Divorced

Wow!  A whole month of no posts, and a whole month of no weight loss, in fact a 1.2 lb weight gain.  I'm still on track with my 6-month plan but only because I was 6 lbs ahead.  Now I'm really going to have to hustle and be very vigilant about sticking to a weight loss program and also begin exercising too.

The last post I wrote about my first love, but the ironic part is the date I wrote that was the day of my final divorce hearing.  On August 28, 2012 I became a divorcee.  I didn't know how I would react to that. But now time has passed and I can tell you.  I am desperate to start dating someone.  I want sex like crazy.  So I'm on 4 different dating sites and emailing more than 4 different men at a time.  Some in this past month have fallen away and some have stayed but always juggling about 4 or more at a time.

I also started Massage School one week after the divorce.  Its a 10 month course and I'm doing ok except I'm very tired and not studying enough and getting behind at work with all my on-line dating and school and work mixed up activities.

First love is still dating the woman he threw me over for in July.  That still breaks my heart.  But I'm trying to believe its for the best, or that if not, we'll get back together.  Although the longer his relationship lasts with the ugly raggedy ann red-headed he-woman that he dates, the less attractive he becomes to me.  Still breaks my heart but its as if her stink just covers him more and more -- sort of like clingy cigarette tar smoke.

So anyway after a month of not tracking I'll start again as of yesterday.  And here are my body statistics too.  October 2 official Weight Watchers weigh in 146.8 lbs.  Today October 3 homescale 141.5 lbs.  Omron scale 142.8 lbs, 24.5 BMI, 37.8% body fat, 25.7% muscle, need 1347 kcal to maintain this weight, 7 visceral fat.
Bust 40"
Rib 32"
Waist 34"
Hip 37-1/2"
Bicep 11-3/4" right
Thigh 20" right.

Composition

Now that I'm at the dividing line BMI between average weight and overweight, I need to clarify why my torso still looks so heavy.  The answer is because I am an apple shape and due to the composition of my body fat versus muscle percentages.

So here are a couple of Body Fat % charts to help figure out what's going on.

I have finally reached the undeniable time when I need to nourish myself with only healthy foods; and more than ever need to detox through supplements, stretching and massage, steaming, sweating cardio and weight resistance exercise, etc in order to tone muscle, while I continue to lose fat.

As of yesterday I have 41% body fat which is obese!  Body fat is starting to hang on me in shredded-looking excess skin and so I just really need to do as much as I can to improve the texture of my skin and tone muscles.

There is something I need to explain about those many months of plateauing around ~174 pounds too.  Something that was percolating up into consciousness at the time but that I came to consciously recognize only this week.  I gained over 60 pounds one month in 1998.  I've been carrying all that weight and more since then.

I had been dating my husband, since 1996 when I weighed about 130 lbs.  When I met him I really wanted to have a baby and a family.  And my husband gave me the impression he wanted the same thing.  But then in 1998 one harrowing weekend saw a string of synchronized tragedies and difficulties all struck at one time.  That is when I discovered my husband didn't want the same things I wanted.  After we'd already gone through so much together in the past 2 years, I had been named as the reason for his divorce, the story of our relationship had been posted for the scrutiny of everyone in the newspaper,  his divorce was acrimonious, so I didn't turn away from him, instead I continued moving forward with wedding plans.

When I started shopping for a wedding dress that's when I gained 60+ in one month.  I weighed 120-130 lbs at the beginning of the month and weighed over 190 pounds by the end of the month.   It was as if I was trying to tell myself something.  I was trying to tell myself that I no longer trusted my then fiance, now husband.

From August 2011 through April 2012, for nine months, I plateaued over that 171 lbs goal weight that would mark a 50 pound weight loss, half of my total goal.  All the different things I tried to lose weight didn't work.  But I was starting to talk with people from that harrowing weekend and was slowly piecing together the splinters of scattered and blacked out memories.  Finally I had to face the truth.  Then I found Weight Watchers and was able to start to lose weight again.

It was only after someone asked me this week how I maintain my motivation to lose weight, when I explained that story in detail, that I realized why I had been plateauing so long.   To lose the weight I needed to bring those memories into a light to see the story coherently.  To figure out why I gained all this weight in the first place.

Losing weight is a deeply transforming process.

Happy problem 1: as my body becomes leaner its becoming more uncomfortable to sleep and sit on my less padded bones, the skin feels a little bit raw and almost aches where my lower rib, hips and tailbone stick out.  When I reach 149 lbs I'll be the same weight the first time I joined Weight Watchers in the 1980s.

Happy problem 2: as I'm becoming slimmer and continue to dress in clothes that are form-fitting, men are paying more and more appreciative attention to me.  This unnerves me a bit, especially when it's men I work with who always ignored me.  But I just have to become braver and friendlier.  Fortune cookie says "Love is being offered to you; be affectionate in return!"  --good advice.

Genuinely sad problem with happy outcome:  my true love started dating someone else, and un-friended me on facebook so I can't follow what is going on in his life.  Result is that it continues to be  hard to eat, or sleep.  The lack of sleep is a bother, but eating less is nice.

Stress

Well I've been plateauing at 172 lbs for weeks now.  My weight just won't budge below that.  Very frustrating.

Here is what is going on.  I went to a meditation retreat last week, it was supposed to be my big vacation that I didn't have this summer.  It was supposed to be for 3 days.  However I had put off making an appointment to see my lawyer regarding my upcoming court date to finalize the divorce, so when I called to make an appointment there were only two dates available, I had to take both, and that meant leaving the meditation retreat after being there only one day.

The meditation retreat was brilliant!!  It was so hard while I was there, I like to tell people who have never gone on a meditation retreat that I want to draw a cartoon of a person sitting on a cushion, doing nothing, with a thought bubble overhead that says "This is really hard work."  Because it is.  In fact, my legs were sore for a week afterwards, from doing nothing more than sitting.  Then I tell people that the result of only one day of meditation is like when you walk through your house after you have just washed all the windows, everything is brighter and clearer.   My focus is sharper. I look people in the eye more often when talking to them, I am more present, focusing on the other person.  I am alert and attentive.  That is what one day of meditation did for me.

The day of meditation started with one 35-min meditation, a 15-minute walking meditation or potty break, then a second 35-min meditation.  In between those sets of meditation were longer breaks of different activities, most done in silence.  There was a feeling of being compassionately supported by everyone at the retreat, while staying out of each others way.  I felt safe,  to stand and watch myself interacting in this community.  Safe to watch myself struggling to stay awake and alert during the 35-min meditations.  Struggling with myself in a community where everyone else was doing the same.  By the end of the day I had struggled so long that I was almost at the point of surrendering into it.  Almost there but not quite.  I wish I had been able to surrender.

So even though it was a struggle, a real struggle, during the times of 35-min meditation, the pay off afterwards was so great that it feels almost addictive. I just really, really want to go back and do more.  It does not feel nearly as good to meditate alone at home, but  I want to really train myself to sit silently and quietly, so that I'm less of a disruption to others in the meditation hall.  I want to be as motionless as the teachers in the hall.  They look like statues, they have disciplined their bodies to obey their mind so well.  The only way to achieve that is to practice, practice, practice.

But back to plateauing weight.  What I've discovered is that when I'm highly stressed, my weight plateaus.  Its nearly impossible to lose weight.  First I have to fight the urge to binge, then even when I have been careful with my calories, the weight just stays there.  If I give in to the binges then the my weight can increase dramatically!  This past summer when I was so worried about meeting a deadline at work I gained first one pound a day, then two pounds a day for a week, until I finished that project.  I gained 10 pounds in a week.

In the past, in 2007 when I was stressed about getting married I gained 60 pounds in one month!  I see that now as a warning I should probably have heeded.  But this past year since serving the petition to divorce till now I've been struggling with all the would haves, could haves, should haves in my past.  I'm starting to just accept what I've done, try to stop being ashamed of my mistakes, and move forward with the knowledge that even if I'm making mistakes now, I'm doing the best I can.  I can't see the future. I can't see where my decisions today are going to lead tomorrow.  So if it ends up that I am choosing poorly, making more mistakes then that will be my sorrow.  But for today all I can do is try to make the best decisions I can.  I'm sorry future me, if I'm chosing wrong again, but I promise you, I am doing the best I can.

So in conclusion, stress alone, there must be some chemical hormonal reason, but stress alone causes me to hang on to weight, to plateau, as well as creating my desire to binge and that leads to super, super fast weight gain.  Therefore I need to plan my diet for the next few days,  use my natural, holistic appetite suppresants a little bit, and exercise to raise my mood.  That's my plan for the next few days.  I'll let you know if it works.

My sister had a friend who was natural psychic, she described negative self talk as a big, miserable, globular ghost that surrounds a person like a big, down blanket and says negative things to them constantly.  It is possible to shrug off that ghost.  It is possible to counter the negative words, and to tell yourself positive, encouraging words instead.  I've done it in the past, when I was in college.

I'm trying again to give myself positive self talk now.  I find the more I consciously treat myself with loving compassion, the easier it becomes.  I can have compassion for myself and encourage myself.  I can feel good about who I am even while acknowledging that just being alive on this world is a constant state of wanting and then feeling different degrees of pain depending on whether my wants are satisfied.  Thats basic Buddhism.  Its ok to admit that I can feel just as sad and wanting as every single living creature, every innocent baby, every flower.

Its ok to admit that we all have the same struggles as every other living creature on the planet even when we are relatively rich and priveledged compared to others.  Having more than enough does not lead a person to needing less, a person will always need, but very often having more than enough leads to more anxiety, more fear of having to face a time of having less, more fear for a day when needs aren't met.

Having less does not lead a person to needing less, a person will always need.  Having less than enough can teach us how to make do with less,  can teach us that we can survive on a lot less, but  anyone who has done it knows having less than enough is not pleasant either.

So we have to accept that as long as we are alive we have needs, and its good if we are able to choose to take just enough.

The whole planet is struggling with this right now.  There are more humans than ever before and we have a huge capacity to change our environment.  We are taking more and more away from fellow earth beings.  It doesn't make us feel good to take so much.  The only answer is to use what we need, but not more than what we need.  And with that frame of mind, we can help the world, and that is what will satisfy us best.  To know we have helped others, because we all need, every one of us.  And we are here to help each other.  We are alive and its good to be alive.

Binges

Wow!  After a month and a half I'm finally losing weight again.  What a relief!

In March I'd reached 187.5 lbs which put me at the 1/3 of total weight lost goal, and also just under being obese at 188+ lbs to being overweight -187 lbs.   I stayed at 187 for over a month then last week I moved up to 190 lbs.

 It feels so arbitrary, I didn't expect to have gained weight except that I'd had one day of bingeing.   I had crepes for lunch, a high carb, low protein choice.  Then I remained hungry and ate a big bag of Pizzeria Pretzel Combos and made a bowl of nachos for myself for dinner.  I was ashamed of myself but I ate it in full sight of my family becuase:
1. I don't want to eat in hiding and in shame anymore.  If I'm going to eat in shame then I'll do it in full view of everyone.
2. I want to reinforce in my mind that I can have high calorie foods that I crave sometimes and still lose weight.

So I weighed myself the day after that and I'd creeped up to 190 lbs. That was discouraging but also sort of increased my resolve to be more careful.  I have been more careful too, but not too careful, I never want to be too careful.  I have been eating more nuts, and protein foods.

Now I'm 184.5 lbs.  That's including one cupcake a week from the new coffeehouse next to where I work and also special occasion pie and cake several times a week too.  And the weight loss does feel just as arbitrary as the weight gain because I fully expected to stand on the scale and weigh even more than 190 lbs.

So I can't tell by the way by body feels if I'll gain or lose weight.  I can only tell by weighing myself and pretty soon I'll take my measurements too.  Just for another way to measure success.  Now that I'm well under 187 and not teetering up anymore I feel safe to measure myself.  Then I'll know what size clothes I should fit in versus what i do fit in.

The secret to success has been balancing what and how much I eat each day.  But also by buoying myself up, fighting cravings by keeping myself satiated with high protein foods.  A Subway sandwich isn't bad exactly but it creates cravings.  A salad with protein is good, it helps keep me satiated.

I'm anxious to get down another size but that is likely to be a while.  I'm also anxious to have lost 50 lbs (when I get down to 171 lbs), half of the total amount I want to lose.  I just would feel really reassured by that.  I feel reasssured now, but that would be even better.  Good luck to all of us trying to be fit and healthy.

Why

For the plan that I'm sketching out,  I started with not having a calorie limit. I wanted simply to reduce my appetite.  I found that to be extemely difficult to maintain losing weight though -- I would just plateau gaining and losing 2-4 pounds week after week.

So I decided I needed to have a calorie limit and toyed with the numbers 1500 or 1800 because it would be easy to follow.

But I remember learning how during WW2 in Britain everyone was on food stamps from 1939 - 1954, and there were still many food shortages through the 1970s.  When I figured out the number of calories one would be eating if they were able to get all of their food rations each week, it averaged out to be 1200 calories per day.

I remember another WW2 story of a woman in Italy who held up her fist and said "one fistful of food a day, that's all you need to survive."  A fistful  it turns out, is the same size of what the stomach can comfortably hold.


So I came up with the notion that if I want to weigh 120 pounds eventually, I'll have to limit the number of calories I eat per day.  The most important factor to figuring out how many calories I need to eat to maintain a certain weight is the BMR - Basal Metabolic Rate Calculator.

When I put in my height, desired weight of 120 pounds, age and gender, the calculator tells me I need to eat 1243 calories per day to maintain that weight without any exercise.

So that has become my daily target.  To train myself to eat approximately 1200 calories per day, in an effort to get myself used to eating that much food, to learning what I need to do to meet that goal each day.

Wish me luck.

Plateaus

I've lost another 5 pounds since the end of December. I've been firmly in a size 1X down from 2X since January.

For me fat loss takes place between long periods of plateauing and then a quick plunge on the scale. I've read that instead of using the scale, its good to take measurements. I am not ready to do that. I'm sure in the end it would be impressive to see the difference in numbers but for now I'd prefer to use clothing size as my measure.

It will be a relief to be back into normal size clothing, out of the plus sizes. I have an apple shape, I carry my weight on my tummy, bust, back and arms. So even when I weighed 150 pounds I still wore 1X, which means I might be stuck in plus size clothing for a long time yet.

I've noticed with this plan to be slim that I've often repeated the words of Scarlett O'Hara "I'll worry about it tomorrow". Those surprisingly comforting words, that I've never consciously used before.

This weekend I plan to do some spring cleaning, ruthlessly get rid of all size 2X as well as some older clothing. Out with the old and progress forward.