In the 210s
And no, it was not all tooth weight.
That probably doesn’t make a lot of sense without the context.
Flashback to a few weeks ago, when I thought I must have The Cancer, since I was tired all of the time, sick and my jaw was killing me. I couldn’t open my mouth enough to bite an apple and I was pretty sure that it was the apocalypse. Maybe not quite that dramatic, but I was unhappy.
So I do a search online for “hurts to open jaw” since my doctor just wanted to give me more painkillers that made me ill. Up came the result TMD. Per WebMD, “Temporomandibular disorders (TMD) occur as a result of problems with the jaw, jaw joint, and surrounding facial muscles that control chewing and moving the jaw. These disorders are often incorrectly called TMJ, for temporomandibular joint.”
I so wasn’t going to make the mistake of calling it TMJ. But really, it didn’t mean a whole lot to me. It said that dentists screened for it, so I picked up the phone and made an appointment.
As it turns out, ye olde wisdom tooth that had crested years ago through my gums was having its wicked way with the nerves in my jaw. The diagnosis? Remove it.
And thus, all of my problems were solved. The root of the wisdom tooth was bothering the nerves, which was causing swelling up into my ear canal, making me dizzy and nauseated. Plus, it was hard to eat apples. Or much of anything. Great for the diet, bad for longevity.
Having the tooth out has given me a new lease on life. No, really. The very day they took the tooth out I felt better than I had in forever. Not being dizzy makes you much more motivated to be active. Well, I don’t know if that’s true for you. It is definitely true for me.
I haven’t been on Jenny Craig in a while. I couldn’t get my sponsor calls and so now I just wing it. It taught me valuable lessons on how to put a meal together so that it’s lowfat and filling, so I wouldn’t discourage anyone form a diet program, because they can be very valuable. I was pretty tired of the same menu, so having things to choose from works out better.
And… just because I could, I bought something from Banana Republic. It’s hard to love fashion as much as I do and just plain be too big for everything. BR goes up to 16, which is a little hoochie on me at the moment, but it gives me motivation to keep working to know that I’ll have this fabulous outfit to wear if I stick with it.
Dead Zone
So I’m at 228, which is nothing to sneeze at, but of late I’ve been feeling a bit… i don’t know. Out of sorts. Thanks to the prozac, I haven’t really had to deal with chemical shifts in a long while and I think…think that’s what is going on. But then, I’m not sure.
I just suffered a nasty stomach virus that followed hot on the heels to an allergic reaction to darvocet (allergic meaning I don’t tolerate it, not anaphylactic shock) so I’ve sort of felt like bulimia girl for the past couple of weeks. Add to this that my schedule was disrupted by jury duty and… well… I guess I can see where my tidy routine is disrupted, which might be sending me into the nearly paralyzing paroxysms (how’s that for oxymoron?) of anxiety.
Much as I may loathe the routine, the routine is my coping mechanism. It’s how I add order and sense into a rapidly shifting world. As it stands… I’m spending a fair bit of the day pretty sure that somehow, in some way, something Really Horrible is going to happen. Like, I pet my cat and wonder if that’s the last time I’ll do so. It’s morbid. It’s bizarre. And really, most of the time when that happens, I just Find Another Way to Feel.
But sometimes it gets obsessive and spirals beyond my ability to stop. It leaves me confused and not sure if I should speak up about things that are worrying me or if I should just keep it to myself because it’s obviously paranoid craziness (oh no, no tin hats, really. mostly hypochondria).
Anyway, just noting it here. This is not a cry for help so much as me trying to sift through my thoughts, trying to find the root of it so I can rip it out and move on. But I really suspect that after a few days of maintaining my routine will resolve it.
<3 35 lbs down
I heard someone on the radio once say that they were tired of the prejudice aimed at the overweight. They said something like “you’re not allowed to make fun of gay people, so why are you allowed to make fun of fat people? It’s the same thing.”
It’s not the same thing though, is it? Gay people are born that way. They didn’t work at becoming gay. Fat people became fat because they would rather be that way than stop eating so much. They had to eat and eat to get fat. Then, when they were fat they had to keep up the eating to stay fat. For gayness to be the same as fatness, gay people would have to start off straight but then ween themselves onto cock. Soon they’re noshing all day getting gayer and gayer. They’ve had more than enough cock… they’re full… they’re just sucking for the sake of it. Now they’re overgay, and frowned upon by people who can have the occasional cock but not over indulge.
When a doctor tells me that that’s how you become gay, I’ll stop making jokes about fat people.
– Ricky Gervais
I love him.
Rattling around in my ears.
So last week was stressful. This week will be less so because I’m taking a couple of days off from work so I can catch up on things in my relgular life and just sleep and all of that good stuff.
Last week my mother decided to get serious about getting The Internet and so of course, while I’m in the middle of just tons of stuff that I need to do for work, she keeps calling to ask Intarweb Newb Questions. It’s fine. I’m in IT and I’m fairly used to it. But with our continued and more extensive chats, she dared to get more personal.
Now let me preface this by saying that if I hadn’t injured my foot, I wouldn’t be on this diet. I started dieting because it was a way to make my foot hurt less and as I’m very against pain, it seemed like a good idea. I know I’m not going to be a size 0. or a size 4. In fact, if I ever did make it into the single digits, it would probably have to do with a deathly illness. I’m cool with it.
Even if I were a size 0, just knowing me the way I do, I’d have problems going out in a bathing suit. I’m just self-conscious. Even if I feel fabulous and look fabulous, I get nervous about how people are looking at me and what their motives are. I just don’t think it’s in me to run around scantily clad in public. There are worse things.
So all of that said, my mother started going on about how great it is that I’m on this diet and that I’ll be beating off the men with a stick.
Nothing is more likely to derail me from my diet quite like the prospect of unwanted male attention.
First of all, I’m married. Secondly, I don’t want to have to beat anyone with a stick. Well, no, that’s not true. There are plenty of peope I want to beat with sticks. I just don’t like wanting to beat people with sticks.
I’m sticking with it, though. Because I feel better. Because I don’t want to hurt. Because I do love fashion and I want more options. But mostly because I feel better.
Just…admittedly…the idea of unwanted attention frightens me. It keeps rattling around in my ears, in my head, worrying me. But I guess that’s a bridge to cross if I come to it. I should probably stop filing my pens into shivs, though. I’m starting to get looks.
Broken 240, happy but stressed
Things are pretty stressy at work. I think it’s just the time of year. Kids back in school, no more summer vacations, going into nose to the grindstone time until November where we all check out mentally for the holidays. I’m taking a couple of days off next week to ramp up for things.
I am, as of this morning, at 239. I’m more than 25 pounds down now and I’m happy for it. Even though it means those tight jeans I bought are now loose and being eyed for going to Goodwill. But hey, it’s a good reason to go to Goodwill.
I’m thinking a lot about the presidential race. I can’t claim to not care about what’s going on, because I do. Deeply. I believe in Obama and damn that man, he has actually given me hope.
What scares me now is all of this negative, “terrorist” stuff they’re throwing at him. It’s scary. Maybe I have heightened sense of paranoia about it because I’m in the south, but I just don’t know. They killed Kennedy, and he was only Catholic.
And it would be about right. We finally get a good, honorable, honest man on the cusp of getting the office and turning things around and we would shoot him. Everything just feels so out of balance, so out of control. I get worried. Anxious. I bury myself in work and try to munch on veggies.
I just want everything to be all right.
Be less active, eat less
Evidently, that worked all right last week and probably would’ve worked okay this week except that I had a big sodium-laden lunch yesterday. So that kept my weight the same as it was last week, 241.
Not that I posted. But here’s the thing. I had a bladder infection. I didn’t realize this until my kidneys started hurting and I thought, “well that seems strange, I should probably have that looked into.” And, tadaa. So I’d been feeling really crappy for weeks, not exercising as much because I felt barfy. But also, I wasn’t eating as much because, you know, barfy.
So the weight came off, but I still felt awful. Then I went to the doctor, got some antibiotics, felt better almost instantly, and got back on routine.
Which led to this week where I didn’t gain, but stayed at the same weight as last week.
I was hoping to be in the 230s this week. I always get so anxious about getting down the next 10 and it always seems to sort of hold out for a while. Not a lot, because, you know, I’m still allllmost 25 pounds down. But enough that I get whiny and cranky about not meeting my weekly goal.
Anyway, my clothes are fitting looser. My skinny jeans now fit in a very comfortable way and the pants that fit well are now my loose fat pants. Life is good.
Down some pounds
- Cavalli Watch
So, let’s see. I’m down to 244. That’s 21 pounds so far, which evidently puts me on par with Queen Latifa. But I’m much less queenly than she is, so I’ll just be the princess. I have to admit, I do like seeing her ads. There’s just something commanding but warm about her. Like, you wouldn’t screw around with her, because she’s a Queen, but there’s something about her that makes you feel comfortable.
Anyway, it’s good company.
Smaller Still
So I’ve shed one more pound since last week and gotten a haircut. I don’t think I got a pound of hair cut off, but that would make me sad if that’s what it was!
I’m just hanging in there for now. Trying to focus on the 17 pounds of lost and not how much more I wish I’d lost by now. I’m losing at a healthy rate, and there’s not much more you can ask than that, really.
I ordered resistance bands from Jenny Craig. I’m probably paying too much for them, but I need some sort of exercise alternative for when my ankles make the recumbent bike a non-option. I went ahead and ordered them with my food counselor yesterday so they should come in with my next food shipment.
Tonight I’m going to do the happy hour things with The Ladies. I don’t know when I started calling them The Ladies, but it seems to be what I tell my cow-orkers I’m doing. The Ladies. The Girls. Some Friends. Personally, I like saying The Ladies in a scandalous tone. It makes it sound like we’re going to get up to some mischief. Really we’ll probably just have a couple of drinks, I’ll try to avoid eating anything fried, and we’ll catch each other up on what’s going on in our lives.
It’s like Sex in the City with harder alcohol and a fat girl.
Hopefully the fat girl part will change if I keep going, but the hard liquor will remain.
Oh oops!
But that’s it! Things are moving forward. My foot doesn’t hurt as much as it did last week and I’m feeling pretty positive.
No news is good news.
Well, sort of good news. It’s less than bad news.
I didn’t gain weight on my trip.
I didn’t lose weight, either.
I didn’t go over 1700 calories in a day and rather painstakingly entered in everything that I ate. However, I didn’t get my regular exercise. But! I did walk around quite a bit. So somewhere in the middle of it all… nothing really happened.
That’s good, right?
So why am I disappointed?
