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Jul 8, 2011

Conference Time Pressure

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It’s that time again: BlogHer. I originally started a weight loss blog back in 2009 for the sole purpose of motivating myself to get in better shape to look good at that year’s BlogHer conference. Hot by BlogHer was simply about losing weight so that I could rock a little black dress at the conference cocktail parties.

Then last year I decided that it wasn’t just about looking good at conferences – I really did want to be healthier, too – and so I switched to Losing My Hind, which has more of a year-round, broader focus on weight loss, health and fitness.

Conference season always brings out the vain side of me, though. And so with less than a month to go until I’m hanging with some of my favorite bloggers in San Diego, I’m suddenly feeling more pressure to step it up and stay the hell on track.

Generally I’m a jeans and t-shirt type of gal. No make-up, no accessories. It’s not that I don’t like nicer clothing, make-up and jewelry, because I really do like it. Years of being heavy, along with teased for being different, taught me to draw as little attention to myself as possible. So most of the time I keep to my comfortable and plain uniform of jeans and t-shirt, blending into the background and happy for it.

But for conferences I love playing dress up. I have no idea why, but at blog conferences I feel like I can open up more and show off. Maybe because these people have already seen me vulnerable on my blog? Whatever the reason, a blog conference is an excuse for me to show off. I’ve already purchased one dress for BlogHer, and I’ve got my eye out for more. I’m prepping my feet to wear heels again, and applying sunscreen dutifully to avoid t-shirt tan lines. I’ve got plenty of shapewear to go under my outfits, but I would also prefer to not work that shapewear as hard as I have in the past.

Since attending my first BlogHer back in 2006, I’ve been getting progressively lighter and healthier each year. And each year, a few people will see me and remark on how I look so much smaller than the year before. Yes, I usually make some throw away remark about their foggy memories and then thank them for the compliment, but truthfully? I eat it up. I cherish every single positive comment and wrap myself in those kind words.

I know I am far more than just my outward appearance, but damn it feels nice for people to like the outside as well as the inside. It’s a sad truth that for those with self-esteem issues, it takes several positive comments to make someone believe she’s pretty, yet only one negative to undo it all.

So with the conference approaching quickly, I’m evaluating myself and feel pretty good about this year. I’m 10-15 pounds lighter than last year (depends on the day and the kindness of the scale) and down one size in clothing. I don’t expect to lose more than a few pounds between now and then, so I’m instead focusing on healthy foods and strength training versus dieting.

I can’t make drastic changes in 25 days. (OK, I did make drastic changes like that once, but it wouldn’t be as easy now.) But I am using BlogHer as a little extra motivation to avoid laziness. Choosing between junk food and a more natural snack is easy when you plan to be on display in less than a month. And feeling good about your appearance makes dress shopping a lot more fun!

Filed Under: motivation · Tagged: ,


Jun 28, 2011

Looking In The Mirror

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When I weighed 40+ pounds more than I do now, fashion usually meant disguising my body to hide all of the lumps and bumps. I didn’t like how I looked and so I never put a lot of thought into what I wore, other than does this hide as much as possible? Loose clothing, baggy t-shirts, stretch denim – the less skin visible, the better.

Now that I’m within 10 pounds of the “normal” BMI range (wow, does THAT feel weird to say!), I’m trying to re-evaluate what I wear. I know I need to dress better, in both home and work settings.

When I come to work during the day for meetings, I’m expected to wear business wear. I see my peers dressed in beautiful tops and either fitted pants or skirts, and I envy them for looking so good. I have yet to purchase a button-down top because I worry that when I sit down the buttons will bulge from my belly sticking out. And skirts are completely a no-go – I can’t imagine letting my coworkers see my bare tree-trunk legs.

Here’s the real problem: I still have a disconnect between my eyes and my brain. I look in the mirror and all I see is fat. A lifetime of criticism from those close to me has left me incapable of seeing myself as anything other than a fat girl. I keep telling myself that it’s not so bad and I used to be so much heavier, but my brain still interprets it as jiggly upper arms, big belly and thunder thighs.

I still feel my 5th grade teacher poking my belly and saying I’d better have a growth spurt soon with a belly that big. I still remember kids teasing me for my large thighs at the 8th grade pool party. I remember a family member telling me I should focus on losing weight rather than going to grad school, as losing weight was more likely to help me find a spouse someday.

I’m haunted by even darker moments from earlier in childhood, moments that remain buried deep in my memory, but I now realize were likely contributors to my desire to hide myself from the world with a layer of fat.

I’m working against a lifetime of psychological abuse. I’ve distanced myself from the worst offenders, but it was too late – my subconscious adopted the worst of their weapons and wages war on my psyche daily. I didn’t get fat because I lost track of how many doughnuts I was eating – I mean, I DO love food, but food addiction alone can’t explain why I’m unable to visualize myself at a healthy weight.

But progress comes in small doses, and I’ve already shown a lot of progress to lose nearly 50 pounds in a few years. The internal sabotage clearly isn’t as strong as it used to be, and while I may never be able to completely silence the negative self-talk, I can work on tuning it out.

Last weekend we attended ComFest, and while there I suddenly felt the urge to buy one of the dresses I saw so many others wearing. Aaron encouraged me, and so I did buy it and wear it around the festival all day. (Although with denim capris – I didn’t have any shorts with me, and it was too short to wear without something underneath.)
I still don’t like what I see, but I’m willing to concede that it’s getting better. After all, I spent an entire day wearing a dress with my full arms and shoulders bared, no support garments underneath, and didn’t feel all that awkward.
Filed Under: photographic evidence · Tagged: ,


Jun 13, 2011

The World is Upside Down

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Ya know, sometimes you do everything right and get nothing for your hard work. And then sometimes you let things slide and find yourself rewarded for slacking off.

Consider last week one of the latter situations.

Despite trying to see the positive side of a plateau, I was still feeling irritated about being unable to make the scale move. That irritation translated into sloppy habits: grabbing not one but two cookies at work, eating fast food more often than I should, and choosing to not log my calories for a couple of days because it was just too tiring to think about.

I did go to my bootcamp class on Tuesday night, where I was completely whipped by my trainer. Not sure if that night’s routine was harder or if my lazy self was getting weaker, but I really struggled through it.

And then, on Saturday morning I stepped on the scale, fully ready to take the beating I deserved for a week of indulgence.

The number displayed was 166.8.

Not only did I finally break the 169 plateau, but I slid down over two pounds. I’m officially at my lowest adult weight ever.

I felt good, too. Looking in the mirror, I could see the two images of myself switching back and forth – still seeing the “fat me” that my poor, troubled brain perceives, but also seeing the muscle definition, the smaller waist and hips, and the healthier version that the mirror is really reflecting. I’m becoming healthy. I’m witnessing my risks for several diseases drop with each inch that disappears from my waist.

(And then I celebrated by eating too much that night and having cake for my husband’s birthday the next day. Eh, you win some, you lose some. No way I’m stepping on the scale again until I’ve had some time to detox from food overload. I seriously doubt I could get that lucky with the scale ever again.)

Filed Under: success, weigh-in · Tagged: , ,


May 24, 2011

Did I Mention I Ran A 5K?

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So I completely forgot to mention last week that I ran a 5K on May 14. I know, who forgets to brag about something like that, right?

Actually, I went into it with the intent to walk most of the 5K. I was mostly supporting my husband, who has been training for the past 3 months and decided the Komen Race for the Cure 5K was going to be where he put himself to the test.

During that 3 month period, Aaron taught himself how to run, lost 20+ pounds (he’s totally kicking my butt in weight loss), and was ready to take on his first 5K. During that same time frame, I went to my bootcamp classes, ran a couple of times, lost a couple of pounds, and well…didn’t do anything nearly as impressive as him.

On the day of the race, I lined up with the non-competitive runners. I haven’t had the chance to run more than a day here and there lately, so I didn’t expect that I was even going to make it further than a few blocks without needing to stop for a walk. Aaron was ahead of me with the competitive runners. He didn’t expect to place in the race, but he wanted the timing chip so he could see his exact finishing time.

When the bell sounded, I pressed play on my iPod, took a deep breath, and started the run. I was helped by the amazing energy of the people around me – they were all so happy and excited. (Me at 8am? Less so.) The first few blocks were a bit of start and stop as the crowd needed time to thin out. I tried to stay to the side because I was a slower runner and didn’t want to be in anyone’s way.

Quickly I realized my iPod was going to be trouble. It has a problem where the songs will “scramble” when the headphones are in, meaning it’ll play a few seconds of the song, then scramble the song on high speed for a few seconds, then shift to another song, where it does the same thing. So I found myself jogging slowly while trying to hard reset my iPod, put the headphones back in, and try again. It gave me a few songs in a row before it would scramble again, but those few songs were better than nothing. I need music to distract myself from the reality of running.

We made the first turn, and I was surprised I was still running. Then the second turn came two blocks later and I was hurting, but still running. A huge hill was in front of me, though, and I realized I couldn’t make it up the hill. I stopped to walk, a little disappointed, but also reassured by seeing others slow down to walk up the hill.

Once we reached the top of the hill, I decided to go back to running. My lungs ached at the greater effort again, and although I couldn’t hear it over my music, I’m sure I sounded wheezy as I gasped for air. This part of the run was slightly downhill and after a couple of minutes I finally fell into a comfortable pattern. I was still working hard, but I wasn’t hurting.

The next leg of the race took us around a local park. My side was starting to hurt again, so I made a deal with myself that I’d walk when I reached the north end of the park. I kept that agreement, slowing down to walk along the entire north end of the park.

As we made the final turn for the (long) home stretch, a guy in a lobster costume passed me by as I was walking. I’m being passed by a lobster? Surely I can run again if this guy in a full-body costume is still running!

I forced myself to run again, but at this point it was getting hard. During the final stretch I took a couple of short walk breaks, just to catch my breath, and then threw myself forward into running slowly again.

I didn’t see my exact time when I crossed the finish line, but I believe it was somewhere around 44-45 minutes. Not a great time, of course, but only slightly longer than the 5K I trained for back in the fall.

While I had planned to walk most of this 5K, I instead ran most of it and only walked a small portion. I was exhausted at the end, but proud of doing more than I had intended.

And Aaron? He finished at 30 minutes, which is a very respectable time for his first 5K run. I’m proud of him for accomplishing his goal and getting so fit in the process. Hopefully we can both find time to run during the summer and sign up for other 5K races.

Again, if I can do this, anyone can. It just takes baby steps to do so. Had you told me five years ago that I’d be running in a 5K, I would have laughed at you. Yet it’s happened, thanks to making small changes here and there.

Filed Under: running, success · Tagged:


May 9, 2011

In the Details

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OK, so it’s obvious that my plateau has me feeling a little down lately. More than a little down, really. I step on the scale and curse the number. I look in the mirror and wonder why my stomach isn’t flatter, why my hips are still so large, and why I still have the lumpy saddlebags hanging off the sides of my legs.

I know the self-hate does me no good. It provides no motivation. It zaps my energy. It only tears me down when I should be working towards building my self-esteem up.

So I take a deep breath. And then I look a little closer in the mirror.

My upper arms have definition when I flex them now. I can see the smooth contour of my bicep forming a small hill along my upper arm. And even with the floppy skin underneath, it’s obvious that my arms are smaller than they once were.

I need to have my wedding ring re-sized because it’s now loose enough that I worry about it slipping off when I’m not noticing.

My face looks thinner compared to the photo on my work ID badge. That photo was taken a year ago.

I’m wearing one size smaller in my favorite Lee jeans. My old “tight” jeans have become my “loose” jeans. XL shirts now look ridiculous on me.

I no longer have those bulges above or right below my bra strap. (You know, that icky back fat.)

I can go up a few flights of stairs without getting winded.

There are so many positive changes happening in me. Sometimes I need to remember to look beyond the total image and instead focus on the small details.

And if I still need something more dramatic, there’s always this:

Yep. Definite progress right there.

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Filed Under: motivation, photographic evidence ·