From Cocoon to butterfly

I never thought of it this way. When I started to lose weight, I did not think of it as that much. It was liken to a stick of butter and then to a tub of margarine in the fact of how much I lost. Then I could look at the sugar and hold them up. I can remember going to WW as a teenager and after weighing in and meetings, my father would take me to the grocery store and have me hold as many bags of sugar as I had lost and it always amazed me. Then, some months ago I was carrying a bag of cat litter up the stairs and realized I had lost as much as that cat litter weighed. But today, wow, it struck me that I have moved beyond those things and I have lost as much as a normal person! Do you relize what that means? Do you really?n It means I use to weigh more then an avearge of TWO people. I was carrying around on my bones, more then two people. Two people and a child. I jsut can’t belevie that. I don’t know about you guys but I always deceived myself about how fat I was. I know I was fat but to realize I had that much on me, wow, I just never realized it in those terms. I have lost more now then I will weigh once I reach goal. It just was an amazing discover for me or as someone says, a lightbulb moment.

My weight loss is still going well. I am getting more and more in control of myself and things. I am slowly working out a plan in my head and heart of how I will stay here because I have to stay and not let that other person get back on me again! LIke the monkey on your back but I had a gorilla on mine. As I continue down, I am slowly watching myself and learning what are my triggers and what to watch out for the rest of my life. Chocolate, no problem really but I think bread and pastries will alwasy be a downfall to me and soemthing I really will have to avoid. When I go tot he store, I watch myself to see what strikes me the most and those are the things I will have to avod or be very very careful about. I have already determined I will be weighing in every day once i reach goal. Tina did an experiment, not planned but it worked out. She was attacked by the snack monster and lost but after she did that, she got right back with the program and was very strict with herself and guess what, it came off in just a few days. So, I know that works. I am still working out how to do portion control and the best I can figure is if I do get something, make sure it is the tinest package and if not, give away what I don’t eat. Or just throw it away. I am just babbling here, just trying to work out some things so forgive me for my ramblings. As I get closer to my goal, I think about these things. I have 34 more pounds to go. Still a ways but I am going to do it! I am hoping to hit the 130’s by two weeks. I can’t wait.

So, what motivates me now?

There is less and less of a bump from hip to thigh

I can see my bonework coming out  and being prominent , not the fat

sex

Crossing my legs

being able to buy clothes. I was in the dept store the other day (about dropped dead from the prices) and one lady came up to me when I was looking at a skirt and asked if I wanted to try it on. I have NEVER been asked that in 10 years I have been here. Usually they run scared if they see me and my fat butt! That is motivation

Having a pic made of me and liking it

my stomach goes in when I lay down

I can wear heels now! Knee high boots are next objective!

feeling of control

water barely rising when I get in the tub

liking what I see in the mirror (when clothed) while naked is another story!

Nothing really important here that much but wanting to just chat and write down a few things I have noticed or has happened. Snack monster is not attacking at this moment, Tina, hope he is not at your house!

I have been fighting binge impulses though> At the teacher’s office,t hey always have lots of snacks and I was by myself, alwasy when that monster rears it’s head. But I knew it was something I could not do and would not do and did not want to do and did not do. Lot of dos there hehe. But I am getting better with things and that makes me happy The changes I have noticed are getting more and more. It is really amazing to observe my body and see how everything is changing, not only that but my self confidence is so much more now and I even feel I walk straighter, better. I was in my night class last night and we were talking about weight and when I told them I weighed about 66kg, they did not beleive me. They were sure I weighed less. Made me feel good. (they did not know I could understand what they were saying)

Another good feeling is that I have got my husband’s no good partner on the run. Before the  sumemr, he found out from my husband that I was losing weight. He bet that I would not be less weight then my husband by the end of this year. Or should I say, he siad it would be impossible for me to lose enough weight.Now, you have to understand, I hate this man with a passion. So, for him to say I could not do anything, well, competition. Well, he was smug about the bet for a while but now , he is running scared.  He is trying to get out of the bet now. Made me feel good to see that roach scurrying to the darkness! hehehe.

My mother has lost 15 pounds so far on this plan, I am so proud of her and very happy. I hope she keeps at it.

As I get closer to my goal, I am thinking more and more about how to become a TO (thin others) and have been talking more to other people. Even today I was speaking to a chinese english teacher (who by the way, doeesn’t use English go figure) and we were talking about me losing weight. I asked her how she kept thin when she ate the things she did and she just laughed but I did something that was startling to me. I admited to her, that she was able to snack because she could eat just one cookie but for me I had to have the whole pack. I have never admitted that publically to anyone and to do it, showed just how much I am becoming aware of myself and how I need to change.  But the insight did not come from her but from my aunt. My aunt was heavy when she was in her late teens and she lost it and has kept it off all these years. I was talking to her on the phone about some things with weight and I asked her if we can ever eat normal again.  She said something that just got into my head, “no, I alwasy feel like I am being punished because I can’t eat the way I want to eat”. I don’t know why that was so earth shattering to me but it was. She is a TO but she has the same trouble as I do. She also has to watch what she eats all the time and can’t just indulge the way she wants. This showed me that for the rest of my life, there can be no slack, there can be no relaxing my guard. It must be liek that always. I was also telling her my plan about perhaps keeping within a five pound limit and she said, no way. What to do is every single morning, weigh yourself. When you see a gain, even for that day, then that day, get back on plan. You can still have that piece of cake, when  you are at the weight you need but the next day, back on plan. Always aware and ready to do battle. She said, if you do it that way, it comes off easy but if you wait a few days, it turns into weeks and then months and then over 100 pounds again.

Hmm, I thought that was good reasoning because I can’t eat reduction plan all my life but when I think of it the way she is talking, I can do that but it means always being aware, never relaxing and letting one day go to the next without action and more then that, not going crazy. If you want a piece of chocolate, get a piece but stop there. DOn’t eat anymore and back on plan right after that. That is something I have to learn and I will. I wonder if I should carry a before pic of me just so I have it to remind myself. Just don’t understnad, why does it take a week to lose two pounds but one day to put on many? Crazy isn’t it? But I have to accept my body is this way. I can never change it no matter how much weight I lose and if I want to keep the weight off, I have to accept what I have to do. Just liek college, nobody forces you to college but we still go, We stil undergo the pain of lectures, tests and papers. We know it has to be done and there is no getting around it and so it is the same with keeping the weight off. My aunt also told me that I should drop about 5 to 7 pounds below my goal weight because once back in the salt and oil, it will go up on that just normally. So have to thik about that.

Other then this, the other news was so depressing. I miss my family so much right now and what I would not give to be back to see them now. My brother’s wife was pregnant and the baby died so they have to do an abortion to get it out, she was four months. I am so sad for her and it makes me want to snatch up my little one and just hug her close for safty. I wish I had the right words to tell her how I feel but when you lose a baby, no matter how young, how can you , what can you say? I wish I was there. I also talked with my grandfather a little bit, he is not a phone person and it made me just want to cry. I miss him so much! He is my rock. I lost my grandmother last year and I am so afraid to lose him. He hates I am so far away but he is more proud of me then any of the other grandchildren, he is my hero and role model. I will not be back to see him till 2010, such a long time but those tickets are so expensive, and add three kids to that! WHew! It is hard to not be in the loop with the family. To always think about how it use to be but when you go back, things have changed so much. I am sure I have changed also but it still is hard to accept. Christmas is coming and that is a time I have a lot of trouble with depression. It is better now that I have a family and kids that love christmas as much as I do> I try and decorate and do things as much as I can for it but I miss the way it use to be back home. But if I went back home for christmas, I would hate it because it isn’t the christmas that I remmeber. The family does’t all get together now at my grandmother’s house. They go to my cousin’s house. My grandmother isn’t there now. More kids are there. The food is not the same. Mom and dad don’t go anymore (family politics)  and economy is bad so what kind of presents can you expect. Not that I am selfish, in fact, I don’t get presents for christmas from my kids because I rather spend for them but the christmas I remember is the one with mountains fo presents waitinf for us to unwrap and play. Goodness, just the unwrappng was the best part of it. So, I think of those days. I could not handle going back from what it was to what it is now. I have to preserve it in my heart and make my own traditions here.

Besides, at least here I am safe from all those christmas goodies! That would be hard to deal with! And I want to hit my goal in Jan or Feb. hopefully.

I know the latter part of this blog is a bit downcast but I will be alright. I just worry for my brother and for my family a lot.

Hate the snack monster. It really is indestructable. I keep killing that thing off and it keeps coming back. But the major thing is to just keep fighting it. After all, typing fingers can’t be snacking fingers right? So that is why I am on right now, trying to keep thoughts and nose out of any ick that I am in the vicinity to. I wonder, does everyone has these struggles or is it based just on people that are losing weight? When I look at the thin women walking downt he street, they just buy when they want to snack on something and it seems they don’t have a care in the world yet I sit here and struggle with my snacking urges because I know that is one long steep slippery slope. What is the difference? Could it be because I don’t have portion control? That I have no control over myself. The other ones (TO Thin ones) can eat one thing and then they are full. They can open a package of cookies and stop. Myself, I would eat one then two and give up and eat it all. How can I teach myself to be like a TO? I have had trouble with control from the time I was a child. I remember mom would get things from the Swan man and I would eat and eat and eat and just could not stop and noone knew how to stop me becauswe I was a professional sneaker. I did not know how to stop> I would eat one and it would just taste so good and then I wanted another. I would be full but just wanted that taste. I knew there was one more in there, had to go back. So, how to teach myself/ I was hoping it would be as easy as breaking the habit but it has become much more then a habit, it is my life. I have been eating and controlling myself for over 8 months now so  a simple habit would have been broken by now. I know I do react to stresses. When everyting that could go wrong did go wrong on Monday, my initial reaction was, eat!! I did not and I was fully concious of my feelings so I am learning from that but back to my orginal question, it can’t be just the stuff we eat that makes us overweight. I see too many TO eating cake, bread and other goodies. How do I learn control from them? Do I have to just exert superhuman strength to keep myself at one? Does it get easier after practice? Do I have to look forward to always fighting with it all my life? After haivng my last child, I got really bad with snacking. I would eat lunch and be full but still wanted to snack. I made it is point to stop at a different convience store every day and I would buy at least, two to three packages of cookes, a bag of choclate and some bread or what nots. Then, within a space of less then an hour, I ate them all. Then the next day, this cycle would go again. I would tell myself I would not do it again but I would and did. If I went to the bakery and bought things for the kids, within 30 min  or so, I ate them all. Now, I buy only one thing for a one time eat for the kids so it isn’t around afterwards but it is so hard. The impulse is still there. HOw do I get rid of that? Can I conquere it? Or will I just learn to subdue it, to live with it and acknowledge it’s danger? I still have at most, 36 more pounds to lose or least 26 so I am still planning on my living lean stage. I know there will be times where I do want to eat normal and I will but I have to learn control, i have to learn portions but it does worry me. So many people I know struggle with their weight. Even when reaching LL, they struggle and for most, gain it back. I don’t want to be that way. I am already going to incorporate my cousin’s technique, once I hit 4 to 5 pounds gain, back to losing. Never go above. Always weigh in every day and watch it. Only by being continual concious of it, always watching and always always being vigilant can I keep it off. Melissa has kept hers off for over a year, I can too but will it get easier?

“Self-Image:
VISUALIZING your new self-image  

Joy joy, TOM is back!! I was so worried there for awhile with it being over a week late but it showed up this morning> Have never been so glad to see it!! Weigh in was good and I am excited excited and did I say, excited!

 Self image, that is something that so hard for me to think about. I know many have talked about visualizing what they will look like when they reach goal but I actaully have no idea what so ever I will look like at goal. Sure, everyone can tell you but until you actually experience it, you don’t know. For me, I know 150, that is all I know. I can remember being in 5^th grade and wanting a dress but my mother would not buy it because it was only as big as a 10 and I was already bigger then a 10 by then, I don’t know what size I was but I can remember shopping in the hated huskies dept. So, how can I visualize something I really never experienced. I could not even tell you what size I will be or anything so I have to say, I find myself fascinating right now. Every day I look at my body and just stare at it because it is a stranger’s body. I see changes but it is taking a while to accpet them as MINE. But I can say, my self image is much better now then it was before. I still feel fat, maybe I will always forever feel that way but I don’t feel really fat and I think that is progress. I can look in a reflection of myself and not hate what I see, that is progress to me. There are still a lot of areas I want to change but that is good, it keeps me on my toes and makes me continue and not want to stop. I realize my self image is still a mit murkey and be cuase of that, I am letting my husband tell me where to stop because I don’t know if I will miss the perfect number or not so I depend of his input. I do have to work on my self image as in that I am strong, I can make it. I am getting better with it but the fear is still there. My mother was laughing at me and urging me to  throw away my fat clothes but I just can’t, not yet. I know I have to work on that part but I have time. I will get there, I am sure. But in some areas, I have no problem visualizing success. I can see me at where I want to be, don’ know what I will look like but I can see the scale there. I can see myself going into shops in the US and buying the cute clothes I have always wanted. Going into coldwater and buying cute dresses and skirts. I can see myself getting off the plane and shocking my family at being tiny. I can see myself gettig into the airplane seat and having plenty of room left over. I can see events. The biggest one I am really looking forward to is having my husband pick me up, carry me! Today, I took a big step. My mother has wanted me to have pics made of the kids and I together and I had been holding off. You know, you want to be thin for them. Well, I went out today and set up an appointment for it to be done. I am happy with myself. I will not stay where I am but I am happy to have pics made. My mother also urged me to get some sexy pics made when I go back to the US. I agreed. This from a girl who hid behind the camera all the time. Of all the pics in the US, I am in only one. That is how I am but I am changing and by agreeing and actually honestly wanting to, I can seel myself image getting better and better. 

Rachel 

I am so happy lately. Losing weight does not solve allt he problems in your life but it does take a heavy burden off of your shoulders. I never realized how much I “carried” the weight. Not only was I carrying it around physically but also mentally. I let it weigh my self confidence down till I had so little left to lift up. I let it weigh my happyness down because I thought I did not deserve it. I let it do so much to me and it became such a heavy burden more mentally then physically. I have never really been able to buy clothes here and that was actually one of my goals to hit. Today, I had to go ina place that is like a outlet mall? Hard to explain but many shops are there and you just weave in and out of shops finding whatever clothes you want. Well, I was there today looking for a jacket and I could fit in almost everything they had in every shop. The feeling was wonderful! To feel like I fit where I should. Not clothes wise but being able to walk in a shop and they help me instead of looking at me like I am a bull in a China shop. It was the greatest feeling. The jacket I bought looks really good so can’t wait to wear it. Then, many of the people there know me because I have shopped there a lot for my kids and such and some of them did not even recognize me. I could hear them whispering about whether I was the one that had three kids or not (having three kids is somethign that nobody does here so I am known for that) They even asked me, are you the one with three kids. They were amazed and I was embarrassed but it felt good. So many ask me how to lose weight and everyting. I felt so great!. There are still some things I can’t fit like skirts and the more narrow coats but I am getting there. I have about 37 more pounds to lose at most and really excited about losing them. I also got on my scales today to see what my weight was for my heart breakers (Monday is my official weigh day) and I have earned my next avi! 110 pounds lost! I can’t beleive it!

On other news, a little worried. Probably nothing and praying it is nothing but my period is a week late. Usually the day gets earlier every month so this is strange for me. Hoping it has someting to do with the weight loss. I have been cut and tied so there should be no chances but the worry is still there and after almost leaving my husband because of this happening before (my third child) I am afraid to be burned again. I will be screaming high and low in that hospital if someting happened. But why worry about things that are not yet? So I am trying to keep it in back of my mind. It could come today for all I know so try to keep that worry tapped down. I know my husband is worried about it too. Ok, gotta stop taloking about it right now. Just wanted tos hare the problem with someone that I know will not tell my family and people here. Things will be alright. Well, getting near time for my last two classes and then ballet for my daughter. Have a great weekend guys and pray for me that there is nothing to worry about. Living in China where the one child policy is, having more then two kids is not normal and looked down on a lot.

I was lurking in the forums catching up to my boards and I caught sight of my recent pic on my post. My first thought was “who is that girl?” Honestly, I know myself but my mental image doesn’t match to my physical appearance and I stare at the pic entranced. To see all the changes that have happened from the beginning to now has been astonding! I can’t get use to things at this moment, a good problem but strange. When my husband compliments me on being small, I can’t accept it becuase in my mind, I am not small. Crazy mental problems ehehhe. But I catch my husband looking at my strangely at times though because as he says, he is so use to seeing me “fluffy” that to see me now is so drastic

I am very happy with my loss though. I lost in my face first and then in my upper part of my body but the bottom part still had a long way to go but I am really seeing such a difference in the bottom now. These last 30 or so pounds are all coming from my bottom half, what a relief! When I get ready for my bath, I look in the mirror, not for vanity but with just fascination, who is that girl? I have been teaching over a month with the primary school and not ONE child has said I was fat! Wow, that has been great!! Before, I would hear it all the time, many times in the day> I have to admit, I keep expecting it, thinking perhaps they have saved that comment for when I least expect it. Yes, I know, I am crazy. But really, I know my mental pic of myself is distorted. COmes from all these years of being fat. I am trying to change that but it takes time. Until then, I will go on humming, who’s that girl…..

For years and years, I have always had trouble with the 150’s. Don’t know what it is or why. It isn’t that that is the number that is good for my body because it surely isn’t because even now, my BMI is still “overweight” Love that term but better then obese. But, back to my orginal subject, I remember having troube with that number every time I lose weight and I just hate it so much! Last week’s weigh in was just soso and it had me worried that I would not be able to get that number gone on my scale. I then weighed in after two days (I weigh on Monday for official weigh day ) and I gained 2 ounces! I was shocked and not just a little depressed. There was nothing that should have causedme to put on any weight. Told my husband about it and he told me I should stay off of the scale, good decision. So I did. Well, today is my heartbreakers weigh in so I got the scale out, stripped and then carefully got on the scale all the while holding my breath. Wow, 68, better get on it again and check, did it three times and got the same numbber, 68kg! (149.6) oh wow, I did it, I got below my cursed number! I am still dancing around and very happy about that. It is like a weight has been lifted and I can see past the mountain. I am not stopping because I still have at least 39.6 pounds to go but this was a huge weight in my mind. To see past it has just lit up my life. And this was the weight I was when I got engaged to my husband!! This means, once I get below 149, I will be lower then I have in 9 years! And even then I had lost a lot just to get there! From there, my next goal is to get below 138. This is the weight I lost 90 pounds and got to in the ninth grade. I can’t wait to get below that because then I will be lower then I have ever been except perhaps as a child so I am so excited, like a child at christmas time! I can wear all my old clothes now and I can look nice. I haven’t been complimented in a long time for my clothes but now I am hearing more and more. Losing weight does not solve the world problems but it makes life definitely easier to deal with! So, now, waiting with baited breath for next week’s weigh in and hoping to earn my next avi! Have a great one!~

With food that is. I was thinking about it the other day. I was in the countryside for a dinner and I really wasn’t hungry and I went outside and took 15 minutes by myself to think about why I did not want to go crazy and eat everyting in sight. At first, it was hard. I could not beleive it, why would it be so hard to remember how I felt when I was fat and how hard it was for me. It took a little thinking but I finally got over it and was fine once I started remember what and how I felt now. it hit me then that I was in an abusive relationship with food.

I have been in one relationship that really went bad and that is what I am drawing my conclusions from. When I first met this guy, perfect gentleman, went to church, treated his mother so good and could play the piano like a dream. I got involved with him and at first, it was perfectly innocent. But little by little, I got sucked in. He made me very dependent on him, isolated me from all friends and family and very jealous. Then he made anything bad that happened to always be my fault. I thought that without me, he would get worse and worse because he made me beleive that. He twisted my thinking up really bad to where I let him do my thinking instead of arguing with him. Later on, I found out he was an alcoholic and did drugs like cocaine and worse. By then, I could not get out and could  not think independently from him. This is the short version by the way. It took the intervention of friends to get me out of there and start my feet back on the right path but it was so hard. He cheated on me, paid hookers to do stuff and whatever. While in the relationship, it was terrible and I was in depression all the time and beleived it all my fault. But the crazy thing is, once I broke it off with him, I remember more of the good stuff. The bad stuff fades from the memory.  My relationship with food is the same way.

When we first met, food was so innocent, it could not hurt me. I was in control. Everything was good for awhile but then food started to gain control all the while I thought I was in control, I wasn’t. Little by little, I let food do the thinking for me. “you feel angry, eat xxxx” You are so depressed, you deserve to eat xxx” and I listened and stop being independent from food. As time went by, I could not get myself out of the relationship and got sucked in more and more. Food was abusive to me. At first, come on baby, just take a bite, you have the control right? Then when I took a bite and then another and then anotehr, I could not stop. Then food got abusive, how could you have eaten that whole package of cookies, look at you, so fat and ugly! No body could ever want you! And I beleived food. Icould  not stop this relationship withoiut help. I got help thank you 6wbm! But I find occasionally, food wants back in my life. Tells me I have control now and as with all bad relationships, the bad has faded some and I remember the good. GOod feeling when you eat xxx, how easy it was to be able to eat anything I wanted, how I felt loved when I took a bite of xxx. So, now I realized, I was in an abusive relationship with food. And food is very jealous, food doesn’t want to let me go and I have to be so careful or I will be sucked into that again. I have to keep in mind the things that happened and how I felt. I have to remmber that foood is not alone but alwasy brings his friends, depression, fat and no confidence with him when he comes. And he doesn’t just leave once he is done, he wants total control and will stay forever if you don’t kick him out. It takes a lot of strength to fight food and it isn’t a fight that can be done alone, we have to have help, support and friends throughout the journey. So I realize now that food was an abusive boyfriend and lover. I have to get away and keep interaction to a minimal, only when needed. I can’t let him take over again!