It's About Freaking Time

I am finally ready to be more open. I keep mentioning how I had a specific milestone in mind for when I would reveal my weight, and I have hit that milestone. Please be gentle, it's really hard for me to reveal this information.

I stepped on the scale today and recorded a loss of 4 lbs since I last checked for a grand total of 66 lbs lost. This puts me at 140 lbs.

Why is 140 lbs a big deal to me? Because my drivers' license states that I weigh 140 lbs, and it has said that since I got it when I was sixteen. They don't weigh you, they just ask you. You can say whatever you want! I lied when I was sixteen about how much I weighed. I don't remember by how much, just that I lied, but it was at least a twenty pound lie. My drivers' license is accurate for the first time, except for maybe the picture. Maybe this is silly, but it has always been important to me.

Now, I know you can all add, which is why I never wanted to reveal my weight. I've lost 66 lbs, and I now weigh 140 lbs, which means at my peak weight I weighed 206 lbs. This is horrifying to me to let this information go. There are two sides to this number. I saw this number on the scale after Christmas 2009, and that number didn't stick around for very long. It was the biggest number I ever saw on the scale. However, there were times when I was too afraid to even step on the scale, so while 206 was the biggest number I ever saw, that doesn't mean that was the biggest number I ever weighed. I don't have the most accurate of records, but I'm guessing that by the time I went in for my neurologist appointment in February 2010 I weighed just under 200. Scary thoughts.

I will update my Progress page with my Weight and BMI charts and new inches and everything soon. Also, my goal has changed. My goal was to make it to 115 lbs, which would mean that I have another 25 lbs to lose. But as I have mentioned, I have been working with a personal trainer, and she says that since I am working out, a more realistic goal for me would be 125 lbs. This means I only have another 15 lbs to lose. This is good news, but weight loss has been slow as of late.

Today I am thankful for all the support I've had so far. I could not have made it this far without my friends and family.

Don't Deny Your Pleasures

Anyone who knows me can’t deny that I find pleasure in life. I am by nature a happy person. If I am in a good mood, it is likely that I am laughing about something. I find myself defending myself constantly for either laughing at someone or laughing too much. My only defense is this: I’m not laughing for any reason other than to express my contentment. I have no intention to make fun of anybody; I laugh because I am happy. I also tend to think things are funny longer than I should, but that’s a quirk that people are just gonna have to deal with. As Stephen King says, “You can’t deny laughter; when it comes, it plops down in your favorite chair and stays as long as it wants.” I have often wondered if maybe the real issue is an annoying laugh. Is my laugh annoying? Well, I just wish that I could hear other people laugh more often. I love the sound of laughter, it is beautiful.

As you may have guessed, my post today is another for the Self Discovery Word-by-Word Series. The host this month is Joy at Being Joy, and the word she selected is Pleasure.

I have spent a great deal of my life avoiding pleasure. It’s like I feel guilty if I enjoy myself too much. Why is that? I’ve worked hard my whole life. I deserve to have fun. It seems that it has only been recently that I have invited pleasure into my life. I tend to deny myself the things I love. This is usually for a greater purpose, but it never works out how it should.

I take pleasure in unconventional things – for a girl anyway. I like action movies and video games. When I was in college, I went up with a Playstation, and I downloaded a bunch of old NES games on my computer. What this meant was that I never did homework. In order to get back on track, I began to deny myself the pleasure of playing these games and I took all the games off of my computer, as I felt they were wasting my life away. Was I more productive with my schoolwork? Of course not. I wasted my life away with other crap that I took less pleasure in.

I have always found real pleasure in certain food groups. I LOVE ice cream. I will never get sick of ice cream. I denied myself the pleasure of ice cream my entire second year of college. I was really good about it. I might have cheated once or twice, but I basically never had ice cream that year. It was rough, but I did it. Did I lose any weight that year from denying myself of my favorite treat? Of course not! Because I ate other crap instead! The other food I deny myself to this day is good breakfast cereal. Cinnamon Toast Crunch and Reese’s Puffs. That stuff is freaking GOOD. You can’t have one bowl without eating half the box. Okay, maybe I could now that I have more self control… or maybe not. That’s why I don’t eat it anymore! I deny myself that pleasure.

What I have learned is that denying yourself of your pleasures doesn’t work. You replace those pleasures with other things that don’t satisfy you as much, and the end result is the same. I still didn’t do my homework, and I still ate garbage and didn’t lose weight.

I have other pleasures that I have never denied myself. I love art and music. I also take pleasure in helping and influencing those around me. It feels good to know I can make an impact. That’s why I do my blog. Today I am grateful for opportunities I have had to influence people’s lives for the better.

I'm Back!

I haven't been writing because I haven't had much to say on the weight loss front. It turns out that I am really good at maintaining weight loss. So when I do eventually make it to my goal, I know I'll be able to stay there. But I'm not happy yet. So I have actually been working with a personal trainer. She is helping me with my nutrition and with my exercise, so it has been pretty awesome. The same old exercises I had been doing just weren't working for me anymore, so I sought outside help. I'll have more to say about how she has been helping me later, but I just wanted to check in and let ya'll know I'm still here and still working. I didn't want to write until I had actually had some forward movement again! Finally, I have lost another 1.2 lbs for a grand total of 62 lbs lost.

Today I'm grateful for my freaking awesome friends. They are amazing.

Creativity and Body Image?

The Self-Discovery Word by Word Series prompt for this month is Creativity. The host for this month is Margarita at Weightless.

This is funny to me because everyone always assumes that I am creative, when I know that I am not. People think that I am creative because I draw and do other crafty things. However, I am an imitator, not a creator. I cannot create without an image being put in front of me. When I am inspired to make something crafty, it is never from my own head. When I found out I could draw, people would encourage/harass me to try to develop my creative side and see what I could come up with on my own. It seemed that no matter how I tried to explain it, I could not convince people that I did not have the talent to create, only to imitate. I am okay with this. It's funny to me that other people aren't.

My non-creativity translates to other aspects of my life, which is how this relates to my blog. The prompt was Body Image & Creativity. How in the world are they related? How in the world is creativity related to my weight loss journey? Well, for starters, I have the most success in losing weight each week when I eat the same thing every day, day after day. I find a meal that suits me that has a proper allotment of calories and I eat it every day. When I get tired of eating the same thing, I eat more normal and don't lose as much weight. When I try to be more creative with my eating habits, I am less successful.

As for body image, I have written before about how I always thought my body image issues would go away once I lost weight, but they haven't. In this way I have been somewhat successful at being creative, because I have had to come up with creative ways to battle this. I have found that dressing in new and creative ways helps me feel better about my image. Same with making sure my hair is done and my make-up looks right. I started wearing lip gloss for the first time ever. It doesn't fix the problem, but these little things definitely have helped me to see myself in the mirror as what I am and not what I was. I still run into those days where I say to myself "who has time for all of this?" But on the days I spend time on myself, I definitely feel more confident.

Today I am thankful for sincere compliments. It's nice when people notice on the days I try.

More Maintenance

I am so close to my goal, so it is getting harder and harder to lose each week. They call it a plateau. I'm gonna have to be more creative when it comes to dieting, which is something I'm not good at. See my next post for more on that. So this week was another week where I didn't lose any weight, and I just maintained my weight loss so far. I can't complain, but I do need to make some changes that I haven't wanted to make. Like with my diet soda. Maybe now is the time to drink less of that. Hopefully certain people don't read this so I won't be held accountable... I just want so badly to eat normal, but I can't yet! I am SOOOO close, but not quite yet, so I'll keep chugging along.

"We're Not Fat"

I was at the store the other day buying ingredients to make my fabulous rolo cookies. I rarely make them because they are a pain in the butt to make, but I was in the mood to make stuff that week for some reason. Anyway, I was in the aisle with the white chocolate and bags and bags of candy looking for rolos. I needed a ton of rolos for these cookies and I had to go to three stores to find them. Apparently they don't sell them anymore. Either that, or everyone was making these same cookies. At one of the stores I was at, some people walked down the aisle while I was looking for rolos, and I immediately felt ashamed and wanted to hide. I didn't want to be seen in the candy aisle looking for rolos!

I had to remind myself that it's okay. People don't see what I think they see. When people look at me, they see a normal sized person. They don't see a fatty looking for her next sugar fix, which is what I immediately assume they are thinking. And even if they do, I need to remember that I don't care what they think. They don't know what I'm doing with the rolos. They don't know I'm making cookies with them. They don't know that I'm sharing the cookies with my friends and co-workers.

Sometimes I just need to be reminded that I'm not what I used to be. Like when I went to the store a few weeks ago with a friend and we parked far away. I didn't want to park far away because it was cold, but this friend assumed it was because I didn't want to walk that far. This friend said to me, "Rosie, we're not fat." It was funny, but it was also a nice reminder.

Today I'm thankful for midnight beverage runs.

Trapped!

Have you ever heard people talk about how they felt like they were a skinny girl trapped in a fat girl's body? I never felt that way. I knew I was fat, and I knew why. For example, my first year of college was a terrible year for eating. My roommates made a pan of brownies almost every night which we ate while we watched the movie "Mean Girls" a thousand times that year. We were not civilized about it. We didn't wait for them to cool down, we didn't use plates, sometimes we didn't even use forks! We ate them straight out of the pan. Good times... Anyway, we found chocolate on one of our door knobs once. We thought that was pretty darn funny! We came up with a Jeff Foxworthy type comedic bit because of it. It was called "Sign of a Fat Kid." Do you ever find chocolate on your door knob? Sign of a fat kid. Is there ever food on your shirt under your bosoms that you can't see and therefore don't know about? Sign of a fat kid. I don't remember all of them, but there were a bunch. It was pretty funny! Other examples of terrible eating habits that year were our frequent visits to Panda Express and Cold Stone. It's no wonder I regained the twenty pounds I lost prior to moving out to college! I was the only fat one though. The point is, I have never had that thought of "I'm a skinny girl trapped in a fat girl's body."

Now that I've lost 60 lbs however, I've been having a very opposite thought. I was eating a hot dog the other day and I had the thought "I am a fat girl trapped in a skinnier girl's body." Ha ha! I have all the habits of a much larger girl. I eat way too fast, so my stomach doesn't have time to tell me to stop because it is full. I need to be careful of this. I take way too big of bites. Ketchup and mustard was dripping down my hand and almost fell on my shirt (sign of a fat kid). I drink my Diet Dr. Pepper. I eat in the car when I get take out instead of waiting until I get home. Maybe everyone does that though... Anyway, this was just a funny thought that went through my head as I was eating my hot dog. I wonder if anyone else has ever felt that way?

Even though I have bad habits, I am still very careful by maintaining portion control. I eat fast, but there is not a lot of food on my plate. I will probably feel like a fat girl trapped in a skinnier girl's body for a long time. It will take a while for me to adjust.

Today I'm thankful for the new sound system on my tv. It's awesome.

Short and Sweet

I took this week pretty seriously, aside from a trip to Tucano's. MEAT! And it just kept coming! I haven't eaten that much in so long! But it didn't derail me, so I don't feel too bad.

I lost 2.6 lbs for a grand total of 60.8 lbs. I'm pretty pleased. As the title suggests, I'm keeping this post short and sweet, because I'm really tired...

Today I'm grateful for my friend who brought me a bunch of gently worn hand me downs! I am beyond thrilled to have some new clothes that might fit soon!

An Irrational Fear

I am afraid of Cafe Rio. I used to love that place! I'm not a big fan of Mexican food, but this place sure knows how to make it. It is soooooooooooo good. Their sweet pork is to DIE for. At an old job I used to have we would have Cafe Rio Wednesdays, and we'd get Cafe Rio every week. Someone would take orders and pick it up for everyone. I would look forward to Wednesdays so I could have my Cafe Rio. Seriously, this stuff is good. But, it does come in rather large portions and I was never very careful and I would get sick to my stomach from eating too much of it.

Since losing so much weight, I have tried to eat things I used to love and gotten sick. I guess my stomach just can't handle what it used to be able to. I haven't tried Cafe Rio yet. I haven't eaten there in at least six months, maybe more.

I had an interesting experience a little while ago. I was driving to the grocery store when all of a sudden someone was honking at me. I look to the car next to me and see my two brothers and my sister-in-law. I roll down my window and they tell me they are on their way to Cafe Rio to meet my parents and that I should come. I thought about it for a minute and said I'd go, but that I wasn't going to eat there. We drove our separate ways.

I arrived at the complex where Cafe Rio is located where I used to have such feelings of excitement! It's right next to a Sonic Drive-In (they have really good Diet Dr. Pepper) and some shopping areas. It's a cool area. But as I drove in that day, I noticed a very different feeling. It was a feeling of dread and horror. I had lost so much weight and here I was driving right into a place I used to eat all the time.

I sat and watched my family eat their food. I didn't want to eat any, and I wasn't even jealous of their food because I was too afraid of how it would make me feel. Eating it had made me sick before (but only from eating too much), how would it possibly make me feel now?

I don't really have anything to be afraid of. Cafe Rio uses fresh and healthy ingredients. It's the same as anywhere else, really. I would just have to be careful with portions. But I have this emotional attachment to this place that makes me fear it. I don't know when or if I will ever eat there again.

Today I am grateful for my coworkers again. They help even the most annoying situations seem hilarious!

Bones!

This post today is about as exposed as I will ever get, when it comes to pictures anyway.

I wanted to share what I've been really excited about. I already mentioned it in another post. I am finding bones that I don't remember ever seeing before. Well, I remember seeing ribs before. But I for sure don't remember seeing bones around my neck before. I know they've been there before, I guess it's just been so long that I don't remember having noticed them before. Besides that I'm seeing bones in my wrists, arms, and legs, but nothing worth taking a picture of.

Can you see the definition from the bones poking out around my neck? So crazy! I can probably keep stuff in there, ha ha!

This picture you can't really tell very well, but I'm holding my ribs. I just can't believe that I have come this far that I can see all these crazy bones.

Today I'm thankful for people who take pictures so I don't have to. It makes my life so much easier!

Time to Get Serious Again

I thought this week would be so easy since Christmas was over. It wasn't, so now I'm back to getting serious about dieting.

New Year's Eve was awesome. Best New Year's I've had in a long time. Huge pallet fire out in the desert! Since I started off the new year right, I can continue by getting back on track. My boss is so sweet, she gave me some almond milk that will go really good with my cereal, so I can start eating that again. No more treats for a little while, which should be easy now that the holidays are over. Also, I have signed up for a 12-week contest on the website that sends me my breakfast shakes. I've done something like this before with the Body for Life workouts, but this is something that I have actually registered for. I have submitted a before essay, and will soon be submitting a before picture as of this week holding a newspaper with that day's date. After 12 weeks I'll submit an after picture and can potentially win $25,000 depending on how epic my transformation is. Don't worry, I won't be getting my hopes up, but it sure is a big incentive! So I will be working on one of my goals for this year of being more active sooner than I thought.

Today's results: I gained .06 lbs. Not a lot, I know, but I'm still annoyed. Total weight loss is now 58.2 instead of 58.8.

Today I'm thankful for spanx, enough said!

Transformation

It is the start of a brand new year. I have my New Year's Resolutions prepared. They seem so much easier this year than they ever have in years past. They are not incredibly overwhelming. It is doable.

So how have I changed from 2010 to 2011? Oh my gosh, I feel like a completely different person. Inside and out. There are definitely a lot of factors involved in my transformation. 2010 was a big year for me. A year I will never forget. To start off with though, let's show you a picture of me last year around the holidays.

And here is a picture of me from almost exactly one year later. Big difference, right? This was right after a Mary Kay party, so I'm wearing a lot of make up...

But honestly, my weight is only one change that I went through this last year. I never really had a big problem with self-esteem, and I've always accepted my personality quirks. But this year I had some self-worth issues that I had never really dealt with before that I was able to work through. I'm still working through my body image issues. I have a long way to go before I can say that I am 100% happy with myself, but I can definitely say that I am a different person today than I was one year ago. I am close to 60 lbs lighter, I react to people's approach in a more positive manner, I am more loose, I have been working on being friendlier, and I am much happier.

Today I'm grateful to everyone who impacted my life in a positive manner in 2010 and helped me become a better person.