Tuesday, July 31, 2012

Trainwreck of a day!

Okay, maybe trainwreck is overstating it. The day at the rodeo was actually pretty fun despite my exhaustion -- I hadn't see some good ole steer wrestling or anything in years and I really enjoyed it. The day was marred by my father being admitted to the hospital for a burn from three days earlier that he didn't take care of, but that's a whole separate clusterfuck.

Foodwise, not a good day, although I didn't go completely nuts. But today I actually feel okay. No crazy cravings, not bloated as fuck, maybe a little more tired and snotty than normal but hard to tell if that's from carbs/wheat or from exhaustion/sunburn.

Had a surprising moment while leaving the rodeo. When I did the first C25k workout the other night, the minute long runs seemed absolutely interminable and I hated every second. I didn't realize quite how much of that was the awful shoes I was wearing though! My grandmother has knee problems, so she hitched a ride on on a golf cart to get to the car. There were other people who needed a ride so I said I'd walk. In fact I jogged behind the cart for about two minutes, and wasn't even out of breath which astounded me considering my walk/run the other night! I mean, I wasn't keeping up with the cart or anything. And I'm aware that two minutes isn't much. But still, I was surprised that after no sleep, in the heat, after my shitty experience the other night, that I wasn't gasping and red in the face.

I need to try to get enough rest today to do the first C25k workout again; being awake 27/28 hours straight and then not really sleeping that night either has really wiped me out, hopefully I can make it up today.

Sunday, July 29, 2012

Can't sleep, and discouraging thoughts.

After an hour and a half, I gave up on getting any sleep at all tonight before my rodeo hell tomorrow. Or in four hours, more like.

It wasn't what was keeping me up, but I did have a very discouraging thought earlier. I won't think I'm not-fat unless I don't have a hanging stomach anymore. Well, the least I've weighed in my adult life is 186. And guess what? Still had a flabby hanging stomach. That means even if I lose a hundred pounds, a lot of things will still be inconvenient. My stomach will still lay on the bed next to me when I'm on my side. I'll still not be able to see to shave ... areas. It'll still be uncomfortable to bend over. I'll still be very big on the bottom and not so much on top. Etc. etc. It's a pretty depressing thing to think that I could put that much time and effort in to something and still not have resolved so many things.

Of course, all those things will definitely still be true if I do nothing.

Struggling on.

I was going to at least go for a walk last night, but then I came across something that really upset me and I ended up having a mini breakdown and just going to bed. Still not too happy today. Not too happy is an understatement. I'm fucking depressed. So far I haven't made any poor choices foodwise, mostly because I'm too bummed out to care much about food or anything else. Yeah, it's about the ex. Yeah, it's pathetic.

Plus I know tomorrow is pretty much going to be a disaster. I'll be spending tomorrow with people I don't want to spend time with (one of whom I actively hate), at a place I don't want to be at, doing something I don't want to do -- and I'll be surrounded by food I shouldn't eat. Which is not to say I'm throwing in the towel immediately. I'll have a good breakfast (eschewing the famous cinnamon rolls at the place we're going, sigh), and I'll do the best I can with dinner (I have no idea what my aunt is making, my luck lasagne or something). Not sure what I'll be able to find at a freaking rodeo/fair/carnival that would remotely okay, plus frozen pina coladas are going to be enticing. I don't even drink normally but certain people who will be present tomorrow awaken the urge. Only plus; outside means I can keep my sunglasses on so people won't really be able to see my expression. That'll make faking happy -- which is absolutely necessary with that side of my family -- a little easier. Wish I'd had an excuse to not go. BTW, the person I hate isn't related to me. It's the skanky chain-smoking drunken bitch who's latched on to my father.

The chunk of fat in front of my ribs feels bigger and like it's sticking out more today. It feels discouraging. But I know it's just a feeling. It's because I'm not as bloated anymore, so overall I'm more jiggly; also the first place I lose any weight, even a few ounces, is in front of my hips. So basically there's just a little less support overall for that chunk of fat. I hate that particular chunk of fat. It sticks out over my waistband and it makes my (larger than average and very fabulous) boobs look smaller. I don't like that. They deserve more attention. I have a lot of clothes that, when they fit, draw attention to my rack, so it would be nice to wear them again. Not that I really have anywhere to do so.

I haven't done any work on my story. It's really hard, when swamped under with misery, to try to create something that feels anything other than miserable. Not to mention that crying until you puke makes it hard to type. One day at a time ....

Saturday, July 28, 2012

Extra grumpy today.

It's not a job I'd particularly enjoy, nor does it pay what I'd like. But it's something, and it doesn't start for almost a month so I can look for something better before that. Despite that, I'm still very grumpy today. I didn't sleep well; took forever to fall asleep, woke up a lot, etc. My ankles are also still sore from those damn shoes. And I sent my ex a text a couple of hours ago and no response (not that I really expected one).

I've just been very cranky all day. I've tried everything I can think to re-set my little brain. I had a good meal, I read, watched tv, took a shower, listened to some music, tried to take a nap and was too irritated to fall asleep. At this point, I genuinely feel like a boatload of sugary stuff would cheer me up. At least it would be something to enjoy, which nothing else has been today. I feel like heading over to Olive Garden for some breadsticks and something soaked in alfredo. Or Perkins for some peanut butter silk pie. Something. And I know food won't actually fix any of the problems I have. I'm just so motherfucking cranky! I'm really trying not to succumb to this urge, but I've been feeling it all day and that makes it pretty hard.

I watched some of the Olympic ceremony and ate one of my Carb Smart ice cream bars. The sugar taste did actually make me feel less cranky. Of course I'd rather be irritable than depressed, which is what I'm back to now. This heartbroken crap is getting old. Despite that, when I went to the store just now I managed to control myself. Didn't get anything I shouldn't. Did forget a couple of things I should have gotten, but oh well. Have rotten headache right now though.



Friday, July 27, 2012

My damn ankles hurt.

I think I'll be taking those shoes I wore yesterday to Goodwill. They're normally really expensive running shoes, but I got them for $10 at Ross. I got them because they were silver, white, and purple and I thought they were really cute, but ouch. Of course, some of it may also be due to the fact that I haven't done any activity in a long time, and the last time I did I didn't weigh as much. My eating didn't change but damn did that desk job have an effect. Which I knew it would, but then I got swamped under my the things going on in my life and I just couldn't care.

Anyway, hat's the only side effect of last night's exercise I'm feeling. A friend asked me how I felt today, like I was supposed to be all energized or something I guess. And I know for some people exercise releases endorphins that make them feel good, less depressed, etc. They just make me cranky that I'm sweaty and hot and feel like my entire head is pulsing. Oh well!

At least so far today I'm not having any cravings. Cravings require thought or desires, I think, and I feel totally empty of either today. I've got four hours before my date gets here and I have a bunch of stuff to do around the house -- probably only an hour or so, but it seems absolutely insurmountable, possibly because I just don't feel excited about him coming over. I don't feel much of anything about it. It's not really even a date; he'd just be a source of sex. And it is so not like me to be hesitating about that. Joys of depression/heartbrokenness I guess. The thing that pisses me off is that for a while, I was doing pretty okay. Then one of my best friends got engaged and it's like a dam of jealous misery cracked open in my head. Gotta run out eventually though.

Had leftover LC mac and cheese with chicken for breakfast; a glass of milk and a peach for a snack. Realized I don't say nearly as much about food as a lot of bloggers do, but that's really on purpose. Part of me wants to write everything down and weigh and measure and track it just for curiosity's sake, and because I'm the type who likes to look at charts and graphs. Maybe I'd lose weight more quickly if I went there, but I know that obsession lies that way, and with obsession comes a lot of mentally unhealthy things that I know will just cause me more problems in the end. Besides, what am I going to care about more when I look back at my blog in a year, or even a week: what was going through my head, or how many baby carrots I ate?

I did some cleaning - my house looks pretty good right now -- and was feeling a little more optimistic about the guy coming over. Then, about thirty seconds before he got here, I saw a piece of paper under my DVD player and wondered what it was. I pulled it out and found it was a receipt from when I went to the grocery story to get supplies to cook dinner for my ex the first time he came over. Really just fucking excellent timing, that. Now that the guy has left after an awkward hour or so, I feel sad and empty and like hopping in my car and going to McDonald's. I know french fries won't fix anything. Neither will chicken nuggets. But I want some form of comfort and don't feel like I have anything else available. I don't know why that kind of food feels comforting, especially since after eating it I feel like there's a rock in my stomach and I'm pretty disgusted with myself.

Okay, that was a strange experience. I went into my bathroom to get a Qtip. The medicine cabinet is mirrored and has three doors, and one of them was not quite shut. It created an awesome optical illusion (identifiable tattoo blurred out!):
I've tried before to use those online predictions of what I'd look like if I lost a lot of weight, but they've never inspired me because that's just something on the computer. But I stood there for several minutes looking at this, wondering if it was something I could accomplish. Who knows. But it was an interesting experience. And stopped me from pursuing junk food too. Instead I cooked a couple of hamburger patties with some jack cheese, popped them on a sandwich thin (those things are awesome), and had some carrots and cherry tomatoes too. Go me.

I got bored a couple of hours later. Since my floor was freshly vacuumed, and my house was reasonably cool, I whipped out an old yoga CD thinking I'd do some relaxing stretching. Yeah, that lasted about five minutes. I couldn't focus, for one thing, and for another I forgot how much the woman talks. And how much I hate downward-facing dog. 

Thursday, July 26, 2012

I ran. A little bit.

Well, I did the first workout of the Couch to 5k. Sort of. I only ran the first four intervals, I walked the rest. It wasn't so much because I was too tired, although my muscles did feel a little jell-o like. Mostly it was the cramp in my right side. And the fact that I forgot the shoes I chose just plain hurt. My right Achilles' tendon and my left hamstring tightened up horribly, but felt better as soon as I took the shoes off. Never wearing those again!

I got the C25k app for my iPhone, so it was nice to have the little recorded voice telling me when the intervals changed. Made it very easy. Assuming I can motivate myself to put on a (different) pair of sneakers in a couple of days to do it again, I'll re-do the first workout. I'll keep doing it until I can do all the running intervals, and then I'll move on. Since I don't actually care about running a 5k (I don't really even know how far that is), time and distance don't really matter.

Of course, I know there's a chance that in a couple of nights I'll look at my shoes and think .... fuck that noise. Because I hate the feeling of sweat leaking out from under my hair. I hate my face feeling hot. And that rush of blood pounding in my ears, in my head? I fucking hate that. There's no sensation regarding exercise that I enjoy. Oh, there was a certain amount of satisfaction when I could lift a higher weight, not that it did me any practical good. And swimming at least didn't have the sweat and body temperature issues. But other than that I really just hate everything about exercise.

And so begins another day.

Not that I'll be posting this for like twelve hours! I slept even later than usual today; it was a little cooler, so I wasn't waking up every ten minutes soaked in sweat, which was nice for a change. So far I've had some macaroni and cheese with chicken (made with Dreamfields LC pasta) and a whole bunch of water. Watched some Futurama and some South Park, read a little bit. Trying not to think too much about the date I have tomorrow. He's a nice guy, but I'm not really in to it. I was feeling optimistic when I invited him over a couple of days ago, but now I find myself wishing I could think of a good enough excuse to cancel yet again.

I keep wanting to text my ex, but I don't know what to say that won't sound stupid or whiny, so I've been holding off for a week now. I just hate not knowing what's going on with him. He just sort of faded away, and I don't know why. Maybe it doesn't even matter why. In fact, that probably would be the way to look at it: it doesn't matter why he stopped talking to me, only that he did and so he clearly doesn't care. I'm trying to remember that.

I don't feel terribly hungry, but I do feel like I should have some fruit or something for the nutrient value. Because my mac & cheese may have been yummy and low-carb, but it didn't have much actual value beyond the protein in the chicken and the calcium in the cheese. Some carrots would be good for me!

The friend who likes to lecture me about how I met my ex ran a 13k race this last weekend, and is very proud of herself. I'm not saying she shouldn't be, but ... I just don't get it. So she ran a long way. Yay? I can understand running to lose weight or for general fitness. I can understand running so you can run from attackers (I read too much). But just so you can say "I ran (this far)"? I don't get it. Again, not a condemnation of it or anything, I just don't understand the impetus. Similarly, I don't understand why my other friend's husband rides his bike 40 miles several times a week (in addition to a bunch of other workouts that are apparently so intense he has to be massaged to move the lactic acid out of his muscles every night so he can do it again the next day  [which from what I've read is bullshit]).

Of course, they wouldn't understand why I read endlessly either. Different strokes, different folks, etc. However, her talking about it remind me of the infamous Couch to 5k program, which I've looked at and pondered before. Not because I care about the 5k, but just to try something new in a semi-guided fashion. Especially now that I can't afford a gym, so I can't swim or lift weights, which are the only two exercises I don't hate. And I've never seriously tried running, or even walking, as a scheduled form of exercise. Honestly, it hurt too fucking much. I spent so long waitressing or trotting around retail stores in uncomfortable shoes that my body hurt constantly from the ears down. Seven months of not doing that crap has seriously unkinked me, and I'm loving it. After a few months of my desk job, I was astounded to find that when I rolled out of bed in the morning I could walk. Right away. Without feeling like my feet were solid and incapable of flexing. It was pretty damn amazing.

Anyway, I think walking/running is something I might be able to do now. I do still have the problem of a bra that can sufficiently support the pounds of breasts bouncing on the front of my chest, but I think for the limits of C25k I have one that will work. Also, when I told my mom today I was nervous about walking around at night she sort of laughed at me. This used to be her house, and she rolled her eyes and told me it's safe. I'm still a little nervous, but ... I think I might go ahead and do it. I'd rather go to a nice air conditioned gym, but I'd feel better about spending money on that (once I have a job) if I already have an exercise habit. I might find I hate it more than I've ever hated anything, but I guess we'll see.

Well. That was interesting. Think I'll make it a separate post though.






Wednesday, July 25, 2012

Today I woke up feeling nothing ...

... except a craving for Qdoba. All I want to eat is a bowl of rice and three-cheese queso and chicken and green salsa and sour cream. This is product of the fact that I freaking love Qdoba, and also because I last ate about 24 hours ago. I've been hungry since I got up, but nothing sounds good. Except, you know, the burrito.

Yeah, yeah, somebody's probably gonna wanna bitch at
me about it and tell me how unhealthy it is. Go for it.
Well, for a while I wanted pizza. Then pancakes. Then croissants. If I just ate something I'd feel better, but I don't feel like I could choke down anything I have in the house. So I drank a lot of water, and I read, and eventually -- once Qdoba was closed! Avoidance is key for me! -- I went to the grocery store. Forty dollars of fruits, vegetables, dairy, and such later, I came home and made myself a little pizza on a low-carb tortilla. Honestly, I didn't expect to enjoy it very much. I expected it to be a pale substitute that made me crave the real thing more. But it was surprisingly satisfying. I feel alright now. Will have a peach later on, I think. And my next meal I think will be .... hell if I know. If I even get hungry again I'll figure it out.

I've basically just had this window open all day to type whatever popped in to my head, which has been a lot less than the last couple of days. That's not necessarily a good thing, though, because it's basically because I've been pretty depressed all day. Oh, just low-level depressed, not sobbing or anything. Just sort of feeling empty and nothing. It's actually sort of a break from my misery the last few weeks, but that doesn't mean it's healthy.

If I did more social stuff, I'd probably feel a little better. But it's hard to set anything up, because I feel like it's hard to even carry on a normal conversation. The last time I went out with a friend I hadn't seen in a while, I started telling her what had happened with the ex and I started crying in the middle of the restaurant. Embarrassing. Sometimes people will be in the middle of telling me something and I'll be struggling to understand, not because I wasn't paying attention, but because it felt like my brain had forgotten how to decode their words, usually because some thought about my ex or something had sort of halted my neurons.

I feel like doing what I did the last time I felt like this, the last time my life felt so empty and up in the air. I used to put my little schnauzer on her leash and walk for hours. We'd just wander our neighborhood in the dark, every night, until I finally dragged us home. It felt right to wander aimlessly. Sometimes I sang to myself. Sometimes I talked to my dog. Sometimes I cried. Other times I was just absolutely silent. I don't know if it really helped; it didn't keep my weight in check nor did it tire me out. But I find myself wanting to do it again. Unfortunately, that was about seven years ago, and it's not something I've felt comfortable doing since. The town I moved to after that had a state prison in it, and I didn't feel safe wandering the streets at night when felons were regularly released there. Then I moved back to my old town -- but the opposite end of it, and to get to a well-lit, safe area I had to walk about a mile up a road with no sidewalk and no streetlights. Where I live now, there's enough gang activity to make me uncomfortable roaming at night, even though none of it is really in my area. I wish I could move back to my little wood-floored house in the quiet, safe neighborhood where I used to wander.

Really, I hate the town I live in now. I like my house. It's quirky and has lots of room for me and my pets. It's fairly cheap, and I'm overall fond of it. But the town I live in smells because there's a cattle processing plant, it's weirdly organized and I can't find things, and then there's the gang activity in certain places. There's a reason housing is cheap, is what I'm getting at. If I had the money, I would move. Maybe I should have, back when I had a job and they were still giving us bigass bonus checks. But finding somewhere that I can have the three cats and two dogs I've accidentally acquired is a pretty big challenge. And at the time I had money, I was happy.

Actually, I had an offer a few days ago to move back to the prison-containing town and live for a year rent-free. There were a lot of reasons to do it; money, change, being there for a family member struggling with some emotional issues. But in the end I just couldn't do it. The space I'd be crammed in to would be much too small, and because of the way the house is arranged I'd have no privacy. Plus I'd have to find a job down there, and then after less than a year bail out on it and haul all my things back to this area (100 mile drive), because in a year all reasons to live there would have gone to college or moved away, leaving me alone and without a place to live, in a town I don't really want to live in. And honestly, I feel like I'm just too goddamn old at this point to be uprooting my life like that every year, at least when it comes to jobs. My work history is bizarre enough already (I tended to work a lot of unconnected jobs consecutively).

I suppose because I'm unemployed and applying for jobs all over the place, it's normal that I've been trying to evaluate what my goals really are. In terms of a job or a career, I've never been one of those people who knew What I Want To Be When I Grow Up. Oh, for a while I thought I'd be a novelist. And I do love baking. But I never even knew what to go to school for, because I was so ... unfocused, flighty, whatever you want to call it. And there are plenty of people like that, but those people usually have something else they want. For example, they want to get married and have kids. Yeah ... I don't. I mean, if I were with someone and they wanted to get married, I'd do it for them. But I'm never spawning. Ever.

So I don't want any particular career, I don't want a husband, I don't want kids. I don't want any of the "normal" things society tells me I should. What do I want? I want to be happy. But what would make me happy? Fuck if I know. :)

But hey look, it's late evening (er, according to my jacked up schedule) and I've eaten properly today!

Tuesday, July 24, 2012

I think I'm going to be doing a lot of this.

I'm only a few days in here, but I have the feeling that -- assuming time allows, which right now it does since I haven't found a goddamn job yet -- I'll be writing a lot. The reason for that is simple: eating properly is fucking difficult. It's hard with all the ads for pizza and assorted other crap being thrown at you. It's hard when your well-intentioned friends push chocolate at you. It's hard when you're tired or lazy and just don't want to cook chicken breast when McDonald's is down the street. We all know this. It sucks. And writing about it doesn't necessarily help.

But what I think writing may help with is the high emotional content to my eating. I'm not nearly as bad as I used to be about it. I had some fucking epic binges, back in the day. Now at least my emotional eating tends to be having macaroni and cheese for dinner instead of chicken, rather than having macaroni and cheese and cookies and ice cream and chips and whatever random other crap I picked up at the store. So that's definitely good. But the emotional eating is still a problem, because I know that one episode of it can quite easily lead to a string of horrible days ending in giving up. I know this because of how my body reacts to sugars and high levels of starches. It's addictive.

There are things I can do to mitigate those emotional eating slips; for example, taking chromium definitely kicks up my insulin receptors and allows my body to deal with it better in a biochemical way. And drinking a lot of fluids helps keep the water retention factor down. My next meal being properly composed, that's another big one. But of course the best thing to do is, you know, not cause the problem in the first place. Which is where the blogging comes in, for the most part.

See, I love my friends. And I know they love me. But I also know that they're tired of hearing about me being heartbroken over my ex. They all think he's a douchebag and I should be over him. Most of them don't say that, but I can read between the lines. To be fair, for the first month or two I was upset, they thought he had been just a casual boyfriend. They didn't realize I was in L-O-V-E with him. I was embarrassed to admit it, and scared to admit it, and never did admit it to him. So my friends were in a frustrated mindset before I really told them why I was so upset. But still ... they're tired of hearing it. And I'm sort of tired of saying it, and I'm definitely tired of feeling it .... but it won't go away. I still feel heartbroken over him almost every moment of every day, and it makes me want to reach for the comfort food because I don't really have anything else to comfort me.

And of course, there's the stress of being jobless. And the fact that my grandmother is dying, I really haven't even begun to process that shit yet. And all the other little and not-so-little things that make up the ups and downs of life. Basically, I just need somewhere that I can announce "I FEEL MISERABLE AND HEARTBROKEN TODAY AND I HATE THE WORLD!" without feeling like I'm dragging down the people who care about it. Even if nobody reads this (or nobody but Amy, hi Amy), that's okay. It's there. It's written down. I have documented how I feel and have let it out in some form other than talking to my cats like a crazy woman.

Actually, I sort of feel badly for anybody who does try to slog through all of the crap I'm bound to throw out. It's gonna get awfully boring and repetitive. But that's the beauty of blogging - I can say whatever the hell I want, but you don't have to read it! And maybe some would say all the crap I'll spew doesn't belong on a weight-loss blog, but here's the thing: it influences how I eat, and how I feel about myself. If I'm not at least mildly mentally healthy, I'm not going to make any progress on the physical side of it.

(Made no progress on the story, btw. I read instead!)


TMI

I mentioned in a previous post that I had sent a picture of the scale to a friend of mine, because I wanted documentation but I didn't want to know the number myself. Well, yesterday my curiosity got the better of me a little bit and I told her, "I just want a yes or a no, that's all - is the number on the scale 300 pounds or higher?"

I shouldn't have asked, because she thought she was being encouraging by telling me it was "just under." I said "That's not a yes or no answer." and she thought I didn't understand, so she said "It's just under 300." I was like, "I know that, the point is I just wanted to know yes or no."

So, now I know that I'm closer to 300 pounds than I've ever been in my life. I don't know what constitutes "just under" - one pound, ten, twenty? Considering this is a woman who didn't think she was thin at 117 pounds, I have no idea. And I love her to pieces, I know that she was only intending to motivate me by telling me it wasn't "that bad". But Christ on a pogo stick. If "just under" means something like 295, the amount of weight I'd need to lose to a 'normal' size just jumped significantly, and that is depressing.

Of course, the fact is that nothing's actually changed except my own knowledge!

Monday, July 23, 2012

Dreams are depressing.

I woke up today from a dream about my ex. It was a good dream, which just makes it all the more painful to wake up and remember he's cut me out of his life without even saying goodbye. Then I got an email - not even a call but a fucking email - telling me I didn't get one of the job I interviewed for. Then I waited around for an electrician all day, finally called my landlady and she admitted she never called him. Fuck.

I'm really down today, and everything feels absolutely pointless. I haven't eaten anything because I haven't been hungry, or when I was for a few minutes I had zero desire to cook anything. I'm hungry now and all I want to do is jump in my car and drive two blocks to Qdoba for a bigass carbfest of a burrito. And chips and queso. What would it solve? Nothing. It would make me feel better temporarily to sit in the a/c, drink a bunch of cold Diet Coke, and read while eating something delicious. I know it would feel great at the time. But then I would have spent money I can't afford to, and undone the few days of good eating I have lined up. I guess I just sort of feel broken today, and like there's no point in fixing it.

I know, I'm a whiner. I hate feeling like this. I'm trying to snap out of it.

(Shortly after writing this I started doing some cleaning, never my favorite thing. But I'm noticing a difference in how I feel already. Bending over still isn't terribly pleasant because I do have a bunch of blubber in the way. But it doesn't hurt internally like it did a week ago, either. I'm sure a lot of that has to do with simple fluid retention, but it's still slightly encouraging.)

Too far ahead.

I'm falling in to my usual trap when it comes to trying to lose any weight: I start thinking about how hopeless it is. The last time I knew my weight, I'd have to lose 150 pounds to be at a "normal" weight. That's according to the BMI chart, which I think is complete bullshit - but regardless I'd still have to lose a fuckton of weight to even get out of the obese category. And then the mere idea of maintaining ... I know myself. The chances are astronomical of me losing any significant amount of weight and keeping it off. So what's the damn point? I feel really down about it. Even if I just lose enough so most of my clothes fit again, what are the chances I can maintain that loss? 

I'm just not good at sticking to things. I rarely finish projects. I just run out of steam. That's one reason I haven't told anybody outside this blog - and the one friend with the picture of my atrocious weight - about changing my eating. It's also why I haven't told anyone, anyone at all, that I've started working on two separate story ideas for novels. I have a friend who would love to hear that news, because she's always on me about how I have a gift and I shouldn't waste it, and how she's jealous of how easily my writing flows. But I don't want to tell her, because I don't want to disappoint her when I don't finish either of them.

I know this all sounds extremely self-defeating, and anybody I said it to would tell me that my attitude shapes how things will come out, etc. I'm not even disputing it, really. But I've been this way for so long, and I've been failing to finish projects for so long, that it doesn't seem pessimistic. It just seems realistic.

So why am I trying this at all? Today I don't know. I guess I'm hoping that maybe I'll lose enough weight that my clothes will fit, maybe I'll overshoot the mark a little, and then when I balloon up again go through the process again. Which seems stupid. But .... I guess I'm just conflicted today about a lot of things.

I still ate properly today though. And I'm about to try to write some more. The story I've been typing is at 3280 words. That's more than I've written in more than ten years, aside from blogging.


Sunday, July 22, 2012

Resisting.

Well, I restrained myself when I went out, despite my friend desperately trying to push chocolate mousse on me. That was good. When I got home, I decided I was going to do some cleaning and re-organizing. I did some vacuuming, then unhooked my computer. Then I saw I'd missed a spot, so I plugged the vacuum back in to the same outlet .... which lit up blue for a moment and then all the power in my living room, and half of my kitchen, died.

I about lost it. I was right on the brink of a meltdown, because the outlet my fridge was plugged in to was one that went out and I couldn't drag the fridge across the kitchen to a working outlet. It's a million degrees here lately so I thought all my food was going to spoil. I also have no tv and no internet. I was livid. If I'd had any ice cream or anything, I probably would have eaten it, even knowing it wouldn't fucking help. Luckily, I had no such things here.

I calmed down once I remembered that my dad had given me a heavy-duty extension cord, so I have that running across my kitchen now to power my fridge. Not the safest thing, but hopefully it won't be for long. I also have the world's most obnoxious coaxial cable stretched from the one port that carried my internet to an outlet in another room, so I at least have internet access. Luckily it's wireless so my laptop can pick it up.

But I'm almost certain my landlady is going to claim that nobody is available tomorrow, because she won't want to pay Sunday rates to have an electrician come out. I think it's just a blown fuse, should be pretty simple to fix; but I can't find the friggen fuse box to check. The circuit breaker, yes; but the fuse box is well-hidden. Aggravating.

Saturday, July 21, 2012

Blech, eggs.

Another ridiculously hot day here. I'd love to put my window a/c unit in, but I can't afford the electric bill seeing as I have no job. But I made myself eat, and I made myself eat eggs even, which ... yuck. Not my favorite. But cheesy eggs with sour cream, and a while later strawberries and white peach, was a decent lunch.

Now the trick is to not each a bunch of crap when I go out tonight.

Friday, July 20, 2012

Not the best start ...

It's 6:00 and I haven't eaten anything today. I've had a Diet Coke and a few sips of milk. But god, it's just unbearably hot. 102 degrees here today, and it makes it hard to move. Food sounds absolutely unappetizing. I just have to be very careful that once it cools down, I don't end up binging on all sorts of crap because I'm out-of-control hungry!

ETA: I finally at about two a.m. cooked up some burger patties. I really hate the heat.

Writing so I don't eat.

See, right now is a perfect example of why I came back to this long-neglected blog. It's 6:45 a.m. and I haven't been to bed yet. This is partially because I stayed up all night yesterday and then sort-of slept from 11a.m. to 7p.m. But it's more because my brain is running in circles and I'm feeling miserable, and I knew that if I went to sleep before I was utterly exhausted, I would end up sobbing in to my pillow. And my friends have to be tired of hearing this shit -- even if any of them were awake. Furthermore, a couple of them are severely fucking irritating me with their responses, and of course those are two that know about my regular blog.

It's nothing earth-shattering; it's nothing a normal person my age hasn't gone through several times. But it's only the second time I've been in love, and the first time I've been dumped. I am not fucking dealing with it well. For example, I know he's on his way to work right now. I know he'll spend all day outside in the godawful heat, because he does landscaping. I know he'll be all tan and muscular from months of work, and that he's got a new tattoo I haven't seen. And I know I'll never see any of this, because I haven't seen him in three months and he hasn't communicated with me at all since June 11th. And it makes me sick to my stomach. It also makes me feel helpless, and hopeless, and that makes me want to drive to McDonald's for some greasy, carb-laden, nasty junk food, because my emotional eating has been completely out of control since December.

I know it wouldn't fix anything. It doesn't matter what I eat; he doesn't care about me. A couple of my friends, when I say things like that, have tried to tell me I should use it as a reason to lose weight so if I see him again I can rub how good I look in his face. I gave up on trying to explain it to them, but that's stupid in several ways: 1) I probably won't see him. 2) That's incredibly high school. 3) He loves big women. His ex before me was even bigger. Losing weight would make me less attractive to him.

Another of my friends is completely "in love" after dating a guy for about two weeks, and keeps talking about how "it's scary to give your heart to someone completely." I want to fucking throttle her every time she says something like that, especially when I just poured my heart out about how much I'm hurting and she answers with, "I wish I could make it better. I just had the most amazing day with my boyfriend and then we had sex all night. But it's scary to give your heart to someone completely." Gah.

And another one, when she asks how I am and she can tell I'm sad, thinks it's appropriate to lecture me about how I met him. We met on a sex site. I wasn't looking for a boyfriend, he wasn't looking for a girlfriend. It just ended up that way. But this friend always jumps in to, "I just think you were really looking in the wrong place. You can't expect to have a real relationship with someone you meet like that!" Never mind that it wasn't supposed to be any more than sex. He's the one who took it anywhere else -- and if as soon as we'd had sex he'd changed, that would be one thing. I'd write him off as a jackass and move along. But for two months after he kept telling me how I was so special, how he couldn't wait to see me, how he was so glad he knew me. And I've tried to tell her, every time, that I'm well aware you don't go on a sex site intending to find a boyfriend. But instead of acknowledging that however we met, I've had my heart broken ... she just lectures. I've hardly talked to her the last couple of months because of it.

Time for this stream of consciousness to end, because I have to take my grandmother to a chemotherapy appointment. But at least I spent the time typing instead of binging.

Holy shit, I'm alive.

Not that I expect anybody is reading this. I don't care much. I just need an outlet for some things. I have a regular blog, but the thing is there are a small handful of real-life friends who know about it, and so I have to censor myself a bit which means leaving certain topics untouched. Actually, I know there are at least a couple of regular readers of my regular blog that I've seen on weight loss blogs as well, so it's entirely possible I'll be recognized by someone, but that's okay.

In the nearly-a-year since I last wrote, a whole fuckload of things has happened. I had sex for the first time in four years, with only my second partner ever, who became a regular fuck buddy. I made a wedding cake for 300 guests. I realized I like pain and submission with sex. My mom came home from Mexico, sans her husband but plus two kids that have no relation to her. I had a couple of one-night stands and went to a strip club and discovered I'm a little bisexual. I started arranging the WMW threesome my fuck buddy wanted and he abruptly quit answering my texts and then blocked my number. I turned 30. I had a kind of mental breakdown during the holiday season, anxiety attacks and severe depression and all sorts of fun stuff. I got a new, non-restaurant job, a full-time desk job, and started gaining more weight. I met a guy and started dating him, and even though he was the opposite of anyone I ever thought I'd fall in love with .... I totally did fall in love for the second time in my life. I got forced out of my restaurant job that I was trying to keep as a second income. I gained some more weight. The aforementioned second love dumped me. I continued gaining weight. I interviewed for an absolutely perfect, wonderful job and didn't get it. My mother had her thyroid removed after months of hormonally-induced insanity. My grandma had a stroke. I found out my teenaged cousin had been raped. My boyfriend sort of came back for a few weeks. I was forced into a promotion at work that involved moving to a department I fucking hated. The boyfriend left again. My grandma got diagnosed with terminal cancer. I gained some more weight. I had a threesome with a married couple. I filed for bankruptcy because of the $18k in medical/credit card/miscellaneous other shit debt I had left after almost ten years paying off the first $16k of it. I quit my job because I hated it/they were going to fire me over attendance issues anyway because three different cars kept breaking down during my 100-mile-per-day commute.

So at the moment I'm broken-hearted, unemployed, broke, depressed, and some unspecified number of pounds heavier. I'm wearing a size 24 jeans, which is bigger than I've ever been. I've gained a lot of weight in my stomach and in front of my ribs, not at all proportional. I really haven't looked at the scale because it's depressing. I can't even guess how fucking huge the number is. But I know that at some point I'll want to know. So I got on the scale and I pointed my iPhone at it, took a picture, and sent it to a friend of mine without ever looking at it. That's what I'm going to keep doing over the next few weeks.

I have nothing carby and unhealthy left in my house. I have meat and cheese and eggs and fruits and vegetables, and there's no excuse for me to buy anything unhealthy. I'm also starting to really want to exercise, which is crazy - I've never wanted to exercise, at least not in the last 11 years, because all my jobs have involved being on my feet 40 hours a week. But for the last seven months, the only exercise I've gotten has been sex, and to my surprise I'm starting to feel physically restless. Of course, that's at odds with my depression. It's also not something I'm likely to act on any time soon because of the blazing fucking heat this summer - I can't afford a gym membership, the temperature in my house is never below 80, and I don't live somewhere safe enough to go for a walk late at night when it's tolerably cool. Sigh.

But, for now, I'll start with the eating properly. Stay tuned, nobody who cares.