Weight, Eating, and More

I am fat. Not curvy, not plump, just plain ol' fat.

Fatness was never a problem for me. Body appearance was one of those things that only mattered if the people I cared about made it matter. And it happens I did have one person who really REALLY did not want me to be fat and made sure I knew it. (Fitness gurus would laud that person as my savior, but as for me I mostly found it frustrating and demoralizing.)

I lived in a state with a LOT of severely over weight people. I had a friend who was over weight. I guess I could have spent years judging them and snickering and thinking how much better I was than them (back then, not now obviously) because I was so much skinnier. I mean, aren't skinnier people smarter, healthier, and greater people after all? Otherwise why would our country be so very VERY obsessed with being skinny?

I didn't judge them though, and I'd like to think it's because I'm not stupid. Judging people based on their weight is like judging them based on a handicap or their hair. You don't know what brought them there, you don't know what their struggles are at that very moment, and you don't know if you were in their situation whether you'd have done any better. Only God could know, and the last time I looked none of us are God.

I won't delve too deep into it, but I think I gained weight because of--for lack of a better word--emotional stress. I felt trapped and hopeless, so I over ate (what I ate wasn't the problem) and I became lazy (or lethargic, if you want to say it nicely). Once the emotional stress was dealt with, I was able to crawl out of the pit I'd fallen into and take stock of myself.

And that's when I realized the fat had to stop. See, if I just maintained my weight that would have been one thing, but I was gaining weight. About 8 pounds a year, for the last 8 years. Do the math and you'll see how much weight I've gained. If I kept gaining weight I was gonna turn into a mountain of unmovable human flesh, and I didn't want that.

After concluding that Something Must Be Done, I then had to think about what to do. It was during this time I had an epiphany about myself. I think if people figure out this simple truth and work with it, they'd have an easier time of life. This is what it figured out:

I have a Lazy Bum living inside me. Not just any ordinary lazy bum, it's a clever conniving persuasive Lazy Bum. If you tell me to do something I don't want to do (and sometimes what I do want to do), the Lazy Bum will come along and immediately work out ways to 1) get out of the work, 2) avoid the work, and/or 3) reduce the amount of work that has to be done. The Lazy Bum always talks me into getting out of work. Every. Time.

Now some people try to beat their Lazy Bum out of them with will power and discipline. Sometimes this works, but most of the time this shows that people underestimate their Lazy Bums. The Lazy Bum can not be chased off, or run away, he'll stay in the corners of your mind waiting for a moment of weakness. And make no mistake, a weakness will always show up, because we're human and that's our nature. We are weak, and people who pretend like they aren't will just end up being sweet talked by their Lazy Bums and be worse off than when they started.

So I thought about my Lazy Bum and how he works. Lazy Bums have certain hallmarks, certain ways of doing things. Once you acknowledge what those are (rather than pretending they don't exist), you can start working around them.

I knew a few things that would be automatic failures for me. Large over-arcing goals would not work. A rigid diet and exercise wouldn't work. And anything that my mind labels as "hard work" definitely would not work. This pretty much meant that every single diet I knew of was unworkable for me.

I had to think outside the box. I had to think Nikki shaped. It wasn't worth thinking too much about what I couldn't do, because that was also a tactic of the Lazy Bum. I had to think in terms of what I could do, no matter how small and seemingly laughable.

Firstly, there are no "goals", just "aims". My AIM is to walk at least once a week for a whole year. The reason is to prove to myself I can start something and finish it. The purpose of walking is to stop gaining weight. If I should lose weight during this, well then.... that's an unexpected bonus. But that's all it is, a bonus... it's NOT the main reason for what I'm doing.

I am also willing, though I'm not required, to push myself when I walk. If I feel up to it, I can try walking faster or jogging. But only if I want to, and never because I "have to".

Secondly, eat food that "feels good", fills me up, and try not to starve myself. This is harder than it sounds, because I'm discovering that a lot of food that tastes good makes me feel like crap afterward and food that's "good for you" doesn't fill me up (so I end up hungry). When I get busy or am thoroughly distracted, I forget to eat and starve myself (which makes me over eat later and then I'm back to feeling like crap again).

Yesterday I decided not to cook but waited too long to order pizza. When it finally came I gorged myself on pizza, over eating, and felt heavy and icky for hours afterward. I spent the entire night regretting eating that pizza, I should have just had spaghetti and meatballs like I'd planned. (This is an example of the Lazy Bum kicking me in the arse in a round-about way.)

I started this in January. (It wasn't a New Year's Resolution. It just happened in January.) It feels like it's been an awful long time since I started, but it's only March. Still, for 3 months I've done what I set out to do, and that's a small accomplishment in and of itself.

I have not gained weight, which is nice. I'm quite happy about that. After gaining weight for the last 8 years, stopping the trend is a wonderful feeling.

I was surprised to discover I have also been losing weight. I'm not really sure how much since I don't keep track via the scale. (And the Hospital scales keep giving me different numbers so...) Rather, I have a different method of knowing how much weight I'm losing. I use my pants. Yep, if the pants are feelin' lose, then I'm losing weight. If they're tight, then I'm gaining. (It's not accurate to the pound, but it's much more noticeable.)

I'm actually a bit curious to know when my weight will level out. Eventually I'll hit a point where the energy being expended will be equal to the energy being put in, and I'll stop losing weight. I haven't decided on what I'll do when I reach that point...

Like I've said, I'm not aiming to lose weight. Changing things up mid-way could just lead to disaster. I'm thinking I'll keep doing what I'm doing and just change my aim when 2013 comes around.