They starve themselves to look like that and are in a conspiracy with clothing designers to make women feel bad about themselves!”

I was a joy to be around, I’m certain.

Looking back, the women I was shaking my fist at were simply of normal weight. I wasn’t as mad at the Kate Mosses…as I was at the Jennifer Anistons and Sandra Bullocks. I was secretly mad at my husband’s daughter, who was slim and beautiful. Her mother was suddenly tiny and exotic. How in the hell could I live up to that? This wasn’t rational by any means…but neither was the way I was gaining weight, or what I was doing to cause the gain. Even less rational was my gift for finding multiple targets to blame my fatness on. Thyroid issues (unfounded for most people, duh. Hyperthyroidism causes people to be unable to gain weight). I’m from a Viking background…and part German….so I’m big-boned! My knees/ankles/hips hurt…so I can’t exercise (No surprise there…my ankles were carrying ME around). I’m too tired from working so much (see previous parenthetical remark). My excuse list grew longer and longer as I grew bigger.

Desperate attempts at diets soon became a regular part of life. No carbs. No meat. All meat. All veggies. Miracle pills. Supplements. As Seen On TV sure-things that tasted like battery acid-spiked lime-ade. I tried them all. Every single last one of them. They all were either a hoax, or so strict and complicated that I gave up. But I kept trying and kept throwing my money at each and every item that even suggested easy success. Certainly the regular-sized people in this world didn’t go through this crap! Why in the hell couldn’t I find the trick THEY had?

This…brings us back to me. On the floor. In size 20+ overalls. Dizzy. Bleeding from a coffee-table-induced head wound. And sobbing like all the “bad things” had suddenly come home to roost.

Pretty picture, huh? Pathetic. Right?

Not so fast….

Lip-Smackin’ Love

Yeah….real, honest to goodness love. Like some sort of phantom speeding bus, it hit me right when I entered the cross walk between one of the worst dating experience I’d ever had and my realization that…hey, I’m pretty damned cool and comfy being single. Sure, I thought I had been in love before. You know…that “can’t eat, can’t sleep, can’t stop mentioning his name four hundred times a day and god help anyone who gets between me and the phone because he MIGHT call” kind of love? This, was totally different.

I wasn’t even interested in dating. Having, some months back, ended a “relationship” with the equivalent of the world’s largest adolescent I had gotten really comfortable with just being me. Me and my cats and my job and my friends. No stress (outside of work) and I was totally over that whole “gotta have a boyfriend/fiance/get pointed toward the walk down the aisle” rat race. I didn’t even see a reason for marriage. I had friends who had taken the plunge and from what they were saying, it wasn’t all the romantic comedy movies made it out to be. Some people were just meant to be single, and I had come to the conclusion that my long list of failed relationships was solid evidence that I was one of them. But then this guy asked me out to dinner and a movie. What the hell, right? It would be more entertaining than dining out alone, and I hadn’t been out to the movies in quite a while. Creepy people sit next to you when you go to a movie alone. So I said “Yes”…and three days later found myself leaning against the inside of my front door after returning from probably my most interesting date ever saying “Holy crap!” to myself…over and over and over.

This real love thing was awesome. I didn’t worry constantly about what he thought about whatever I did or said. We had both agreed that no matter what happened…we would always be exactly who we were. No pretense…no trying to be who we thought the other person wanted us to be. Just the raw goods, as is. This was especially great because I didn’t have to play the femme fatale who orders a small salad and a glass of water on a date (and then goes home to eat a real meal hours later). Nope, my guy and I both loved food. In short order we were living together. Me with my two jobs, and him running his own business. Again, eating out or take-out became the norm. The people at Popeye’s Fried Chicken knew us by name, as did the pizza delivery guy and the little Asian woman with no eyebrows at the Chinese take-out place.

My new guy was divorced with two small children that came to stay with us on weekends. As it is hard to cram a bunch of quality family time into one weekend, and there are no two siblings on the planet who admit to liking the same foods…we discovered all-you-can-eat buffets. The kids could get whatever they wanted and we didn’t have a pile of dirty dishes to waste time on when we could be watching the kids growing and learning and enjoying them just being kids. Very noble of us…right?

Things progressed, birds sang, kids laughed, rainbows and fireworks burst across the sky, love blossomed into a full-scale extravaganza. The “L” word had been exclaimed…and we decided that we were in this for the long haul. No piece of paper or ceremony needed. My guy’s first marriage had been, among other things, not good. I was a child of divorce…and totally got where he was coming from…and was totally fine with his position.

Then he up and proposed. Six months later, on Valentine’s Day 1990, my guy and I got married. Everything was wonderful. We were happy, healthy and suddenly we were a family. Not much changed outside of my last name. We both still worked like slaves, ate like kings and had a grand old-time.

That we had to up a size in clothes was not that big a deal. Clothing manufacturers are always jacking around with the sizing guidelines anyway. And I was entering into my quest for the miracle-diet…which had become a hobby of sorts. If it cost $29.99 and was offered on late night TV…well it just HAD to be great. And all my friends were joining Jazzercise groups….so I did too. That we went to a Mexican restaurant after class, to scarf up their free appetizers and two-for-one drinks, made sense to us. Well, at least to me. I had just flailed about, pumping my fists and jiggling my jiggly parts for a good, solid hour. And I hadn’t passed out. This was reason to celebrate! And then, of course, I went home to shower and have dinner with my husband. Life was GOOD!

Then…I got the phone call I knew would come someday…but nothing could have prepared me for… and everything shattered.

Rome wasn’t built in a day.

So, let’s back up a bit. I didn’t arrive on this planet in the state that my last entry described. I had a pretty normal upbringing. I ate fairly balanced meals, or as many as a working Mom with two very active kids can pull off. Plenty of running about in the outdoors activity. I was a competitive swimmer, cheerleader and took riding lessons. I romped about through the fields around our house, playing king of the mountain (O.K., it was a pile of dirt at a construction site…but you work with what you have here in Florida), climbing trees and having dirt-clod fights like any other normal kid. I was always tall for my age, but drifted in and out of the weight-gain/growth spurt phases of life along with my friends.

College arrived and my eating habits stayed pretty much the same…with the exception that I was attending school in the heart of Everythings-better-cooked-in-bacon-grease-ville. But yeah, weight drifted on and off a little slower. I think my discovery of beers and student-discount-pizza may have helped a little. By the time I graduated my frame was carrying an extra ten or fifteen pounds. Nothing life threatening, but I noticed the need to go up a size when I bought my outfit for graduation, was weighing in around 140, and promptly joined a gym once I was settled in my first place.

Here’s where I think things may have started to go a bit wonky. The gym that I joined was a tad intimidating. It was in a high-dollar, somewhat snooty area which, being raised to hold the title of Gloriously Spoiled Princess, wasn’t a big deal. But, the social competition to look like all of the society-wives and their daughters (most being the proud owners of assorted new and surgically improved features, and prize-winning eating disorders)…along with the “lifters aren’t LOSERS!” barking of the trainers, was probably not the place for a twenty-something woman during her entry into the adult world.

So yeah, I quit.

I had it covered, though. One awesome crash diet of nothing but salads (no meat, no cheese, no croutons)….gallons of water…and a now-illegal diet aid and I was back to where all those workout tapes said I should be. Easy-peasy. Big deal that I was dizzy. A lot. Big deal that I was more wired than a six-year-old mainlining Mt. Dew and meth. I was SKINNY!

So…those who know me are aware that I am not Paula Deen. I am pretty much a disaster in the kitchen. But that’s cool. There were tons of handy options for nutrition right there on the frozen food aisle at the grocery store right up the street. Every week I’d cruise up there, load up my cart with all the frozen goodness (even vegetables! With extra yummy cheese sauce! Mmmm.) I’d need for the week and then stop at the ice cream shop I always parked in front of for a chocolate malt. This was my reward for getting everything on my shopping list and using coupons, thus staying on budget and proving to my family and myself that I was totally a grown-up. And the nights I didn’t want to “cook”, I could always pick something up. Every fast food and pizza place I could ever crave was just minutes away…and some delivered! I SO had this surviving on my own thing worked out.

But you know…buying frozen food and eating out isn’t cheap. Certainly not as cheap as buying the actual makings of a meal and cooking it myself.  I know this now, but back then…well, as I’ve pointed out, I was a bit spoiled. Eating out with my friends or tossing a french bread pizza in the oven before heading out to a club was what EVERYONE was doing. Duh!

So I got a second job.

Now I was working a fulltime job and a part-time job. I was too busy and important to cook. So…take-out, delivery and dining out became my routine. I ate on the fly between jobs, or late in the evening after working a twelve-plus hour day. Excercise? Are you kidding? I was certainly moving around enough to equal the excercise of a marathon in my evening and weekend job as a bartender/assistant manager. And the stress from my paper-pushing/phone answering daytime job had to be eating up any excess calories I might be taking in. It was fast and furious. Work, eat, work, eat, eat while working, sleep, eat in car, drink and eat, dance then stop to eat, work, eat, rinse, repeat.

Then, when I least expected it….I fell in love.