As is well known, I've been on a million and two diets in the last 28 years or so since I first started worrying about my weight, and as you know, I've failed a million and two times. After failing something a million and two times it is extremely difficult to 1) try again and 2) believe in yourself about this particular thing.
Now, if one thing is common in EVERY SINGLE plan I've been on, it's this; they want to know your "why". WHY, WHY, WHY? For me, not that hard. There are a multitude of reasons WHY I want to lose weight.
I want to feel better
I want to look better
I want to wear pretty clothes
I want to be sexy
I don't want to get diabetes
I want to be able to keep up with the kids
I don't want to embarrass my kids with my weight
I want to fit in restaurant booths....comfortably
I don't ever again want the humiliation of being too fat to fit on a carnival ride
I want people to take me more seriously
I don't want people to look through me like I'm not there
I don't want people to think I'm lazy (I'm not)
I want my Asthma to improve
I want my cholesterol numbers to improve
I want my liver function to improve
I want to fart less (yes, I fart much less when I eat well!)
I don't want my skin to itch, itch, itch all the time.
I don't want to be a weird lumpy shape!
.... the list could go on and on and on and on. I have a trillion whys. There are that many small indignities in being FAT. So yes, all the plans have that in common. My whys are motivational for a while.. especially when I just start out and I am so disgusted with what I see in the mirror and so fed up with how bad I feel... but when I start losing weight and start feeling better, sometimes the whys don't scream so loudly and I lose motivation. This is why I am SO excited again about my new lifestyle living on planet Shibboleth.. once again, following the wisdom of God, Mr. Martin tackles things differently.
He asked me one very important question before asking about my whys. Travis asked me WHO.
"who are you?" he asked.
huh. I'm me. I'm Tanya. I'm mommy, I'm honey. I'm taxi. I'm booboo kisser, and schedule maker. I'm bill payer and I'm friend.
"No," he says. "not what are you, but WHO are you?"
Oh.
Who.
Good Question. It has some good answers that I was reminded of.
I am a child of God.
I am made in His Image
He is beautiful.
Therefore...
I am beautiful.
JUST. THE. WAY. I. AM
God loves me NOW.
God loves me FAT.
God loves me BROKEN.
GOD LOVES ME.
So who am I to look in the mirror with disgust? Who am I to criticize what God made in his perfect will? I am a beautiful creation and I am fearfully and wonderfully made. God lives within me and I am his temple.
Well, okay then.
My temple needs some repair.
It needs some Tender Loving Care.
It needs to be swept clean of filth and poison.
It needs to be nourished and loved
It needs to be glorifying to God.
I declare today. I LOVE MYSELF.
I LOVE MY LORD.
I love myself enough to nourish and take care of the temple God has given me.
I love myself enough to put God before and health before the lust of my flesh
I love myself enough to daily make the choices that will lead me to wholeness and health.
I love myself enough not to abuse this body
I love myself more than I love food
I love God more than I love food
I am me. That's who I am.
and I am Beautiful.
And I am worth it.
Monday, March 3, 2014
Sunday, February 16, 2014
False Guilt (or every day has enough guilt of it's own)
matthew 6:34 says Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own...
I've struggled with this, worrying. I am a mom after all and that is what we do best. I try to "let go and let God" with varying degrees of success, but this week I've been having another issue and I want to paraphrase the word a little by saying "each day has enough guilt of it's own" - I mean, seriously. If there is one thing we do almost as well as worrying, it is guilt. That feeling that we are never doing enough, well enough, or often enough to be what we should be.
So if feeling guilty for something I really can't help is bad, how about this; now I'm feeling guilty for something I'm not even guilty of! It's the food. It's the yummy, glorious, abundant food I am eating on this new lifestyle plan of Shibboleth. Specifically the french toast.
Oh, let me tell you the glory that is this french toast.
sweet, subtle, a little crisp on the outside, oh so creamy on the inside...a dollop of whipped cream on top, sprinkled with cinammon.. i can taste a hint of vanilla as I savor each bite. Oh goodness, As my favorite Christian comedian Tim Hawkins once said " Its like eating a baby angel!"
But here's the thing.Even though I am aware that this is a lifestyle plan, and not a "diet", my body and mind has been conditioned to think over the years of any kind of restricted eating as a "diet". Therefore my mind is saying "I'm going to go without. I'm going to be deprived, and what's more, everything is going to taste bad". Along with that comes the other conditioned beliefs "If it tastes good, especially if it's sweet, I'm cheating and i'm going to go straight to diet hell, and gain fifty pounds on my way down".
So,, back to the french toast.... Let me tell you what it's made of... two slices of Natures own double fiber wheat bread. On my new planet Shibboleth, inexcplicably, that bread is counted as a fibrous carb along with most VEGETABLES. Yes, my bread counts kind of like a vegetable. I know. It's like a wonderful parellel universe where bread is not EVIL, as long as it's the right kind. Okay, so moving on. Egg whites.1/2 cup. No problem. A splash of vanilla in the egg whites, Bread coated both sides and cooked in a frypan with a little PAM for a minute or two on each side. a sprinkle of cinammon.1/4 cup of sugar free syrup. I thought this would be a miniscule amount, but it is actually plenty for each bite to have syrup and leaves some on my plate at the end. This AMAZED me, because I am the girl at IHOP that adds more syrup several times as she eats her buttermilk pancakes. One thing I have realized is that 1/4 cup and 1/2 cup is actually more than you think it is! Of course, to just make it that much more awesome, fat free reddi whip that I can dollop on top in pretty little puffy clouds to make me feel like I'm being spoiled. According to the rules of planet Shibboleth, this is completely approved, right down to the whipped topping!
I've struggled with this, worrying. I am a mom after all and that is what we do best. I try to "let go and let God" with varying degrees of success, but this week I've been having another issue and I want to paraphrase the word a little by saying "each day has enough guilt of it's own" - I mean, seriously. If there is one thing we do almost as well as worrying, it is guilt. That feeling that we are never doing enough, well enough, or often enough to be what we should be.
So if feeling guilty for something I really can't help is bad, how about this; now I'm feeling guilty for something I'm not even guilty of! It's the food. It's the yummy, glorious, abundant food I am eating on this new lifestyle plan of Shibboleth. Specifically the french toast.
Oh, let me tell you the glory that is this french toast.
sweet, subtle, a little crisp on the outside, oh so creamy on the inside...a dollop of whipped cream on top, sprinkled with cinammon.. i can taste a hint of vanilla as I savor each bite. Oh goodness, As my favorite Christian comedian Tim Hawkins once said " Its like eating a baby angel!"
But here's the thing.Even though I am aware that this is a lifestyle plan, and not a "diet", my body and mind has been conditioned to think over the years of any kind of restricted eating as a "diet". Therefore my mind is saying "I'm going to go without. I'm going to be deprived, and what's more, everything is going to taste bad". Along with that comes the other conditioned beliefs "If it tastes good, especially if it's sweet, I'm cheating and i'm going to go straight to diet hell, and gain fifty pounds on my way down".
So,, back to the french toast.... Let me tell you what it's made of... two slices of Natures own double fiber wheat bread. On my new planet Shibboleth, inexcplicably, that bread is counted as a fibrous carb along with most VEGETABLES. Yes, my bread counts kind of like a vegetable. I know. It's like a wonderful parellel universe where bread is not EVIL, as long as it's the right kind. Okay, so moving on. Egg whites.1/2 cup. No problem. A splash of vanilla in the egg whites, Bread coated both sides and cooked in a frypan with a little PAM for a minute or two on each side. a sprinkle of cinammon.1/4 cup of sugar free syrup. I thought this would be a miniscule amount, but it is actually plenty for each bite to have syrup and leaves some on my plate at the end. This AMAZED me, because I am the girl at IHOP that adds more syrup several times as she eats her buttermilk pancakes. One thing I have realized is that 1/4 cup and 1/2 cup is actually more than you think it is! Of course, to just make it that much more awesome, fat free reddi whip that I can dollop on top in pretty little puffy clouds to make me feel like I'm being spoiled. According to the rules of planet Shibboleth, this is completely approved, right down to the whipped topping!
My diet brain can not comprehend this. It keeps saying "girl, you craycray.This is NOT diet food, and you will NOT lose weight eating anything this sweet, creamy and delicious". Well, is 8 pounds in 5 days not losing weight? My brain doesn't care. It says " This is a fluke, you eat this again and it's all over" As you can see, my brain is very talkative, and it usually doesn't say anything at all encouraging or helpful, so I have to put it in it's place a lot.. As I was cooking this particular dish again for the third time in 7 days I was having a nice little conversation with my brain. it went something like this....
Brain: oh oh, here she goes again, Little sugar addict. She's gonna ruin this plan before she even starts it.
Me: Brain, I would like to point out that this dish is made entirely of approved items, and are combined in appropriate and approved combinations.
Brain: But it's SOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO good. You know if something seems to good to be true, it always is.
Me: well, maybe not always.
Brain: SMELL that.... mmmmmm. it smells heavenly! Smells SINFULLY good.
Me: this food is not a sin, it's a blessing.....
Brain: I'll believe it when I see it..
Me: well okay then.... I'll show you on the scale buster!
Brain: oh, she's getting scrappy!
Me: Shut up! I'm gonna eat.
Brain: Enjoy that fattening sweet goodness!
Me: grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr.
So you can see why i might sometimes struggle with this new lifestyle. I'm expecting it to be a DIEt. It's not. I'm expecting to be bored with my food. I'm not. I'm expecting to feel deprived. I'm not. I'm expecting to be hungry. I'm not. I'm expecting to be miserable. I'm not. I'm actually having fun. This is definately a first, but I'm finding learning to live on planet Shibboleth to be a fun journey. One I'm walking on with fun friends. I'm excited to see what tomorrow will bring, and I'm excited to see how this can work for me...So shut up brain. I do not WANT to feel guilty every time I eat this french toast, because there is nothing wrong with it at all! Right now my scripture of the day, every day is this much needed one as I try to purge years and years of dieting failure and dieting mindset from my life "do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind"... my mind doesn't like being renewed. it fights tooth and nail and is very stubborn, but I believe that it can be done, and I continue to work on it every single.day. And now.... for your viewing enjoyment... a little bit of french toast heaven on earth. Enjoy! there's no reason not to!
Wednesday, February 12, 2014
Shame on me (or, get under my heel where you belong you devil!)
It's been a long time. Part of what held me back was stress and time, but the biggest thing that has held me back is shame. I've felt incredible shame. One of the things you risk when sharing your journey of life with others is the risk of public humiliation and failure. The risk of falling flat on your face infront of friends, family and strangers. For those of you who have been with me on this journey for a while, you will know that I very publicly went on a several months long diet and weight loss kick that resulted in me losing a good amount of weight and getting to just under 200 pounds. Then I kind of dropped off the planet. Well, that's because I fell on my face.
I found myself faced with a very stressful year, with a teen daughter I couldn't stop worrying about and inlaws falling very ill and requiring my time and energy (as long as a ton of my husband's time and energy), my Asperger's sweetheart boy about to start middle school woefully unprepared, and feeling all around like a horrible mom and a horrible wife and a horrible person in general. My comfort, as is my decades long habit, was food. I should have turned to Jesus, my husband, my friends, but I didn't. I turned to food, my old friend.
Soon I had regained the weight I lost, plus some. When I hit 250 pounds, my previous highest weight, I remembered when I had sworn I would never weigh more than that in my life. When I hit 260, I just cried. I was out of control and couldn't seem to do anything about it. My humiliation and my shame was crushing, but the thought of all the very hard work I did to lose some of the weight in the first place was overwhelming. I had exercised a lot and had to eat PERFECTLY to lose weight. It seems I couldn't have a treat once in a while without sabotaging the whole thing. The stress of having to be perfect in my eating, never being able to have a treat, and having to exercise so much just to slowly lose weight some weeks, and to gain some weeks despite my best efforts was very hard when I was in a great mindset. In this very stressful time of my life I frankly did not have the energy to even think about how to eat right, and when I thought of doing what I had done previously I just broke down crying. I couldn't face putting in all that work again and failing yet again. So I did nothing.
Well, that's not true. I did do some things. I stopped looking in the mirror unless I had to, because I hated what I saw there. I did start eating whatever I wanted, because what joy was there other than the pleasure of food? I did start sitting through most of worship at church because my back would give out on me trying to carry my massive stomach around. I did start breathing heavy after walking up stairs. I did start taking my asthma inhaler multiple times a day. I did make trips to walmart to buy ever bigger sizes of inexpensive shirts and leggings..... yeah, so I did do things, just nothing productive.
When I wasn't taking care of my family, much of my day was spent hating what I had become, so when my ever loving husband who has always been super supportive and who I know in my heart loves me no matter what my size is, started mentioning that we had to start losing weight,and told me I was starting to "waddle" and that I looked like "a swollen tic", I hit rock bottom. He wasn't meaning to hurt me, but his strength has never ever been tact. He wants me healthy and strong and to live long. He doesn't need me to be supermodel skinny. He just wants me healthy. I am thankful I have him, but when he said I looked like a "swollen tic" I was absolutely devastated. It wasn't something I didn't already know, but hearing it out of the mouth of the man who loves me unconditionally was absolutely earth shattering. I had never felt so hideous and unlovable.
I knew I had to do something, but I didn't know what I could do different this time. I didn't want to go back to the same thing that had been so hard the last time, but I certainly didn't want some crash diet that would just perpetuate the cycle I've been on for 30 years now. I had been watching a couple of my friends at church lose weight the last year or so, especially my one friend Nancy, who lost an incredible amount of weight in what seemed like no time at all. These friends talked of this new lifestyle program they were living and they all had one thing in common. They had a placid and peaceful expression on their faces. They looked calm and happy. When I asked about the program they would tell me snippets, but to my mind it sounded very complicated and despite their protestations that you caught on very quickly, it just seemed too overwhelming to consider. I saw it as another diet I would fail at. I was too scared to try something new, because I didn't have it in me to consider failing again, and there is nothing in my past to indicate long term success in weight loss was even a possibility for me.
Then last week my friend Deborah, who looks incredible by the way, set up a presentation by one of the leaders in this program. I decided to go and at least listen. For two hours I listened to a man named Tony Quinn talk about how this program had saved his life. I was bawling at many parts of it, because his story sounded like mine in many ways. The truths he spoke were truths from my life and from my pain. When I wasn't crying I was laughing, because he was so flippin' funny, but in the end I decided that maybe God was leading me to this program and that I should give it a try. At half off (I got a code from Tony) it was only 74$ for a whole year. That's incredibly inexpensive when you consider I spend more than that for only two months of weight watchers. Unfortunately, I didn't have 74$ and didn't see myself having it anytime soon. I emailed Tony and told him I desperately wanted to start this program and had taxes coming back in a month and could he please find me a sponsor until then. (He had mentioned sponsors being available). He wrote back and said if I would bring a willing mind and heart he would sponsor me himself. He signed me up the next morning, which was a saturday.
I spent all saturday listening to videos and reading and trying to figure out what I could eat. I spent sunday going to three grocery stores trying to find the foods I needed. I was almost ready to quit before I started. It seemed incredibly complicated, and I was worried I would never get it. Next thing I knew, I was signed up for the facebook group, and that is when it turned around for me. There were a ton of people, all happily living this program, who were more than happy to help me through my confusion. I know now that if I have a question, no matter how stupid or silly, there will be 50 people ready and willing to give me an answer at the drop of a hat. I have never met a more welcoming, positive, and helpful group of people.
I am on day three of the program. I have watched about twenty videos, all about 5 minutes in length. I have watched a couple of long videos, about an hour in length. I have taken a lot of notes. I have asked a lot of questions. If this were a diet I would be throwing my hands up in defeat and saying "this, this is NOT worth it", but it is so much more than that. This is a different PLANET. This program is a Christian ministry, and it is run like one. These people are THERE for you. You are celebrated for being a beautiful creation of a loving God. Yes, even at 260 pounds. Travis Martin, the one who conceived and birthed the program, is enthusiastic, funny, real, and flawed, just like me. The people who work with him are the same way. This is not a slick packaged diet program. This is people trying hard to help people stop killing themselves with food. Sometimes that lack of polish is frustrating. Travis will be holding up a product in a video and all of it but the very top of the package is off camera! I'm like, move it up, move it up! I can't see! However, to me, something about the lack of polish is comforting. I feel like I fit in. I don't feel that way very often.
The other aspect of the program that is wonderful to me, is that Travis says we can't do this without the Lord God! He recognizes that on HIM we depend for success in anything. He recognizes it is about transforming our minds as much as our bodies; that it is about what we feed our minds as well as what we feed our bodies. The more I learn about the program, the more I feel assured in my heart that this is what I've been looking for all along.
Why blog about it now, after three days? Why risk myself again in this public arena? Why not wait until I've had incredible success and then blog? Well, one reason is that I'm excited about it! Another reason is that I'm a writer at heart. Not writing, not putting my feelings down on paper, has in a way kept my emotions chained up inside me.... as my friend Julie puts it, "you HAVE to write, or you have shackles on". The most important reason though, is that after only a couple of days listening to Travis Martin I've realized that the shame is just a tool the devil uses to hold me back and squash me down. I'm a human being on a journey. All human beings fail. My failures happen to manifest in a fat body. Some failures manifest in symptoms you can't see on the outside, but everybody has failures. Everybody has secret shame, but keeping it a secret will eat you alive. I'm not going to be ashamed of trying and failing. The only shame I should really feel is if I never try at all, or if I give up entirely! I lost sight of that under the accusations of the devil this past year. Well, I'm done listening to you Satan! You can just go to Hell, where you belong. I'm listening to new, positive voices now, and they will help me remember to keep you in your place.
So my journey continues. This time its about more than shedding the weight. It is about shedding all the chains holding me back, mental, spiritual and physical. Step one is writing again. So here I am. read me if you want. What's important is that I'm here.
Oh, and what is this program you may ask... ??? It's called Shibboleth, but Shhhhh....it's a secret.
I found myself faced with a very stressful year, with a teen daughter I couldn't stop worrying about and inlaws falling very ill and requiring my time and energy (as long as a ton of my husband's time and energy), my Asperger's sweetheart boy about to start middle school woefully unprepared, and feeling all around like a horrible mom and a horrible wife and a horrible person in general. My comfort, as is my decades long habit, was food. I should have turned to Jesus, my husband, my friends, but I didn't. I turned to food, my old friend.
Soon I had regained the weight I lost, plus some. When I hit 250 pounds, my previous highest weight, I remembered when I had sworn I would never weigh more than that in my life. When I hit 260, I just cried. I was out of control and couldn't seem to do anything about it. My humiliation and my shame was crushing, but the thought of all the very hard work I did to lose some of the weight in the first place was overwhelming. I had exercised a lot and had to eat PERFECTLY to lose weight. It seems I couldn't have a treat once in a while without sabotaging the whole thing. The stress of having to be perfect in my eating, never being able to have a treat, and having to exercise so much just to slowly lose weight some weeks, and to gain some weeks despite my best efforts was very hard when I was in a great mindset. In this very stressful time of my life I frankly did not have the energy to even think about how to eat right, and when I thought of doing what I had done previously I just broke down crying. I couldn't face putting in all that work again and failing yet again. So I did nothing.
Well, that's not true. I did do some things. I stopped looking in the mirror unless I had to, because I hated what I saw there. I did start eating whatever I wanted, because what joy was there other than the pleasure of food? I did start sitting through most of worship at church because my back would give out on me trying to carry my massive stomach around. I did start breathing heavy after walking up stairs. I did start taking my asthma inhaler multiple times a day. I did make trips to walmart to buy ever bigger sizes of inexpensive shirts and leggings..... yeah, so I did do things, just nothing productive.
When I wasn't taking care of my family, much of my day was spent hating what I had become, so when my ever loving husband who has always been super supportive and who I know in my heart loves me no matter what my size is, started mentioning that we had to start losing weight,and told me I was starting to "waddle" and that I looked like "a swollen tic", I hit rock bottom. He wasn't meaning to hurt me, but his strength has never ever been tact. He wants me healthy and strong and to live long. He doesn't need me to be supermodel skinny. He just wants me healthy. I am thankful I have him, but when he said I looked like a "swollen tic" I was absolutely devastated. It wasn't something I didn't already know, but hearing it out of the mouth of the man who loves me unconditionally was absolutely earth shattering. I had never felt so hideous and unlovable.
I knew I had to do something, but I didn't know what I could do different this time. I didn't want to go back to the same thing that had been so hard the last time, but I certainly didn't want some crash diet that would just perpetuate the cycle I've been on for 30 years now. I had been watching a couple of my friends at church lose weight the last year or so, especially my one friend Nancy, who lost an incredible amount of weight in what seemed like no time at all. These friends talked of this new lifestyle program they were living and they all had one thing in common. They had a placid and peaceful expression on their faces. They looked calm and happy. When I asked about the program they would tell me snippets, but to my mind it sounded very complicated and despite their protestations that you caught on very quickly, it just seemed too overwhelming to consider. I saw it as another diet I would fail at. I was too scared to try something new, because I didn't have it in me to consider failing again, and there is nothing in my past to indicate long term success in weight loss was even a possibility for me.
Then last week my friend Deborah, who looks incredible by the way, set up a presentation by one of the leaders in this program. I decided to go and at least listen. For two hours I listened to a man named Tony Quinn talk about how this program had saved his life. I was bawling at many parts of it, because his story sounded like mine in many ways. The truths he spoke were truths from my life and from my pain. When I wasn't crying I was laughing, because he was so flippin' funny, but in the end I decided that maybe God was leading me to this program and that I should give it a try. At half off (I got a code from Tony) it was only 74$ for a whole year. That's incredibly inexpensive when you consider I spend more than that for only two months of weight watchers. Unfortunately, I didn't have 74$ and didn't see myself having it anytime soon. I emailed Tony and told him I desperately wanted to start this program and had taxes coming back in a month and could he please find me a sponsor until then. (He had mentioned sponsors being available). He wrote back and said if I would bring a willing mind and heart he would sponsor me himself. He signed me up the next morning, which was a saturday.
I spent all saturday listening to videos and reading and trying to figure out what I could eat. I spent sunday going to three grocery stores trying to find the foods I needed. I was almost ready to quit before I started. It seemed incredibly complicated, and I was worried I would never get it. Next thing I knew, I was signed up for the facebook group, and that is when it turned around for me. There were a ton of people, all happily living this program, who were more than happy to help me through my confusion. I know now that if I have a question, no matter how stupid or silly, there will be 50 people ready and willing to give me an answer at the drop of a hat. I have never met a more welcoming, positive, and helpful group of people.
I am on day three of the program. I have watched about twenty videos, all about 5 minutes in length. I have watched a couple of long videos, about an hour in length. I have taken a lot of notes. I have asked a lot of questions. If this were a diet I would be throwing my hands up in defeat and saying "this, this is NOT worth it", but it is so much more than that. This is a different PLANET. This program is a Christian ministry, and it is run like one. These people are THERE for you. You are celebrated for being a beautiful creation of a loving God. Yes, even at 260 pounds. Travis Martin, the one who conceived and birthed the program, is enthusiastic, funny, real, and flawed, just like me. The people who work with him are the same way. This is not a slick packaged diet program. This is people trying hard to help people stop killing themselves with food. Sometimes that lack of polish is frustrating. Travis will be holding up a product in a video and all of it but the very top of the package is off camera! I'm like, move it up, move it up! I can't see! However, to me, something about the lack of polish is comforting. I feel like I fit in. I don't feel that way very often.
The other aspect of the program that is wonderful to me, is that Travis says we can't do this without the Lord God! He recognizes that on HIM we depend for success in anything. He recognizes it is about transforming our minds as much as our bodies; that it is about what we feed our minds as well as what we feed our bodies. The more I learn about the program, the more I feel assured in my heart that this is what I've been looking for all along.
Why blog about it now, after three days? Why risk myself again in this public arena? Why not wait until I've had incredible success and then blog? Well, one reason is that I'm excited about it! Another reason is that I'm a writer at heart. Not writing, not putting my feelings down on paper, has in a way kept my emotions chained up inside me.... as my friend Julie puts it, "you HAVE to write, or you have shackles on". The most important reason though, is that after only a couple of days listening to Travis Martin I've realized that the shame is just a tool the devil uses to hold me back and squash me down. I'm a human being on a journey. All human beings fail. My failures happen to manifest in a fat body. Some failures manifest in symptoms you can't see on the outside, but everybody has failures. Everybody has secret shame, but keeping it a secret will eat you alive. I'm not going to be ashamed of trying and failing. The only shame I should really feel is if I never try at all, or if I give up entirely! I lost sight of that under the accusations of the devil this past year. Well, I'm done listening to you Satan! You can just go to Hell, where you belong. I'm listening to new, positive voices now, and they will help me remember to keep you in your place.
So my journey continues. This time its about more than shedding the weight. It is about shedding all the chains holding me back, mental, spiritual and physical. Step one is writing again. So here I am. read me if you want. What's important is that I'm here.
Oh, and what is this program you may ask... ??? It's called Shibboleth, but Shhhhh....it's a secret.
Tuesday, October 2, 2012
I don't understand anymore (or, how many pieces can a mommy's heart break into?)
I was ordering some new checks this morning. I decided on Autism Awareness checks, because a portion went to support autism awareness and acceptance, and as a mother of an autistic son, it seemed the right thing to do.
My life is so busy and crazy I seldom slow down to just think, but while ordering the checks I got to thinking about all the challenges Sammy is facing as he grows older with Autism. I got to thinking about this special little boy, and all we've been through together, and my heart started breaking.
I adore and love all my children, both natural and those God blessed me with through marriage, but if I'm to be truthful, there is a little spot in the corner of my heart that my firstborn took when he was born that belongs only to him and Jesus ( I mean, Jesus gets all of it...that's just the way it is!). I can't help it. It just is.
Since the day he was born, Sammy and I have been.... sympatico. No other word for it. We understood each other in a deep way. I sensed his needs and he sensed mine. I was his home base. He was my touchstone. I knew what he was thinking, and why he was thinking it. He was diagnosed with Asperger's syndrome around age 5, and in learning about Asperger's -which is part of the autistic spectrum- I learned even more about how he ticks. I could always help him. I could calm him down, bring him around, cheer him up, and make him smile. He could take the worst day and turn it around just by saying something sweet. Yes, definately he is a mama's boy, and I'm okay with that.
Lately, it's been different.
He's 11 now, and the challenges he is facing are greater than they were. The school work is harder, the social interactions are more complex. The sarcasm, jokes, and innuendos are all around him and often so subtle (and so hard for Asperger's kids to understand!). He's more aware of his own limitations brought on by the Autism, and more frustrated by them.
The worst thing of all.
I can't make it better anymore.
Take homework for example. He will freeze up. It's like he literally just can not even put the pencil to the paper. It isn't that he doesn't know the stuff, he does. He just CAN'T DO IT right then. He doesn't know why, I don't know why, and nothing I do or say can make it better (although often I can make it worse if I'm not careful!). He can't do it, but he doesn't want to put it up because he doesn't want to go to school without it done, so we will have a boy sitting infront of a text book and paper for three hours, tearing at his face and hair with his little fists that even at 11 still have little dimples in the knuckles like a baby. His face will be screwed up in anguish and I know he is suffering personal demons that I just don't understand anymore. It's the first time in my life I haven't 'got' him completely. All I can do is pray over him and hope it passes.
I realized recently that he struggles greatly with assignments where he has to write something personal. I questioned him extensively and finally came to the conclusion that anything attached to emotions are hard for him to write about. In a way this makes sense.. he feels VERY deeply, I have no question of that. His love for me is not in question, his compassion for people is not in question. I know this because I know him, but his actions don't always match up with his feelings. Something where you or I would instinctively know called for giving someone a hug, might cause Sammy to get up and walk into another room. Things for him are either "the best thing in the world" or "the worst thing in the world". Everything is very black and white, good and evil. Sometimes he gets it right, sometimes he doesn't. He watches others, and he mimics them. This is how he learns how to relate to people, because it isn't something natural and instinctive inside him. Talk about pressure. I feel as if I have to be the best possible role model, because I am the only thing that tells him how to act around others.
Recently he has been trying sarcasm. I've had to advise him to just stop for the time being. Sarcasm done wrong isn't funny, it's just mean. He most of the time comes out sounding mean or rude. He doesn't have a good enough grasp of 1) what sarcasm is and 2) human beings and how they work to even begin to pull it off. My 9 year old girl can pull of sarcasm with grace and make you bust up laughing when she does it. She is quick witted and has a gift with being rude in a funny enough way that you don't really mind. Also, she knows when it's appropriate (at home with our family, with her best friend) and when it's not (with your teacher or somebody who doesn't like you much, or when you are in trouble!). For Sammy, those things are often beyond his grasp.
And now, Sammy is beyond my grasp. I can't always make him feel better. I don't always understand what is going on in his mind anymore. The disease - disorder - syndrome - whatever you want to call it - the DIFFERENCE in his brain has outdistanced my understanding. I get him therapy, and I pray for him a LOT, and I love him with everything I have. I try not to lose my patience with him when I'm losing my patience with the Aspergers. Sometimes I fail, but mostly I do okay. It can be really really frustrating. We are blessed with an understanding school, and wonderful understanding teachers he's had since day one. That helps so much. Mrs. Williams will modify homework so he can write about an imaginary person instead of himself, and the days where that pencil just won't touch that paper and after two hours I just pull the book out of his stiff hands, wipe his tears and make him sit and watch a tv show with the family so he can relax his muscles before bed - well those days I will write a note and Mrs. Williams will give him grace.
I know that the world out there doesn't give much grace. I know that one day a job won't care if his mind is freezing up. College won't care if his assignment freaks him out on 10 different levels. The world doesn't care about my Sammy. I have to prepare him for that world, and so we keep moving forward, keep him in therapy, keep helping him to grow and stretch and deal with the discomfort that is his mental world.
But my heart is breaking.
I just want to hold him, and make it all better. I just want him to not have to worry about this. There are enough worries in the world without having a brain that won't work WITH you to cope with it. I feel so deeply for the invisible illnesses out there. For those with crippling depression, high functioning autism - where you aren't necessarily seen as handicapped - and so just end up being WEIRD. Chronic pain like Lupus - disorders where you walk around and on the outside you look normal, but on the inside you have a daily struggle just to keep on keeping on and hold it all together.
Oh Sammy, how I wish I could knock down the wall of Asperger's that is growing between us - how I wish I could live in your brain for a day so I could better understand you, and the young man you are becoming.
Mommy misses the sympatico. It's just not there like it once was. As you grow more complex and fascinating, you grow more complicated and unknowable at the same time. Your pain is yours alone and you don't seem able to share it anymore.
My arms are always open, mommy will always be here. No matter how complicated it gets. I love you Sammy.
My life is so busy and crazy I seldom slow down to just think, but while ordering the checks I got to thinking about all the challenges Sammy is facing as he grows older with Autism. I got to thinking about this special little boy, and all we've been through together, and my heart started breaking.
I adore and love all my children, both natural and those God blessed me with through marriage, but if I'm to be truthful, there is a little spot in the corner of my heart that my firstborn took when he was born that belongs only to him and Jesus ( I mean, Jesus gets all of it...that's just the way it is!). I can't help it. It just is.
Since the day he was born, Sammy and I have been.... sympatico. No other word for it. We understood each other in a deep way. I sensed his needs and he sensed mine. I was his home base. He was my touchstone. I knew what he was thinking, and why he was thinking it. He was diagnosed with Asperger's syndrome around age 5, and in learning about Asperger's -which is part of the autistic spectrum- I learned even more about how he ticks. I could always help him. I could calm him down, bring him around, cheer him up, and make him smile. He could take the worst day and turn it around just by saying something sweet. Yes, definately he is a mama's boy, and I'm okay with that.
Lately, it's been different.
He's 11 now, and the challenges he is facing are greater than they were. The school work is harder, the social interactions are more complex. The sarcasm, jokes, and innuendos are all around him and often so subtle (and so hard for Asperger's kids to understand!). He's more aware of his own limitations brought on by the Autism, and more frustrated by them.
The worst thing of all.
I can't make it better anymore.
Take homework for example. He will freeze up. It's like he literally just can not even put the pencil to the paper. It isn't that he doesn't know the stuff, he does. He just CAN'T DO IT right then. He doesn't know why, I don't know why, and nothing I do or say can make it better (although often I can make it worse if I'm not careful!). He can't do it, but he doesn't want to put it up because he doesn't want to go to school without it done, so we will have a boy sitting infront of a text book and paper for three hours, tearing at his face and hair with his little fists that even at 11 still have little dimples in the knuckles like a baby. His face will be screwed up in anguish and I know he is suffering personal demons that I just don't understand anymore. It's the first time in my life I haven't 'got' him completely. All I can do is pray over him and hope it passes.
I realized recently that he struggles greatly with assignments where he has to write something personal. I questioned him extensively and finally came to the conclusion that anything attached to emotions are hard for him to write about. In a way this makes sense.. he feels VERY deeply, I have no question of that. His love for me is not in question, his compassion for people is not in question. I know this because I know him, but his actions don't always match up with his feelings. Something where you or I would instinctively know called for giving someone a hug, might cause Sammy to get up and walk into another room. Things for him are either "the best thing in the world" or "the worst thing in the world". Everything is very black and white, good and evil. Sometimes he gets it right, sometimes he doesn't. He watches others, and he mimics them. This is how he learns how to relate to people, because it isn't something natural and instinctive inside him. Talk about pressure. I feel as if I have to be the best possible role model, because I am the only thing that tells him how to act around others.
Recently he has been trying sarcasm. I've had to advise him to just stop for the time being. Sarcasm done wrong isn't funny, it's just mean. He most of the time comes out sounding mean or rude. He doesn't have a good enough grasp of 1) what sarcasm is and 2) human beings and how they work to even begin to pull it off. My 9 year old girl can pull of sarcasm with grace and make you bust up laughing when she does it. She is quick witted and has a gift with being rude in a funny enough way that you don't really mind. Also, she knows when it's appropriate (at home with our family, with her best friend) and when it's not (with your teacher or somebody who doesn't like you much, or when you are in trouble!). For Sammy, those things are often beyond his grasp.
And now, Sammy is beyond my grasp. I can't always make him feel better. I don't always understand what is going on in his mind anymore. The disease - disorder - syndrome - whatever you want to call it - the DIFFERENCE in his brain has outdistanced my understanding. I get him therapy, and I pray for him a LOT, and I love him with everything I have. I try not to lose my patience with him when I'm losing my patience with the Aspergers. Sometimes I fail, but mostly I do okay. It can be really really frustrating. We are blessed with an understanding school, and wonderful understanding teachers he's had since day one. That helps so much. Mrs. Williams will modify homework so he can write about an imaginary person instead of himself, and the days where that pencil just won't touch that paper and after two hours I just pull the book out of his stiff hands, wipe his tears and make him sit and watch a tv show with the family so he can relax his muscles before bed - well those days I will write a note and Mrs. Williams will give him grace.
I know that the world out there doesn't give much grace. I know that one day a job won't care if his mind is freezing up. College won't care if his assignment freaks him out on 10 different levels. The world doesn't care about my Sammy. I have to prepare him for that world, and so we keep moving forward, keep him in therapy, keep helping him to grow and stretch and deal with the discomfort that is his mental world.
But my heart is breaking.
I just want to hold him, and make it all better. I just want him to not have to worry about this. There are enough worries in the world without having a brain that won't work WITH you to cope with it. I feel so deeply for the invisible illnesses out there. For those with crippling depression, high functioning autism - where you aren't necessarily seen as handicapped - and so just end up being WEIRD. Chronic pain like Lupus - disorders where you walk around and on the outside you look normal, but on the inside you have a daily struggle just to keep on keeping on and hold it all together.
Oh Sammy, how I wish I could knock down the wall of Asperger's that is growing between us - how I wish I could live in your brain for a day so I could better understand you, and the young man you are becoming.
Mommy misses the sympatico. It's just not there like it once was. As you grow more complex and fascinating, you grow more complicated and unknowable at the same time. Your pain is yours alone and you don't seem able to share it anymore.
My arms are always open, mommy will always be here. No matter how complicated it gets. I love you Sammy.
Wednesday, August 29, 2012
Never, never, never, give up. (or, did I mention that you should not give up?)
I almost gave up there for a minute.
I think it started on my daughters 15th birthday on the 14th of August with this Perry the platypus cake I made.
Isn't it cute? Yeah, it was also really huge (it took me 3.5 sheet cakes to make it), and most devastatingly, extremely yummy. I allowed myself one small piece. Then every time I opened the fridge he was staring at me saying "eat me, I'm yummy". My willpower crumbled to pieces and I listened to the call of Perry for a good three or four days until the cake was gone, largely eaten by yours truly. Did I mention it had raspberry jam between the layers??? MMMMM.
So here's what you need to know about me and sugar. I'm truly an addict. I have this tipping point I've noticed over the years as I've tried so many times to conquer this enemy. I can eat a little pure sugar, but as soon as I hit this point of no return it is like it triggers an avalanche and I can't stop. I want to stop. I know as I eat the food, or buy the food, that I really need to stop, but I just can't seem to. I know I'm going backwards, falling off the wagon, digging myself a pit, but I can't bring myself to care when the lure of the sugary treat is in front of me. This is what happened after my cake binge... my sugar cravings came back in such force I was almost crippled by them. If it was in the house and it was sweet, I would eat it. Sometimes I would cry as I ate it, knowing it was a mistake. Wishing I could stop. My strength was gone.
Dominos.
That's what it's like. You don't feel good because you aren't eating right, so you don't want to go to the gym because you feel tired and sluggish and just bad about yourself... you don't exercise so you are even more tired and sluggish and when it's time to eat you just grab the nearest (sweet) thing. Too much thought to try to think of something healthy. Too much work to make it. Now you are getting depressed and discouraged because you've done so badly.
Dominos. Crashing down.
This is where I was Sunday at church. Depressed and crashing and out of control completely. Just a few weeks post Biggest Loser win, I was truly feeling like a real loser. Each morning I'd vow to get back on track and each morning I'd eat an oatmeal creme cake (or two) and cry. I know that sounds completely pitiful, but anyone who has ever been in the grip of any kind of addiction can attest to the fact that when it is in control, it is in control - and you are entirely out of control. Some people don't believe you can have a sugar addiction, or a food addiction, and to those people I just respectfully will have to agree to disagree. This is something that has had me in it's grip for the better part of 25 years now. I've tried repeatedly to conquer it, and I've repeatedly lost the battle. I've repeatedly given up because it was too hard, and too painful, and took just so much of my energy. I've repeatedly felt the fear of wondering if I was just going to slowly and methodically eat myself to death. I've been committing suicide the slow way for more than half of my life.
I cried out to my friends on sunday at church. I begged them to pray for me. They did. They are, and one of those friends (I love you Julie) texted me and asked me look up all the scriptures I could find on strength in the bible and to pick one or two that spoke to me and to post them in my house.
This one especially spoke to me: He gives strength to the weary and increases the strength of the weak. Isaiah 40:29
I am weary, and I am weak. He gives strength to me. It's a promise. He increases my strength. It's a promise. Oh Jesus, how I love you. I don't have to be strong, because you will be strong for me.
It was freeing somehow. I decided to face the facts and see where my three week binge had gotten me. My trainer said "no, Tanya, don't do it!" but I assured her that my head was in the right place now to deal with what I saw on the scale. I had gotten to 199.8. This morning I was 206.2. Okay, big deal. 6.5 pounds more or less. I can take care of that in two weeks of training and eating right. It wasn't as bad a gain as I had imagined it was going to be.
All the oatmeal creme pies are gone. I ate them. I won't be getting any more and my hubby has promised not to bring any in the house either. There are no other snacks in the house I can't resist. I'm set up for success. I read a poster this morning, and it said "The beginning is always the hardest. If you are tired of starting over, stop giving up!"
Yeah, I'll be putting that on the wall too.
This time, unlike all the other times, I will never give up. No matter what my setbacks I will remember that I am fighting for my life, literally. This addiction will kill me slow or kill me fast, but it will kill me if I don't take it on, and with the help of God, beat it once and for all.
Back on the wagon. Sometimes I wish I could go cold turkey on food. But obviously, THAT would not end well. I'm back at the gym. Monday to Friday. I'm committed. The food I am working on. I don't know if it will ever stop being a battle, but I'm encouraged to remember that my strength does not come from me, but from the one who never grows weary or faints. When I fall, He will pick me up, and he will never quit on me. So I'm never going to quit on him. Yep, back in the saddle girl.
Never, never, never, never, never, never quit. You'll just have to start all over again.
I think it started on my daughters 15th birthday on the 14th of August with this Perry the platypus cake I made.
So here's what you need to know about me and sugar. I'm truly an addict. I have this tipping point I've noticed over the years as I've tried so many times to conquer this enemy. I can eat a little pure sugar, but as soon as I hit this point of no return it is like it triggers an avalanche and I can't stop. I want to stop. I know as I eat the food, or buy the food, that I really need to stop, but I just can't seem to. I know I'm going backwards, falling off the wagon, digging myself a pit, but I can't bring myself to care when the lure of the sugary treat is in front of me. This is what happened after my cake binge... my sugar cravings came back in such force I was almost crippled by them. If it was in the house and it was sweet, I would eat it. Sometimes I would cry as I ate it, knowing it was a mistake. Wishing I could stop. My strength was gone.
Dominos.
That's what it's like. You don't feel good because you aren't eating right, so you don't want to go to the gym because you feel tired and sluggish and just bad about yourself... you don't exercise so you are even more tired and sluggish and when it's time to eat you just grab the nearest (sweet) thing. Too much thought to try to think of something healthy. Too much work to make it. Now you are getting depressed and discouraged because you've done so badly.
Dominos. Crashing down.
This is where I was Sunday at church. Depressed and crashing and out of control completely. Just a few weeks post Biggest Loser win, I was truly feeling like a real loser. Each morning I'd vow to get back on track and each morning I'd eat an oatmeal creme cake (or two) and cry. I know that sounds completely pitiful, but anyone who has ever been in the grip of any kind of addiction can attest to the fact that when it is in control, it is in control - and you are entirely out of control. Some people don't believe you can have a sugar addiction, or a food addiction, and to those people I just respectfully will have to agree to disagree. This is something that has had me in it's grip for the better part of 25 years now. I've tried repeatedly to conquer it, and I've repeatedly lost the battle. I've repeatedly given up because it was too hard, and too painful, and took just so much of my energy. I've repeatedly felt the fear of wondering if I was just going to slowly and methodically eat myself to death. I've been committing suicide the slow way for more than half of my life.
I cried out to my friends on sunday at church. I begged them to pray for me. They did. They are, and one of those friends (I love you Julie) texted me and asked me look up all the scriptures I could find on strength in the bible and to pick one or two that spoke to me and to post them in my house.
This one especially spoke to me: He gives strength to the weary and increases the strength of the weak. Isaiah 40:29
I am weary, and I am weak. He gives strength to me. It's a promise. He increases my strength. It's a promise. Oh Jesus, how I love you. I don't have to be strong, because you will be strong for me.
It was freeing somehow. I decided to face the facts and see where my three week binge had gotten me. My trainer said "no, Tanya, don't do it!" but I assured her that my head was in the right place now to deal with what I saw on the scale. I had gotten to 199.8. This morning I was 206.2. Okay, big deal. 6.5 pounds more or less. I can take care of that in two weeks of training and eating right. It wasn't as bad a gain as I had imagined it was going to be.
All the oatmeal creme pies are gone. I ate them. I won't be getting any more and my hubby has promised not to bring any in the house either. There are no other snacks in the house I can't resist. I'm set up for success. I read a poster this morning, and it said "The beginning is always the hardest. If you are tired of starting over, stop giving up!"
Yeah, I'll be putting that on the wall too.
This time, unlike all the other times, I will never give up. No matter what my setbacks I will remember that I am fighting for my life, literally. This addiction will kill me slow or kill me fast, but it will kill me if I don't take it on, and with the help of God, beat it once and for all.
Back on the wagon. Sometimes I wish I could go cold turkey on food. But obviously, THAT would not end well. I'm back at the gym. Monday to Friday. I'm committed. The food I am working on. I don't know if it will ever stop being a battle, but I'm encouraged to remember that my strength does not come from me, but from the one who never grows weary or faints. When I fall, He will pick me up, and he will never quit on me. So I'm never going to quit on him. Yep, back in the saddle girl.
Never, never, never, never, never, never quit. You'll just have to start all over again.
Saturday, August 11, 2012
I'm a loser baby! (so why don't you read me)
Well, after 3 arduous months that I'm pretty sure were about 60 days each, the Biggest Loser Challenge at my gym is finally officially over!
And it's official. I am a big loser. Infact, I am the Biggest Loser. I WON!!!
My final weigh in, which happened yesterday, Friday August 10th, was.....drum roll please.
199.6 pounds!
WHAT????!!!!! unreal! I had to weigh myself twice and get the exact same weight before I would accept it, because the day before I had weighed myself and I was 4.5 pounds heavier than that! Evidently I had eaten something salty the day before. Water weight is my nemesis!
If I still weigh in at under 200 next week I will truly celebrate being in ONE-derland, but I still remain suspicious of my body and it's quirks. Meanwhile though, I can celebrate. At 199.6 or at 205, I still won the challenge. I blew my competition away! Here's the stats!
My starting weight at the beginning of this journey (March): 242 pounds
My starting weight at the beginning of this challenge(May): 224 pounds
My weight at the end of the challenge (Aug 10): 199.6 pounds
Total weight Loss to date: 42.4 pounds
Total lost during challenge: 24.4 pounds
Theres some other exciting stats:
Since March 6th I've lost:
5.5 inches around my waist
5.0 inches around my chest
6.5 inches around my hips
2.5 inches in my thigh
1 inch in my arm
1 inch in my neck.
Not only have I lost inches, but I've gained muscle. I've never felt as strong as I do now. I have never felt a bicep muscle in my arm in my life until the last month or so, and though it's still buried under some fat, you can actually feel the hard lump of muscle in there! My Abs and back are getting stronger, my endurance is getting better. My calves are downright sexy, if I do say so myself! Slowly and surely I'm building my health and strength and losing the unhealthy layers of fat.
My BMI has gone from a 42 to a 34. Still way above where it needs to be, but no longer in that imminent death by heart attack zone.
I've been on this journey for 5 months, and though I have a long long way to go, I've come a long way too!! I've learned so much about myself, and have much more I know I will learn. This is as much, or more of, a mental journey than it is a physical one. The farther I get the more I realize that my mindset is everything.
I give glory to God in the highest for helping me to transform my mind throughout this journey, and pray he will continue to help me have a deeper understanding of why it is so important on so many levels for me to follow through on this commitment and lifestyle change.
Now that I have celebrated, I want to discuss something else that's been on my mind.
FEAR.
What's fear got to do with it? For the last month of this challenge I've been fighting over about 5 pounds. Gaining, losing, gaining, losing. I keep sabatoging myself with food. When the pressure is on to finish strong, I whimper and lose momentum. I struggle mightily and berate myself and wonder why, with all eyes on me, I can't stick to a simple diet for a few weeks longer. I had this goal to get under 200 and I thought it would be a piece of cake, but I still think it was a fluke that I made it at all, and squeaked in at 199.6 yesterday. I haven't been doing what I need to do to lose that weight. I've been trying, but I've been messing up. I've been tracking religiously every day, these last few weeks, I miss more days tracking than not. I've been exercising monday to friday for 5 months. The last few weeks I've missed two or three days. I've been exercising self control with snacking and sweets. The last few weeks, not so much. I won't just have that treat, I'll have it twice. I'm telling you, it's self sabatoge, and as I eat the food I KNOW it is! However, I don't seem to be able to stop myself. I have this internal dialog AS I eat the food. I argue wih myself about the calories and if I "deserve it or not, and I make all sorts of excuses and I refute the excuses. I swear sometimes there are two people inside me, these conversations get so lively!
My trainer and friend Melissa suggested that I have been scared to hit that under 200 milestone. She said maybe part of me feels safe where I am. I've visited this thought many times in my life. I lost over 70 pounds a few years back, and right after I did, my husband left me for another woman, took me to court, and tried to take my kids from me. I gained it back and more to add to the pot (belly that is). There is sexual abuse in my past. I have often heard that victime of abuse "hide" behind their fat. I have explored these things, and I truly don't know if my subconcious is telling me, "lose the weight and Josh will leave you too! Men will be attracted to you and you won't be safe!" The subconcious is a tricky tricky thing. It doesn't matter how much your rational mind tells you what a bunch of hooey those thoughts are, your primitive reactive mind will think what it will. Sometimes I just think I love to eat, love food, and feel deprived not eating it. Maybe that's all there is to it. Maybe there is no deeper psychological thing going on, but my heart tells me its more than just that. If it was just that I didn't want to be deprived, I could work in treats on a regular schedule to my diet (and I have done that on this journey) and be perfectly happy. The reason I think there is more going in is because I get to these points where I just can't stop. I get obsessed with the thoughts of the foods I want and I will eat it to excess. I remember being this way for many years. I can eat an incredible volume of food, especially if it's bad for me. I feel completely unsatisfied with a small portion of anything. Much of my diet planning is me trying to figure out how to get the most food for the least calories. I want and crave volume.
I feel almost at an impasse, to where I am considering going for some professional counselling. I know I have these impulses and feelings, I know some of them are not natural nor healthy. I think I might be deeply afraid of succeeding. Maybe more than I am of failing. I know one thing, I want to get to the bottom of it, and I want to understand what is driving me once and for all, and I want to conquer it,whatever it may be. I don't necessarily like self discovery. It's hard, and it hurts more times than not, but I am determined not to end up back where I started yet again in my life. I'm sick of looping around and around. I want to keep moving FORWARD. I want to FACE MY FEARS. With God's help, I want to face them down and overcome them, whatever they may be.
I think what I do in the next few months will be critical to my success or failure. I think the mental work will be the hardest, but the one I really need to face straight on and tackle. I don't want to be writing a year from now how I've gained back all the weight and I'm trying to lose it again. A year from now I want to be speaking to and inspiring others in their own health journeys, proving to them that it can be done if you are honest enough to ask yourself the tough questions and strong enough to face the answers head on.
Keep on praying for me friends. The best (and hardest) part is yet to come.
And it's official. I am a big loser. Infact, I am the Biggest Loser. I WON!!!
My final weigh in, which happened yesterday, Friday August 10th, was.....drum roll please.
199.6 pounds!
WHAT????!!!!! unreal! I had to weigh myself twice and get the exact same weight before I would accept it, because the day before I had weighed myself and I was 4.5 pounds heavier than that! Evidently I had eaten something salty the day before. Water weight is my nemesis!
If I still weigh in at under 200 next week I will truly celebrate being in ONE-derland, but I still remain suspicious of my body and it's quirks. Meanwhile though, I can celebrate. At 199.6 or at 205, I still won the challenge. I blew my competition away! Here's the stats!
My starting weight at the beginning of this journey (March): 242 pounds
My starting weight at the beginning of this challenge(May): 224 pounds
My weight at the end of the challenge (Aug 10): 199.6 pounds
Total weight Loss to date: 42.4 pounds
Total lost during challenge: 24.4 pounds
Theres some other exciting stats:
Since March 6th I've lost:
5.5 inches around my waist
5.0 inches around my chest
6.5 inches around my hips
2.5 inches in my thigh
1 inch in my arm
1 inch in my neck.
Not only have I lost inches, but I've gained muscle. I've never felt as strong as I do now. I have never felt a bicep muscle in my arm in my life until the last month or so, and though it's still buried under some fat, you can actually feel the hard lump of muscle in there! My Abs and back are getting stronger, my endurance is getting better. My calves are downright sexy, if I do say so myself! Slowly and surely I'm building my health and strength and losing the unhealthy layers of fat.
My BMI has gone from a 42 to a 34. Still way above where it needs to be, but no longer in that imminent death by heart attack zone.
I've been on this journey for 5 months, and though I have a long long way to go, I've come a long way too!! I've learned so much about myself, and have much more I know I will learn. This is as much, or more of, a mental journey than it is a physical one. The farther I get the more I realize that my mindset is everything.
I give glory to God in the highest for helping me to transform my mind throughout this journey, and pray he will continue to help me have a deeper understanding of why it is so important on so many levels for me to follow through on this commitment and lifestyle change.
Now that I have celebrated, I want to discuss something else that's been on my mind.
FEAR.
What's fear got to do with it? For the last month of this challenge I've been fighting over about 5 pounds. Gaining, losing, gaining, losing. I keep sabatoging myself with food. When the pressure is on to finish strong, I whimper and lose momentum. I struggle mightily and berate myself and wonder why, with all eyes on me, I can't stick to a simple diet for a few weeks longer. I had this goal to get under 200 and I thought it would be a piece of cake, but I still think it was a fluke that I made it at all, and squeaked in at 199.6 yesterday. I haven't been doing what I need to do to lose that weight. I've been trying, but I've been messing up. I've been tracking religiously every day, these last few weeks, I miss more days tracking than not. I've been exercising monday to friday for 5 months. The last few weeks I've missed two or three days. I've been exercising self control with snacking and sweets. The last few weeks, not so much. I won't just have that treat, I'll have it twice. I'm telling you, it's self sabatoge, and as I eat the food I KNOW it is! However, I don't seem to be able to stop myself. I have this internal dialog AS I eat the food. I argue wih myself about the calories and if I "deserve it or not, and I make all sorts of excuses and I refute the excuses. I swear sometimes there are two people inside me, these conversations get so lively!
My trainer and friend Melissa suggested that I have been scared to hit that under 200 milestone. She said maybe part of me feels safe where I am. I've visited this thought many times in my life. I lost over 70 pounds a few years back, and right after I did, my husband left me for another woman, took me to court, and tried to take my kids from me. I gained it back and more to add to the pot (belly that is). There is sexual abuse in my past. I have often heard that victime of abuse "hide" behind their fat. I have explored these things, and I truly don't know if my subconcious is telling me, "lose the weight and Josh will leave you too! Men will be attracted to you and you won't be safe!" The subconcious is a tricky tricky thing. It doesn't matter how much your rational mind tells you what a bunch of hooey those thoughts are, your primitive reactive mind will think what it will. Sometimes I just think I love to eat, love food, and feel deprived not eating it. Maybe that's all there is to it. Maybe there is no deeper psychological thing going on, but my heart tells me its more than just that. If it was just that I didn't want to be deprived, I could work in treats on a regular schedule to my diet (and I have done that on this journey) and be perfectly happy. The reason I think there is more going in is because I get to these points where I just can't stop. I get obsessed with the thoughts of the foods I want and I will eat it to excess. I remember being this way for many years. I can eat an incredible volume of food, especially if it's bad for me. I feel completely unsatisfied with a small portion of anything. Much of my diet planning is me trying to figure out how to get the most food for the least calories. I want and crave volume.
I feel almost at an impasse, to where I am considering going for some professional counselling. I know I have these impulses and feelings, I know some of them are not natural nor healthy. I think I might be deeply afraid of succeeding. Maybe more than I am of failing. I know one thing, I want to get to the bottom of it, and I want to understand what is driving me once and for all, and I want to conquer it,whatever it may be. I don't necessarily like self discovery. It's hard, and it hurts more times than not, but I am determined not to end up back where I started yet again in my life. I'm sick of looping around and around. I want to keep moving FORWARD. I want to FACE MY FEARS. With God's help, I want to face them down and overcome them, whatever they may be.
I think what I do in the next few months will be critical to my success or failure. I think the mental work will be the hardest, but the one I really need to face straight on and tackle. I don't want to be writing a year from now how I've gained back all the weight and I'm trying to lose it again. A year from now I want to be speaking to and inspiring others in their own health journeys, proving to them that it can be done if you are honest enough to ask yourself the tough questions and strong enough to face the answers head on.
Keep on praying for me friends. The best (and hardest) part is yet to come.
Wednesday, July 25, 2012
short post, but I need to get it out. (0r what the heck? where did my muscles go?)
I felt I needed to say something about what I have learned since my roller skating debacle last week. Evidently, when your body is healing itself it takes every ounce of energy you ever had and decides to use it for those purposes.
My trainer says it is just because I'm healing, and possibly mixed up with that, that my wonderful hormonal time of the month is approaching, but that I'll get my strength back soon enough. Meanwhile, however, she has dropped my weight on my exercises to next to nothing, and I can barely get through them. I had to quit my hour walk on the treadmill yesterday at 41 minutes because my legs were buckling and I was losing my balance, and this after I first had to reduce my speed from my normal speedy (ha!) 3.0 miles an hour to 2.8 then 2.5 miles an hour, and reduce the hill program from level 13, to 11, to 10.
REALLY? WHAT IS UP WITH THAT?
I realize I had begun to feel strong, and that I now really dislike feeling weak!
I didn't think trying to lose weight and get fit would teach me so much about myself. I thought I was a pretty self aware person to begin with, but I've learned a lot about how I tick through this journey, and what drives me to do the things I do, and make the decisions I make, for good or bad. Also, I've started thinking a lot differently about certain things, and like a pebble in a pond, you think differently about one thing and it causes ripples through other areas of your life.
Ever changing, ever growing
I think the only way you can really fail miserably in this life is to stop trying - to stop striving for the best your life has to give, and the best you have to give life, because even the rough spots - sometimes especially the rough spots - change you and grow you and teach you and stretch you on the inside to be a little better, a little stronger, a little more noble, a little more generous, a little more grace filled.
Yes, I agree. That was a hugely messed up run on sentence, but I am too tired to fix it, and have grown enough through the rough spots to realize it doesn't really matter. :) .. you will catch my run on drift and life will go on.
speaking of which (I'm referring to life going on), they have extended the deadline for the biggest loser challenge at my gym due to both coaches having been on vacation for a week or two, so I get another week or two to get to my 199 goal (thank you God for small mercies, because Aunt Flo and weight loss just don't GO together) and I have another week or two to kick butt,win this thing, and finish strong!
So I'm praying my strength and stamina come back sooner rather than later, but if they don't, I'll just keep doing what I can and let God take care of the rest. I need to stop stressing about stuff I can't do anything about. Anybody else need to do that? Just me? I thought so.
Blessings, Tanya-Marie
My trainer says it is just because I'm healing, and possibly mixed up with that, that my wonderful hormonal time of the month is approaching, but that I'll get my strength back soon enough. Meanwhile, however, she has dropped my weight on my exercises to next to nothing, and I can barely get through them. I had to quit my hour walk on the treadmill yesterday at 41 minutes because my legs were buckling and I was losing my balance, and this after I first had to reduce my speed from my normal speedy (ha!) 3.0 miles an hour to 2.8 then 2.5 miles an hour, and reduce the hill program from level 13, to 11, to 10.
REALLY? WHAT IS UP WITH THAT?
I realize I had begun to feel strong, and that I now really dislike feeling weak!
I didn't think trying to lose weight and get fit would teach me so much about myself. I thought I was a pretty self aware person to begin with, but I've learned a lot about how I tick through this journey, and what drives me to do the things I do, and make the decisions I make, for good or bad. Also, I've started thinking a lot differently about certain things, and like a pebble in a pond, you think differently about one thing and it causes ripples through other areas of your life.
Ever changing, ever growing
I think the only way you can really fail miserably in this life is to stop trying - to stop striving for the best your life has to give, and the best you have to give life, because even the rough spots - sometimes especially the rough spots - change you and grow you and teach you and stretch you on the inside to be a little better, a little stronger, a little more noble, a little more generous, a little more grace filled.
Yes, I agree. That was a hugely messed up run on sentence, but I am too tired to fix it, and have grown enough through the rough spots to realize it doesn't really matter. :) .. you will catch my run on drift and life will go on.
speaking of which (I'm referring to life going on), they have extended the deadline for the biggest loser challenge at my gym due to both coaches having been on vacation for a week or two, so I get another week or two to get to my 199 goal (thank you God for small mercies, because Aunt Flo and weight loss just don't GO together) and I have another week or two to kick butt,win this thing, and finish strong!
So I'm praying my strength and stamina come back sooner rather than later, but if they don't, I'll just keep doing what I can and let God take care of the rest. I need to stop stressing about stuff I can't do anything about. Anybody else need to do that? Just me? I thought so.
Blessings, Tanya-Marie
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