Food Post #2

Weight: 252.8

Breakfast: Slimfast
Lunch: Greek Salad (lettuce, greek olives, feta, peanuts, keilbasa, garbanzo beans, raisins, light dressing)
Dinner: Slimfast

Food Post

Breakfast: granola, pomegranate, skim milk
Lunch: Clif bar
Dinner: Lean Cuisine pizza
Snack: Apple

Irresponsible Food

I'm really not suprised I've gotten as fat as I have. The opportunity to be fat is all around me. Everywhere we turn, we're offered french fries, hamburgers, pizza, dressings, sodas, desserts. Perhaps what we have here is not an obesity epidemic, but an epidemic of irresponsible food options.

It isn't shocking that there's a correlation between being poor and being fat. I recently had about five dollars to spend on food for the day. I could go to the grocery store and buy a plethera of food with that money, but it's doubtful it would be the kind of square meal we're intended to be receiving. I could take the five dollars and buy five cheeseburgers, or five medium fries, or how about some fried chicken? Nutritious food is simply not affordable for everyone, and as someone who works on a very tight budget, the deicison to save money and eat badly or to spend money and eat healthy is an often lost battle.

I watch a lot of tv (which I'm sure is another factor in my weight) so I see a lot of television commercials. I'm shocked at the choices some places have decided to make. While McDonalds has choosen to do away with Super-Size options and offer smarter side choices, other fast food chains seem to be going to the other way. Burger King has introduced even larger portion sizes for the breakfast sandwiches, and Taco Bell has campaigned some of their quicker, easy to eat on the go, cheaper items as "Fourth Meal" options. In a country where our waists are getting bigger and bigger do we need to add more meat/carbs/cheese to our breakfasts and add a fourth meal to what is traditionally a three meal day? Probably not.

It's not easy making the right choices when everywhere we turn there seems to be someone eager to offer us a cheap escape from making a healthy decision. Foods that are less nutritious are far more attainable and affordable. But I guess loseing weight is going to be a whole world of making the right decision, which in the end, is the harder decision.

This Is Your Body

I wish that I was more in tuned with my body. I wish I understood how it works, what makes it happy, what makes it do certain things.

I am ashamed of my body to the point where I don't even physically see it the way it really is. I ignore the mounds of flesh, I ignore the stretch marks, I ignore the multiple chins.

A dose of reality:

I have chubby ankles.
I cannot wear boots because my calves are too big.
I have stretch marks behind my knees.
I have trouble shaving because I can't reach.
There are areas in my midsection that are enveloped in folds of skin.
I have stretch marks across my belly.
I have stretch marks under and around my arms.
I have gigantic upper arms.
My rings barely fit.
I can't wear a watch.
I have two chins.
I have irregular hair growth.
I can't really see my feet.

This is my body. And maybe now that I can really see it, I can really change it.

The Beginning

Starting Weight: 253
Goal Weight: 150
Weight to Lose: 103 pounds .

I cannot count the number of times I have begun entries such as this one. How many times have I said "tomorrow will be the day!". I have started (and deleted) an estimated 8 weight loss journals. Some of them lasted a few months, some of them a few days. A few of them showed significant success, others only served to document my neurosis about food and the harmful things I was (am) willing to do all for the sake of feeling thin.

I've read places that thin people look in mirrors and see their reflections as fat. I have this same problem only in reverse. When I look into the mirror I don't see 230 pounds hanging on a five foot two frame. I see a face that's kind of cute, hair to be envied, eyelashes that go on forever, even a little bit of a waste. If I hold my neck just so I can see color bones and if I move my shoulders forward in such a way I can see the bumps of my breast bone and pretend I look like Jennifer Aniston.

Being as short as I am my goal weight should be lower. According to all those charts and graphs I should be somewhere about 120 pounds. I can't even imagine. I feel like I would disappear. I like curvy girls, I admire them, I think they're bold and sexy and confident. They're realistic. So my goal is to be 150 pounds, but also sassy and happy and me with a better sense of self and a happier smile on my face.

I have an older sister who used to be a Fat Girl. She wasn't always fat like I have been, but gained her weight in her teens. After a bad break-up and reaching a breaking point with herself she entered "the zone" and the weight just melted off. It was literally like I saw her one day as a big girl and then saw her the next and she was this leggy beauty that I could only envy. I always wondered if when I turned twenty my thin motivated genes would kick in like hers had and suddenly I'd be all legs. Well, I'm almost twenty one and getting wider every day. I recently asked her for details on her weight loss. She told me two things: "I had a Slim Fast for breakfast, a salad for dinner, a salad for lunch, and I worked out every day" and "Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned."

While I was waiting around for my thin genes, I was also waiting for "the moment". You know, the one where everything is just so bad that I would finally go nuts and lose all my extra baggage. The moment where someone calls me fat on the streets and it finally clicks. It never came. I've been called fat on the street (recently, in fact, someone yelled out "Fat girls need love too!" as they walked past me. It's true, we do need love. But you don't have to be rude.) I've broken benches, I've not fit in places, I've had pants rip, I've been the only girl not asked to dance, I've been mocked, I've been embarassed, I've been lonely, I've been ashamed. None of it has ever made me so miserable I've ever done anything about it.

So I'm done waiting for nature to take over, and I'm done waiting for something tragic to happen to kick start my motivation. I hate to say it but... I don't wanna wait for [my] life to be over... before I start to live it.

Events to keep in mind:

Christmas is in 2 months

My 21st is in 3ish months

I'm going to Spain in 4 months

How much can a person lose in 4 months? How much can she gain?

It's getting late. More tomorrow.