Back to the Weight Thing...

I got off track lately, when it comes to the whole weight issue. It happens to me, getting off track, that is. This whole blog is a simply a stream of consciousness. I don't really edit after I type, except to check for typos or REALLY heinous grammatical errors. But I want to get back to the weight/self-image story...

So, we left off during a sedentary part of my life, when online communities were in their infancy and costly. I spent ALOT of time online, and on my ass. This was the beginning of my downfall.

Now, don't get me wrong, I met my husband on Compuserve. He moved up here in '95, we were married in '96... and celebrated 15 years together this past Memorial Day weekend. I got comfortable... really comfortable... and a bit lazy, other than the three nights a week I played softball.

There's something to be said about being "comfortable"... but when you add "lazy" to it, it's just a slippery, slick slope to fatty girl!

All that time I had "worried" that I was fat... went through the bulimia... got better... got fit... and here I was, 15 years after all of that, and I was truly getting fat.

Then the next chapter came with the illness of my mom.

She and my dad had been divorced 5 years, she was remarried. Dad had remarried also. Mom lived in Chester, VA with my step dad who taught logistics at a local army base. They travelled to Europe for his work and his hobby, train collecting. Often they stayed in military housing which meant very old facilities and not the best accommodations.

A little aside, Mom had polio as a child, and one thing they've found in polio victims of the past is that the muscles that the polio affected in childhood deteriorated earlier and became extremely weak. Mom's muscles were her abdominal muscles that helped her exhale, the muscles around the lungs. She developed a poor breathing problem at night and used a bi-pap machine to sleep, in order to keep her O2 levels non-toxic. When mom was diagnosed with post polio and respiratory issues, her O2 levels had slowly (over years) lowered to toxic levels... she couldn't stay awake for more than an hour without needing to sleep. It was scary, but the bi-pap had handled things.

Where she got "ill" was, in my belief, from her stays at these bases overseas... and the use of her bi-pap machine to force air through her lungs. She once remarked that her filter in her machine was black when she took it out.

Mom was diagnosed with non small cell lung cancer in Sept of 2001. She had a procedure in June to remove a mass in her lung, but they told her that they got it all and there were no live cancer cells surrounding the mass, they would just monitor it with x-rays and regular visits. Three months later, it was in both lungs, her spine and a rib in her back. It was stage IV. She went to Johns Hopkins for confirmation and a treatment plan. There really wasn't one...

Up to now, that phone call I got from her on the way back from the doctor was the worst moment in my entire life. It literally rocked my world.

I spent the next 6 months going back and forth to Virginia. I hosted Xmas at my house for my family, consisting of my brother (who hadn't been home for Xmas in 10 years - from Dubai), my grandmother, my aunt and my mom and step-dad. We had a wonderful holiday, and I worked so hard to make it a great visit. We had "talks"... we shared lots of stories, and love, and tears.

For those six months I was on autopilot.

Eventually, my mom came and lived with me for her last month. It was hard. Really hard.

Here was my best friend, who I did not want to let down, who I wanted to stay positive for, who it was KILLING me that she was dying... but I just kept moving one day at a time.

Grandmother, Mom and Sue (my aunt)

Mom left us on April 10th, 2002... in the early afternoon. I had spent the entire previous day and night... holding her hand. I was hoping I could keep her around til my brother made it back from Dubai. My family talked me into taking a break, and letting my aunt hold her hand... and try to get some sleep, because I was getting loopy. It was only a few minutes, and she started gasping... her eyes wide open. Someone ran and got our nurse, Maureen. It was time. I let my grandmother get up next to her (she was there, in a wheelchair after having her 3rd hip surgery just a week earlier), my step dad was on the other side.. my aunt and Alan just down from each of them. Me? I was just off to the side. My mom looked over at me... and I looked in her eyes. "It's ok, you can go. I'll take care of Doug. It's really ok, Mom. I love you, but you don't have to stay here anymore." My step-dad was saying otherwise, but I knew she was listening to me. My grandmother and aunt told her the same thing, through their tears. Alan weeped to the side of my step-dad.

She took one last breath, and left us.

Ten minutes later, my dad called that my brother's plane had landed.

I think she knew what we all hadn't considered. If Doug has seen what we saw, he wouldn't have been comforted by it, he would have been haunted by it. But, I still had my guilt for not getting him home, that was my cross to bear.

Mom was out of pain, moving on to where ever we go when we die, but I do believe she had a soul that left her body... and based on my beliefs, I believe she will be back to continue her journey of learning, and I hope we cross paths again. I also believe that she had a say in our getting Alex when we did, a year and a half later.

What does all this have to do with weight... it was a life-changing moment. It switched something in my make-up, and my "eating for comfort" began to take over. I also just wanted to "feel" better, and chocolate cake did that, ice cream did that, fresh-baked bread... did that!

It wasn't til a year into having Alex, that I started to come out of my eating funk. I found a more joyful thing that made me feel good... my own family... and now it was time to look inward at the outside and get fit for my son.

And, I did... for a while.

More to come.....

Sometimes It's Not You...

In this world, there are the narcissists, the confident ones, the insecure ones, the blissfully ignorant ones, the genuinely happy ones...and there are ones like me, ever-critical of self. There's no way I'm arrogant or blissfully ignorant, but I do have moments of confidence, insecurity and genuine happiness, all to varying degrees.

I have found I am a bit more critical of myself once a month, I'm hoping that goes with the wave of hot flashes I now endure. It does help to at least understand the trigger, in order to keep from totally collapsing into a weeping pool of self-doubt.

This is one of the things that makes
me genuinely happy!

Over all, I'm a fairly secure individual. I experience genuine happiness every time I hear my son truly laugh, see a perfect sunset or successfully help a friend in need. My insecurities manifest themselves in a physical issue called "weight" which is actually a deeper insecurity which I can discuss in a later blog. Blissful ignorance is something I can't resolve, I find nothing blissful about ignorance, and those that live their lives that way, irritate the snot out of me.

In the day-to-day bombardment of one's self-worth, if you're like me, there's always the underlying idea that it's something "we've" done. Unless you're the "confident" one, you start by looking inward. "Did I say something wrong?" "Did I miss something, not do enough?" "If only I had... (insert issue here)." When we've exhausted those ideas, THEN we look outward.

Why?

Why do most of us start with the fault lying with us, versus that particular situation, or the circumstances we had no control over?

I believe it harkens back to two things: 1) being a people pleaser or 2) the need to be in control of the situation on some level. "If I was in control of this situation, then it wouldn't have gone down like this."

Sometimes it just hits during a "low" and you just metaphorically add it to the pile of things you can't do right.

Or... maybe you did have something to do with it, but does it have to be ALL your responsibility? Were there others who should share in the shame?

For those "people pleasers" of us, you're convinced you could have done more to prevent it. Your disappointment actually comes more from letting others down and internalizing it as a lack of ability on your part. But sometimes... it's NOT YOU!

It's usually a series of decisions, some you had control over... and others you did not.

While you can SHARE in the responsibility, you don't OWN it, regardless of how you feel. Sometimes others, in their haste to buck their responsibility, play on your insecurities in order to avoid the trap that is self-doubt. The trick is not to simply accept it. Understanding the part you played, and taking a deep breath before beating yourself up, often prevents a lot of unnecessary self-flagulation.

Life is about learning... learning from your mistakes... learning from your successes... learning from others... and remembering the lessons. Take what worked, and own it. Take what didn't, and figure out what to do differently next time, and own that too!

We're fallible, we're human and most of the mistakes we make in life will not cause extreme harm to anyone, so don't fall into the trap of feeling TOO guilty, or accepting too much responsibility. Weigh the facts, assess the outcome and try... TRY not to beat yourself up.