Plateau Be Gone! Week 5

http://www.betterhealthnaturally.ca/images/frustration-diet.jpg

This picture summarises the situation this week. Following 3 very successful weeks of weight loss, I have registered a small gain on the scales. 

Whilst this is a disappointment, it is not the end of the world. I know where I went wrong; my teeth haven't been hurting so much this week so I've made some poor choices with my diet. I have not been disciplined with myself about getting enough sleep which has resulted in an increased unnecessary snacking and disrupted my exercise schedule. 

Moderation and consistency are my keys to success when it comes to weight loss. Any deviation from my routine tends to result in backward steps and I need to be more aware. I ate very lightly last week because my teeth were so sore from my braces. This helped me have a very big loss on the scales last week, which was great, but it distracted me. Avoiding unhelpful food is easier when it hurts to eat but I did not think about having to keep a more stringent eye on myself when my teeth stopped hurting. 

I have been getting very lazy with making myself go to bed at a reasonable hour. I have a tendency to be a "night owl" and I am so much worse in the holidays when I don't have to get up my any particular time in the morning. Functioning on less than adequate sleep for no real reason is just silly and being tired means I become more hungry than usual, craving sugary foods to give me an energy boost. Weight loss aside, with my health issues contributing to increased fatigue, I need to get on top of this. 

In other news, I am heading to the Gold Coast on Saturday with a bunch of my uni friends from paramedics. It should be really fun and it is the sort of thing that a year ago I would not have had the confidence to agree to go. This trip will force me to confront just about all of my "fat girl" insecurities, from eating in front of other people, being in bathers in front of other people to getting dress up and going out at night (weird, I know, but I'll explain that particular social anxiety  another time). 

Part of me dreamed that by this point I would be further down the weight loss track and I would be ready to dance around in a bikini. It would be fantastic if I were at that stage, but I think being in a one piece with some little boardies in front of other people will be a big enough challenge. As I said last week, the mental component of all of this is huge and I need to make sure I make those mental adjustments as well as the physical ones. 

My impending trip has forced me to face up to one of my biggest "fat girl" fears - clothes shopping. In recent times I have only gone clothes shopping when forced or coaxed by my mum. Having to go shopping usually puts me in my a foul mood and I usually end up crying at some point. My trip today was forced by my holiday at least, something I decided to do.

I think it is fair to generalise that people who do not like the state of their body do not like shopping. I hate shopping for just about every conceivable reason. There is the obvious trauma of trying things on and having them not fit and not being able to try on the styles I liked because I knew they would look ridiculous. I find it really hard to spent money on myself. I don't feel worthy of nice things, plus it is only recently that I have started to fit into clothes that I feel like a 21 year old should be wearing. Before I just bought what fit best and covered the parts of me I could n't bear to bare in public.

There were no tears or tantrums today and I don't think I've ever bought more in one trip. I doubt I'm ever going to love shopping, but today was fine. I was able to get the things I needed without upsetting myself or my mum. It is so nice that things I previously never would have dared to look at actually fitted me.

My mum has been an incredible support to me throughout all of this. She has helped me in so many ways and it has brought us much closer together. She understands me; she understands how I think and feel as well as what it is like to be unhappy with yourself. Thank you so much, mum. I love you very much.

There is still a way to go before I stop losing weight, but today was an important step toward feeling like a normal human being again. 

Plateau Be Gone! Week 4: Mirror-phobia

http://www.farhanadhalla.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/06/jump-for-joy.jpg

Using the traffic light system I've adopted for talking about weight loss, today's result was like getting all the green lights when you're running late for work. I'm really pleased.

Given that I've been living off yoghurt, "Up N Go", weetbix and fish*, I really wasn't sure what the scales would have to say (*soft, squishy braces friendly foods). Eating a lot of fish has been fantastic for my skin. My skin tone is more even and it feels softer, too.

Over the past few weeks I have started to notice that I do look different to how I did at my heaviest. This might seem like a ridiculous thing to say, on paper I am approaching 20 kilos lost but my body is changing faster than my mind.

I am well and truly in the habit of avoiding mirrors and photos. When I was gaining weight it distressed me so much to see my appearance that I had to avoid looking at it in order to be able to go about my daily life. 

At the time I was at my heaviest I worked part time in an office in the CBD. It was a fantastic job but the corporate world is full of mirrors and I couldn't focus on the task at hand when my concentration got interrupted by a sickening feeling induced by my own reflection. The lifts in the building I worked in were fully mirrored from floor to ceiling. I trained myself to focus my eyes on the floor the entire time from walking in to walking out. 

The bathroom is another place that went from being just another room in the house to a site of torment. As well as the main mirror above the vanity, there is a row of mirrored cabinets along the opposite wall that faces the shower. I quickly got into the habit of opening all the cabinets in the bathroom or covering them with towels so that I wouldn't have to see myself without clothes. 

I am very much afraid of my appearance. Gaining weight and being overweight was so overwhelming. A lot of things were not going well in my life, but I felt like I ought to be able to get my weight under control by myself. I couldn't. Every time I saw myself in the mirror or in a photo I felt like a worthless failure. How could someone with my intellect not be able to control something as rudimentary as their weight?

Whilst it was horrible, being very overweight was a great learning experience. It gave me a harsh slap of reality about how much of my identity and self worth was wrapped up in my appearance. I wouldn't have readily called my self a superficial person before, I don't think many people would. However, I really did not have anything close to an honest grasp on how closely I tied how I felt about myself to how I looked. I don't think many people do.

Being fat also helped show me who some of my most valuable friends are. Most people treated me incredibly differently when I was overweight to how they did when I was slimmer. I was particularly shocked at how differently complete strangers reacted to me.

Accepting your own appearance is a challenge for many people, and most women and girls I know are constantly grappling with their body image and self esteem. I think a certainly level of insecurity can be normal but a life ruled by insecurity is barely living at all. One thing I can say with confidence is that the mental part of this weight loss business is much harder than the diet and exercise stuff. 

I think we all place to much importance on appearance full stop. We each read way too much into what it means to be too fat or too skinny. Whilst there are valid health concerns for both category, the fact that we subconsciously make value judgments about each other based on how they look is not right. 

Coaching gymnastics helps to remind me of how important the "self acceptance" part of this process is. Hearing primary school aged girls dissect their appearances makes me sad. It also reminds me that if I want to have a family one day, I ought to learn to accept myself so that I don't teach my children how to hate themselves.

I long for the day where I am no longer horrified by my appearance. I don't feel I need to love my appearance, I just need to be comfortable enough with myself that I don't think about it all the time. These feelings are very slowly just beginning to subside but it was not all that long ago that thinking about how fat I felt was on my mind constantly. 

Whilst the number on the scales continues to decrease at a steady pace, the "fat girl" in my head is only just starting to shrink. With time, I hope that both the "me" on the "inside" and the "me" on the "outside" can both reflect health and contentment. 

Sunday Funday

I will admit, I'm less than inspired to write this evening.

I am a bit tired. The medically based events of this week were less than fun and to be honest, a little upsetting. And thanks to my braces, I have been limited to very soft food this week ( I might turn into yogurt or a banana any second now). My mouth feels like I tried to eat a cheese grater and got little sharp bits stuck on my teeth.

On the bright side, I have a job interview on Friday for a medical reception position. Applying for jobs as a uni student is always fun. Employers are rarely all that accepting of the fact that us uni students are completely at the mercy of the timetabling gods. As far as employers are concerned, uni students are fantastic during the holidays but less than ideal during semester time. 

It would be great to gain some experience in medical administration. I would love to get back into administrative work, it is a much nicer gig than retail. Student jobs are hard to come by at the moment so getting some experience that would increase by future employment prospects would be great. Plus a bit of extra money never goes astray. 

Alex will be officially invested as a Prefect tomorrow at a special assembly at school. He has been memorising his oath with the help of his loving family in front of the cricket on the TV this evening. Granny and Grandpa are going along as well as mum and dad, but apparently it is not a sibling appropriate event (much to my disappointment). It will be especially nice for Granny and Grandpa to see to most recent part of the St Kevin's-Griffin family tradition, a tradition that started with Grandpa and now spans 3 generations. 

Please let me know if you have any ideas for blog post topics or would like me to write about something in particular!

Have a lovely week and I hope to be more inspired by the time I speak to you on Wednesday.

Plateau Be Gone! Week 3

I don't think anyone would really want me to represent my week pictorially, so instead I give you a picture of a funny cat from the internet (not one of mine). 

http://www.1stfun.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/02/Funniest-Cat-Pictures-14.jpg

It is only Wednesday and I have already had 3 different appointments with health professionals this week. The first one was the orthodontist, who was kind enough to bestow braces upon me. The second one was a radiologist and the third was a medical specialist/ surgeon. The upshot of all of this is that my ability to deal with solid food is somewhat compromised and that I will need to have surgery in March. 

I am less than thrilled with this situation. I also don't want any medical or allied health professionals to come near me for quite a while. I have had a health problem for a while that had been worsening but I kept trying to ignore it and convince myself that nothing was wrong.  I was hoping that the scans would come back normal, alas they did not. On the other hand, I'm glad that there seems to be an identifiable cause for these problems and whilst the condition is unpleasant, it is certainly not life threatening. I'm just not thrilled that addressing them will involve surgery. 

The specialist was fantastic. She was so frank and forthcoming, which I found very helpful. I find it really frustrating when doctors will advise you of your options but will not actually give you their opinion as to which option they think is best. I realise this is a cultural shift as a result of patients complaining that they felt pressured into taking their doctor's preferred course of action, or instances where alternatives have not been clearly explained. 

Whilst I certainly believe in the patient's right to make an informed choice, I don't think this means that doctors should present all options neutrally. From my perspective, I want to know which option my doctor thinks is best and why, given that they have spent all those years studying and practicing medicine and I haven't. I did not feel any pressure to do what my doctor suggested and she presented the alternatives as being legitimate and perfectly acceptable. But by knowing her opinion of the options, I felt that I had a clearer understanding of what she thought would procure the best outcome for me. 

This doctor also emphasised the importance of looking at health holistically. Even though she will operate on one of my body's systems, she talked to me in some depth about the importance of being active, eating well and in particular getting enough sleep. This made me feel validated in the efforts I have made to improve my health, whilst reminding me that there is still some way to go.

I am frustrated. Over the past year I have been trying harder than I ever to be as healthy as I can be. Since I have been doing this I have felt more well and have been sick far less frequently. I guess I have come to expect that because I am putting in the effort to be healthy, I feel in some strange way that I don't "deserve" to have health problems. I know this is not entirely logical and that whilst a healthy lifestyle will improve many things, it will not fix everything. 

I expressed this thought to my mum, who very wisely suggested that I see this surgery as fixing a problem as a part of the health improvement process, rather than a setback. This is now what I will try and do. 

In terms of weight loss, I am satisfied with my efforts this week. I have not been all that well, but I still managed to register a "green light" on the scales. It was not a huge change, but another small but sizable step in the right direction. 

Life is full of challenges, great and small. In order to achieve my goals I don't need to be making earth shattering progress each week, but I do need to make sure I'm always moving in the right direction. A steep part of this learning curve for me has been about making positive steps in instances where I have had a number of legitimate reasons not to. 

My overall goal is to continue to craft myself into the kind of human being that I am proud of being and comfortable to be. Part of that is to continue to develop my resilience and become the kind of person who ceases the opportunity for success in situations where you don't just have an excuse, but a valid reason not to do your best. This is a big challenge, but little victories like this give me the hope that one day I might get there. 

Brace face

I am not exactly looking forward to this week. This is why...

http://www.tanos.co.uk/braces/bkb/images/dblhg2.jpg 

My braces go on tomorrow. Now that I'm nearly 22, most of my friends have been out of their braces for a few years now if not more. The prospect of having them put on does not exactly fill me with joy and I have been told by Kate to eat as many apples as I can today! Whilst braces will not be fun, knowing how much they cost, I am very aware that they are privilege. Whilst I don't think they will be an enjoyable experience, I am very lucky to have them provided to me. No doubt in a year or so I will be pleased I had them.

I have a number of less than fun activities scheduled for this week. That's life, I guess. Looking on the bright side, I have been allocated 5.5 additional coaching hours a week at the gym. This means extra money, but more importantly; more time spent doing what I love.

I am not looking forward to this week. I know it is not going to be fun and I have been feeling a bit flat and despondent recently. Wish me luck and as they say, "this too shall pass".