My Earlobes Still Feel Fat

A couple of hours ago, I was lying in bed with my boyfriend, making out etc, and he whispered in my ear "your body drives me crazy."  Not only did I not respond by arching my back and grinning at him, the way I should have, but the way I did respond is just SO classic.  I sort of faux-smiled (cha grinned , as I like to call it), and said "that makes two of us." God, what a mood killer, eh?!  If it weren't for my boyfriend's persistance I would have just given up.  And to be honest, sometimes I do.  I don't write about sex much on this blog, I guess because it's one of very few subjects I'm not quite comfortable throwing out there into the internet, but I'm beginning to think I ought to change that.  After all, the bedroom (or the living room, or the kitchen, or the airplane bathroom, etc) is the one place where (in most cases) we can't hide our bodies behind clothes or under water. It's also one of the few places where sarcasm...

I woke up this morning, nose running, lungs itchy and swollen, and generally just feeling like shit on a stick. I got out of bed, topless, and turned to put on my robe, and there was my boyfriend, staring at me appreciatively. I was not in the mood, but all he said was “you’ve lost a lot of weight.” Of course, being the bitchy, complicated female that I am, I replied: “I don’t know how to take that,” and walked off to the bathroom, covering up on my way. He meant it as a compliment to how I look now, rather than an insult to how I looked before, and in his defense he’s never once in 3 1/2 years said anything but kind words about my body. But that doesn’t mean I don’t hear the unkind ones he doesn’t say. Those are delightfully provided by my own fucked-up psyche. But the point here isn’t that I’m screwed up, because everybody already knows that. The point is, when he said that about my weight, I realized with a jolt that these past few days I’ve been so focused on hacking up my al...

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...

I'm in bologna right now, enjoying delicious food and gorgeous scenery, but I can't stop hating on myself! What the fuck is wrong with me?

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...

My friend Courtney sent me the link to this NY Times article this morning, and I found it really interesting and wanted to share. I can't decide how I feel about it. There's always been a part of me that agrees with the idea that fat is ok, and all of me agrees that you can be fat and fit, but I think in a country like this (or in human society in general) people like to hear absolutes ("diet" or "don't diet"), so I fear the caveats and in-betweens and ifs/ands/buts will fall on deaf ears and we'll still be divided into anorexics/judgmental bitches and obese mcdonalds-eaters. But maybe I'm being too cynical! Courtney seems optimistic. What about you guys? Any thoughts on the matter?

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...