Ownin' up and all.

Despite spending the last week feeling like shit, I still ate a bunch of junk. Sometimes. Other times, I ate well. So .. nothing changed much. I weighed myself today, a few days late but I couldn't be bothered before. I always weigh myself in the morning, like most people I think, and I don't get up early enough to deal with weighing myself. Not that stepping on the scale takes very long, of course, but I don't keep my scale sitting out. I put it in a really inconvenient place, specifically to prevent myself from getting on it all the time and obsessing over the number.

Anyway, I dug it out today, and was surprised to find that I haven't gained back everything I lost. I really thought I had, because I've felt so bloated and gross. But somehow I've only gained back two pounds. I suppose it's because it hasn't been all binging, all the time. I'm just glad I didn't do any more damage.

I've got another job, and one that's a very regular schedule and even regular hours. I'm suddenly on the same schedule as the normal working world, for the first time in my life. I even have weekends off. I went to the store last night and got a bunch of stuff to pack my lunches for the week so I don't end up going down the street for junk food, and I also have stuff to eat for dinner at home. I'm as prepared to eat properly for the week as I can be.

Damn me and my emotional eating.

Some meals are good, some are bad. Yesterday was really bad. Nothing has really happened to trigger this, at least that I can put my finger on. It's really frustrating me. I can't even babble about it trying to process whatever is wrong because it's so vague. Maybe I'm just feeling generally overwhelmed? I don't know.

I'm am pretty bummed out that I've given up on baking. Everything I've made for the last year has been a fucking disaster; I've lost my touch (meanwhile, a friend of mine who never baked a fucking thing until I started is now promoting her baking business). Baking was the first thing I felt like I Wanted To Be When I Grow Up, sort of thing. So there are definitely some feelings of loss there. I keep thinking if it's making me unhappy to give up, I shouldn't give up .... and then I remember all the exploded cupcakes, the sunken cakes, the frostings that changed weird colors, the broken cake stand, etc., and I remember why.

Plus side: I got a job that (so far) I don't hate, and at a company that (so far) seems like they really treat their employees well. So that's really been a boost!

Color me surprised.

I had a feeling as soon as Blogger showed a massive spike in pageviews that Al had linked to me again. I'm not surprised that once again he's assuming things that aren't in the entry (never said a bad day of eating was 3500 calories, he added together example of different days; I don't believe I've even stated my height which is not five feet), assuming I'm lying (If I weren't "coming clean" about the treats etc I wouldn't have explicitly listed the junk I was eating), and using the old one-size-fits-all-calories are everything method came up with 7,500 calories a day for a week to gain five pounds (another figure he pulled out of thin air, when did I say anything about five pounds in a week).

Really, Al's response is an absolutely perfect example of the point of what I said in that entry: People assume if you're fat, you're eating massive amounts of food all the time. It doesn't matter what you say. As I've said repeatedly, I have absolutely had my binges. Plenty of them, in fact. I was not eating healthful things. No denying that. But the plain truth is that my average daily intake of strictly calories is nowhere near what people would assume by looking at me. I'm not "lying to myself and posting it for the world to see." I have no reason to lie to myself. I am fully aware of my size, my eating choices, and their consequences. I have no reason to lie to anyone reading this completely anonymous blog. But, again, I'm fat, and my statements don't tally up with the old calories-are-everything belief, so I must be lying. Or too stupid to realize what I'm putting in my own mouth, or too deluded, or whatever. It couldn't possibly be that there's more to weight and metabolism than strictly calories, nope. Couldn't be that I have blood sugar and insulin resistance issues, and the consistent intake of sugar was keeping my insulin chronically high which prevented any fat from leaving my cells (because, you know, that's one of the things that insulin does). I must be just a liar. Even though I'm stating that the choices I made caused that situation, I'm still not "owning up" to it somehow.

Now obviously a lot of people have lost weight, and even a lot of it, strictly by counting calories. I'm not saying it can't or doesn't work. I'm saying it's not the only factor for everybody. For somebody with insulin resistance, eating low-calorie and high-carb at the same time is going to make weight loss exceedingly difficult. Even if you need fuel, if there's a bunch of residual insulin in your bloodstream because of  massive sugar spike that's only very slowly coming down, it's going to block the mechanism that moves fat from the cells for use. Eventually the insulin level will come down, and fat from cells would begin to be released -- unless you eat a bunch of carbohydrate again, of course, which is likely to happen when you start feeling tired and cranky because you're running on empty because your body can't access your stored fat for energy. Now, if your metabolism is functioning normally and you don't have any issues with insulin resistance, that's a different situation.

In any event, it doesn't really bother me on a personal level. I've had worse things said about me by nicer people, as my father would say. What bothers me are the societal assumptions about overweight people, which is what I said in the first place.


I spent Friday, Saturday, and Sunday up to my eyeballs in wedding cake baking, which sort of turned into a disaster. Things were fine until the cake stand broke. And there was no air conditioning in the hall and the bride flatly refused to have fondant over the buttercream, even though it would have looked much nicer and withstood the heat better than smoothed buttercream (and been a hell of a lot easier on me). I wasn't happy with how the cake looked, but at least everyone told me it tasted great.

I haven't been paying a goddamn bit of attention to what I've been eating since .. er .... going on a week, I don't remember exactly. No excuse for it other than just not caring. I definitely feel shitty, though. My allergies are worse, my moods are unstable due to the see-sawing blood sugar (wheee, let's not eat anything for 24 hours and then gulp down a burger and fries!), and food doesn't taste as good. I'm going home tomorrow (wedding was 100 miles away), and will even have a little money for grocery shopping, so I'll be stocking up on meat, cheese, fruits, and vegetables again. I'm not expecting to have any weight loss this month, but I would like to undo any damage I've done this week and at least maintain the 12 pound loss from last month.

Just plain depressed.

Depressed about the way some people have been treating me, depressed about my job/financial situation .... one day I ate nothing but macaroni and cheese. Yesterday was a perfect day. Who knows what today will be. So far I don't want to eat at all. We'll see.

Feels pointless.

I haven't been awake long today, but so far I just feel like it's completely pointless to try to eat well. I don't feel any different, any better. With the overwhelming abundance of crappy, quick, easy, sometimes delicious food, the idea of me avoiding it for long enough to make any true difference seems utterly laughable. And even if I do, then it just means more time avoiding it to maintain that difference. It all seems like a epic waste of time today. I'm assuming it's another by-product of PMS. But it makes me want to binge. That urge got worse when I went to try to donate plasma and was told I was put on the nationwide permanent deferral list -- because two of their employees couldn't find the same fucking vein I donated out of for literally months on end at the center in my old town. I was wicked pissed. I needed that money.

By the time I went to Walmart to get a money order for my rent, I was all set to get a box of macaroni and cheese and some cheap ice cream. I even wandered the food aisles a bit and then just left because I it wouldn't fix what was wrong. I feel bad about myself, but making myself feel physically sick wouldn't change that. I'm pissed at life, but ice cream won't make it better.

Of course, really the deciding factor was really that I'd just sucked down so much water my stomach felt uncomfortably full. If not for that I might be munching down on some potato chips right now -- I'm craving them, which is really weird since I almost never eat chips.

Ugh. Scratch all that. My second trip out did not go well.

I feel badly about myself.

I took a long shower, and this is what I realized: I feel like shit about myself. Nothing to do with weight or eating; I just feel like I'm ... not good. I don't feel like I have any particular talents, like I'm particularly smart or funny or anything. I hate it when I feel like this. It may just be PMS, but right now I just feel like I'm completely useless. I feel like a total loser.

Speaking of PMS, I'm interested to see what my period is like this month. Last month's was the lightest I've ever had in the 19 years I've been dealing with that pointless (for me) monthly cycle. (It really pisses me off every month when I'm put through pain and discomfort because of a capability of my body I will never willingly utilize.) I've been on the same birth control since November, and the only thing that has changed is how I was eating. I know insulin can affect a lot of the hormonal processes in the body, so I'm wondering if that might be a nice side benefit to ex-naying the carbs. We'll see.

I did okay today, although I did use all my carbs at one meal. I had a jar of alfredo sauce and some chicken I'd sauteed in olive oil, and I was craving pasta in a wicked way. I could have gone to the store for a box of Dreamfields LC pasta, but I should eat what I have since monetary funds are severely limited. After battling the craving all day, I decided that I could have real pasta ... if I made it myself. Well, that stalled it for another hour or so, but I really wanted some damn noodles. So I made up a very small batch of pasta dough! I wasn't sure it was going to work; the recipe I'd looked at said to knead until the dough was smooth, but I wasn't sure I'd be able to tell when it was smooth enough.

As I was kneading the dough, and examining the texture, I realized I knew exactly what it should look like. I'd never made pasta on my own, but I'd made it with my mother when I was very little. It always amazes me the things that have stuck in my head from those experiences. I made royal icing to decorate some cupcakes once, and the smell brought back ... not exactly memories, they were a little too vague for that, but a definite feeling and familiarity. One time at the first restaurant I worked at, somebody asked what the difference was because lemon meringue and lemon cream pie. I was kind of shocked when I heard an explanation of what meringue is come out of my mouth, because I didn't know I knew. The pasta dough was another example of that. I should have sliced it a little more thinly before cooking, but other than that it was quite tasty and hit the spot. I should have spread my carbs out more through the day, but I was still within limits.

Either tomorrow or Sunday I'm going to go prostitute my blood, as a friend of mine calls it. One of the few good things about being fat is that I get paid a much higher rate for my blood plasma than skinny folks! We'll see how it goes. I never had a problem at the donation center in my old town, but the one here I stopped going to because they could never find my damn vein! In retrospect, I wonder if it's because I'd gained about twenty or thirty pounds since I was going to the other center. I've lost about half of that, so we'll see if that helps. I really hate doing that; it's not painful, but it's boring. My free arm gets tired from holding up my Nook! But especially the first five times as a "new" donor, it's worth it. Assuming they can jam the bigass needle in my arm in the right spot.

Laughing myself silly -- and also irritated.

Oh, the joys of blog-browsing. Apparently being fat is a sin. Not that I believe in God - but if there is a benevolent being, I really have a hard time believe he gives a damn about how fat my ass is. And I don't think it "sets a bad example for the children." I had a Mormon friend once who was about a size 14; she didn't have rolls, didn't have a sagging belly, she was just all-over sort of solid. I'd guess she was maybe 140, 160 tops at 5'4". She went on a crash diet and told me it was because "I don't want my daughter thinking it's okay to be fat."

I sat there and looked at her in shock as she kept talking about it, amazed that at a little under half my weight she would say that in front of me -- especially with the amount of time she and her daughter spent around me and our other friend who was bigger than me. She noticed my expression and quickly started trying to backpedal, saying it wasn't okay for her, she didn't feel good, she meant unhealthy not fat, she didn't mean anything against anyone else. Maybe she even thought she meant it, but I'd heard enough of her comments to know that although she loved us, "fat people" weren't okay. That sort of attitude pisses me the fuck off. One of the many reasons we aren't friends anymore.

I've seen several posts by people detailing what their "typical day" pre-diet was. Al's description of a typical day ingesting 13,000 calories stunned me.  I'll be honest, it makes me ill thinking about eating that much. (And before any of Al's followers jump my shit, he said he'd be sick eating that much too, and I'm not judging it at all, just saying I personally couldn't eat that much.) Nobody would ever believe it because after all, I am a fatty, but I highly doubt I've ever eaten that much in one day, let alone have that be a typical day. A more typical day for me, if I'm just sort of screwing around, is a big glass of milk, about 20 ounces, a few hours after getting up. Then maybe I'd go get my favorite chips and queso and a burrito from Qdoba some time in the evening ... and that would be it. That's about 2000 calories. When I was working at the restaurant, I'd usually only eat the end of my shift, and then I'd have some boneless wings (1500 calories if I had a LOT of ranch) or maybe a burger and fries (probably about 1500). Or sometimes I'd just have a dessert for dinner.

Healthy? Fucking hell, no. Do I binge sometimes and consume 3000 calories at one sitting? Hell yes - but again, not normally, not even often, and typically it was all I'd eaten that day. Some times I won't eat anything all day because I just don't feel like it. I'm in no way shape or form saying I was eating well, I'm not trying to say my weight isn't a result of what I was eating -- because carbs totally fuck me up, and of course that's what's quick and easy to make or buy. It's just that every once in a while I'll realize that people look at me and probably assume that I am eating thousands upon thousands of calories a day, that all I think about is food, and that at any moment I might have "sausage gravy" on my face as Al likes to say.

I don't really have a point, just rambling. I guess I just object to the cultural stereotype that all fat people are uncontrollably stuffing their faces all day long. I think it's ironic that we look at the skinny people we know who stuff themselves at every opportunity and say how they're lucky they can eat whatever they want -- but a fat person isn't conversely unlucky, they're just a gluttonous sow.

In other news, I'm back to being fucking jobless. The place I worked doesn't allow any absences during the training period, and I had the bad luck to get sick. I went despite gagging and vomiting constantly, threw up in the parking lot after barely avoiding puking in my car halfway to work (a trip which takes five minutes), and that was that. Motherfucker.

And then I forgot to post this yesterday, which btw was a spot-on day of eating.

I confuse myself.

I don't understand my psyche at all. While I was unemployed and had no prospects, my dad was in the hospital, and I thought I would never hear from the man I love again .... eating properly was pretty easy. I had a few days where I stumbled, but generally I was okay. Now my dad is home and much better, I'm working, and I heard from and even saw the boy again ... and I've been on an emotional eating bender. What the fuck? What is wrong with me? How does life heading in an upward direction trigger this kind of stupid crap?

Today I've managed, although mostly because I've been sick and haven't eaten much. I don't have anything left in the house I shouldn't eat, so tomorrow is looking up.

Well, this has been interesting.

It's been a crazy few days; there's the new job, which still largely sucks but is at least a job. Just exhausting me. Plus I was having a really hard time because there's a guy in my class who reminded me of the boy just enough to make me sad. And he kept talking to me, too,

And then my dad got put in the hospital again. First they thought he had c-diff after his time in the burn unit. Then it was friggen' e. coli. Then he wasn't responding to the meds like he should have, so they did a colonoscopy. Considering my grandmother's colon cancer I was terrified. Found out today he does not have cancer! He's got ulcerative colitis. Sucks, but much better than it could have been.

And then ... the boy is back. I don't know in what ... capacity, I guess the word would be. He had a fairly good excuse for part of the time I didn't hear from him. He literally wasn't able to answer. But he also knew it was going to happen and didn't warn me. And he left me hanging for weeks after that was over. So I'm not very happy about that. Of course, I wasn't his girlfriend at the time, so I suppose he didn't owe me any explanations. Other than he knows from experience that it fucks me up when someone vanishes and ignores me. So I'm still a little hurt, and I still don't really trust him. I'm sure he'll be around for a while and then flake the fuck out on me again. But I love him and couldn't refuse to talk to him or see him. Well, obviously I could have, but I didn't want to. I fully realize the idiocy of this, but right now I feel like it's worth it because after spending one night with him I feel better than I have in months.

Anyway, a side effect of all the changes/emotional ups-and-downs this week is that I had another burrito freak-out on ... Tuesday? I forget. Anyway. I've had one meal a day that was waaaaay too high in carbs, every day. Except yesterday, because yesterday I hardly ate because I was too upset/confused/excited/nervous.

Some of the issue was lack of planning, too. If I don't pack my lunch the night before, I'm going to end up buying junk because if I come home I'll have a hard time going back to work plus I just get distracted and don't eat anyway and then I'm so hungry later I eat things I know damn good and well I shouldn't.

I have the weekend off, so hopefully that'll help me get back on track by being at home and eating what I have here.

Blurred days and weigh-in.

Sunday I spent most of the day in bed because I didn't feel well again, after being awake all night suffering from my pizza binge. Then I loaded up my stuff and my dogs and did the two hour drive back home. I didn't want to leave. I hated leaving my cousin alone, and I hated coming back to going to work at a job I knew I'd hate.

Predictably, I couldn't sleep last night after spending all day in bed -- even though I was exhausted from feeling sick for two days (headfirst first, then intestines). So at 5:45 I headed off to my first day, and it was worse than I anticipated. This place is insane. Lots of crazy policies that serve no apparent purpose, completely overbearing, it's like they're big brother. There are seriously security cameras fucking everywhere. It's kind of creepy. The building is set up poorly and I've never seen a place that provides less desk space and more employees per foot on the floor. They don't pay enough for me to put up with this crap! I'm really going to try to give it a fair shake, or at least make it through the week so I"ll have the rest of my rent money, but beyond that ... I don't know if I can hang. The basic job is soul-sucking enough without feeling like I'm under a microscope like that.

I came home and crashed from about four to midnight, even though I meant to only sleep for an hour or so. But that's okay, at least I slept. When I got up I was going to send my friend another scale picture and ask her to tell my what my loss was, but I figured I'm ready to handle the numbers. I didn't think I would yet. But I guess her telling me my weight was "just under" 300 pounds sort of prepared me.

Anyway, I pulled up the scale photo I'd sent her, and faced my fat. When I took the photo, my weight was 295.5 pounds. I then spent the next three weeks binging and lounging depressedly on my couch, not even working. So I'm sure by the time I actually motivated myself, I'd hit at least 300. But I didn't think to take another photo, so we'll got with 295.5 as my official starting weight. As of today, I weight 283.5, so that's a loss of 12 pounds. Not too shabby.

There are a number of things I need to be careful I don't succumb to now, though. First, I need to absolutely not start jumping on the scale all the time, because I know how that affects my little brain. Second, I didn't really try all that hard this month. I mean, I behaved most days, but I had the pizza incident, and overall I had six days that were less than perfect. And I don't expect perfection from myself, but I need to be sure I don't start thinking "if I lost twelve pounds in a month and screwed around that much, I can have a burrito today too, what's the harm!" It's very easy for me to fall in to that kind of thinking.

I'm not sure if the horrible job is going to make that better or worse, honestly. The fact that they have some restaurant come in to sell lunch and dinner just about every day will probably make it a challenge. Also the fact that it's two minutes from Perkins (which has that pie I so love) and Olive Garden, and it's five minutes from McDonald's. I'm planning to take lunch every day (at least as long as I can manage to stand their overbearing crap), but I know a day will come when I'm pissed the fuck off and I'm going to want to spend my lunch hour -- or right after work -- chowing down on some breadsticks and pasta. Of course, this job will pay my bills and nothing else, including food, so I suppose that won't be much of an issue.

I'm sort of surprised I had as few "bad" days as I did. In the past, one day of carb gorging usually ended up as several more before I reined myself in. I think some of it is that in the past, I've usually tried to squeeze in the kind of crap I shouldn't be eating, just within my "carb limit." And/or I've been really strict about counting things -- like weighing my carrots and stuff to try to account for every gram, which just gets wearing and time-consuming and makes me obsessive, which never leads anywhere good.

This time, I've been more relaxed. Yeah, sometimes I've still eaten stuff I shouldn't (hello, pizza), or I've used up all my carbs for the day (not that I'm adhering to a strict number) by having a burger with the bun. But generally speaking when I say more relaxed, I mean that I'm not obsessing over "I can only have half a pear because a full pear is 25g of carb!" or "I can only have a half a cup of carefully measures strawberries!" or "I can only have six baby carrots!"

Yesterday I just had a glass of milk before I left for the horrible job, just to have something in my stomach. For lunch I had some grape tomatoes, some baby carrots, a chicken breast and swiss sandwich on a sandwich thin, and a nectarine. I had some more milk in the afternoon, and was planning on cooking some chicken for dinner but instead I fell asleep. Not the best day, I probably didn't eat enough, but I didn't wake up hungry. I'll probably pack about the same lunch for today, maybe some strawberries instead of the nectarine. Or instead of the sandwich I might have my meat and cheese on NutThin crackers. Since I'm already up I might scramble some eggs for breakfast ... or not. The idea sort of nauseates me. I'm weird about eggs.

I've been eating a lot of fruit; I should probably eat more vegetables but god, do I dislike them. I like baby carrots; every once in a while I can deal with a salad, but not often enough to buy lettuce because it goes bad; I like tomatoes (of course not technically a vegetable, and I only like certain kinds anyway); sometimes I like broccoli and cauliflower; I can do green beans if they're just barely cooked so they're still crunchy. That's about it. I try to broaden my horizons and try squash and radishes and stuff and I just hate them all! They all taste really bitter to me.

Ugh. An hour until I have to get dressed and go to that job. I should probably shower.

Days and days.

Nothing noteworthy happened today, other than I couldn't fall asleep until about 9:30 this morning and when I finally did, I managed to sleep for five straight hours. That's like a miracle for me. Wondering if I might be able to fall asleep just a tiny bit earlier tonight for a change.

I've spent most of the day reading one thing or the other. A lot of it has been from a blog by a doctor who's written a lot about low-carbing. I knew he wrote a blog but I never had read it before. Lots of interesting stuff.

Holy hell, I actually fell asleep at about 11:30 last night and slept (more or less) until 5:30. That's the first time I've slept at night in months. Of course, I woke up with a screaming headache and went back to sort-of sleep until 3:30 because the pain just kept getting worse and worse despite staggering up for pain killers, allergy meds, potassium, and magnesium. I had a small glass of milk, a hunk of cheese, and a peach, too. When I finally dragged myself up, I started thinking about the short time I was awake yesterday, and I realized I didn't drink that much water. So I was probably just seriously dehydrated. I've had some turkey and cheese and some NutThin crackers and several glasses of water, and I do feel a little better. The pain is starting to recede back to once spot, at least, whereas it was squeezing my whole head before.

I ate pizza and ice cream today. Fuck. There was no reason to do that. There was plenty of other stuff I could have eaten. My cousin ordered pizza and I just dove right in. And then had a "what the hell, already fucked up" moment and had some ice cream. Not very much of it, but any is too much. Dammit. I'm paying for it all now though, I've spent most of the last couple of hours in the bathroom. My intestines are not happy with me! I guess I can hope that some of the dreadful carbs just passed on through!

I'm heading home tomorrow, finally; I've enjoyed my week here, because I always like spending time with my cousin, and it's been sort of like a mental vacation. My angst about the boy has been way down (although I suspect when I go home and back to my normal life it'll come rushing back), I've done a lot of reading. Haven't done any non-blog writing, which I really had planned to do, but just never felt like it. It will be nice to be home, though. We're a close family so I don't feel uncomfortable in their house, but of course I'm more comfortable in mine.

Of course, I'm absolutely not looking forward to starting my new job at 5:45 in the fucking morning on Monday. Why the fuck do these fucking call centers do their training classes at such stupid times? It's goddamn idiotic. That's not when any of the regular shifts start, so what's the point? This job is just going to be hell. I just have to keep trying to find something less hellish. Like stabbing myself repeatedly in the kneecap with an icepick.

Rambling on down the road.

A friend took me out for dinner tonight, and I found myself mindlessly munching on chips while we talked. That's the downside of having spent so many years not restricting my eating at all: sometimes I truly forget I'm not supposed to eat something. Of course, I wouldn't trade that for the self-hatred, self-flagellation, and general fuck-up-ness I lived with daily before. Anyway, I stopped eating the chips when I realized it, so that was good.

I've been feeling sort of mindless hunger all day. I just had some Almond NutThins crackers with turkey and cheese, but I still feel like eating and I don't really know why. I feel a little bit of physical hunger, but mostly it's just the sort of gnawing urge to .... gnaw. I'm going to chalk it up to boredom or hormones or something. Or it could be from the carbs/wheat in the chips, maybe. There is definitely something about certain carbs that trigger stupid hunger in me. Potatoes not so much, rice not so much, even desserts don't really. But bread and bread-type things totally do me in.

A couple of interesting things occurred to me yesterday. The first is that at this time of the month, I usually have an absolutely gigantic cystic acne bump on one side of my chin or the other. It hangs around for a week or so, generally healing up and turning back in to normal skin about a week before another pops up. Well, this month I don't have one of those things! Oh, I still have a little bit of acne happening, most likely because I haven't had the money to get the face wash and lotion that really make my skin look good. But the Great Red Spot didn't put in an appearance this month.

Also, and this is slightly embarrassing to even admit ... but, well, I'm sure plenty of you have encountered this before. Especially when it's hot, or if I wear heat-trapping pants, I get this sort of rash-like thing under my stomach. It hurts like a burn when it's exposed to air, but it also hurts when anything touches it. And it's a wet rash, that really doesn't smell nice. The only thing that helps it is putting ice packs under my stomach, or coating the entire area with calamine lotion. I figured it was just a rash until I had a bad bout of it going in to sinus surgery, and it totally cleared up for a while after the lovely course of antibiotics I had afterward. That was when I figured out it was some sort of bacterial/yeasty thing. I've always cleaned under my flab, because I hate to be sticky and sweaty at all, but it would still happen when it was really hot out. I figured out that if every other day or so I wore bikini-style underwear that go under my stomach, it would sort of draw the moisture away and it wouldn't happen. If I wore briefs for a while, especially in bad heat, it would start to crop up a little.

I didn't realize it under yesterday, but in the last month I haven't had any issues, and I haven't been wearing the bikini underwear because I've only got a couple of pairs left and I don't know where one of them has ended up anyway. And I haven't had a single problem! Not even the day I went to the rodeo in jeans and lovely summer heat.

The only thing that's changed has been what I eat. The lack of giant acne makes sense; the other I guess is because .. um ... I don't know. Better body chemistry in general, maybe? Anyway, I'm certainly not complaining! Wonder what else will happen ... or not happen. I know a lot of people say they sleep better when they eat better, or that they're more energetic, but that never happens to me. Not anymore, at least. The first and second times I seriously restricted my carbohydrate intake, I felt like shit for a week and then I felt fucking amazing. I still remember exceedingly clearly one evening when I was 17 (the first time I tried eating this way), and I was running across the lawn to my car and I felt so light and so incredible, I'd never felt better in my life!

Sadly, that doesn't happen when I cut out carbs now, and hasn't for a long time. I had the misfortune to contract mono my second semester at college, and goddamn, did that stuff fuck me up long-term. Before then, I'd sleep four hours a night or so and have plenty of energy. I ran around like your typical normal teenager (and was still fat). Then I caught mono, and spent six months sleeping about 20 hours a day, unable to wake up or function properly even though it seemed like I'd had such a mild case of it. The doctor I went to didn't even diagnose me with mono; it wasn't until my boyfriend got so sick I ended up taking him to the emergency room that we figured out I even had it.

Anyway, since then I'm just chronically fucking tired. I thought it was because I was working too hard with school, etc. Then I thought it was just because I was fat. I dropped fifty pounds and was still exhausted all the time. I was exercising a lot too, and never got that endorphin rush or increased energy most people report. I had my thyroid checked, and my blood sugar, and my iron levels, and all sorts of stuff, and nothing ever came up as a reason for my exhaustion. I got on Prozac for my depression, which didn't help my physical exhaustion but at least keeps my brain running okay. I'll seriously be on that shit forever. I had sinus surgery to correct a bunch of issues, which did help a little, but not much. I had a sleep study done. I've had the blood tests re-done every year or so, and they're always normal. It's incredibly fucking frustrating.

Man, I ramble sometimes. The point is that I don't feel physically any different since changing my eating. It would be easier to do this if I did feel better. It's annoying.

Forcing myself to eat and drink.

I don't feel hungry at all today. It's to do with my period, but I know that if I don't eat something, and something with protein, then later on my stupid body is going to start screeching for food and I'll be more likely to make idiotic choices. I also don't feel thirsty, and in fact feel bloated and gross and like every sip I take just sloshes around in my stomach when I move, but I'm making myself slowly steadily hydrate.

Really all I want to do is go back to sleep, because the a/c makes it nice and chilly in here, my cousin is just studying anyway, and I'm bored and sad and always tired anyway. So cuddling into some blankets and drifting off sounds just about the right speed. Of course, I'd just end up thinking about things I shouldn't and getting upset and never actually falling asleep. It's been weeks and weeks since I've been able to just crawl in to bed and sleep. The only way I can fall asleep is if I'm absolutely exhausted, to the point that my eyes are burning, and I either watch tv or read until my brain just shuts off. Otherwise, no matter how tired I am, I start thinking, and moping, and crying. It's ridiculous and it's pissing me off. But my brain saying "this is stupid, why are you upset about someone who doesn't care about you" doesn't seem to have any effect on my stupid emotions. If anything this crap seems to be getting worse instead of better. Time is supposed to make the pain less, dammit, not make me more lovesick and stupid! Grrr. I suppose it's because he didn't actually tell me it was over ... he just stopped answering me. That's just an extra mindfuck right there.

I got Blue Diamond Almond NutThins today, ranch and pepperjack flavors. I figured having something crunchy to munch on would be helpful with the pretzels and chips taunting me. So I'll slice up some cheese and have cheese and crackers, and it shall be loverly. I also got some more strawberries, some lunch meat, and some straws. My water intake has been lower than usual the last couple of days because I don't like drinking without a straw. I don't really know why. It doesn't hurt my teeth or anything. Maybe it's just because I like to chew on my straws all the time. They're always all mangled. Everybody at the restaurant always knew which drink was mine!

I don't physically feel like eating, but I keep finding myself wandering in to the kitchen for something to munch on. It's stupid. I wonder if it's because I didn't have much protein, or much to eat at all, yesterday, or if it's just boredom.

I was writing a couple of days ago about my aunt and cousins' eating habits, and my aunt's fondness for diet trends. Well, my cousin, who is 17, informed me that she's trying not to eat gluten because every time she eats wheat she feels ill. Which is something she's never mentioned before. And I've noticed a lot of things labeled "gluten free!" in their house, from bread to cereal. Now, I don't think that wheat is necessarily a good thing for humans to be eating. But I do find the timing of this suspicious ... considering my aunt's stack of books by her bed is something called "Gutbusters," some diet recipe book, and a book called "Wheat Belly." I suspect she's on a quest to lose weight again, and has been blathering to her daughter about the evils of wheat. She does that sort of thing a lot.

"Wheat Belly" is only a couple of hundred pages once you take out the recipes and sample meal plans, so I figured I'd give it a read tonight. The author seems to contradict himself a lot. At one point he says excess weight causes diabetes. A few pages later, he instead says high carb intake/chronically high insulin levels are to blame. He says animals products are very acidic and can lead to bone loss, but then of course recommends them because of cutting out wheat.

He makes some valid points about how what we call wheat today is genetically different from the first grains cultivated. He says that it was around the 1950s that the dwarf strain of wheat we consume now was created and became widespread, and says that's when the problems he associates with wheat began, and really took off in the eighties when the government started in on the "low fat, high complex carb" crap. But that theory assumes that the change in wheat was the only change to the food supply, whereas the introduction of high fructose corn syrup, highly processed foods, and a lot of other things have come about in the last 60 years too. There's a lot of information about celiac disease and its correlation with other conditions, which was interesting.

Overall, though, it seems like in terms of health benefits the author was really saying "carbohydrates are bad. Wheat is just extra bad!" because he talks a lot about insulin and its effects on the body. But it was an interesting enough read.

Now it's the wee hours of the morning, and as usual I'm tired and seriously doubt I'll be able to sleep even though I'm tired. I fell asleep for a few minutes while I was reading earlier, but was in a weird position on the couch so didn't stay that way unfortunately. I might at least crawl in to bed with my Nook and see if I can read myself to sleep.

The ice cream is calling me ....

(Huge rambling post ahead.)

I was moving things around in the freezer trying to make room for a bag of ice, and I found a flavor of ice cream that I actually looooove. Dammit. I'll admit, I grabbed a spoon and had one delicious bite of toffee cookie and fudge peace sign wrapped in creamy goodness before I stuffed it back in the freezer. But now I know it's there.

Not that I'm at all hungry, which means it would be even more pointless to eat it. I'm just depressed about the boy, and my period is about to start, and I'm sort of bored. None of those are good enough reason to eat it, of course. I brushed my teeth and started drinking diet Orange Crush soda to get the taste out of my mouth and try to forget about it.

I've also been doing my daily blog reading. It never ceases to amaze me how many different ideas there are out there about proper nutrition and proper "dieting." I hate that word. Anyway, it's just incredible how many plans are out there. And of course I'm not going to try to debate what's "wrong" or "right" or anything; to each his/her own. It's just funny to me that something that probably 50% of the western world is actively trying to do or thinking about doing (losing weight) has no hard and fast answers. Yeah, yeah, yeah, calories in/calories out, except the body isn't a closed and simple system and some people process different foods with different degrees of tolerance. It's just interesting, is all.

There are a lot of great inspirational blogs out there, and then some that I can't even stand to read because they're so whiny. Which probably sounds rich coming from me, with all my bitching about the boy, but I mean more "pity me because I'm so fat and it's so hard" whining. I have no sympathy for anybody fat -- because I don't think they fucking need it. If they let their size interfere with their lives, then that sucks for them, but unless they have an actual physical ailment that prevents them from walking or something, there's no reason for it. Yeah, society discriminates, it can be hard to find nice clothes, etc. But none of that should stop you from living!

One thing that's been bugging me lately when a blogger that berates another blogger for something and then goes and does the exact same thing. You can't be ragging on other people about how the idea of cheat days or carb cycling or taking a week off exercise or whatever is bullshit - and then post about doing the exact same thing! "You haven't lost enough weight by my standards to stop exercising for a week! By the way I'm taking a week off from my workout routine for reason X." or "I'm not a doctor and I don't know everything but what I'm doing is the only thing that works. Deal with it or you'll die a horrible disease-ridden death." Some people like that I do continue to read because they often have something funny or interesting to say, but that particular sort of thing gets under my skin.

None of any of that is important, of course. I'm just typing away to distract myself from ice cream. I'm also eating a peach. I dare.

I'm supposed to weigh myself on Sunday; it's That Day Of The Month. Unfortunately, it's also That Time Of The Month, so I may wait a couple of days to let the extra accumulated water weight go and let the intestinal issues settle. Sometimes that kind of stuff adds about five pounds to my weight, and at my first weigh-in I'd rather not see any higher of a number than I have to, thankyouverymuch. I'm pretty curious as to what the number will be, not that I'll be asking my scale-photo-keeping friend for it. I just want to know what the difference is. I'm not ready yet to know just how heavy a lardass I was/am, in numerical terms. It might not upset me, or it might completely unhinge me. So better to just let it slide for now, find out what the progress is, and at some point in the future I'll actually ask what my starting weight was.

Of course, I do like to fiddle with charts and graphs. I've already got a spreadsheet set up to track these things. At first I was going to just put in the number of pounds' worth of change every month, but then I decided that at the end it might be nice to have a chart that showed the actual values as they decreased. So I thought about putting in an estimate; I know I wasn't over 300, so at first I just plugged that in as a placeholder. But then I realized that means that every time I put in a weight change, I'm going to be associating it with a specific total weight which would be incorrect. So instead what I did was put in a ridiculous, huge number. I know I don't really weigh 1023435425 pounds. It's just a number to stick in for now, a number that means I won't be berating myself for being at a certain weight, and one that won't stick in my mind. Then, once I finally do ask my friend what my starting weight was, all I have to do is replace that number and the rest of the spreadsheet will adjust accordingly. I think it'll work well.

I'm trying to look at this week at my aunt's house as a sort of vacation. That would probably be easier if I hadn't been on "vacation" since the last day I worked, which was July 3rd. And it's not a vacation foodwise. But I'm trying to use the time away from my house to reset my moping, mourning, lovesick mind if possible. So far I haven't had much success and in fact spend a big chunk of today crying. Maybe if I'd been working I wouldn't have felt so terrible. Of course, I felt pretty awful when I was working, I was just too tired all the time to really feel it. An hour drive to work, eight hours on the phone dealing with jerkfaces, an hour lunch, an hour home (if I didn't have to stop anywhere) ... it was just too mentally fatiguing to process anything else.

And come Monday I'll be starting another hideous fucking call center job. I keep telling myself it's just for now, it won't be forever, it's just until I get my claws into something better. I was hoping that something better had been found, and I haven't gotten a yes or no yet on the job I want. But honestly, that's just not how my life works. There are people who breeze into great jobs, people who happen to meet their perfect person at the perfect time and fall in love, people who have things easy. And of course there are people who lose everything in house fires, their spouses leave them, their kids are in jail, all sorts of awful things. I'm neither; I'm in the middle. I do okay, but nothing ever falls in to my lap. I get the occasional break, but it seems on the occasions where the universe does throw me a bone everything gets fucked up in fairly short order. That's just life, I guess, and I'm not saying mine is horrible. I'm not saying anyone should feel sorry for me, or that I even feel sorry for myself (except about the boy). It's just the pattern of my life for the most part so I try to be realistic about it. Then again, I did once stumble and fall face-first into the most awesome and fun job I've ever had. And the company shut us down a year later. But it was a good year!

Carb hangover.

Today was unremarkable in every way, except for the fact that I felt fucking godawful after yesterday's little carb indulgence. My allergies have been worse and I've just felt generally ..... blah. I've done well so far not eating the few junky things in the house that sound good to me, mostly because of feeling so damn crappy!

Well, I guess it was bound to happen.

I woke up pissed the fuck off at the world, and that rapidly descended down into tearful misery. I did a bunch of errands, and then on my way home had a "fuck it all" moment and decided that god dammit, I wanted a freaking burrito. I wanted to sit in air conditioning, eat, drink Diet Coke, and read, and fuck everything else. So I went to Qdoba and I enjoyed the hell out of a burrito and an order of chips and queso. And I did enjoy them ... while I was chewing.

As soon as I stood up though, I realized I felt like I had a bowling ball in my belly. I had a crampy sort of feeling under the right side of my ribcage. A few hours later, I felt gassy and was spending a lot of time in the bathroom. That's what happens when you slam down 200g of carbohydrates after a monthish of behaving (or at least behaving better than that, for fuck's sake). I wasn't that sick, but it wasn't pleasant, and it wasn't worth it.

It was bad timing, too, because an hour or so after that I headed 100 miles south to stay at my aunt's house for a week with my cousin. This is bad because they chow carbs like nobody's business. It's worse than my dad's. There are things I can eat -- already here, plus what I brought -- but there's also a surplus of things I shouldn't eat.

This is where being really picky comes in handy, though! See, of all the junk in the house ... it seems I lucked into not liking most of it. I normally love macaroni and cheese, but they have this weird organic brand that tastes vaguely like cardboard. I love ice cream as much as the next fatty, but not the flavors they have. I didn't spot any cookies or cakes. The corn Chex cereal won't be a problem -- rice checks might have been, but I don't much like corn Chex. The tortillas they have are corn, another thing I'm not big on. They do have one bag of chips that look delicious (tuscan herb and parmesan) and two bags of pretzel bites. One is sour cream and onion flavored, so blech. The other is four cheese. I like Ramen noodles, but I don't wicked crave them. Nor any of the generic flavored rices or pasta packages. I'm sort of amazed.

It's always bugged me how my aunt and cousins eat. When my younger cousin was fourteen, she was on a swimming team so was practicing six days a week in addition to horseback riding, archery lessons, gym class, and being a growing adolescent. One day I watched her eat dry Cheerios and a banana for breakfast. For lunch she packed a fruit roll-up, some chips, and a thing of Ramen noodles. Dinner that night was spaghetti noodles with tomato sauce. The next day, she had the same breakfast. Lunch was a treacle sandwich (syrup on bread for anyone who doesn't know), some squishy fruit snack things, an apple, and some cheese-flavored crackers. Dinner was leftover spaghetti.

I don't remember what she ate the third day, but she came home complaining that her leg muscles were tired and hurting. I suggested maybe she needed some protein to maintain her muscles, and maybe some vitamins and minerals, since she'd had 99.9% empty carbs for at least three days. She looked at me and shrugged ... and had Ramen noodles for dinner. Ahrg.

Her sister wasn't much better then, and their mother .... well, let's just say she's got a shelf full of diet books, another full of workout videos, a bunch of unused gym equipment, and several bottles of "homeopathic" HGC "hormone" diet supplements. And eats just like her kids, all the time. With the addition of a respectable amount of alcohol.

Anyway, I was expecting there to be a lot more tempting awful crap, but I might just make it out of here in decent shape. I mean, I know that no matter what food surrounds me it's my choice what I eat. But it's definitely a lot easier to not eat Cheetos if they're nowhere near. Avoidance is definitely my key strategy!

Woke up empty.

I'm curiously numb today. Not sad about the lack of response to a pathetic text sent in the middle of the night. Not happy about ... whatever. Not angry about anything. I am full of nothing. And a pizza made on a low carb tortilla, and a bunch of water. And some cantaloupe.

Hey look, numb has been replaced by miserable. I think I spoke too soon yesterday about not binging because I knew it wouldn't help, because right now the idea of hopping in the car and scooting through McDonald's for chicken nuggets, french fries, and a chocolate-dipped cone sounds like the best thing ever. What will it solve? Nothing. Will it make me feel better? No. Why do it? I don't know exactly. It just sounds like a really good idea right now. I've been trying to distract myself from feeling rotten with tv, books, games, Facebook, texting friends (tried to get someone to go out with me but nobody wanted to), and just general stuff but it isn't happening.

I keep feeling my fat, reminding myself that it's more squishy than it used to be, and that there's a little bit of a hollow in front of my hips, which is the first place I ever show any weight loss. Also, the right straps on my biggest bras keep slipping down, which means I've lost a little weight around my ribcage too. I don't really feel anything about this any of it, though. I don't get any satisfaction or excitement from it. No sense of pride or anything. It makes it hard to stay motivated, or even not actively unmotivated, which is probably a more accurate description of how I am anyway.

I cooked dinner at home; in fact I haven't left my house today. It wasn't as relaxing as it sounds though because, y'know, I'm crazy.

Once again, being social is good.

(Weight wise, the news is that I ate well today. Other than that it's a bunch of blathering.)

I managed to sleep a little bit today, and woke up starving. I was in the process of making myself something to eat when somebody knocked on my door and my dog went absolutely nuts. It was a college kid doing one of those fundraiser things, and I thought that once I told him I was unemployed and couldn't help, that would be the end of the conversation. Instead, I ended up talking to him for almost an hour. It was quite a weird conversation; I think he was hitting on me, truthfully. He kept asking me questions, and telling me personal stuff, and complimenting me. I now know that this stranger used to have a Prince Albert piercing, has 21 tattoos, likes big women and was in fact in an amateur porno with a big woman, his sister works for a big adult film company, he takes certain drugs for "enhancement" in sexual situations, and he thinks all women should have at least three vibrators.

Most people would probably be uncomfortable with a conversation like that with a stranger, I think. I just laughed and shot back jokes about threesomes and strippers. But it was still a very odd encounter. He gave me his phone number in case I ever wanted help with "chores." He also said he'd been wanting to stop by and find out who had the car with the great racing stripes (they're not great, they're freaking stupid). It doesn't happen to me often, but I definitely got the feeling he was hitting on me. I might have enjoyed it more if he hadn't said "wasn't there a guy living here too?"
I said my mom lived here before and she was married.
"No, since then. A big guy?" and he made that shoulder gesture that means muscular instead of fat.
My heart sank and I tried to say casually, "I had a boyfriend for a while."
"Kicked him to the curb, huh?" he grinned at me.
"No. The opposite." I tried to say it in a tone of voice that would shut him up.
It didn't work. "Oh. Why?"
I had to swallow hard before I could say, not very loudly, "I don't know."
"Well, he's dumb! You're cute."
I just laughed and said thanks. Once he left, though, I felt really sad. Then I started to get paranoid and wonder if he was just pumping me for information because he's going to rob and rape me or something. But he looked like he was about to shit his pants when my dog was barking at him, so I'm not too worried.

I finished making my dinner and ate, trying to decide if I wanted to meet a friend for our usual Saturday night bingo or not. I didn't feel like facing the world but she guilted me in to it, so I showered and left. And I cried all the way in to town, and then was so early I didn't want to go in by myself so I sat in a park by a willow tree kind of in the dark and sniffled to myself. I hate how much I miss him. I hate that I miss him and not just someone. And I'm shocked that it's not triggering binge after binge after binge, honestly. I guess it's because in this case, I know that eating won't make me feel better. Sometimes it does. In this case, though, it wouldn't accomplish anything.

Not for me!

Anyway, I met my friend, and I consumed all my carbs for the day in one meal but overall behaved myself. I didn't even eat the pile of chocolate deliciousness she kept trying to push on me and ordering me to eat because she was full. No fucking idea how I managed that. By the time I headed home, I was feeling .... not happy, but at least not miserable. I felt slightly hopeful. It lasted a couple of hours before I started getting mopey and sniffly again. It's like I need constant stimulation, constant distraction, or else I start obsessing and missing him and moping.

I'm not naturally a weepy person. Depressed, yes, which is why I've been on Prozac for years, but that's just a biochemical imbalance (my personal theory is that my mother smoked marijuana while she was pregnant with me). That aside, I'm usually loud and cheerful and the life/annoyance of a party. Or at least a small group. I feel like my lovesickness is almost totally subsuming my personality. If this stuff doesn't start to pass soon ... fuck, I don't know what I'll do. I can't afford professional help. I guess all I can do is keep trying to process it. I should probably delete his number from my phone but I can't yet. I did finally get rid of the last of the pictures. I still have them on my computer, but I haven't looked at them in a week. I guess that's something.

I'm worried about what will happy in terms of my eating if I do start feeling normal again, though. It's weirdly easier now that it is when I feel happy. When I'm happy I'm more likely to toss everything to the wind because it doesn't seem important when I'm already happy. Of course, I'm not doing this because of being unhappy, because weight loss won't do anything for that either.

They still don't fit!

But I didn't really expect them to either. My size 22 jeans, that is. Although if I lay down I can at least get them over my flab now. And the 24s are a little loose now.

It's 1:25 in the morning now and I haven't eaten anything today. Haven't been hungry, and even when I did feel a flicker of it ... I just couldn't care. It's been a bad day in terms of my emotions. Sometimes when I feel like this, I'll binge because why the hell not eat what I want, I'm already miserable. But today I'm so blah that I can't be bothered. I'd have to go to the store or a drive-through for unhealthy food. Or order pizza. I can't be bothered to do either. I finally ate at 3:30, because my brain was starting to prod me to go out and get junk food even though my stomach was fine. Now I'm goddamn ravenous. I do feel slightly better though.

I couldn't sleep last night, or rather this morning, just like usual. Obsessive thoughts kept me awake for an hour or better; then I woke up every hour or so. Eventually I got up and got ready to go to my interview, which I can only hope went well because it would be the perfect job for me. I was supposedly one of only five people they were interviewing .... but I'm trying not to get my hopes up. Then I came home and watched some Olympics, read some, and then eventually fell asleep. Taking a nap from 7-midnight guaranteed I'll be up way past dawn today, but at least I got some sleep finally.

Assumptions.

I think everybody sees themselves in a certain way, and that way does not always match up to reality. I know a lot of the time I'll be bouncing around on errands, grinning and feeling like I'm exuding joy*, and then I'll catch a glimpse of myself in a window and realize what I'm actually radiating is "batshit insane."
*Before I got all mopey and depressed of course.

Similarly, I know my body is perfectly capable of some things, and I forget that other people look at me and think ... not. For example, people assume because I'm fat I'm not able to play sports. I had that proved to me last night when I casually commented, "I hope I get this other job so I'll have time and money to join a volleyball team."
My dad's head swiveled around and he stared at me. "What?"
"I wanted to join the rec center volleyball team before I moved, but I was always working evenings so I couldn't."
He continued to look at me, eyebrows as high as they would go. "Excuse me?"
"What?" I looked at him blankly. "I like to play volleyball!"
"Oooookay." he pursed his lips and turned back to the Olympics. Wise man. If he had said what he was clearly thinking, from his glance at my stomach, I would have had some choice words for him.

I am perfectly capable of slapping a ball around, and even diving after one. I wouldn't be by the net because I'm short and can't jump very high, so I can't spike. But I can serve like a mofo. And I'm kind of surprised that my dad would make the assumption I'm too fat for it, honestly. The man has seen me chase dogs around his house, run endless circles around restaurants, pick up my cousins who are taller than me and swing them around, heave around furniture he said was too heavy for me, etc. etc. And yet he's shocked I expressed interest in volleyball. What must people who don't know me at all think? They must see me walking around and assume I'll start sweating and collapse at any moment! Not that I care all that much; assumptions just bug me.