I Guess I'm Not the Fat Girl Anymore

I had an encounter yesterday that seriously called into question my self perception, as well as reminded me of the type of comments I hope I never hear myself making.

I was offsite at a client’s office and had to be let in by the secretary. The elevator door opened to let us on and out walked 3 heavyset women with large containers of food they had just gotten from the cafeteria one floor below.

After we got in and the doors shut behind us, the secretary turned to me and said, “I know this is awful of me to say, but every morning when I see those big women with their big food containers all I can think is, ‘You can’t walk up one flight of stairs?’”

And, ok, the women were large and they did have a lot of food, but as someone who has bounced around the 200 mark for awhile I know that simply eating less and walking up a flight of stairs occasionally probably aren’t the only issues there.

I just kind of murmured, “Uh-huh” without elaborating. This was the client after all. It’s not like I could really whip out my In Defense of the Overweight Treatise.

It was weird to suddenly feel like I was part of the in crowd. The thin crowd. The ones who talk about the fat people. The fat people were the “other”, there to be judged.

I can’t tell you how many times I’ve wondered if people around me were thinking that I really didn’t need to be ordering that brownie or that scoop of full fat, full sugar ice cream. Maybe they were.

I still feel like the fat girl. I feel like I look pretty good now, but I know I still have 20 pounds to lose. More if I wanted to look like someone on TV, which I don’t.

Just an odd moment all around. Uncomfortable because of the comment being made to me, assuming I would agree. Strange to realize that I suppose I don’t come across as the fat girl anymore. At least not to this secretary.

Plateau?

I think I may have hit the dreaded plateau. June was kind of a loss because of the craziness of the month and my sporadic exercising. However, other than a McDonald's indiscretion the other day*, I have been pretty precise with my eating for the last few weeks. I've been doing the calorie cycling, eating my high calories on the heaviest exercise days. I've been swimming and when I can't swim I do weights and pilates at home, which, with the weather the way it's been, is probably worth more than I give myself credit for based on the amount of sweat I'm generating in my non-air conditioned apartment on the 3rd floor.

Yet I weigh myself every morning and the scale keeps bobbing between a 2-3 pound spread. I whip out the tape measure and don't really see any difference. And, people, I need to fit into my wedding dress!

With my schedule, I can't really squeeze in more workout time right now. So I guess my only option is to try to mix it up. This morning I swam my 80 laps, but I threw in 10 laps of backstroke and I can really feel it. Different muscles, different breathing. I think I need to fight my way out of my workout rut, which it's easy to fall into when it's 6:45 AM and I just don't want to have to think about an interesting and challenging routine. Apparently, though, just swimming my usual isn't cutting it anymore.

On the mornings when I don't swim, I think I may try to go for a fast walk. Since I drive to work now I never get to walk through my neighborhood anymore on the way to the train station so it will be nice to check out everyone's gardens and see what's new. Then I can do some weights in the evenings.

I just need to do something. This whole plateau thing is very annoying!


* Which was totally not worth it. The puny, deep fried, heavily battered Chicken Selects were not all they had promised to be. Yesterday I had a Southwest Salad and realized I should have just ordered that the other night for dinner. Yum! And no guilt!

Boyfriend*

80 laps yesterday.

However, today I had to get something signed by a client before work. A client who works near where I live, not near where I work (about a half hour from where I live). Since the gym is near my work, I had to forego the pool this morning. I did get up early and do pilates, weights and abs, so at least I did something.

Last weekend, Jason had to go to work on Saturday afternoon and left me to putter around his place. I was watching TV, but then got antsy just sitting on the couch so I decided to do an ab workout while I was waiting. Then I went ahead and did some leg exercises too while I was at it.

He got home and said, "Have you been watching TV this whole time?" I said, "Yes, but I've been productive too. I did abs and leg exercises." He looked crushed and said, "Why didn't you wait and do the exercises with me?"

Well, A) you never really seemed that interested in exercising before, and B) (as a corollary of A) I'm not a mind reader.

However, I was excited to learn that he actually wants me to show him the exercises I do and to do them with me. Also, he's started walking the mile to work every day AND playing tennis occasionally with some co-workers. I think I'm being a positive influence. Now if I could just get him to eat better...


* I don't like the word "fiance." It sounds too snooty or something.

Dress

Now I can tell you one of the big things that was so distracting during the month of June.

I have additional motivation to keep losing weight, you know, besides my health and all that. My dress. It's just a tad too small, but I knew when I bought it that I was losing weight so it would all work out. Right? OK, there is enough fabric in the seams that a seamstress could let out an inch or two, but I don't really want to go that route. I would rather have her taking the dress in.

So this month I focus on fitting into the dress. I don't have to get the tailoring done quite yet so my goal is to fit into the dress on my own by then.

Monday: 80 laps
Wednesday: 80 laps, ab exercises, weights

And I plan on swimming tomorrow and Friday too.

On A Roll

I asked my roommate the other night why suddenly after 4 months of good eating and working out I was having such a hard time being consistent? She said it's because this whole weight loss thing isn't the only thing I have to think about anymore. Very true.

When I was at my mindless job, it was easy to be very precise with what I was doing to take care of my body. Since I could work from home, I would often leave early to make the pool's lap swimming schedule and then work a couple of more hours that night, usually with The Office or something in the background. Now I use my brain and I actually have to be at work ALL DAY LONG. The nerve! Plus, I've had a couple of outside projects come up that are further occupying my mind and my time.

So while I should have lost 4-5 more pounds and who knows how many more inches last month, instead I lost nothing. Well, no, that's a lie. My weight stayed the same, but I lost half an inch on my waist and half an inch on my hips. Which, you know, is good and all, but not that much progress for a whole month.

I think I need to make an effort to blog more here just so that I'm more mindful of what I am doing. I feel my momentum kicking up again as I'm settling into a routine. Last week, we wound up walking about 4 miles on the 4th, then I did pilates and weights on Thursday and swam Friday and Saturday. Granted, Saturday was only 60 laps because the pool was too crowded and at one point there were 4 unevenly-matched people trying to swim circuit in my lane and I don't even want to talk about how annoying that was, but I still did it.

80 laps this morning, and I plan to do pilates and weights tomorrow morning. I'm going to do some ab exercises tonight too. So I'm getting this week off to a good start.

It's still really hard to swim in the mornings. I got to sleep around midnight last night and finally dragged my butt out of bed at 6 AM (my alarm went off the first time at 5:30). Out the door by 6:20. Packing my bags the night before helps. It also helps to know that getting to the gym by 6:50 means I miss rush hour traffic.