I have been traveling for work.  This is not conducive to watching your weight no matter what anyone says.  I end up hanging out with people who want to feed me.  Some times I eat for hunger, sometimes for boredom, sometimes for solace.  There is not a scale to be found so I must judge myself by the fit of my cloths.  Something I have never been good at.  I hope to be in one place for long enough to actually go to a grocery store, instead of take out.  At this point I will just be happy not to gain.  

This brings to mind a thought I often have, with all the cures for all the diseases in the world why can't we find a cure for the overweight.  Is it just that the thin, male doctors don't think it is that big of an issue?  Is it thought of as a matter of self control instead of an actual physical problem?  Is it to complicated, a combination of physical and mental issues combined?  Why is no one working on this?  Hey doctors and large pharmaceutical companies, I would pay good money for a cure as would many other people in this world.  Just a thought.

Eureka!!  Apparently a subliminal memo was sent out to ALL of my friends that I am the person they should contact if they want to walk/run/exercise.  Maybe it is the universe working to align with my thought for change.  Every day this week I have gotten together at least twice a day with girlfriends to socialize while getting some form of exercise.  I was on a walk yesterday, and I got a text from another friend asking if I wanted to go on another one later.  I feel like I am friend cheating a little bit.  I guess it is just a sign that they all need to meet and then we can all go together.

On another note,  I weighed in on Monday.  Down 1 lb from last week and 3.8 total from my start date.  I was slightly disappointed at the number.  I feel a change in my body though as I start to work out more.  I know muscle weighs more than fat, so I am trying not to let the numbers drag me down.  My emotional health has greatly improved from exercising daily and I recommend to all of you out there to jump on the bandwagon!  It is the perfect time of year to start.  If you need someone to go with you, the universe might conspire to send a few girlfriends your way.  Happy trails!

It is official.  I have started jogging.  I have yet to decide if it is the best thing I have ever done, or just some crazy torture I am inflicting upon myself so I can eat more.  Not only have I inflicted this upon myself, I have also invited others to join me in this time honored ritual of "no pain, no gain".  We stealthily go very early so we will be seen by as few people as possible.  Although I am the only one who looks like "she can not possibly be a runner" , and the truth is everyone else thats out at that hour is secretly hoping that we are not looking at them and thinking those same thoughts.  Needless to say I am popping IB like candy.

By the way, who invented workout cloths?  Certainly not someone who needs to loose weight.  If so I could possibly purchase a pair of flattering pants with tummy, ass, thigh, and cellulite control.  Or how about a shirt that actually covers the LARGE parts of me I do not want others to see as I am sweating them off.  When I rule the world this will be the first thing I form a task comity for.  Until then I forge forward in my quest for a smaller size pair of pants.  Stay tuned, I will weigh in tomorrow and see how all this dieting is working out. 

Spring, glorious spring.  It is a great sunshiny day!  What is it about spring that makes me feel like anything is possible?  The chance for growth and renewal are at hand.  If those little green buds can somehow survive a cold harsh winter, and still push up thru the soil to live again I can at least find room for some change in my life.  Something about the weather makes it so much easier to eat light with fruits and veggies.  The heavy cheese and comfort cream dishes of winter seem to fade away with the melting snow.  Ah, sweet bliss.  Maybe I am a Californian at heart.

Why is every holiday surrounded by the assumption that we must get together with friends, and family to GORGE on food?  Somehow if we don't do this there will be strange looks.  People will ask if you are feeling okay, or if there is something wrong with you.  If you take to much food then you get those looks as well, but they are different.  Shouldn't that girl be on a diet?  Wow that is a lot of food on your plate.  ARG!!!  Why do I have to be around others on these days!!!  I guess I am trying to say, not only did I blow my points out of the water, I also loathed being scrutinized by all the other people who don't have this secret (or not so secret) addiction to food.  Next time I am going to be sick, and avoid the downward spiral depression and self hatred.  Humm, what day is Memorial Day?  I think I feel the flu or a spring cold coming on.  I think my food issues are all because of my mother.  At least that is what Freud would say.  If it is not I think I should blame her anyway.  She makes me feel the most fucked up about it.

So, day 1.   Is this the hardest day?  I think so!!  It is a pivotal point where you decide you can't turn back.  If you waiver even once on this day you will give up and be perpetually in the cycle of dieting beginnings that go nowhere.  You know that swamp of a place where you will just start tomorrow, and you can never pull yourself out of that muck without help.  So I am almost thru this day one and I am feeling like I can make it for sure.  I got out and went walking with a friend earlier.  Tonight I go dancing with friends.  I also tried a new veggie curry soup for dinner that turned out really well, and is only 4 points for a big bowl.  I just have to get thru the next few hours until heavenly sleep sets in and I will have successfully completed day 1.  I can't believe I waited so long to start.  

Okay, today I officially committed myself (for the umpteenth time) to a new diet.  A new way of living.  A new way to torture myself and be happy simultaneously.  I joined weight watchers online!!!!!  I am excited and freaked.  This time , however I am sure it will stick.  I am almost the same weight I was when I gave birth to my daughter 16 years ago.  I have one and 1/2 friends that are also committing to this program (the 1/2 of one doesn't know me, but is supporting my other friend so I count her, but only partially since we have never met, and she doesn't know I joined the band wagon).  I feel like I have such a long way to go.  I just need to make it thru 3 weeks with no fuck ups and I think I can make it through to the end.  The worst part for me of any diet is explaining or avoiding explaining why I am, or am not eating and why.  Arg!!!!  Why can't people just mind their own business.  Anyways the facts are this:  I weigh 197 lbs (yuk!!)  and I want to get to 114 (crazy hot!!).  My first goal is 175 so I begin now.  

Oh, how a new day brings so much HOPE!  Hope for change in a life so bogged down with past failures and unfulfilled dreams.  The trick is to keep that feeling going, and propel it into the next day, and the next, and the next until the dream becomes reality.  My only problem is that I feel like I need so much hope to propel me.  I have so far to go and I can't seem to get myself launched for more than a day or two recently.

So I am writing it all down.  My sucess, and my failure, my hopes, and my dreams.  I just can't share this with the people in my daily life.  It is such a deep wound that only people who have the same wound would know the pain of sharing this part of our lives.

It seems as if I have been on a perpetual diet since the age of 14.  I guess that is when I realized not only that I was the fattest girl of all my friends, but also that nobody wanted to date me.  I was mistaken for the school nurse from behind!!  How humiliating.  She was sooooo old and fat.  I started smoking in the hope that that would somehow make me skinny.  All of the movie stars smoked and they were skinny, right?  My grandma smoked and she was skinny.  

My first attempt at a diet was Slim Fast.  We did not have a TV when I was growing up so I do not know how I found out about Slim Fast (maybe a friend).  No breakfast, slim fast at lunch at school and slim fast at dinner.  Oh, and of course lots of cigarets in between when no one was looking.  I would put that Slim Fast in a thermos so my friends wouldn't know what I was having for lunch.  I mean, how could they even understand?  They could eat pizza, burgers and giant chocolate chip cookies and be 100 lbs. or less.  How could they understand my battle with food when all I wanted to be was a normal teenager trading clothes with her friends, and waiting for a boy to call her his own.

The only benefit to being overweight is that I had the biggest breasts.  This somehow only prevented me from exercising.  I had never been in sports or even been encouraged to participate in them.   I had a mom who was no help in the beauty arena at all.  She did not diet, exercise, wear makeup, or even shave!!!  How was she going to help me become a desirable young woman.

And so it began.  My quest for a normal body, and a normal teenage life.

Its been a few years and I still deal with the quest for what I wish I could be.  Normal?  Maybe.  I know I am not the only one who has these issues.  Maybe slight variations (times, dates, etc.), but at the core the same issues.

This blog will be about my current issues and a detailed look at my past in attempt to deal with this life that has CONSUMED me in more ways than one.  I hope that this can help me, and many others.