Socal Mom

Stress Eating

As some of you know, I recently lost a significant amount of weight. I am now trying to maintain that loss, and discovering that in some respects, it's harder than losing the pounds in the first place.

Tuesdays are the one night of the week when the whole family is home early; it's the night I actually have time to cook. As I'm still playing catch-up after all the business travel I did the last couple of weeks, I decided to make a turkey stew that is not technically low-calorie, but something I've enjoyed since starting maintenance (without causing any weight gain). The beauty of it is that it only requires me to work in the kitchen for about 30 minutes -- the rest of the time, I just let it simmer while I continue working on projects.

And since my work load right now is so overwhelming, I ended up skipping my time in the gym. Looking back, I think that was a major contributor to yesterday's problems.

Yesterday ended up being one major binge.

I started small. I had a second grande non-fat latte, in the afternoon. An extra 130 calories. No big deal, right?

But then, while cooking the stew, I found myself craving bread. Not just any bread, but this nice loaf of artisanal whole wheat that I'd purchased for the family for their dinner on Sunday. Big mistake.

I've been trying to make friends with carbohydrates again; telling myself that they are not ALL evil, and attempting to find the level I can consume without harming my maintenance. One slice of high fiber, really GOOD bread shouldn't do any harm, don't you think?

The problem was that I wasn't able to stop at the one slice.

This tends to be my issue with carbs. I'm like an alcoholic who thinks just one little drink isn't going to hurt. There are times when that one little bite of pasta sets me up for a lost weekend of major carb loading.

The problem with this particular loaf of bread is that my daughter (who likes that bakery's white bread) balked at the whole wheat loaf on Sunday. My husband liked the bread, but he doesn't have my carb addiction. So by last  night, I had a half loaf of this amazing bread (and it truly was! I am taking some small consolation in the fact that I did not sabotage my maintenance with junk calories). Another day, and it was going to go badly stale.

Yes, I know I could have stuck it in the freezer for later consumption, but by this time, all rationality went out the window. I WANTED that bread, even though at that time, I wasn't thinking that I would eat the remaining half loaf by myself.

That came later. After I'd had two servings of the stew, and I was still feeling hungry. After I'd said "yes" when my husband asked me if I wanted a glass of wine (and then said "yes" again when he asked if I was allowed a second serving. Don't get me started on how I feel when my husband questions my food choices).

By this time, that bread was the only thing I could think about, and I made a decision. I was going to finish the loaf -- AFTER my family had gone to bed.

Think about that. Since I started my weight loss program, I've managed to fight most of my cravings by distracting myself. I do something else (like play video games) and they pass. Last night, after dinner, I went back to my work project... but still, all I could think about was that half loaf of bread. And as soon as my family went to bed, I was on that bread like white on rice.

I scarfed it down as fast as I could, lest my husband get up and find me there. And as I ate, I wondered why I was sabotaging myself this way. I wasn't hungry. In fact, I've become so unaccustomed to such a huge amount of carbs that it was making me feel kind of woozy. And yet, I didn't stop until I'd finished every last crumb.

Past carb binges occurred when I was pre-menstrual. That wasn't the case last night. So why was I so out of control?

It was getting late. I turned out the lights and grabbed a pillow, so I could fall asleep on the couch with the TV on. I've been doing that a lot the last couple of weeks. The failing economy has affected my family. My husband works in the housing industry, and while he still has a job, he's worried about what the future holds. A writing contract that provided me with the money for our family's extras wasn't renewed this year. The only thing that keeps me from obsessing about our budget when I go to bed at night is falling asleep in front of the TV.

And that's when I came to the realization that I'm feeling stressed. Skipping gym yesterday didn't help (even though I did that so I could finish a paying project). And I remembered the words of my friends who had lost weight last year only to gain a lot of it back: Stress eating is what killed their maintenance.

Today, I am going to the gym, no matter how inconvenient it is. And I'm back to eating the lousy, low-fat, low-calorie, low-carb, diet clinic food until I lose the two pounds I gained between last week's New Jersey trip and last night's close encounter of the bread kind.

Thanksgiving

So last night, we celebrated Thanksgiving at my sister’s house.

I’ve been a bit stressed about this weekend. As I've written here before, I've been on a very strict weight loss regimen for the last four months, and I've been worried about the havoc this holiday would have on that.

Even more stressful was the prospect of seeing my parents.

I have a long history of weight issues with my mother, who says she watches her weight. I say she’s obsessive. I’m going to leave it at that. Let’s just say that I’ve done the yo-yo diet thing for such a long time that I didn’t want to open up that can of worms. So now, four months after my last visit, I was coming up here nearly 40 pounds lighter. And I didn’t want to talk about it with my mother, which sounds strange, because I’m usually delighted when someone notices that I’m losing weight, but that’s how twisted our relationship is.

“Maybe if I wear a big bulky sweater, she won’t notice,” I said to my husband. He didn’t think that would work.

I was helping my sister out in the kitchen when my parents got to her house, and I spent a lot of the evening maneuvering myself behind counters and tables so she wouldn’t notice.

And it worked. By the time we sat down to dinner, I was more relaxed, because I realized that my mother could not tell that I’d lost five dress sizes since the last time she saw me.

And it irked me.

Because even though I am still overweight, I think forty pounds is kind of a significant amount to lose. How could she NOT notice?

Is it because in her eyes, I am still grossly obese? Or is she just that self-involved? (My sister and husband ruled out the possibility that she might not have said anything out of any sensitivity to my feelings. That’s not in her nature.)

And how twisted am I, that I got what I wanted and I’m still upset about it?

Fearless Friday

Is it really Friday already? The last one in April? As usual, I'm having trouble keeping track of the days flying past.

Earlier in the week, I was going to offer up an (I hoped!) amusing diatribe about online marketers who seize upon us bloggers as middle men and women to further their cause. Ironically, that post was interrupted by a lunch meeting I took -- with a marketer whose favor I am currying, because her opportunity sounds like so much FUN that I want to work with her-- really really badly. No money involved, but there's more to life than that. As the good doctor Seuss said, "These things are fun and fun is good."

The older I get, the more I crave attention from friends and strangers alike, and I'm at the point where I'm not ashamed to admit it. Half the email I get these days comes from marketers; pitching products and issues they hope I'll seize upon as topics for this little-read online journal. Their goal is to create some kind of viral critical mass that will result in "buzz," and it must work, because every day I get new pitches from other corners of the Internet. Most of them get trashed like so much spam -- but every so often, I get one that intrigues me... or sounds like fun. And as I moan so often, these days I am sorely in need of fun.

So the following email (received last week) from Mother-Talk's Miriam Peskowitz remained flagged in my Inbox, forgotten until this morning when I attempted to prune away the dozens of messages that have piled up above it over the last seven days:

Hey bloggers:

Please join MotherTalk on Friday, April 27th  for the very first MotherTalk Blog  Bonanza:  Fearless Friday.

MotherTalk is spreading the word on the paperback release of Arianna Huffington's "Becoming Fearless," in which she eloquently writes of women coming into our own and overcoming the anxieties and fears that can stand in the way of our happiness, our health, and our ability to fully participate in our lives, our relationships, our families, and in the public life of our communities and nation (yes, all that!). Moreover, she wrote this book as a mother, concerned by the world her daughters were facing.

So, on Friday April 27th, let's all blog about overcoming fear—at home, in relationships, at school, of our bodies, in parenting, at work, and in leadership.  Arianna challenges us to find our inner voices and align it with our purpose in life. As we do that, we become fearless, and that's when the fun begins...

The real prize is the fun of it, but we will also get Arianna involved in awarding a prize (an autographed copy of her book) and hope to link these entries to the Becoming Fearless section of the Huffington Post.

Those of you who caught my BlogHer '06 posts may remember how thrilled I was to have my picture taken with Arianna Huffington following her panel appearance there (promoting the original hardback publication of this book). What I did not write then is what a dorky fan I am, and have been for years -- ever since she won me over on KCRW's political show, "Left, Right and Center." I subscribed via email to her weekly column BEFORE she launched the Huffington-Post and even voted for her for governor (knowing full well that I was throwing that vote away; there was no stopping the Schwarzenegger machine. I think she knew that too, but used that crazy recall election as a platform to advocate for the social issues we've been neglecting all these years.)

I have to admit that I absolutely HATED Arianna when she started out as a spokesperson for the "Right" -- the woman is so damned SMART and it irked me when she would make cogent arguments for the Republican POV. Right now, she's identified as a "Progressive," but I think those kind of labels (right, left, etc.) are irrelevant. Ms. Huffington strikes me more as a humanist, in the sense that the source of her outrage is the way the people in power have stripped away any semblance of a "safety net" for our poorest, most defenseless citizens. This predated and is bigger than Katrina, which at least forced the rest of us to see it. She does not suffer gladly fools or hypocrites and is herself fearless about calling them on their lies and doublespeak. And switching tracks so publicly (from "right" to "left") was a very brave thing for her to do.

But there's very little bravery in my own makeup. I am ruled by fear, and many of the posts in this blog are exercises in articulating it and trying to deal with it. Intellectually, I understand how baseless many of my fears can be, and 10 years of therapy before my marriage helped me to break a lot of the ones which were holding me back (essentially preventing me from having any kind of healthy relationship with ANYONE).

Over my 50+ years on this planet, I have managed to overcome fear -- only to have it return, later on, in a slightly different form. I grew up in a volatile household, and things got even worse during times of unemployment or a family member's illness. Avoidance is a defense and a weapon. I am both attracted to and repulsed by drama and would rather crawl into a hole than confront someone who is likely to fly off the handle. And when my life is going well -- as it has been now for many years -- I cannot enjoy it fully, because I know that the good times can end at any time... and I'm always waiting for that other shoe to drop.

So I follow the wisdom of A.A. and take it One Day at a Time. Last month, I was afraid to visit the dentist. This month, I've been dealing with my fear of change. Last week, like everyone else, I was sickened by the events at Virginia Tech and had to deal with the truth that random violence is a fact of life. On Monday, I got another reminder that Mother Nature will once again wreak her own havoc on my nice, neat little world. And today, I outed myself as a Volvo-driving, wine sipping, anti-gun, pro-choice liberal Democrat and am now open to trolling by those who disagree.

Baby steps. If we give in to our fear of every little thing that could happen to us, none of us would ever leave our homes -- and that's no way to live.

Fortunately for me, I have a wonderful model of fearlessness living here in my home. My daughter, Megan, amazes me. I know I write about my pride in her all the time, I know I can go overboard when I recount her amazing gymnastics feats. I can't help it. I am the type of person who retreats in the face of failure. My daughter simply doesn't accept it, and she works and works and works until she's turned it around. Every new skill she attempts at gym is a struggle; each one performed badly has the potential to hurt. She acknowledges her fear and works through it, and singlemindedly practices until she gets it right. It's not just her sport, but her entire approach to life. I don't even know how to express how much I admire her.

She is an inspiration, and my reason to keep trying to be fearless.