day three - an abandoned post that I decided to publish

After two days, I've lost 7.5 pounds.

When I got out of bed this morning, I thought my legs looked like old lady legs. I am certain I have lost muscle from what I'm used to from both my thighs and calves. Maybe it's been a fairly rough several months, since I don't know when, but I remember winter was plagued by a new feeling of fear, and then this spring has felt like I was constantly trying to keep up, and I feel tired. Now maybe this is just the result of my current anxiety, but I feel tired and lazy. I don't even wash the dishes anymore - now my roommate washes them of all things. I hesitate to suggest that this lethargy could be a sign of something greater than just laziness and lack of regular exercise. I have my first annual check-up in years coming up and I'm wondering if I should mention a thyroid check? (Last time a doctor checked, maybe about 10 years ago, and I was wondering if there was some chemical wrong with me that might be thyroidic or PCOS since I was overweight, mostly abdominally, fairly hirsute and menstruating irregularly, but the doctor said there was nothing wrong with my thyroid levels nor did I seem to have PCOS, although, actually I may not have asked the ultra-sound tech about cysts on my ovaries because I was so caught up in the possibility of having 2 cervixes, as my doctor had suggested.)

Anyway, I can't seem to get caught up and I'm tired and lazy and lethargic and losing muscle.

So on top of my stress level, there was very very palpable hostility from my tech crew today, and I'm having a hard time getting over it. Most of it is coming from the master electrician, who seems to always have something biting and angry to say, I'm scared to say anything lest she get irate about it even though I never realized anyone would interpret it as a reason for offense. In other words, I can tell she is too angry and sensitive in general and try not to take it too personally. Then there are the other two guys on the crew, who are her friends, one of whom in particular doesn't really always seem to know what to think for himself all the time but anyway, if she's angry about something, he might be inclined to line up on her side. As for me, I've pretty much decided I never want to work with her again. I'm doing all I can to be calm and like a balm, I approach her as one might approach an angry tiger, and I am over it.

So if I can't tell my true feelings right now, that's why.

Still eating clean. At the grocery store I was hungry so I bought cheats, but my cheats were comparatively bland - sushi (relatively clean except that some of the fish was treated with carbon monoxide?) but not easy to guess at the nutritional content -

That's where I left off that last one. It reminds me that there was about three weeks that happened recently where I was held hostage by a light plot, and spent my days sitting still, withdrawn into my brain, trying to work, and when I couldn't do more, I escaped into computer games, mindless activity - everything was extreme, especially my anxiety, my inability to sleep through the night (waking up due to anxiety - typically I never wake up before having a full night's sleep...) I probably salved my strained nerves with comfort food too. No wonder I came out of it fat and physically unfit.

day one

So this morning I weighed fully 5 pounds less than yesterday. I ate only breakfast and lunch yesterday and drank only water and pomegranate-blueberry lite juice. I haven't been hungry, but I just ate today's breakfast because it seemed like a good idea. I guess I need to go to the grocery store because I'm afraid I'm running out of "clean" food. (I mean I have some Lean Cuisines and canned veggies, but... I'm not even sure I should be okay about this juice, and the tablespoon of dried cranberries I had with breakfast are made with added sugar.) I awoke in a swell of anxiety last night and after trying to go back to sleep for an hour, then I tried to get up and face my light plot (sooo scared and confused!) and then my mind stopped working pretty soon after that, and I went back to sleep and wanted to get up this morning, but when I am scared of a deadline, it's like my body physically can't face it. I might feel stronger about it if I drank some coffee, but I started this *thing* and so am not doing coffee. I am sure that I would love to pig out on comfort food if it would numb these feelings of anxiety and give me something else to think about. But I did surprisingly well last night without it. I assume the fact that I got by so well on only 800 calories probably has something to do with how many extra calories I was carrying on me from the previous few days. I wonder if I'd be doing so well at not eating without the anxiety. Anyway, today 235 feels pretty good.

yuck

Today I started my 3-Day Jump Start. Twelve weeks shortened down to 3 days. I don't know how much that has to do with how bleak and sad I feel tonight. My 3-Day thingy also involves not playing The Sims, but I can still play Farmville and futz around on Facebook, which I have done for a while now adding some pictures and I'm really done. Maybe the only reason I'm here is because I don't know if I want to face this cold, dark, lonely apartment once I"ve closed the laptop. Is this because I reduced my calories - had no coffee or soda, only water and juice? had no candy or fast food, only 800 calories (so far) of clean foods? Is it my body reacting physically to withdrawal? Is it the weather? Is it that it's cold and dark and so so alone? Is it because I'm failing so at this lighting design? The lighting design is taking so much more time than I expected, and even though I turned in a plot on Thursday, my master electrician who is very grousy all the time made me feel like it wasn't good enough, and as I'm redrafting I'm realizing that there are so many uncertainties and unknowns and questions I probably should have asked or realized I was going to need to know the answers to, and I know it's not all my fault - there needed to be way more overhead supervision on this project from the in-house regulars, instead of hiring me at the last minute, but still, I thought I would be done Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday... it was due Thursday - and here I was in the theatre for 4 hours yesterday and for 4 hours today and I'm still not done with the plot??? It kills me to think of it.

Then I'm here alone, which is even more alone than usual because my roommate and her boyfriend are housesitting elsewhere. I would have thought I'd enjoy the respite from feeling like they were avoiding me, and I could just enjoy "having the house to myself" but I am not enjoying it, I feel desperately alone, like if they at least were behind that door there would be someone around. Instead it feels like there is no one anywhere in the world. I don't have any friends-- He's online right now but is not being supportive of my new project on Facebook - just making a point of how much of a nobody I am to him. Today's a rotten day for having my validity affirmed.

I'm chatting with my Mom now, hope to feel better. Need to get offline though, into the quiet quiet loneliness of this apartment under the dark cold of outer space. Maybe this is all just the result of cleaning my eating today, or the barometric pressure, or the absence of two living heartbeats, just the clicking, maybe a ticking of a clock and/or the creaking of the walls...

I just realized - I'm about to start my period, probably.

I was at 239.5 pounds this morning. So the fact that I'm wearing these size 16 jeans is a joke. Part of this jump start is really just to clean my mind as well as my eatin habits and help me get to a place where I can get back on track and find the path back to weight loss.

where I am now

I have been thinking about this blog, really. I just haven't been up to rededicating myself. Not fully. These are the reasons for my downfall:

1) Full on unhealthy addiction to Russell Stover easter candy.

2) Stressful life.

3) I have started playing the Sims 2 again, plus Farmville and City of Wonder on Facebook.

Add to that, I'm not interested, for some reason, in the meal planning at ediets. My financial situation has changed and I'm not sure how that's going to affect me. I bought a new laptop and I got health insurance and I donated until it hurt to Japan tsunami relief and I've been dining out for every meal.

I'm just starting to get to a place of pulling it back together again. I went to a lot of trouble to print up a grocery list from an ediets meal plan, but when I went to the grocery store, I just went to get "a few things" and wound up getting $137 in groceries, from fresh meat and produce to some prepared/frozen/canned/processed foods. And now I'm going to try to live on that sensibly for a while. This will be nice. I think my plan is to quit ediets and maybe subscribe to Cooking Light or something. I shouldn't abandon meal planning, but I shouldn't rely on it either. I need to be able to enter a new phase that allows me to do exotic things like make enough food for a week and live off the leftovers. Eat the food I have here. Today I had a good breakfast and a lunch that was heavier than I realized when I entered it into sparkpeople, because of the potato. And the meal was very filling - a large red boiled potato, boiled mustard greens, and about 4 ounces of some kind of steak. And 5 green olives. Didn't seem like all that much. Anyway, I expect I'll transition to Sparkpeople and if I still have trouble I might try Weight Watchers for a while just for a change, or nutritional help provided by gym or my new health insurance.

I am a lot easier on myself for "failure" than the culture of weight loss typically allows for, but I do get embarrassed when I think of the name of this blog and how it was my driving force - "For real this time." Right now I'm at 236 and no clothes look good on me. When I go to the store, nothing looks good on me. It's spring and I want to dress flirtily and nothing looks good on me, and it's not because of the clothes, it's because of the 'canvas' - my body. I hate wearing jeans because my upper belly hangs out over the waistband - I HATE IT!!! It feels bad. I try girdles, they roll up. My belly feels heavy on me when I jump or run.

And I have been concentrating on getting some exercise almost every day, again, now that things have let up. It's hard because I don't feel like moving, but the weather has been beautiful for nice walks in the park, so there has been some incentive!

So that's where things are. A tentative new start. Just looking for enough mental clarity to make a real new start of it.

And probably I should start checking in on your blogs, too, see where you are and how inspiring your progresses and hardships are.

back up to 233 - Twelve Weeks?

I feel so fat. Physically fat, and mentally like a fat person. I spill over my jeans in that uncomfortable way that I hated enough to start this thing, and those jeans are too tight for me now. Do I go buy the next highest size? No.

This is the fault of my unreadiness to refuse myself Russell stover chocolate-cream easter eggs. They have 3 flavors I like and I think I need to get myself 2 of each flavor and force the richness into my sick stomach because they taste good. And this is treating myself good?

Of course today my sick stuffed feeling is exacerbated by possible food poisoning from last night. I took a chance on some leftover shrimp, but I think it was just a little too leftover.

This is actually very much how I felt when I started this journey 2 years ago, right about at this time of year. I feel like people are ignoring me and I have no friends and the people I love are not participating in my life. This manifests itself largely on Facebook, but also in my own home. I feel like I could slip away and no one would care, most wouldn't notice. And that's kinda what I did 2 years ago. And I quit chocolate.

Only this time, quitting/reducing things like refined sugar and caffeine take on a new meaning as I wonder what all is going on inside my body, worrying about my heart or the possibility of diabetes or glandular issues.

But guess what - my Dad quit smoking again. I have played with the number 12 weeks in my head - a twelve-week program with things like no chocolate, sticking to the meal plan exactly (though for the sake of my budget I must learn to make substitutions), meeting exercise goals (I have so many I don't know where to start!)

I decided to become active again and changed my meal plan specifications from "exercise 1-3 days a week" to "exercise 3-5 days a week" and guess what - my calories jumped up to 2000-2100 and I'm eating 6 meals a day now (on the Glycemic plan). (My first thought was "ack! too many calories!"; my second was "too expensive!"; and my third was "too much food preparation!") I bought the groceries tonight but by the end of that I was too wiped and sick to think of preparing tomorrow's meals so tomorrow I will rely on restaurants again but I will make good choices. Assuming I'm well enough to go to work tomorrow.

Speaking of which, I should go to sleep.

I signed on for health insurance today. Count me in among the insured! $284 per month! If I knew I could afford that I'd have done a lot more with that money. Clearly I'm going to have to pull back my lifestyle some more or look into ways to make more money. Hopefully I can have some help paying for it from the IATSE stagehands union I work with. Which might mean I'm going to become a stagehand, a real, professional stagehand. In which case, I need some training, and I need to challenge myself more. I have picked up on some hints that some people might be thinking of me as more master electrician material, which amounts to being a crew chief and liaison with some very opinionated professionals. I used to have more gumption about my ability to stand on my own and succeed and command respect, but circumstances and time have led me to a place where I prefer to sit in the background. Anyway, if I am possibly being groomed, I want to be able to face up to meet the challenge with confidence.

So Wednesday, back on plan. Lots of exercise goals. Yesterday I exercised at the gym - I spent 37 or so unsatisfying minutes on a treadmill taking what I thought was a fit test but it didn't work and I just walked 3.4 mph on a flat surface and my heart rate never rose above fat burning but that was okay and my legs did buzz numbly a little from the walking. My ankles are becoming problematic, or have been and I keep trying to hope that that will get better as I stay active... Anyway, after the treadmill I walked through a cardio dance class on my way to what I thought would be running on the track (some sprints) but I decided to stay in the dance class. It was fun but I am not good with steps. I decided I want to be good with steps. I spent all last week working with dancers, watching them dance and I thought I'd like to work myself up to maybe taking an elementary ballet class this summer or something. I definitely want to do more classes.

So today I worked out to Dancing with the Stars Latin Dance Cardio DVD and it - meh. They said I should be burning but I wasn't, until we started squatting. I often couldn't keep up with the footwork but I have some confidence that I can learn that so it comes more naturally with repetition. Sometimes they wanted me to twist faster than I could twist - I wonder what that was about - was it because my thighs are fat or because I need more quick-twitch muscle in my abs? Either way - I hope to be working out a lot more.

have been off, trying a new start

Strayed off track. So my self-motivational talk of the past few weeks has been just that - talk. No, I'm not going to be hard on myself, I just regret that I can't have my cake and eat it too - that if I'd stuck to it I could weigh less, but I don't weigh less.

What happened was - I got busy at work and didn't have the chance to go to the grocery store. Then I got muddled in my thinking and quit Kingdoms of Camelot but started playing Farmville and City of Wonder and didn't have time to go to the grocery store or plan my meals. Lost in a haze with no room left for the mental capacity to plan ahead.

The fixes - Well, this week I am working in a different location where hopefully I'll be more able to take time for myself. The initial storm of returning to Farmville and City of Wonder has calmed and will have to calm as I devote myself more to this week's work, so I will plant crops that take over a day to come to fruition and leave Farmville for a while. And I must exercise, and I've been saying that for a while. One of the things that's been holding me up is kind of funny when you look at it from the outside - I want to itemize my exercise goals in order to start working on exercising, but I can't find my exercise planner that I started in January.

I have enjoyed Russell Stover easter candy but I didn't like it as much as I wanted to. I have enjoyed KFC Original Recipe but I didn't like it as much as I wanted to. I have been eating in restaurants and candy and overall have been left feeling a bit sludgy and crying out for crisp vegetables like celery! In the mornings I'm still too full from yesterday to care a thing about breakfast.

So for those reasons I'm kind of excited to get back on the meal plan. I figure now that I tried what I was missing and didn't like it too much, I'll be more interested in my home-cooking and non-chocolate choices. But I'm also kind of underenthused about my meal plan this week - couldn't find anything I looked forward to making and eating. Because of my busy schedule, I'm eating Lean Cuisines for a lot of lunches - and I typically prefer to avoid frozen dinners because they are unfulfilling.

I did purchase (with my tons of $$) a Cooking Light and an Eating Healthy (?) magazine. All-in-all I've come to see health & fitness magazines as unproductive and confusing. The cover titles lure you in with "Fabulous ab moves to firm that tummy!" but inside it's just more of the same that you already knew. But anyway, I thought maybe I'd just copy some recipes into my new meal plan book.

I think that's pretty much it on the diet front. I won't touch on all the rest of the crap I *could* write about the last few weeks. Except to say - :-/

Yay 12 pounds down now

Yay I stood on the scale today and at first it wanted to stop at 225 and that excited me. Then, it worked it was back up to 226, 227. I'm going with 227 because that is still a loss. If I go with 225 I stand a chance of being disappointed again tomorrow.

Yesterday I worked two load-outs, about 5 hours each. My body is sore, especially my legs. I had time before the first one for breakfast, and time between the first and second ones for lunch and snack. By the time I got home from the last one at 3:30 a.m., I was tired and - having already partially prepared dinner and knowing I was going to sleep soon anyway and could go to sleep without eating anything but ought to eat at least some of the dinner I'm prescribed - well I had a tidge of fish and a boiled potato (which was supposed to have been 4-5 ounces of fish and a yogurt-potato salad.) So maybe that's what explains my loss today. Or maybe it's been happening under my water retention all along.

OH! My roommate brought home some cheesecake last night and offered me a piece. I accepted the offer (after initially balking "WHAT? NO!!") but I haven't had it yet.

Cheesecake? Really?

Anyway, day off today. Gotta get a new meal plan and head to the grocery store. Gonna soak my aching muscles and dry, dirty skin in a bath, then we'll just see about some exercise. Some yoga would feel great, but I have to time it so I have an empty stomach.

12 pounds down. 28 long arduous pounds to go to get to 199. 47 to 180.