Singing for a smaller me

It was one of those ridiculously busy weeks. Work's crazy, life's hectic, and the chances of stopping to cook food are next to none. Add to that a singing gig, a Friday night party, and a party at our place Saturday night. Oh look, it's the recipe for going off plan!

It started out innocently enough. Not enough to eat on Saturday as we're cleaning house for the party (and for my folks coming into town this week), desperately begging a friend who arrived early to pick us up food, spicy hummus with pita and cucumber, tortilla chips, beers, some oh-too-tasty drink called "x-rated", then Bailey's and Irish Cream.

Yep, it's the siren song of drinking: "Oh, I'll just have a little hummus on some cucumber. But wait, the hummus is *reallllyyyy* good on pita bread. Ooo, there's tortilla chips and salsa. And what do you mean, I put Harry and David Milk Chocolate Moose Munch out before I started drinking? PARTY!!!!"

And that doesn't even account for the food that was left over!

Granted, I didn't indulge like the past, but I also didn't hop right back on the wagon Sunday morning. Oh, who am I kidding? It was Sunday afternoon when I crawled out of bed. And I was feeling particularly lazy. With very little coaxing, the hubby ordered pizza, and I remembered the salami and cheese in the fridge that never made it out to the table. Self control won out, but just barely - I only had four slices of salami and two pieces of cheese. (Need to remember to bring them into work and out of harm's way) Also, attacked the salsa and tortilla chips with some gusto, but managed to not eat half the bag. Go me!

This morning? I'm retaining water like mad crazy, not helped by Aunt Flo's visit to town. Feeling pretty vile from all the junk I ate and drank, but ready to get back to eating like a normal person and not a "wild, crazy" party-goer. Had to press the snooze button twety times this morning, but will exercise tonight and tomorrow morning it's back to waking up at 5:30.

Positives: didn't stuff myself to bursting, ate before the party, slept enough.

Things I need to work on: healthy party snacks, going back on plan the day following a party, must track even when I don't want to admit what I'm eating.

Hopefully this water weight will be gone in a day or two. Grr.

Last night, the hubby and I watched the Travel Channel. It seemed like the theme of the day was "Extreme . . .", extreme terror rides, extreme waterparks, extreme resorts, etc. As we were getting ready to head off to bed, another Extreme show came on: Extreme Pig-outs. Amused, we decided to settle down and watch for a little while.

It was digusting, yet strangely fascinating. Starting the tour was a restaurant that's main attraction is 6-lb burger, but goes all the way up to a 62-lb burger. Umm, gross! The gastronomic delights/horrors continued from there featuring Ben and Jerry's Vermonster, super-sized pancakes, deep fried twinkies, a 54-inch square pizza, burritos the size of a newborn, and an eatery called the "Heart Attack Grill" (and several others). Frankly, by the time they reached the 54-inch square pizza, my stomach was turning and I headed off to bed. Looking back on it today, I'm still seriously grossed out.

Please tell me what this sick fascination is with artery-clogging and teeth-rotting foods! Yes, a number of these places intend these menu items to be eaten by more than one person, but there are still other people that look at these foods as a challenge: Can I eat 62 lbs of beef? Can I scarf down a 54-inch square pizza? Even deep in the worst of my food obsession I knew that that was ridiculous!!! But these restaurants thrive on our unhealthy fixation with foods we shouldn't even contemplate eating.

It makes me so angry.

Moving on.

Some time ago, I read about the Green Monster Movement, and promptly forgot about it until it was brought up last week in one of the blogs I follow. At its simplest, a Green Monster is a blended smoothie of spinach or kale, some type of milk, fruits, and so on. I was intrigued by the idea of getting so many fruits and vegetables in one tasty smoothie, but the skeptic in me said, "yeah, sure, you can't taste the spinach in those smoothies. . . and I'm the freaking Queen of England".

This weekend, I bit the bullet and made my first Green Monster. What a pleasant surprise! Two big handfuls of spinach, a cup of milk, a cup of frozen strawberries, and half a cup of frozen blueberries later, I had a delicious, filling and healthy smoothie with three and a half servings of fruits and vegetables in one fell swoop. Needless to say, I'm a convert. Now I just have to clear a space on the kitchen counter to keep my blender.

What a gulf exists between these two: Extreme pig-outs to Green Monsters. I'm proud to say the Green Monster appeals to me way more than a 6-lb burger. It means I'm going in the right direction and will keep on heading in that direction.

If you've failed to notice, I work in an office of food pushers, specifically of the treats and sweets variety. Now, I love to eat. If that wasn't the case, I wouldn't be here. Cakes, cookies, sweets, treats, fried food, baked food, and most other foods with a few exceptions.

Outside my boss' office she keeps a big ol' jar of candy which I have fondly dubbed the "Giant Jar of Candy Sabotage". I hear its siren song calling to me every day: "just take a piece of chocolate, it won't really matter. After all, it's just one tiny piece". Yeah, sure. I can take just one piece. Then, the next morning when I get into work, I'll wonder why there's ten candy bar wrappers in the garbage can at my cube.

No, thank you; even though part of me wants nothing more than to concede defeat and start chowing down. I can be strong, and I will be strong, and every day I will congratulate myself for not giving in.

The co-worker who brought the cookies of doom a week or two ago brought cupcakes in today. I didn't take a picture, nor did I bother to ask her what type of cupcakes they were. I just couldn't bring myself to do it. It's like banging my head into a freaking wall every time I walk into the break room and see some other glorious sugary treat. And you know that cookie I wanted so badly? Yeah, it wasn't as good as I played it up to be in my mind. I mean, in term of cookies, it was good, but it really wasn't worth the 150 calories out of my day.

Moving on to an only slightly related note: this whole knee injury thing is really getting to me. I've allowed myself to use it as an excuse to avoid working out. After all, the doctor didn't tell me to stop working out, just to scale back the intensity and impact. After skipping nearly five days of exercise, I finally had enough with the part of me that was making excuses, put together a walking mix on my iPhone and headed out for a half an hour walk. And I feel great!

Note to self: the part of me that makes excuses has lost its marbles! Ignore, ignore, ignore!!!!

I shouldn't be surprised. I know how great I feel after a good workout, and yet it still hasn't fully sunk in.

Obviously, I haven't finished learning my lessons, nor do I doubt I will ever fully learn them. But each new thing is really a revelation, even if it's something I should logically know by now.

My workouts over the past five days have come to a grand total of one. Yes, just one. Ugh. I'm wincing just looking at that number.

Now, it isn't because I haven't wanted to workout. Quite the contrary, actually. Each day that's gone by without a workout has been cringe-worthy. No, I managed to do something to my knee (or right below it) last Friday.

Joy.

And before you ask, I didn't do it working out.

I keep forgetting that my body doesn't yet want to function the way I want it to. Kneeling and sliding across the hard concrete surface at work *will* most likely result in my body getting hurt, or me banging my knee into aforementioned hard surface.

Spent the weekend freaking out about my knee, and assuming the worst: a blood clot in my leg. At my last job, a coworker was diagnosed with Deep Vein Thrombosis (DVT). Suddenly, she has to take a shot every day, go to the doctor once a week, can't drink alcoholic beverages, and can't eat dark green vegetables. Worst fear ever.

My doctor visit yesterday, fortunately, alleviated my fears. A $10 co-pay and an ultrasound of my leg later, the doc isn't sure what it is, but he knows what it isn't. YAY!! He thinks it's just inflammation from the kneelingandsliding at work and overdoing it on the exercise. (sadface) I'm on orders to drop down to low-intensity/low-impact workouts, ice my knee, and take an anti-inflammatory that's leaving me exhausted. Oh yeah, and lay off the workouts for a couple of days. Walking fine, the aerobic DVDs - nope.

Chalk this up to another reason I want to lose weight.

Dammit, I want to do these things. I want to do these things and not hurt myself. I want to be able to do a fifty-minute workout DVD and feel the sweat pouring off of me. I hate the fact that my body keeps getting in the way. Just when I think I'm participating in enough activity to feel like a normal person, my body goes and betrays me and says, "Ha, ha, you're going to be fat forever!!!"

My office is full of food pushers.

They're so very well meaning, and any number of them are on diets of one sort or another - yet I don't think they understand the battle I face with sugar-y baked goods. When the two chocolate cakes appeared on the breakroom table I didn't bat an eye:

Then there were the brownies (which fortunately didn't tempt me since they were covered in caramel. Yuck, yuck, yuck.):




And then there was the German Chocolate Cake (oh, sweet heaven, someone eat it before I drag the rest of that cake to my desk):




And, today, cookies. Yes, cookies. The bane of my freaking existence: cookies. Chocolate Chip Cookies. My co-worker who made them says "Oh, they're supposed to be healthy. I made them with whole wheat flour. *insert giggle here* and tons of butter. It's the Holidays, you're allowed to indulge. They're only about 150 calories each." Each. One hundred and fifty freaking calories EACH. Yeah, they look so innocent and sweet, but they're evil, evil I tell you, eeeee-vvvviiilll:




Here's the dialogue that goes through my head whenever I see one of these ohsotempting treats:

Bad me: Oh, look someone brought in a treat.

Good me: *groan*

Bad me: That looks tasty!

Good me: sarcasticallyYeah, it'll be even tastier on my ass.

Bad me: One tiny slice won't hurt.

Good me: Yeah, it won't just be one tiny slice.

Bad me: Cross my heart, hope to die, just one tiny slice! Pleeeeaaaasssseeee!!!

Good me: Nope.

Bad me: Pretty please!!!!!!

Good me: No.

Bad me: Pretty please with sugar on top!!!!

Good me: No. No. No.

Bad me: *gets that look on face like Bilbo Baggins had when he couldn't touch the Ring* RAWR!!!!! CAKE NOW!!!!!

Good me: Walking away now.

Today, however, I could *not* walk away from those cookies. Even as I headed back to my desk on the other side of the office I heard them calling my name. I started typing away, but still was thinking about those damn cookies. Finally, I started weighing the pros and cons. Do I eat a cookie? Do I keep on ignoring it? Do I drink something? It finally dawned on me: Compromise. I *can* have one cookie. Just one. Not five. Not ten. Just one.




There it is. Sitting on my desk. Waiting for me to eat lunch. And I plan on enjoying that cookie. That little treat that I *can* allow myself to have because if I don't . . . well, for me, if I don't eat that cookie there could be problems. Bad Me can only be pacified for so long or Bad Me might go to the store, buy a bag of Keebler Soft Baked Chocolate Chip Cookies and eat the whole thing.

Twenty-six days from now I will be thirty years old. Thirty on thirty, right? Heh. Yeah, cheesy, I know. Whatever.

For a long time that was my magical number. I'll have my weight under control by the time I'm thirty - that was my mantra. So why the heck am I here? more than a hundred pounds over weight? twenty-six freaking days from my magical number? What the heck happened?

I can't answer those questions any better today than I could yesterday, or the day before that. All I know is I'm doing my best to take that weight off and keep it off. However, there's this part of me that wants the weight gone NOW. This part of me that wants to keep on exercising all day long until the pounds disappear. Don't get me wrong, I've no expectation that the magic weight loss fairy materialize, zap me, and suddenly I'm skinny. The days of wishing my weight away are long gone.

No, I know the key to losing this weight is moderation in both my diet and exercise.

Still, I'm scared. I'm so very scard of losing my motivation. How many times have I gone down this road - lost weight only to gain it back plus more? What happens when I lose my initial momentum? What happens when the floor drops out from under me and I backslide? What happens if I gain weight? I feel more motivated to lose weight than I ever have, am I just fooling myself? There are so many unanswered questions.

Starting back down this path, I've spent so much more time preparing and analyzing my thoughts than I have before. I feel better prepared than I've ever been - that the necessary tools to keep myself on track are all there. But there's this little part of my brain always going "what if, what if, what if . . ."

Fighting back against the "what if's" and the "it's not fair's" is a daily part of this journey. I'm so used to failure that I have a hard time believing in the success.

My 30 Day Workout Challenge Buddy Katherine hasn't worked out in a couple of days. When I check in with her after my workouts she assures me she will workout, but is having a hard time getting back on the wagon after taking a number of days off. She texts me today "I am totally feeling like a big fat loser" and it hits home because I've felt that way so many times. Now, though, I think I've finally hammered it into my thick skull that I'm not a loser, I just have to start back up again. Taking a couple of days off isn't the end of the world. Here, let me repeat that again: taking a couple of days off is NOT the end of the world.

Is that the big secret? Is that what I've been missing all this time? Who knows.

All I know is I'm gonna keep on plugging along, even if most days I hate waking up at 5:30 a.m., stealthily grabbing my workout clothes and heading into the family room to choose yet another workout DVD, even if I hate stepping on the scale and still seeing my weight in the 280s. I'm feeling better than I have in a while and I don't want that feeling to go away.

Being something of a goth-y soul and someone who would call their backyard Gargoyle Chic, Halloween is one of those holidays that makes me incredibly happy. Creepy decorations and scary music warm my heart, and part of me wants to giggle every time I see a gargoyle or raven statue on sale. That being said, it's also one of those "Danger, Danger!" type of days.

In the past, when Halloween treats appeared in the store that was my trigger to pick up a couple of very large bags of sugary, sweet, food coma-inducing goodness. And I'd buy them with the best of intentions: "Oh, I'm going to give them out to trick or treaters" was the usual excuse. When the hubby and I finally decided to go to a party instead of handing out candy it then became: "I can't just let all that candy go to waste!"

This year, the Halloween candy - though loudly calling to me from the supermarket aisles - stayed away from our house. Our plans were set early on.

Unfortunately, candy wasn't my only weekend adversary: my old crummy eating habits regularly rear their ugly heads on Saturday and Sunday. The usual plan of action includes sleeping in late, drinking lots of coffee, not eating for hours on end, and then eating whatever comes to hand as the day goes by. What that typically means is lots of fast food, pizzas, and junk, junk, junk. While I managed to stay on plan all weekend long, I didn't eat a lot, nor did I eat anything of much substance.

Meanwhile, these weekend forays into crappy food consumption leave me feeling horrible come Monday, and render it that much more difficult for me to jump "back on the wagon" as it were. And, frankly, I'm regularly verging on sabotage with my weekend waffling.

I clearly need a different plan of attack so that I face the weekends more prepared. Most likely, it would be helpful if I actually went food shopping instead of pretending that I'll go tomorrow. It's funny, as I sit here typing this I have to keep myself from typing down the myriad excuses I used as to why I didn't shop for food last week. Every one of them seems pretty lame right now. Okay, so food shopping is one. Planning my meals on the weekend would help as well, so that's two. Also, keeping myself on a schedule similar to my weekday schedule wouldn't hurt.

See? I know what I need to do. Now I just have to do it, plan it, force it into a little box and make it be the way I know it needs to be.

By preparing my space and time, I am prepared to meet each challenge and triumph over sabotaging behaviors.