New Jeans - addendum

Oh, the wee hours of the morning, a dangerous time to be thinking!  It's dangerous because that's when the voices of fear and doubt are free to spout their negativity, unchecked by the voices of love and reason. Perhaps it is because love and reason are not yet the strongest.

So yes, at 4 am my voices of fear and doubt were mocking me about the New Jeans line: "Oh, so this is what I have to do: live and enjoy my life in the jeans that fit!" That's cocky they said.  Do you have any idea how to "live and enjoy"? You just admitted in one sentence that you still suffer from Disordered Eating and in the next sentence, you've found the answer! So it's that simple is it?  One just stops their compulsive overeating, restricting their food and their weight/shape preoccupation because they have decided to live and enjoy life? No, of course they don't, you messed up!  And that's when my voice of reason finally chimes in and tells me to get up and go make the coffee, and watch Queen Charlotte on Netflix.

After a very large cup of coffee with cream and a healthy breakfast I still felt like I needed to go back and take out the "live and enjoy my life in the jeans that fit!" line, because even though it may be true, it really is not that simple. And that's when reason speaks up again asking "Can one not sometimes be bothered by moments of uncertainty that lead to compulsively eating all of the crackers before her guests arrive, rush out and buy more, forgive herself and then decide to live and enjoy her party in the lovely linen palazzo pants that fit her?"  I think one can because this one did!

Does that mean Healthy Eating and Disordered Eating are not mutually exclusive? For me at this point in my journey/recovery they are entwined and perhaps they always will be. That may mean I restrict my eating at times to compensate for the times I overeat and while that may not be ideal, it's what I am capable of right now.  It is not easy and it is not simple, but the voice of love tells me I don't have to inflict more suffering upon myself by refusing to live my life in jeans that fit. Punishing yourself by refusing to wear clothes that not only fit you but that you like does not speed up the process, it just makes it more unbearable.

New Jeans

A big, large and super huge step for me in dealing with my food and self-love issues now, as my therapist suggests, was to order two new pairs of jeans: one 1 size larger and one 2 sizes larger, which is the pair that fit me now.  Thankfully, skinny jeans are not the only option anymore! 

I'm so very familiar with working to "become better" and even though it can be very painful, the familiarity is oddly comforting. Working to love and accept what is now is in many ways so much harder as so many old thoughts and feelings must be examined and questioned on a daily, even hourly, basis. It's exhausting, right? But I think the hardest thing for me is that on this journey there is very little external validation, as there is when we are losing weight. No one comes up to you and says, "Well done, you didn't bang your head against the wall for having two scoops of ice cream instead of just one! Or "Yay you for feeling the pain instead of feeding it! High five!". For me, truly moving forward on this journey is dependant upon internal validation and THAT is dependant upon silencing the other voices in my head so my voice can actually get a thought in edgewise which is also exhausting.

The problem is I don't really know what it is I'm supposed to do. If I'm not supposed to be dieting and/or restricting the kind of food I eat, what do I do? Just allow myself to eat whatever/whenever I want? And it's all very well and good to acknowledge and validate my feelings and talk about when and why I started to feel this way (which I've done for years) and to KNOW everyone, including me, is worthy of love (which I've known for years) but how do I live it? 

I'm always Googling something about food and recovery and found a term I've never seen before, Disordered Eating.  In a nutshell Disordered Eating is catagorized as the following:

• weight and shape preoccupation
• excessive exercising
• striving for perfection
• compulsive overeating
• restricting food
• fasting
• purging
• yo-yo dieting
• steroid use (the only one I have not tried) 
• laxative use   

So, I used to have an eating disorder and now I regularily practice only 4-5 on the disordered eating list, I guess that's progress, right?  Still not going sleeveless but I am making strides; I bought new jeans and I'm wearing them. Never in my wildest nightmares did I think I'd be happy Mom Jeans are back in style, but if I am to work on healing while my jean size is not my ideal then wide-legged Mom Jeans it will be! 

Oh, so this is what I have to do: live and enjoy my life in the jeans that fit!  Huh, honestly, that thought just came to me, it must have got in edgewise while I was not preoccupied with my usual thoughts of weight, calories and carbs.  Well, I'll be. 

                             

                                                                                                                               

Comfortable in my own skin.

Moving into a new house is unsettling, even when it’s a really good move!  And we just came back from 5 days in New York, a trip we had planned before we even bought the house, where we attended the opera (apparently one does not “go” to the opera, one “attends”) at The Met and I finally saw “Wicked” at the Gershwin Theatre!   I love this house and love my life! So why am I 20 lbs over my goal? And, more importantly, why can’t I just be comfortable in the skin I’m in at any given moment?  After all, we all know that once we are happy staying thin is easy.  Or is it once we’re thin being happy is easy?

In prepping for the move, the one thing we two reasonably intelligent people totally forgot about was the need for drawers, dresser drawers to be exact, because in the previous house the drawers were built into the closet. So, we ordered dresser drawers and waited the 4 to 6 weeks for delivery. During that time my clothes were in suitcases, boxes and bags in the spare room. To prep for the arrival of dressers I went through my clothes, weeding out the ones that I never wear, or don’t really like anymore, to donate. What I didn’t do was remove the clothes that are too small.

Then last Friday I got the call, the dressers would be delivered Saturday!  Yay, we would finally be able to organize! But Sunday when I was putting everything away it started to sink in that maybe ¼ of my clothes actually fit me. I was filling up drawers and closet space with clothes that I can’t wear now and may never wear again. Feeling a melt down coming on (and yes, I know that’s a bit dramatic, but have you met me???) I decided to go to No Frills and get my weekly supply of fat free yogurt and cottage cheese.  As I was sorting through the yogurt because it’s so easy to pick up the wrong one, I heard this giggly little voice behind me say “I am having an awesome day!”  I turned and saw an adorable little 5 year old girl sitting in her Mom’s cart, and she was beaming up at me. I almost choked up but managed to say, “You are?  That’s great, and you just made my day!” And then I turned to a smiling Mom and said, “The store should hire her, lots of people need to hear about her awesome day.”.  I continued to the cereal aisle to try and see if there was a granola for Bob that wasn’t all sugar and fat.  In that aisle there was a Dad with 2 little ones in his cart and they were, of course, lobbying for their favourite sugar-laden cereals, but their Dad just calmly said, “I’m looking for a cereal you will like but is also good for you.”  And the little boy piped up and said, “That’s because you really love me!”. Next on my list was the laundry detergent aisle and there I saw a woman. I guessed she was about 45 years old and she was pushing a walker; both of her legs had been amputated from the knee down. Her friend was pushing the cart and they were discussing which detergent was best.

I left No Frills feeling ungrateful and frankly ashamed that, yet again, I went down my personal rabbit-hole of self-loathing because my clothes don’t fit. I know what my on-going life assignment is but I keep procrastinating and shove it to the back of my mind, much like I shove the clothes that don’t fit to the back of my closet.  And what have I learned?  I’ve learned that when I’m at my goal and my clothes fit, I can ignore the feelings of unworthiness, because the tag in my “at goal” jeans tells me that right now I’m good enough.  But that’s not our assignment, is it?  Our assignment is to be comfortable in the skin we are in at ANY given moment, and I can only learn that in the moments when my clothes don’t fit.

I’m back in therapy, which I love, but so far I have skirted the issues that lead me there again.  Am I ready to do the work this time? I don’t know.  It's messy and uncomfortable. I’m messy and uncomfortable right now but at least it’s familiar, right? But it’s also a cage.  So, I will try again because I have felt the freedom for short bits of time and I want more. “On the other side of fear lies freedom.”

 

Who were you before the world got its hands on you?

I recently posted an Emily McDowell quote called "Finding Yourself" . The last 2 lines are "Finding yourself is actually returning to yourself. An unlearning, an excavation, a remembering who you were before the world got its hands on you.".  Enter the Lao Tzu quote, "When the student is ready the teacher will appear....

Honestly, I'm kinda of tired of working on myself, I just want to be done! To be clear, I am a big believer in self-discovery and therapy but over the years it has taken up so much of my time and a ridiculous amount of space in my head! But, said Carl Jung, "What you resist persists..." so a student I will be. Again.

"a remembering who you were before the world got its hands on you,"  When was that, in the birth canal??  Of course we were "buried under cultural conditioning" and "other people's opinions" the moment we were born. And very soon "the inaccurate conclusions you drew as a kid that became your beliefs about who you are" helped shape us into who we turned out to be.  That's the real kicker because, for some of us, when the world got its hands on us, we were shaped into beings who believed we had to accept everything it dished out. Why?  Well, maybe it's because some of the inaccuate conclusions we drew as kids lead us to believe we needed to become something other than who we were, that who we were was not enough. I cannot read that last sentence out loud without tearing up. 

So who were we before the world got its hands on us?  How can we ever know? I believe I get a glimpse of who I was more often now and it usually starts with a gut feeling. I believe that gut feeling is who I was reminding me of who I still am. It is me every time I stick up for my choices by saying, "My way is not wrong, it's just different.". It is me refusing to be treated as if I don't matter. It is me asking for what I need and actually believing I deserve it. It is me that gently reminds me again, and again, that even though I can't control what others say or do to me, I can control how I react to it.  And yes, it often takes a good bit of self-talk.

I am so grateful to have remembered at least some of who I am and as painful as it can be, and has been, to process it all, in the end it has lead to a more peaceful existence and less suffering.   

Do you see glimpses of who you were before the world got its hands on you?  What are you now doing that seems like the true you?  What is your gut saying to you? Become a student!

"When the student is truly ready....the teacher will disappear." My gut has been my greatest teacher so thankfully as long as I keep paying attention to her, she will never disappear. That shouldn't be a problem, she's pretty forceful with my insides and only backs off when I listen.

If not now, when?          https://www.facebook.com/groups/594855227714542

Some are angry, some are sad and some are anxious. What are you feeling?

During these final meetings many members have expressed in one way or another how they felt and let's just say that not one member said "I'm totally fine with it."  Understandably people are angry and sad, and that's what most shared with me but one member, who before the meeting said she was angry, after the meeting said that she has been anxious and nervous since the news.  The next layer down: fear.  She's anxious because she fears she's going to lose control without her "weekly accountability". Even after all of the success she has had "this time around", she is anxious and afraid that all she has learned and all of the healthy new habits she has developed will all go away.  I get it because I feel the same way. I get it because first and foremost, I am a Weight Watcher. 

I don't know about you but when I feel anxious or nervous it usually stems from fear.  I was brought up by fear-driven parents and I must say I excel in the fear department. Why are we afraid it will all go away? What do the people who are able to take the weight off and keep it off have that we don't?  That's the question I have asked at goal members over and over again during the past 10 years.  In Belleville during the non-meeting store hours there was often time to chat with an at-goal member coming in for their monthly weigh in and when I first started coaching I would ask them "How have you kept the weight of for 2, 5, 10 , 30 yrs???"  And it hit me one day what these members have: acceptance.

1. They kept tracking because they had accepted that tracking was a key component that got them to goal and so tracking would keep them at goal.

2.  They continued to weigh themselves regularily, even during the holidays and other stressful/busy times, because they accepted how easy it is to gain 1, 2 or 10 pounds. Weighing themselves helped keep them mindful and make changes after 1 or 2 pounds gained.  Much easier to lose 2 pounds than 10!

3. They accepted their relationship with food.  Most of us have an emotional relationship with food, one that was probably given to us when we were children by the adults in our life.  No blame here, the adults in our lives were likely given theirs too.  I have accepted that even though my full-blown eating disorder is in the past, the emotions that started it all at 10 years old are still part of me. I've accepted that some things about me I can change and others I've just learned to manage.  I do a lot of managing.

4. They accepted that they alone are responsible for their health. The accountability of the weigh-in and the meetings helped them learn new the habits, but they put those habits into action the moment they left the meeting.       

5. They accepted the changes they had made must become part of their lifestyle, AND they did it, and continue to do it willingly and with gratitude.  Why?  Because they never forgot how they felt before losing the weight and getting healthier, and they are grateful every day for how they feel now.

6. And finally, they accepted they had to believe not only in their ability to change but truly believe they are worth the effort.

So going forward I hope you accept what it is you need to do to become your healthiest self and, most importantly, I hope you believe you are worth it.

If you would like to join my Facebook group, If not now, when? as a way to stay connected to others here's the page link and just request to join.

https://www.facebook.com/groups/594855227714542

It's like I'm losing a friend....

While my blog is not always about weight and body image issues....wait, I'd have to go back and look to see if there is one that is not at least connected to weight and body image issues, many of them are because my weight and body image issues go back to some of my very first memories, certainly some of my most vivid ones. 

At 51, the menopause pounds had got the better of me and I joined Weight Watchers. From the moment I went to my first meeting I knew I wanted to be a leader/coach.  I had found my people and I wanted to work with them while they worked on their own weight and body image issues. And then I decided I had more to say (don't I always???) so I started this blog to "keep the conversation going".  And bit by bit, meeting by meeting, blog by blog, I started to heal. Every meeting I take away something that affected me and helped a peice of me heal. Sometimes it was what someone shared, sometimes it happened before the meeting during a one on one chat, sometimes it was just seeing one of you walk through the door after you had been away, sometimes it was just the energy of the collective. Oh, I will miss the energy!

It's like I'm losing a friend because the Weight Watcher staff and groups have helped me so much. They helped me rebuild my life when I moved to Cobourg, and when I moved to Kingston to be with my partner, I knew once again Weight Watchers was going to help me find a whole group of new friends, ones I just hadn't met yet!  From the first meetings I felt at home, because we are all the same. So yes, our Weight Watcher collective is my friend and I will miss it terribly. Yes, we are still friends but our collective challenge of weight and body image issues brought us together every week and reminded us that we are understood, we are seen, we are heard and most importantly, we matter and we are not alone. And I think we will all miss those reminders. 

Not sure how many times I've written about this topic: nothing ever goes away until it's taught us what we need to know. But here I go again!

I started writing my blog, "If not now, when?", in 2014 because I had been coaching for Weight Watchers for a couple of years and had personal opinions that I wanted to share but not in a workshop simply because they were my opinions and not neccessarily WW's.  I just re-read my first blog from March 15, 2014 and my reason for writing today remains the same as it was on that day: I want to continue the conversation and maybe some of you do too.  If not, journaling is great therapy!

I was quite prolific the first couple of years but life happened and I stopped writing for a while.  It's interesting now to look back on a few of them and see how my approach to losing weight, aka "my life" has evolved. I've become less rigid with myself and more forgiving.  However, I have not advanced much in the self-acceptance department, I really just kinda fake that one.  Oh, I have moments but not true self-acceptance because the Google dictionary says self-acceptance is "the state of complete acceptance of oneself".  "Complete", that's the part I get hung up on. 

The reason I'm writing this one now is because I'm going to St. Lucia in 10 days and I have decided NOT to try and starve off the 20 pounds I've put on in the last year before I go! That means there will be no skipping meals and no excessive exercsing.  But this is where it gets real since I've also decided I AM going to wear a bathing suit every day that I'm there which means I have to buy a bathing suit. The buying might be relatively easy but the wearing will not. The truth is I don't want my partner Bob to see me in a bathing suit. Dumb I know, because of course he's seen me naked but not in the harsh light of day with sunlight bouncing off my lumps and bumps! I know people think don't worry, you'll be fine, just enjoy yourself but I was on holiday in Cuba, by myself, and I still had a hard time walking around in front of strangers at the beach or pool in a bathing suit! In 2 weeks I maybe did it 2 or 3 times.  Logically I know no one cares what I look like because they are obsessing about their own stuff. But it doesn't matter, this is an old, deeply rooted fear of mine that I've never overcome. Wonder if I could get Bob to wear extremely dark sunglasses?  Will be checking Amazon later. 

But seriously, if Bob read this, he would be so sad to know I feel this way. Why can't we love ourselves the way the people that matter to us do? My guess is at one time a person who did matter to us said, or did, something and the seed of feeling not good enough was planted.

Pema Chodron's quote "nothing ever goes away until it's taught us what we need to know" has been going through my head a lot lately.  I don't know how I will learn self-acceptance but I do know I'm tired of caring what others, even strangers, think of my body. And I'm so very tired of caring about what I think of my body, it's exhausting!

So, I may not be ready, but I am open to learning what I need to know in order to uproot that fear of mine and move towards complete self-acceptance. If not now, when, right?  Ummm, wonder if I can do it in 10 days??