No Lightbulb Moments, Final Part: How I Gained Most of it Back

Part one here, part two in the post just before this or here.

So, what happened?

I was this close to hitting the official fifty-pound mark when everything in my life changed over the course of a few months - I got married, moved into a new apartment, and started at my first post-grad, full-time job. They were wonderful, inevitable changes, but they still knocked me on my suddenly growing ass.

I should have seen it coming, having planned the wedding and applied for the jobs, but somehow I didn't realize that even the most wonderful changes take some adjusting. I didn't realize how much I had relied on having such a free schedule, so when I no longer had all the time in the world, I didn't bother to make the time to exercise or eat right. 

There was also the normal amount of stress that comes from setting up a new household and learning how to perform at a new job. I let those things take over my energy so much that focusing on losing weight seemed like a laughable goal on top of everything else. And because I have no middle ground when it comes to food, over those eight or so months, I gained about 35 of the 50 back. 

That is where I'm starting from now. 

I realize there are so many similarities between the two times I gained a large amount of weight - the first time I reached 200 pounds, and last year when I let normal but busy life take over. It was really the denial that got me there, the denial that I was slipping, letting old habits creep back and eating for no other reason than I was bored, stressed, or that the food was in front of me. I think that's the single biggest factor in my weight gain - I couldn't acknowledge that I was gaining weight again, let alone how much.

I'm just having a muffin. Wait, did I also have one this morning?

Sometimes it's hard not to get angry at myself for having gained so much weight back. It sucks in practical ways, like having to buy new, bigger clothing after I gleefully gave away everything that had gotten too big, certain that I would never need it again. I don't exactly love when I see old friends or acquaintances and realize how much healthier I was last time we met. But mostly it sucks because I let myself down, and all that hard work is now gone. I'm back to where I started. 

However, just like I won't feel guilty over the food I eat, there is really nothing good that can come of being angry at myself. Guilt is not a motivator. I just have to do what I'm doing, which is to keep going,  and lose the weight (again). 

No Lightbulb Moments, Part Two: How I Lost Fifty Pounds

Part one here, or go back a bit. 

After finally facing the fact that at 200 pounds, I had reached the highest weight of my life, I started watching my calories. I lost 20 pounds during the fall of my sophomore year. At 180 pounds, I had a long way to go, but I was happy just to have started to tackle this issue, and to have made some progress. I was also thrilled at how easily those first pounds had come off, and felt like fifty more was totally doable. 

Not surprisingly, it didn't quite work out that easily. For next few years, my overall weight had a downward trend, but it moved very slowly. I mostly maintained the loss during the rest of sophomore year, then slowly lost ten pounds or so during the fall abroad semester of my junior year, for a total of 30 pounds. But when I got back to the U.S. and realized that reverse culture shock wasn't just a weird fad, I didn't deal with it well and ended up gaining back some of the weight. That summer I was even less careful, and gained even more.

At the beginning of senior year, I was ready to try again. I joined Weight Watchers at 185 pounds and loved it. I counted points, measured portions, and worked out at the University gym across the street from my dorm. I also went to weekly Weight Watchers meetings, led by an enthusiastic, entertaining man who had lost 60 pounds, and attended by a group of loyal, fun participants.

 I graduated college at 160 pounds, my lowest weight since high school and forty pounds down total. I felt like I was finally on my way, for real.

College graduation, 2012

College, at least for me, was an ideal environment in which to lose weight. I was lucky: a very flexible part-time job, a reasonable class/exam schedule, and a kitchen in my suite (with three roommates who rarely cooked).

 I could leisurely grocery shop at two in the afternoon, I could spend an hour preparing lunch at noon after class, I could go to the gym that was right across the street after class ended at eleven a.m. There were no major stressors in my life and I could focus most of my time on "project lose weight." My schedule was my own with which to be selfish. 

There were a lot of naps.

After graduation, I lived at home for a few months while I tried to find a job. Though I spent extensive time sending my resume into the black hole where most applications go to die, there was still plenty of downtime. I was lucky that I did not have to work at a minimum wage job while trying to become gainfully employed, and could still focus on weight loss. I started personal training at the nearby gym where my parents were members, and learned a bit about lifting weights. 

 I was in control of the food, instead of the other way around. I could eat something, or choose not to, either one was okay. I wasn't perfect, but my good attitude allowed me to quickly move on from slip-ups and focus on the long term.

During this time after college and before I started my job - about six months - I only lost 5-10 pounds, but there was a huge difference in my body and I'm sure that I had gained some muscle in addition to losing fat. I felt stronger and leaner, and clothes were so much easier to find. 

I was almost at the fifty-pound-loss mark and so fucking confident. I felt so accomplished, I had done the impossible. I had done this thing that so many people struggle with. If I could do this, I could do anything! I wasn't holding myself back any longer.

I wondered if I could put weight loss on a resume - hey hiring manager, how's this for dedication!

Video resume?

This new confidence made me realize just how much I had allowed my weight to hinder me in the past, how little confidence or self-esteem I'd had. I let it stop me from joining things I would probably have loved in college, like the improv group or school paper. 

While the main reward of losing weight was how fantastic I felt, there were other perks. I wore sleeveless tops and felt comfortable with it for the first time in my life. I wore clothes that hadn't fit since high school, and got compliments from people who didn't even know I was trying to lose weight. I daydreamed about going to my high school reunion, as the only person to come back looking better than when they had left and sexily flipping off my former bullies (who would of course have potbellies and be wearing atrocious toupees). I got a thrill being hit on occasionally, a new experience.

I didn't tell anyone about my weight loss who didn't ask me about it first, but I walked around and lived life with this new faith in myself. 

Then, of course, I gained almost all of it back which I where I started from a few months ago.

I will post How I Gained it All Back: Food and Laziness, tonight or tomorrow as I'm still editing it. I know, the suspense is killing me too. 

The Million Dollar, or Seventy Pound Question: Why Did I Get Fat?

Why did I get fat? I started gaining extra weight in kindergarten, and reached what would be a healthy weight for my current height by age twelve. If only I could have just stopped there.

Nope.

This is a topic to which I've given a lot of thought. Childhood obesity is a highly debated and heavily researched area, with sciencey people looking at factors such as my family and my environment, citing fun things like easy access to junk food, no access to healthy food, and too much television with too little exercise. And of course, my genetics. It's mostly experiments on mice and a lot of correlational studies (let's link video games to obesity!), because we can't go experimenting on children.

I don't know how much I fit into those risk factors - I was really lucky. During my childhood, there were always fresh fruits to snack on, and vegetables with every meal. Dessert was reserved for Friday night and special occasions, and my parents only ever bought soda or white bread for guests. Most meals were homemade and eaten at home.

Except when we had wax.

My family was and is healthy. But I was still a chubby 10-year-old who was jealous of her friends in their cute pre-teen bikinis, but who still sneaked extra Oreos at school parties and didn't understand why she couldn't just make herself skinny by wishing hard enough.

It was probably more emotional. I suffered from depression and had low self-esteem as a kid. My parents are wonderful, and did all they could. But I was still an unhappy child. Science says that could have contributed to weight gain.

My current hypothesis is that the initial chubbiness was a fairly standard weight gain, the result of a few overindulgences and being so excited by the junk food that came my way at school or friends' houses that I overdid it and ignored my hunger or fullness signals. This happens to plenty of children, and they often grow into their weights (less so these days, but it used to be more common).

But being a little overweight helped create that classic cycle. I felt badly about myself, so I ate more. My parents wanted to help me lose weight, but they didn't really know how. I didn't know how myself. Food could be both a reward and punishment. I could eat to spite their attempts and punish myself, or I could eat to feel better, or feel in control. Eating felt guilty and great. Or maybe it's a little of all of that.

High school was much better - I slowly got out of feeling depressed and generally grew up a little.  I think time was the biggest factor. But food was still comforting, and while I seemed to be maintaining my weight, it was about 30 pounds too high.

College is a more complicated story, for later.

All in all, I think, I hope, that I'm at least a little more self-aware than I was as a child, and now have the tools and knowledge to get healthy.