My Earlobes Still Feel Fat

The minute I clicked ‘Enter’ I knew I’d done something incredibly stupid.   How could I have been taken in by an Instagram ad, for anything , let alone diet pills ?   I felt disgusted with myself, even as the disgust mingled with an unmistakable tinge of excitement and curiosity – surely after more than twenty-five years of experience with diet culture bullshit, and at least a decade of continuous counter-culture reprogramming, I must know better?   But, well...knowing better didn’t stop me.   I figured five bucks was a cheap price for a very unlikely potential payoff. I went to lie down on our hotel bed with my boyfriend, who was zoned out in front of his own phone, half-listening to an episode of The Simpsons and trying to digest all the rich food we’d been eating on our trip to New Orleans.   I didn’t want to admit what I’d done; I knew he would be disappointed in me, and frustrated with my continued negative body image.   We’ve discussed it a hundr...

When I told my brother I was counting calories, a vulnerable admission of defeat, he reacted just as I should have expected: he rolled his eyes, sighed as if he was exhausted by my weight struggles, and told me “don’t be mom!   Just be balanced.”   As if it were that easy.   I made the mistake, at first, of trying to explain that after years of balance and reasonably steady weight, I was no longer stable and I felt the need to do something drastic to try to reign in my body; I gave up pretty quickly, after multiple interruptions and dismissals. It’s not that my brother is insensitive – he’s actually more sensitive than most dudes and most of my family, not that that’s saying much – but he doesn’t have a lot of patience for any kind of struggle to which he doesn’t relate.   Worse are the struggles he thinks he relates to, like weight.   A few years ago he felt he was getting ‘tubby’ and so he cut out junk food and cut back on carbs and started doi...

Between cheap dinners out with the new boo , a very stressful and time-consuming new job (and the thousands of Goldfish consumed weekly to keep me on my feet), and all the yoga-defying illnesses my little petri dishes have passed me on their homework assignments in the past nine months, I’ve noticed that my clothes have been getting tighter.   Like, a lot tighter.   As in, I find myself wincing as I take off particularly unforgiving dresses at the end of the day – dresses which, nine months ago, fit just fine, or were even a bit baggy at the waist.   And now I’m faced with a dilemma I haven’t faced in years: how to lose bulk, if not necessarily weight.   If you’ve been reading this blog (or known me personally) for the few years, you know that I am majorly anti-dieting.   And if you’ve known me for the past decade, you might recall that the last time I succumbed to societal pressure and tried to lose weight, through a strict-but-real...

Well, in fairness, this one was a nurse.  And she was pretty cool.  But the numbers were still assholes. A little background: I'm still in London, and not going home as often / uninsured in the States, so I decided it was well past time to try to get my birth control on the NHS.  So I went into the clinic affiliated with my Uni.  And of course they had to weigh/measure me.  And of course my BMI says I'm obese. Fuck off, BMI.  Obese??  Ok, I could lose a few stone, but if you're seriously telling me I have to lose 50 pounds to be within the range of 'normal,' you're off your rocker.  I'm a size 12, for god's sake!  I know it's not slender, but it's certainly not obese either! I'm so sick of being controlled by numbers.  Even the nurse, when I told her I'd had weight-loss surgery and had been leveling out within 10 pounds of my current weight for the past 9 years, said she thought the numbers were a bit silly as they don't take b...

I stopped using the calorie counter when we left for our vacation in Italy (Bologna, Umbria , Arezzo , and Cinque Terre ), figuring I didn't want to ruin the delicious food I was planning on stuffing my face with, and relying on the fact that I always lose weight on vacation (my theory is that I'm too busy walking around to snack). And we were really active on vacay , especially when scrambling up and down mountains to nude beaches in Cinque Terre , so I really wasn't too worried about all the gelato and pasta I was consuming (YUM). But I was planning on getting back into the counting when I came back to London... That was the plan , anyway. But then we only had 2 days before we moved into the new flat, after which life was (still is) a blur of unpacking, buying secondhand furniture, and entertaining the friends who so wonderfully came to visit me but whom I so unwittingly told the first week of September would be fine ( gah ). So long story short, I'm still not c...

Well, I’m a Londoner now! I moved two weeks ago, to make another go of it with the boyfriend and to study for my MA in Creative Nonfiction. And while I thought I would drop the calorie-counting act the minute I landed, I’ve actually kept it up pretty well. And given how much I walk here (let me just say, my poor feet have been BEGGING me to drop 25 quid on a pedicure, but I’m too cheap), I’ve actually ended up well below my allowance most days. But I don’t have a scale, and I refuse to pay for a new one, and my boyfriend refuses to help me procure one, so I have no idea whether I’ve continued to lose weight or not. And I can’t decide whether that’s healthy or not. Because I feel like I would be so happy to see that I am losing weight, and it would make me feel more comfortable putting down the calorie counter, but I know that if it turned out I had stopped losing, or worse, I was gaining, I would feel miserable. So I guess for now it’s good to be without. But I do feel bereft. Bu...

That old Upper East Side adage has been running through my mind all week. Ever since I got my visa to go back to London and started counting down the days I had left of fresh, delicious California cuisine. I recently got to within a couple pounds of my goal (well, not my goal weight, but my goal of getting below a certain hated number), and now I’m struggling with a very difficult decision: to eat or not to eat? I have an opportunity here. I could be below the dreaded number by the time I leave for London, if I’m willing to give up all badness and only eat healthy, low-calorie foods like vegetables sans olive oil and salads with no cheese or nuts. But then I would be sacrificing my last week of yumtastic treats like Trader Joes Mini Peanut Butter Cups and delicious grilled asparagus with olive oil and steak, glorious steak! Maybe the choice would be easier if I had a point of reference, but I’ve never been thin, so I have no idea how it feels. What I do know is that a lot of thing...

Happy July everybody! I can’t believe the time has gone by so fast. I feel like I just got back from London, when in reality we’re coming up on a year since I left. Yeesh. And if all goes well I should be heading back that way in just under three weeks; fingers crossed that the British government gives me a visa… But you don’t read this blog to learn about my personal and locational life! That’s what this blog is for. This blog is for all my many ugly and my few pleasant thoughts about my body, so here goes. As you may know, July 1st marks the 12th week of my ‘new’ calorie-counting, gym-going regimen. As you also may know, this regimen, although it follows all logical and mathematical guidelines (I have a resting metabolic rate of around 2700 calories a day, so I eat about 1700 calories a day and work out at least 3 times a week), did me no good at first. In fact, I gained three pounds the first week and spent the next 6 trying desperately to get back to breaking even. And now...

I'm so tired of being trapped in this body. How many times in the last few months have I posted about my body making me miserable? Honestly I feel like it's just the story of my life. I'm living out a life sentence in a horrible cell that I can't seem to change at all. And the worst part is that whoever is holding me here lets me out every now and then, liberates me from the prison of fat and self-loathing, and I get to smell the wildflowers and frolic in the meadows and all that great stuff, but then the alarm sounds and the dogs bark and before I know it I'm incarcerated again. And the really fucked up thing is that I'm living two (or more) lives: one of me is constantly trapped in these body issues (and not just the image, but the reality of my weight and my size and all the exercise and dieting in the world not making a dent in the cellulite), and the other lives this great life, with fabulous friends and a hilarious family and a wonderful, supportive boy...

So it’s week 6 of the new calorie-counting lifestyle. I’ve finally lost that 3 pounds I gained the first week (gah), but I haven’t lost anything else yet. However, I have noticed some general changes, both good and bad. I figured it was about time to update. Pros : I feel better about my body, even though I haven’t really lost any weight– I feel less bloated, leaner, and stronger. Of course this could have to do with all the exercise I’ve been doing, and the type; my desire to eat more calories is a great motivator to work out harder and longer, and I’m learning what exercises (and just daily activities) are more calorie burning than others. I think I’m starting to see calories as something akin to money in my life: I have a finite amount, which I spend on some things over others, but I can earn more with a little hard work. So as a result I’ve been trying to do hard core exercise (like tae bo, which burns 595 calories in 40 minutes) 2-3 times a week, and throw in pilates (66...

A few weeks ago I downloaded a new app for my iPhone called Lose It. It’s a calorie counter, but it also incorporates exercise, and the best part is that it’s pretty non-judgmental, as these things go. It lets you choose your own goal, and how fast you want to lost the weight, and then it just calculates the numbers for you. For example, I told it my current weight (I don’t want to talk about it) and that I wanted to lose thirty pounds (yes, hopelessly idealistic) in six months (hey, you gotta have some realism). And it told me my calorie allowance was roughly 2,100 per day. Way higher than I expected! Which is the other thing about this app: it makes me feel good about my eating habits! I have it tracking my nutrients as well, and besides the fact that I eat about twice as much sodium as I’m supposed to (yeah, yeah, whatever. Salt is gooooood), I’m pretty on-target with everything else. And I’ve been coming in under my calorie count pretty much every day. Even Easter! And I...