Tuesday, April 28, 2009

Weight loss blog. Creativity eludes me tonight.

I've been stuck at 96lbs lost for about three weeks now. This happens alot; I stop loosing for awhile and then it starts back up again. It seems a lot more frequent  now. They say it gets harder the closer you get to your goal, but I don't understand why.

If I'm still making a 3,500 calorie deficit I should lose a pound. Why is that harder? I know that means I have to eat even less as my body requires less energy to operate. And I know I have to work out more/harder as my body becomes accustomed to the demands I place on it. Also, is much easier to do the work when I'm not carrying around a 96lb backpack of fat. These are things I can control though. There seems to be this elusive factor X I keep hearing about that just makes it harder. I don't understand.

Because, the more muscle I have, the more calories it burns while sitting idle. And the more active I am, the more likely I am to choose strenuous activities over leisure. The healthy habits I am practicing become ingrained until the idea of going back to the way I was last year makes me feel physically ill. I don't want to eat like that. I don't want to sit around all the time. I don't want to be obese. So, it gets easier all the time to make the healthy choices. This isn't work.

Except, I feel guilty nearly all the time. Food for me becomes this strange relationship based upon pleasure and pain where I know I have to eat it and I do enjoy it but I keep obsessing over what its doing to my body. Feeling hungry feels good, but I know that I have to eat frequently to keep my metabolism pumping along at a good pace. And sometimes I still do stupid things like eat too much or eat the wrong foods and I feel guilty over it for days and days. Food = bad. I hate it. Because food is still our cultural answer to too many questions. What do we celebrate with? What do we do with friends? What do we reward ourselves with? What do we do to be kind to others? 

Finally, finally my self-image is starting to catch up with my body. I do feel smaller. I can see it now in things like the width of my thighs and my peek-a-boo collar bones.  I can sit cross legged in a chair and I can hug my knees. But other things aren't there yet. I don't feel pretty. When will that happen? I still feel uncomfortable when other people touch me like they are going to recoil from the softness of my stomach, the thickness of my calves, or the hanging skin on my arms. Somehow, in my mind, touching me is going to make the horrible reality of what I've done to my body that much more evident. I'm not like those other girls. I don't know if I'll ever be.

I'm really sorry if my horrible self image makes you uncomfortable. I really am trying to work on it. I don't really know how. I don't believe you when you say I'm pretty. I know you keep saying it to me in hopes I'll understand. I only hear that I look better than I did before. I know that. To me its like improving your grade from a F to a D. According to the BMI charts I'm still morbidly obese. So fat that its slowly killing me. After nine months. After 96lbs. 

I'm impatient. I usually want what I've decided I want RIGHT NOW. This has been a long long wait. I'm trying to be optimistic and grateful and positive and put that face on for everyone else but inside is the little girl crying that she's waited so long, can she please be happy now?

And so I wait.

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