Losing weight has made me realize how big I let myself get over the years. I've always been on the heavier side of average weight, so being a fat girl never really bothered me too hard because it was a thing I was used to. I wore a junior's size 9 when I was in the sixth grade, and I stayed that size until around tenth grade. It was then it occured to me that I should feel a little more sad about losing weight. I remember how horrible I felt when I had to suddenly jump up to a junior's size 11, which is about the equivalent of the misses size 10 that I wear now. I remember how fat it made me feel to wear that size, when most of my classmates were probably still wearing their size 9's, or worse, smaller. I remember how it made me feel like a bad person.
I have come down to a size 10 from a size 16, which was the largest I'd ever been except for when I was pregnant with Devin. Pregnant fat is not like regular fat; it's being fat for a reason other than being a hungry, lazy hippo. I feel super excited to be in a size 10 for the first time since early high school. But then I let myself think about how a size 10 isn't really small at all. I was unhealthily large in early high school, and I'm unhealthily large today. I still have a long way to go, I'd like to eventually be wearing a size 6, and I'm proud of myself for being able to add the word "eventually" to my dieting vocabulary.
The main thing that has gotten in my way in regards to my various quests for relative thinness has been my own impatience. I'd always start a diet on Monday and expect to look like a goddess by the following Sunday. Of course I wouldn't wake up on that day resembling any sort of goddess other than the short, squat, fertility variety, so I'd give up. What little common sense I have about health and fitness tells me that waking up after a week of dieting, looking any different was impossible, but common sense usually tends to fly out the window just when you need it most. Now that I've come to terms with "eventually", it's been much easier to live healthier all around, not just eat a little healthier for a predetermined period of time.
Since I started "living healthier" at the end of June, I've lost 20 pounds, which puts the loss at rate of about 2 pounds per week, which is considered healthy. I've hit a plateau. It seems like no matter what I do, I can't get that scale to budge at all. It's becoming a pain in my ass, and I'm trying to keep it from shaking my resolve. Losing 20 pounds the healthy way is a decent feat, and I'm pretty proud of myself for doing it this way. I need to tuck that feeling in a pocket somewhere so that I can pull it out when I need the encouragement to continue.
Eventually.
8.30.2009
8.24.2009
The last of my mother's living family, besides a few long-lost cousins, Devin, and myself, is currently dying in a shared room at the FutureCare center in Dundalk. I don't take to sick old people very well. Especially sick old people with whom I've spent a decent amount of my life. Like my Aunt Cora, the one sitting at the nursing home, waiting to die. When my grandmother, the woman who half raised me, was dying, I made efforts to not have to go and see her. It's disappointing and very upsetting to see a person you loved so much in so much pain, and that's never a way you want to remember someone. Eventually my mother managed to guilt trip me into going to see Aunt Cora with her this evening, and when we walked into the room my Aunt looked at me and burst into tears. Tears, coming from the eyes of this bald, shrunken, sack with the face of the woman who taught me how to play Gin Rummy. And instead of saying "hello", or "I haven't seen you since you were still in school!", she tells me "You are your grandmother's granddaughter. Oh my God you look exactly like she did when she was your age". And this is why I don't take well to sick, old people; it's because of the fucking things they say.
It's probably because I spent an angst-filled year of my teenage life studying the fine arts of Wicca that I have weird thoughts about death and the possibility of an afterlife. I think that people who are actively dying are actually downloading the knowledge of the Universe at a speed that is directly proportional to the speed with which they are dying. I don't mean "actively dying" as in people my age who are inching towards death, barring any unforeseen accidents along the way. I mean people who are the process of having their internal organs switched off on a daily, or even hourly basis. I feel that this is just another one of life's cruel jokes, the ultimate in hindsight facepalms; you spend an entire lifetime attempting to carve out your personal niche in this world we've developed, then you receive the pertinent information as you're dying. This situation would be the "cherry on top", the big "fuck you" of the Universe, and it is this situation that leads me to believe that people who are dying have very important things to say. If you can wade through the gibberish, you might have access to a piece of Universal Knowledge, and I'm not sure that we're supposed to know about any of that shit until we've started dying.
So before going into the nursing home, my mother and I sat in her car, and she told me to keep my cool, "don't fall apart in front of Aunt Cora, she doesn't need to see that we're upset". We finished our cigarettes and began walking through the crumbling parking lot toward the squealing automatic doors. There were three elderly men sitting in rusty wheel chairs, armed with oxygen tanks, smoking cigarettes directly next to these doors; glaring at us for our walking legs, the orange light of the evening sun setting fire to the windows of their souls. The look of them sent chills directly to my urethra, bypassing my bladder entirely. The peanut butter sandwich and large diet coke, no ice I had for lunch immediately sank to the ass end of my intestines. I avoided eye contact with them as best I could, besides the fact that these old men seemed dangerous, looking at old people in general is depressing; it's a glimpse into a future that I'd rather not see right now. "These bitter old men think that just because they're dying, there's no use in paying any attention to the safety of others? So much for keeping my cool. I've managed to be dragged into a place where people go to die, and well, I'm going to die. Thanks, Mom", I muttered to her as we walked out of the old men's hearing aids' earshot and into the center's lobby.
My aunt has a rather secluded room, away from the hustle and bustle of the rest of the center; this is assuming that there's much of any hustling or bustling going on in a nursing home. There was an old man sitting by himself in a corner of the hallway, just sitting in a wheelchair, staring at what I believe was his reflection in the curtained window of the nurse's lounge. I can only imagine how it feels to look at yourself when you're that old and sick, knowing about your life before this state. I'd rather lose my memory if that's the case. There were carts piled with mostly uneaten plates of food, children's food; pudding, grilled cheese and tomato soup, goldfish crackers, mashed potatoes. If the Lion King were about people, "The Circle of Life" would have contained more lyrics about old people, and how you come out in diapers and leave in diapers, you come out with no teeth and leave with no teeth. Ah, it's the circle of life, and it rules us all.
So when Aunt Cora looked at me and started crying and going on about my grandmother, the fiber-bulked shit that had been growing since the silent death threats from the trio of oldheads dropped, and was being held in by only a thread. The other half of my lunch seemed to have traveled upwards and lodged itself in my throat, but of course that was just the lump that always accompanies tears. I made a dying woman cry. She's on oxygen, so I'm not sure that crying is in her best interests. I could have killed her. I'm not sure what upset me more; her crying or her mentioning my grandmother. Conversation ensues, and I admit that I was only half listening; I was too preoccupied with thoughts of my own mortality, my ambiguous feelings towards Aunt Cora's receipt of Universal knowledge, and the various medical equipment in the room to be bothered with conversation. I was grateful for the distractions though, I had the loosest possible grip on my cool, and I needed to focus on not going to the bathroom in a nursing home.
As it turns out, I don't think Aunt Cora is dying hard enough to be receiving any great amount of knowledge. She's too coherent, too... alive to know things. That eased the pressure in my guts a little, knowing that I wouldn't be accidentally be exposed to any information that would open me up to a possible real life "Final Destination" scenario. Removing the thought of choking on the dinner I had no idea when I'd be eating made the visit a little more pleasant, but still no where near pleasant. I was still in a nursing home surrounded by death and people who have given up. I was still visiting with a person who was not only dying, but had also accepted this fact. I was still visiting with a woman who eerily resembles my grandmother as she was dying, and this was the thing that upset me the most this evening.
The thing that upset me second most was that I didn't get to eat dinner until 8:30, after I stopped by the grocery store as I had originally planned to do before going to visit "Death Becomes Her", picked up a salad at the salad bar, came home to eat the salad, then proceeded to spill the contents of a one pound salad after I had only consumed ten bites.
I shrugged the salad off. After seeing old people who are dying due to certain life choices, I figured that I wouldn't miss the extra calories or the rise in blood pressure from getting pissed at such trivial things.
It's probably because I spent an angst-filled year of my teenage life studying the fine arts of Wicca that I have weird thoughts about death and the possibility of an afterlife. I think that people who are actively dying are actually downloading the knowledge of the Universe at a speed that is directly proportional to the speed with which they are dying. I don't mean "actively dying" as in people my age who are inching towards death, barring any unforeseen accidents along the way. I mean people who are the process of having their internal organs switched off on a daily, or even hourly basis. I feel that this is just another one of life's cruel jokes, the ultimate in hindsight facepalms; you spend an entire lifetime attempting to carve out your personal niche in this world we've developed, then you receive the pertinent information as you're dying. This situation would be the "cherry on top", the big "fuck you" of the Universe, and it is this situation that leads me to believe that people who are dying have very important things to say. If you can wade through the gibberish, you might have access to a piece of Universal Knowledge, and I'm not sure that we're supposed to know about any of that shit until we've started dying.
So before going into the nursing home, my mother and I sat in her car, and she told me to keep my cool, "don't fall apart in front of Aunt Cora, she doesn't need to see that we're upset". We finished our cigarettes and began walking through the crumbling parking lot toward the squealing automatic doors. There were three elderly men sitting in rusty wheel chairs, armed with oxygen tanks, smoking cigarettes directly next to these doors; glaring at us for our walking legs, the orange light of the evening sun setting fire to the windows of their souls. The look of them sent chills directly to my urethra, bypassing my bladder entirely. The peanut butter sandwich and large diet coke, no ice I had for lunch immediately sank to the ass end of my intestines. I avoided eye contact with them as best I could, besides the fact that these old men seemed dangerous, looking at old people in general is depressing; it's a glimpse into a future that I'd rather not see right now. "These bitter old men think that just because they're dying, there's no use in paying any attention to the safety of others? So much for keeping my cool. I've managed to be dragged into a place where people go to die, and well, I'm going to die. Thanks, Mom", I muttered to her as we walked out of the old men's hearing aids' earshot and into the center's lobby.
My aunt has a rather secluded room, away from the hustle and bustle of the rest of the center; this is assuming that there's much of any hustling or bustling going on in a nursing home. There was an old man sitting by himself in a corner of the hallway, just sitting in a wheelchair, staring at what I believe was his reflection in the curtained window of the nurse's lounge. I can only imagine how it feels to look at yourself when you're that old and sick, knowing about your life before this state. I'd rather lose my memory if that's the case. There were carts piled with mostly uneaten plates of food, children's food; pudding, grilled cheese and tomato soup, goldfish crackers, mashed potatoes. If the Lion King were about people, "The Circle of Life" would have contained more lyrics about old people, and how you come out in diapers and leave in diapers, you come out with no teeth and leave with no teeth. Ah, it's the circle of life, and it rules us all.
So when Aunt Cora looked at me and started crying and going on about my grandmother, the fiber-bulked shit that had been growing since the silent death threats from the trio of oldheads dropped, and was being held in by only a thread. The other half of my lunch seemed to have traveled upwards and lodged itself in my throat, but of course that was just the lump that always accompanies tears. I made a dying woman cry. She's on oxygen, so I'm not sure that crying is in her best interests. I could have killed her. I'm not sure what upset me more; her crying or her mentioning my grandmother. Conversation ensues, and I admit that I was only half listening; I was too preoccupied with thoughts of my own mortality, my ambiguous feelings towards Aunt Cora's receipt of Universal knowledge, and the various medical equipment in the room to be bothered with conversation. I was grateful for the distractions though, I had the loosest possible grip on my cool, and I needed to focus on not going to the bathroom in a nursing home.
As it turns out, I don't think Aunt Cora is dying hard enough to be receiving any great amount of knowledge. She's too coherent, too... alive to know things. That eased the pressure in my guts a little, knowing that I wouldn't be accidentally be exposed to any information that would open me up to a possible real life "Final Destination" scenario. Removing the thought of choking on the dinner I had no idea when I'd be eating made the visit a little more pleasant, but still no where near pleasant. I was still in a nursing home surrounded by death and people who have given up. I was still visiting with a person who was not only dying, but had also accepted this fact. I was still visiting with a woman who eerily resembles my grandmother as she was dying, and this was the thing that upset me the most this evening.
The thing that upset me second most was that I didn't get to eat dinner until 8:30, after I stopped by the grocery store as I had originally planned to do before going to visit "Death Becomes Her", picked up a salad at the salad bar, came home to eat the salad, then proceeded to spill the contents of a one pound salad after I had only consumed ten bites.
I shrugged the salad off. After seeing old people who are dying due to certain life choices, I figured that I wouldn't miss the extra calories or the rise in blood pressure from getting pissed at such trivial things.
8.23.2009
Things
-Running is good. It makes me feel young again, and it makes me feel like I'm able to revisit doing things that I gave up on because they were too hard, as I'm able to use the life experiences I've gained since then to tell myself that I've done harder things than running. I ran 1.75 miles in the woods yesterday, that made me feel pretty great. Using my body for what it was designed is a pretty cool thing.
-I now wear a size 10. I got a few cheap, basic things from Old Navy to help bridge the gap from this size to, hopefully, an 8 in the near future. I have a pair of size 15 "skinny" jeans and, even though they are falling off of me, I can't tell a difference in my size when I look in the mirror. I can't tell a difference in the amount of space I take up when sitting on the sofa or lying in my bed. I've read that a lot of people who go from really fat, to not so fat and beyond, have a problem with seeing their "new" bodies. I guess it'll just take some adjusting.
-Devin starts school in a week. It's really hard for me to believe that my baby is a second grader, but I don't see anything but my baby when I look at him, so it's really hard for me to believe a lot of things. There was so much I was supposed to get done over this summer break, but I can't help the fact that time flies. I feel like Devin's birthday was last week, not a whole month ago. Another thing that needs some adjusting.
-I now wear a size 10. I got a few cheap, basic things from Old Navy to help bridge the gap from this size to, hopefully, an 8 in the near future. I have a pair of size 15 "skinny" jeans and, even though they are falling off of me, I can't tell a difference in my size when I look in the mirror. I can't tell a difference in the amount of space I take up when sitting on the sofa or lying in my bed. I've read that a lot of people who go from really fat, to not so fat and beyond, have a problem with seeing their "new" bodies. I guess it'll just take some adjusting.
-Devin starts school in a week. It's really hard for me to believe that my baby is a second grader, but I don't see anything but my baby when I look at him, so it's really hard for me to believe a lot of things. There was so much I was supposed to get done over this summer break, but I can't help the fact that time flies. I feel like Devin's birthday was last week, not a whole month ago. Another thing that needs some adjusting.
8.13.2009
I've never been a fan of the songs that Christine McVie wrote/sang for Fleetwood Mac, and I've also never been a fan of using other people's words in order to convey what I'm thinking or how I'm feeling. This is probably because Christine McVie's songs contain too little imagery for my tastes, plus she sings like a man. Also, there is a very slim chance that some other person feels the exact same way I do about a given situation. Taking the above into consideration, if I were attempting to branch out and try new things, I'd probably say that "Over My Head" might be a good song to express how I feel about certain aspects of my life right now. Go ahead and look at those lyrics if you're so inclined. If you don't do that, then you might feel like this was supposed to be the entry about my trip to the beach last weekend where I almost drowned. Then you'd be wrong, and no one likes to be wrong.
Things
-I didn't almost drown during my trip to the beach last weekend, but I'm pretty sure there was a little extra bit of sea life trying to nip at me. Cons: Being eaten alive by millions of tiny fish, some sharks, and a few stray crabs would probably not be a pleasant experience. Pros: Treading water so that your feet don't have to touch the bottom of the ocean is a brilliantly disguised form of exercise. It isn't going to give me the arms of Madonna circa 1998, but it's a good start for someone whose lifestyle would be considered more "dormant" than "sedentary".
-There was a fair amount of kayaking during this beach trip, more than any of the other times I've kayaked. Before this trip I'd only ever used a tandem kayak. There's a big difference between singles and tandems. Singly kayaking for two hours in a choppy bay, darting across lanes of boat traffic, and dodging the boat's wakes was also a secret workout; one that left me feeling like Henry Rollins' neck and shoulder region when I woke up on Sunday.
-All of the sneaky exercise I did made me think, "Hmm. All that sneaky exercise I got this weekend made me feel real good, man. I wonder if I should just come out of the working out closet and just be a real exerciser?". So I opened the door, and I've been looking around a little, and I kind of liked what I saw, so that leaves me smack dab in the middle of the first week of a couch to 5K training schedule, leaving my legs feeling like fuck.
-Having a new car is pretty rad. Until I have to make that first payment. Then I'll probably stop being so damn excited.
-Links are neat.
-There was a fair amount of kayaking during this beach trip, more than any of the other times I've kayaked. Before this trip I'd only ever used a tandem kayak. There's a big difference between singles and tandems. Singly kayaking for two hours in a choppy bay, darting across lanes of boat traffic, and dodging the boat's wakes was also a secret workout; one that left me feeling like Henry Rollins' neck and shoulder region when I woke up on Sunday.
-All of the sneaky exercise I did made me think, "Hmm. All that sneaky exercise I got this weekend made me feel real good, man. I wonder if I should just come out of the working out closet and just be a real exerciser?". So I opened the door, and I've been looking around a little, and I kind of liked what I saw, so that leaves me smack dab in the middle of the first week of a couch to 5K training schedule, leaving my legs feeling like fuck.
-Having a new car is pretty rad. Until I have to make that first payment. Then I'll probably stop being so damn excited.
-Links are neat.
8.10.2009
I started off this morning writing an entry about my trip to the beach on Saturday, but it's really hard to have a consistent enough train of thought to write while I'm at work. I saved the draft, so it might make an entry someday, but unfortunately I have no idea what I intended to write about so it might be a while before I finish it. While I was busy not writing, I read many articles today regarding healthcare, and a whole bunch of opinion articles regarding the same subject, so I figured that I'd write my own.
Point: Socialized medicine is evil. I'm not paying for some sloppy layabout's or illegal immigrant's healthcare.
Counterpoint: Socialized medicine is not evil. Whether you like it or not, you are already paying for some "sloppy layabout's or illegal immigrant's" healthcare. It's likely that the people complaining about paying for these programs make too much money to qualify for these already existing government sponsored healthcare programs, so they're angry that they are paying for a thing that they can not have. I have to lie on applications so I can ensure that Devin has health coverage, but if the proposed changes are made to this system, I would actually be entitled to the thing I'm already paying for. This is basically a win-win situation. Now I'm just waiting for the bigots to speak up and say that they don't want to have the same insurance that "illegals" have because they feel that they're entitled to better.
Point: Fat people and smokers shouldn't have their entire healthcare bill footed by taxpayers because they are a burden to society. They should have to pay a portion of their own healthcare.
Counterpoint: Where to start? Fat people and smokers are fat and smokers by their own choice only to a certain point. Once an addiction has you in its grip it's hard, very hard, to get out. I'm fat AND I smoke, but I'm hardly lazy, or even an overconsumer of food. Rather, I'm a part of the often overlooked class known as "the working poor", and buying canned, boxed, and frozen foods is more cost effective pound for pound over buying fresh meats, fruits, and vegetables. I'd like to not have such a dependency on the frozen food aisle, but until something is done regarding the price of healthier options, me and Mrs. Pauls will continue to have our quick and delicious meetings. I can understand that people dislike smoking, but god DAMN, I'm sick of hearing about how shitty smokers are. I hate alcoholics, but I don't run around screaming about it every day.
While we're writing lists of things we don't want to pay for, there are certain things that I personally wouldn't like to pay for either. What about the parents who rush their children to the doctor every time the kid fucking sneezes? What about the people who are in so much "pain", that they're constantly at the doctor trying to get pain pills in order to feed their addiction, I mean, cure their "pain"? What about the people who give birth to horribly retarded children (probably due to the breeding horse of a mother being past her prime, or inbreeding) and then refuse to give up the ghost? What about people like Terry Schiavo? I don't really care if that made me sound like an asshole, so please, do tell me if I did.
In a nutshell, there is no such thing, and there never will be such a thing as "united we stand". There will always be something that someone doesn't agree with.
P.S. I got a little excited when I heard rumors that old people would be killed under the new insurance plan.
Cheers!
Point: Socialized medicine is evil. I'm not paying for some sloppy layabout's or illegal immigrant's healthcare.
Counterpoint: Socialized medicine is not evil. Whether you like it or not, you are already paying for some "sloppy layabout's or illegal immigrant's" healthcare. It's likely that the people complaining about paying for these programs make too much money to qualify for these already existing government sponsored healthcare programs, so they're angry that they are paying for a thing that they can not have. I have to lie on applications so I can ensure that Devin has health coverage, but if the proposed changes are made to this system, I would actually be entitled to the thing I'm already paying for. This is basically a win-win situation. Now I'm just waiting for the bigots to speak up and say that they don't want to have the same insurance that "illegals" have because they feel that they're entitled to better.
Point: Fat people and smokers shouldn't have their entire healthcare bill footed by taxpayers because they are a burden to society. They should have to pay a portion of their own healthcare.
Counterpoint: Where to start? Fat people and smokers are fat and smokers by their own choice only to a certain point. Once an addiction has you in its grip it's hard, very hard, to get out. I'm fat AND I smoke, but I'm hardly lazy, or even an overconsumer of food. Rather, I'm a part of the often overlooked class known as "the working poor", and buying canned, boxed, and frozen foods is more cost effective pound for pound over buying fresh meats, fruits, and vegetables. I'd like to not have such a dependency on the frozen food aisle, but until something is done regarding the price of healthier options, me and Mrs. Pauls will continue to have our quick and delicious meetings. I can understand that people dislike smoking, but god DAMN, I'm sick of hearing about how shitty smokers are. I hate alcoholics, but I don't run around screaming about it every day.
While we're writing lists of things we don't want to pay for, there are certain things that I personally wouldn't like to pay for either. What about the parents who rush their children to the doctor every time the kid fucking sneezes? What about the people who are in so much "pain", that they're constantly at the doctor trying to get pain pills in order to feed their addiction, I mean, cure their "pain"? What about the people who give birth to horribly retarded children (probably due to the breeding horse of a mother being past her prime, or inbreeding) and then refuse to give up the ghost? What about people like Terry Schiavo? I don't really care if that made me sound like an asshole, so please, do tell me if I did.
In a nutshell, there is no such thing, and there never will be such a thing as "united we stand". There will always be something that someone doesn't agree with.
P.S. I got a little excited when I heard rumors that old people would be killed under the new insurance plan.
Cheers!
8.03.2009
Things
-I got a new car. A 2009 Hyundai Accent. They say it has 3 doors because they count the hatchback as a door, but I only ever used the hatchback of my old car as a door once; when I locked my keys in the car.
-XM Radio is worse than cable television because it's pretty much impossible for me to choose something to listen to when I have 3247923874 choices. So I pretty much just listen to NPR.
-I'm restarting the Super Control Lady Diet and Exercise Program™. I gained a few (4) pounds back because Devin's birthday party threw me off track with the diet part and I haven't been able to get back on. Also the horrible Wal-Mart fall mostly prevented me from doing any sort of exercise for two weeks. I'll restart tomorrow. There's a Coffee Toffee Twisted Frosty at Wendy's that's been calling my name, and it would be mean to ignore it.
-A person I had through a friend for some business arrangements up and moved to California to go and work on a sort of farm, leaving me jealous as all hell and scrambling to find someone else to make business arrangements with.
-I forgot how fun Super Paper Mario is.
-I work for a bunch of fraudulent assholes and need to find a new job, but am kind of trapped here because the average secretary doesn't make anywhere near what I currently make.
That's about it.
-XM Radio is worse than cable television because it's pretty much impossible for me to choose something to listen to when I have 3247923874 choices. So I pretty much just listen to NPR.
-I'm restarting the Super Control Lady Diet and Exercise Program™. I gained a few (4) pounds back because Devin's birthday party threw me off track with the diet part and I haven't been able to get back on. Also the horrible Wal-Mart fall mostly prevented me from doing any sort of exercise for two weeks. I'll restart tomorrow. There's a Coffee Toffee Twisted Frosty at Wendy's that's been calling my name, and it would be mean to ignore it.
-A person I had through a friend for some business arrangements up and moved to California to go and work on a sort of farm, leaving me jealous as all hell and scrambling to find someone else to make business arrangements with.
-I forgot how fun Super Paper Mario is.
-I work for a bunch of fraudulent assholes and need to find a new job, but am kind of trapped here because the average secretary doesn't make anywhere near what I currently make.
That's about it.
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