Hi. How does this usually work? Do I explain that I’ve been just so busy with my super duper busy life, gained between three and forty-three pounds, but now I’m back on day three of “The New You Diet”TM and totesOMG ready to do this again this time it will stick I’m so motivated?
The truth is, I’m not even sure what happened. I ate like it was going out of style through July and most of August. It wasn’t like freshman year of college, when I got to 200 pounds by eating unhealthy foods at mealtimes and just refusing to think how many calories I was consuming or how my clothes weren’t fitting. It was more like, “What have I eaten today that’s at least 90% empty calories? A cookie? That’s not enough, I need half a pizza!”
On June 25, the last time I posted here, I weighed just under 170 pounds. That was already a couple of pounds gained. In general, I was frustrated and struggling to eat well.
On July 20, I weighed 172.2. A couple of pounds up from June, but not too terrible. But on August 20th I weighed 182.6. I gained ten pounds in a month. The “in one month” scares me a lot more than the “ten pounds” part. It terrifies me. To have gained that much weight in a month, I would have had to eat an extra 1100 calories per day. That’s scary. And impressive in a horrible kind of way.
On the other hand, it was actually pretty easy. A piece of cake and a muffin together have about 1000 calories. So do two slices of pizza, or a proper burrito. A couple of calorie-bomb snacks or a couple extra slices turns an okay maintenance day into a ⅓ pound gain. It’s so, so easy to gain weight. Lesson for maintenance.
I keep thinking about the few people I know, or know of, who’ve lost weight and kept it off for at least a few years. There’s a girl I went to camp with, who lost something like 75 pounds when she was 22. She maintains her weight by only eating carbohydrates or sugar on her birthday, having a healthy living focused job about which she constantly updates on all available forms of social media, and by posting at least three weight/food related articles per week on facebook. I’m assuming that last part is required by her diet, but who knows. There’s my old college roommate, who averaged a pound or two lost per month… for all four years of school. He graduated two years ago, and still looks great. There’s my sister, who lost about 20-25 pounds a few years ago and has since been paranoid about gaining it back, watching her food intake with a diligence I thought was reserved for middle-aged Hollywood actresses trying to stay fuckable. (Please watch Amy Schumer’s amazing sketch on this.)
And as much as I’m mocking some of them them, the truth is that I’m jealous. Jealous that they’ve gotten to a place that seems impossible for me. I’m also wondering if it’s possible to maintain weight loss without being crazy diligent or restrictive forever. Can I ever have a normal relationship with food? I know, technically, it’s not impossible. My body can go down in fat just like anybody elses. And it HAS. I have. Lately though, I’ve felt doomed to the same shitty pattern. It’s not good for my body, my heart, or my health. Maybe I’m finally starting to face what every weight loser, dietician, and lose-now-book-of-the-month laments: You need to fix your relationship with food, how you see it and how you relate to it, in order to make any real or lasting changes. I think - I hope - I can do that.
I feel like I should mention, in the end of a post whining about how eating less is hard, that my grandfather died on July 30. My father’s father, my genius, stubborn, witty, generous, insisting on buying peanuts for the squirrels, showing me the mint that grew by their house, WWII veteran Grandpa, who worked at his business until the age of 81 (ten years ago), and only stopped because he had a stroke. He and my grandmother were part of every Memorial Day, Labor Day, July Fourth, Thanksgiving, graduation, and Jewish holiday. My family is tiny - I don’t actually have any first cousins or aunts - and his death has left a shitty void where an awesome, sarcastic old man used to be.
I don’t know if this belongs here, and I draw the line at these paragraphs because, in the end, this is a weight loss blog and I prefer to mourn with the people who knew him. However, I miss him so tremendously and it feels wrong to not mention him when writing anything about the last couple of months.
I’m in a much better place than I was a few weeks ago, which is good. This time I’m turning it around at 180 pounds. Last year I had to get to 190 before I woke up. I’ll come back soon with what I’m doing to undo this damage, but for now I wanted to check in and say hi.
