Wednesday, July 11, 2012

Gym Floor Meltdown (or, crap, the truth sucks!)

So today I had a meltdown at the gym. Yep - sitting there on the press machine I just started bawling like a baby.  So... the story goes like this:

Yesterday was Sammy's birthday and I was feeling proud of myself for a number of reasons. He had requested perogies and cheesecake for his birthday meal. Not a problem. Mom can do this. I wanted to be a part of it (ie: I wanted to eat it too!) so I planned ahead. This is the first thing I was proud of, because historically I would just say "oh to heck with it" and eat whatever I wanted. I entered the perogies and the cheesecake into 'my fitness pal' before I even had breakfast. I wanted to see what I had left for the day. The plan was to then eat the rest of the day according to what I planned to have for supper.

Then, as a last minute decision in the middle of the afternoon, we decided to go to the movies. We go to the dollar theater and we grab some movie snacks at quicktrip before we go. I ALWAYS have sugar babies. the THEATER size box. I don't care. I just love them, and a movie isn't a movie without them. Even as I've been losing all this weight I have done this. It's just something I decided to work into my system. Granted, that's kind of hard. A box of sugar babies is about one full days worth of calories. Yep, you read it right. 1500 calories, give or take. I enjoy them and I don't feel guilty. However, as we perused the choices at quicktrip I saw this sugar free tube of gooey sour candy stuff. Only 30 calories! I decided to try that instead and save myself 1470 calories. Well, that stuff was really bad, but I was still proud of myself for making an alternate movie food choice. 

Then, when I went to make supper, I cooked my perogies seperately with no oil. Just a bit of PAM to stop sticking.  I was proud for making a healthier cooking choice.

Last, but not least, I went to the gym the morning of his birthday and walked on the treadmill on level 15 hill program (not easy!) for a half hour, and level 10 for a half hour. I did this solely to burn the calories I expected to be eating that night at dinner. So I was proud of exercising off my calories in advance.

I had weighed myself that morning and it seemed like the gain from last friday of 3.4 pounds was just water weight caused by the wrong time of the month, because I was all of a sudden down that weight and then some. So I was proud that I had watched my sodium, increased my water intake and got rid of that water weight.

So, as I mentioned, I was feeling pretty good on several fronts. Then I went to the gym. I warmed up on the treadmill for five minutes and then turned to meet my trainer who was doing the "tsk, tsk" motion with her fingers. You know the motion, the one that says "you've been very naughty!". I was all "what did I do?" and she was all "perogies and cheesecake? all those carbs at night? It's going to turn into fat if you eat all those carbs at night time."


POP.


That's the sound of my balloon bursting. My first instinct was to get mad. "Well, it was my son's birthday! If I can't celebrate I don't even want to do this!"  She was all " have a big salad and one perogie" . I was all "they are mini perogies." One perogie would just be enough to piss me off! Seriously people! I told her "I don't want to just eat one perogie! I don't want the kids to think that eating healthy and being fit is about deprivation and not getting to join in the fun!"  Melissa remained calm and said "I'm just saying, it's these little choices that make the difference. I know you want to get this weight off fast, and I'm telling you, if you'll restrict those carbs after 2 or 3 you will just see it melt off!" 


Well, right about then was when my tears started flowing. Can I just say, and excuse my language, but damn my tears. I cry when I'm super happy. I cry when I'm sad. I cry when I'm mad. I just cry, but by golly, I've never cried at the gym before, and I kept thinking of Tom Hanks in a league of their own. "There's no crying in baseball!!!".  There are a lot of big muscular men at my gym and I felt like there was a spotlight on me and that they were all thinking "there's no crying in working out!" 


Truthfully, I'm sure hardly anyone noticed. After all, tears and sweat look very similar, and it isn't like I was weeping and wailing. I was just leaking tears from my eyes and angrily rubbing them away... repeatedly. 


Then Melissa did the mom thing and comforted me, even though I probably am 10-15 years older than her. She told me how she's proud of how far I've come and she's just trying to point out the little things that could be holding me back. Then she did the trainer thing, and told me to get mad at her and work hard. I did work hard, but not because I was mad.  Just like ever, I was determined, but darn that was rough. You know why? 


The truth sucks. 


Yep. Hurts, Sucks, Stinks, and rots. Sometimes you just don't want to hear it. I've made so many changes that for ME are huge. Maybe easy things for somebody else, I don't know, but for me.... EPIC changes. I've completely turned my lifestyle upside down. I'm learning to think a different way about food, about exercise, and about my health.  I realized today just how much I've changed when Elizabeth asked me as we stopped at Sam's club "Mommy, why did you park here? There are a million spaces up there!" I said "It's exercise, and good for us!" and she spent a good minute arguing that my blueberries would melt on the way to the car if I parked ALL the way back there. Then I said "get out of the car you lazy butt, and walk!" LOL. Seriously, I used to be the one who would drive around for five minutes looking for the closest spot, and now I don't even pay attention to how far away a parking spot is, except maybe to purposely pick a further one! Working out is non-negotiable. At least 5 days a week I need to be at the gym or out doing a loop or two at the park. Weekends are my lazy time, and I'm even feeling the need on the weekends to get moving. Yes, I've changed. 


Then there is Melissa. She's smiling at me. There she is with her perky little blond cute head telling me to change some more. Really? Can you not SEE how much I've changed? Yeah, she sees it. She's my biggest supporter in many ways. She wants me to succeed though. She'll walk through fire to make sure it happens! That includes giving me hell for what I eat. In many ways, the choices I made yesterday were good ones, but they weren't the BEST ones I could have made, and I think THAT is what Melissa was getting at. 


Some days I want to defriend Melissa from 'my fitness pal' so she can't see my food diary, but it's good to be accountable to someone. It's good to have someone who can say "did you check the sodium on that fake crab?"(I had NO idea, it's HIGH!!!). So yeah. My feelings were hurt, my balloon was deflated, but when I went to Sam's club this afternoon I picked up a huge bag of lettuce and spinach knowing that I was going to have more salads for dinner and less carbs. Melissa is good for me. She tells me the truth, even when it hurts, and she points out the things that I might not notice since she is just weeks away from her masters in exercise science and has a lot more knowledge than I do about the human body and how it works. I trust that she has my best interest at heart, and though I don't agree with her on every little thing about food (no, I will NOT give up my miracle whip light. So you can stop asking me to.. it adds a low fat zest to my sandwich I am not willing to give up!) if I can get my emotions out of the way there is usually a lot of wisdom there for me to glean. 


I think everyone needs a Melissa. A person who constantly pushes you to be your best, but understands when you can't be. The perfect mix between slave driver and friend. I found out that for me, that person can't be my husband. I don't want him to talk to me about what I eat. I want him to just support me and tell me how great I am doing and how much he loves me no matter what I weigh. I want him to make up silly songs about how skinny I'm getting. That makes me happy. A Melissa is the perfect compromise. I hope you all have a Melissa in your life, even if sometimes she does make you cry.