The Fatslayer Chronicles

This will be my last entry for a while – maybe my last ever. I’ve been doing a lot of thinking lately, and I have some pretty drastic lifestyle changes to implement – and there’s no time like the present to have a complete life overhaul. Big changes are afoot, and writing this blog is an indulgence I simply can’t afford at the moment, since other things have elbowed their way up the priority list.

The catalyst for all my recent navel-gazing was the suicide a fortnight ago of my oldest, closest friend. His death hit with the force of a brick wall and stopped me completely in my tracks. He and I have known each other since kindergarten, and the thought of life without him is almost intolerable. I guess that people kill themselves for a whole mixture of reasons, but it seems that his main impetus was the problems that he’d been having at work with a difficult boss and a high pressure schedule. He just gave up on ever thinking things would get better.

This is the third suicide in my close circle in the past three years. The first was my only brother, who took his own life during a period of blackest depression in November 2003. The pain of his loss in still raw two and a half years after the event. Then in November 2005 my sister’s ex fiancé – who we all still had fond feelings for - stabbed himself six times in the chest, also in a bout of severe depression. In his case his despair was exacerbated by his worsening schizophrenia, which makes his actions perhaps more understandable, though still heartbreakingly poignant and sad.

This latest suicide, though, is almost the hardest to understand, since my friend wasn’t especially depressed, and yet he just decided that life was too shitty to carry on. His problems at work just drained all the fight out of him. I guess a bad job can do that to a person.

Anyway, his loss has made me take a long hard look at my own life, and man, it’s a wasteland.

For the past four years, practically all of my energy and time has gone into my job, and it’s become a blood-sucking vampire. Every other important thing in my life has been squeezed into the tiny portion of my day that’s left between coming home at around 7.30pm and going to bed at around 11pm.

My priorities are seriously screwed.

On an average day I get up at 4.30am, leave the house at 5am, get to work at 5.30am, work until at least 6.30pm. Then I drive home, eat dinner, talk to Kim a little, try and do a little exercise if I have the time and inclination, watch a little TV and then stagger off to bed.

Often I work all weekend, so this becomes a seven-day-a-week yoke.

I do all this for a boss who used to be a friend, but who in the past 12 months has transformed into a power-abusing tyrant, who makes the atmosphere for everyone in the team hateful and intimidating. She’s insatiable in her desire to get more work out of us, and would literally have us working 18 hour days if she could legally swing it. It’s like being in a fucking meat grinder.

Yes, it’s a highly paid job, and yes the quid pro quo of that is that it involves high pressure and high responsibility – which I knew when I accepted the job - but lately it’s gone beyond a joke. And I’ve decided enough is enough.

Unfortunately I can’t afford to turn drama queen and quit my job, but I can start showing a little backbone and working more decent hours. And from today, that’s what I’ll be doing.

In fact, I started earlier than today – I started last Friday, after the funeral. Instead of going back to work, I took some personal time instead. I didn’t go in to the office over the whole of the Mayday weekend at all. Instead, I planted out my tomatoes and my courgette, cucumber, and bell pepper seedlings into the mini-greenhouse. I baked loaves of bread and made batches of oatmeal raisin cookies and almond chocolate biscotti. I sanded down a wall, and cleaned out the garden shed. I mowed the lawn and washed the windows. I dug a flower bed and planted lilies.  I read a book (the whole thing, in one day – I haven’t done that in ages and ages) and I picked up my own sadly neglected novel-in-progress.

And I decided there and then that I was going to start writing regularly again, and that I’d finish this novel by the end of the summer, even if it half kills me.

So from now on I’m going to be writing. I’ve made a commitment, and now I’ve got to stick to it – otherwise the last 60,000-odd words are never going to get written. With the schedule I’ve set myself I’ll be too busy to write blog entries, but it’ll be a positive busy, not a wasteland busy. I’ll be using my free time when I’m not writing to go for long walks with Kim, to create life-affirming things (homemade food, homegrown veggies and flowers) and to nurture myself and my loved ones. This is a turning point for me, and I’m determined to make changes whilst I’m still fired up enough to make them stick.

I won’t be quitting my healthy lifestyle, but I guess I won’t be writing about it either – you’ll just have to take my word for it that even without the blog updates, things are on track. I won’t backslide, or take my eye off the ball – it’s just that I’ve been buried in the dust for so bloody long, and I’ve just got to dig myself out of the hole and start rediscovering all the things I’ve been missing.

Wow, it’s hectic at work at the moment – working 14 hr days with little spare time to write blog entries. Thanks to everyone who commented on my last entry though – it’s reassuring to know that I’m not imagining things or being a paranoid idiot. And I really, really appreciate the kind comments and support!

Fortified by that encouragement, I tackled my colleague about her comments on Monday, and as I expected, she said I was being oversensitive and over-reacting. I was calm and collected, and said that even if it wasn’t her intention to be rude, I found her remarks offensive, and that she should learn to moderate her language and think before she spoke.

Luckily she played into my hands by being immediately hostile – she said I was “up myself’’, and that by being “so fat’’ I’d made myself “fair game’’ for comments and speculation.

I said that these comments were just the sort of remarks that were offensive, and that they were in contravention of the Trust’s Code of Accepted Behaviour, as well as its equality and diversity policy.

[By the way, I know this makes me sound like a pompous prig, but what the hell WAS I supposed to say? This is the first staff problem I've ever had to deal with - all my other staff are lovely - and I'm a novice at this telling off business. I'm sure I handled it terribly...]

I asked her why she thought that denigrating overweight people was acceptable, when denigrating people on the grounds of race, sexual orientation etc wasn’t…and she replied that in her opinion there was nothing wrong with a little “good natured banter’’ about race or sexuality either, and that “people like that’’ should learn to toughen up, and stop getting their knickers in a twist over something so unimportant.

“I believe in calling a spade a spade” she said, “and if people don’t like it, that’s their problem. I’m not doing anything wrong. You get treated like a criminal if you’re white, slim and straight these days…”

At this point I began to realise that in my desire to be fair and reasonable I'd given her the impression she could get away with murder. Time to toughen up a bit!

Obviously, she’s going to be a tough nut to crack, and this is going to be just the first of many conversations. I said that I wouldn't hesitate to invoke the Trust’s formal disciplinary policy if she didn’t modify her behaviour after being told so clearly to do so, and she said that in that case she’d probably start looking around for a better job, as it was political correctness gone mad to discipline someone just for expressing an opinion.

She was being so rude that I almost expected her to launch into a Nazi salute and a display of goose stepping à la Basil Fawlty at this point, but she settled for muttering a stream of expletives (loudly) under her breath instead, at which point I lost my rag and gave her a formal verbal warning there and then, which will go on her permanent file.

With a bit of luck she’ll cop enough of a strop to quit, and it’ll be good bloody riddance…but if she doesn’t, and she doesn’t alter her behaviour either, at least I’ve got the ball rolling re getting rid of her. The wheels of the health service move slowly, but it’ll only take a couple more formal warnings before she gets the boot – and judging by her behaviour since our conversation, it’s a matter of WHEN not IF she earns herself another black mark.

*********

I’ve been slacking lately, and I’ve gained 3lbs. Shame on me! It’s always the same when I’ve been on holiday – it takes me a few days to get back in the saddle. I have a few measly bad days and suddenly my fat cells wake up from their hibernation and grab hold of all the extra calories with a death-grip, and my taste-buds start to remind me how much I like eating chilli-burgers and chocolate brownies, and how tired I’ve become of bran-flakes and mung beans.

Holidays are always my undoing…I start eating crap and stop exercising, and within a couple of days I feel like a beached whale. A mere 10 days ago I was feeling bright eyed and bushy tailed, now I feel like road kill. It shouldn’t take a doctorate in particle physics to understand the simple concept that if I eat crap I’ll start feeling like crap, so when am I going to learn that lesson?

If someone offered me the options of a) feeling energetic, invigorated and virtuous or b) feeling sluggish, bloated and ashamed of myself, it would be an easy choice, wouldn’t it? So why do I persist in thinking of appetite indulgence as something pleasurable? Eating chilli burger and fries – on top of all the other crap I’ve eaten lately - might have seemed like a good idea at the time, but it just isn’t worth it in terms of the blah feelings that come afterwards. And man, the guilt just does my head in – you’d think I’d been drowning barrelfuls of puppies, I feel so damn guilty and ashamed of myself.

Just to underline my feelings of inadequacy my friend has just come back from vacation, and she was telling me that she didn’t eat or drink a single naughty thing the whole two weeks she was away. Two weeks in Italy without pasta, pizza, red wine, ice cream…what the hell’s wrong with her? Instead she ate undressed green salads, grilled chicken and sparkling water, she ran and swam every day and did press-ups and crunches in her hotel room – and she LOST two pounds.

In Italy!

Damn, it’s not fair. Losing weight on an Italian vacation is practically illegal! It shouldn’t be allowed. No one should be that perfect and self-disciplined – it’s simply not normal.

I don’t even ASPIRE to being that perfect – I’m willing to accept a few flaws if I’m generally heading in the right direction.

With self-discipline like this it’s small wonder that though she’s 5’7” tall she’s never weighed more than 8 stones (112lbs). Honestly, I’ve seen more fat on a spare rib. If I had a tenth of her self-restraint I’d probably be at goal by now. I wish she was horrible and nasty so that I could hate her with a clear conscience! Heh heh.

As it is, I’m forced to like her despite myself. She’s a dead ringer for Courtney Cox and yet she’s really lovely and good natured. It’s obscene. If she was just ten stone heavier she’d be perfect. Heh heh. Maybe I should start injecting liquefied lard into her celery sticks and carrot batons just to even the playing field a little.

But enough of her, and back to me. I need to haul myself back on the wagon so that I can be in better shape for my own Italian vacation which is now only 17 weeks from today. That’s not that far away, bearing in mind I wanted to be at 150lbs by the time we go. I’ll need to lose a consistent 1.33lbs per week to make it, which is more than I’ve been averaging recently (even without the 3lb gain). I probably won’t make it unless my metabolism goes into overdrive, which it’s never obliged me by doing in the past.

I guess I’’ll just have to start trying harder. As an accountant my busiest time of year is approaching – from 1^st April to 30^th June I’ll be working at least a 12 hour day as standard, so I’ll have to be ultra-disciplined with my exercise. I’m planning to do 2 hours exercise each day (split into pre-work, lunchtime and evening sessions), and I’ve worked out a schedule as follows:

4.30 am – 5.00 am      Exercise

5.00 – 6.00 am           Shower and drive to work

6.00 – 1.30pm            Work

1.30 – 2.30 pm           Brisk Walking (to de-stress from morning)

2.30 – 6.00 pm           Work

6.00 – 6.30pm            Drive home (playing de-stressing music REALLY LOUD)

6.30 – 8.00 pm           Dinner (prepared by Kim) and relaxation

8.00 – 8.30pm            Exercise

8.30 – 10.30pm          Relaxation

10.30 – 4.30am          Sleep (…zzzzzzz……)

If I can’t haul myself out of bed half an hour earlier than normal to exercise before work I’ll have to do an extra half hour in the evening. It sounds like an onerous schedule, but 2 hours exercise out of every 24 isn’t a lot (8.3% of the total) and I’ll just have to force myself to make the time. I don’t want to, but I have to.

I’ll have to get Kim to poke me with a sharpened stick if I start to slack. Heh, he’ll probably enjoy that.

I envy those Superwomen types who somehow seem to hold down a demanding full time job, rear and home-school a brood of adorably well behaved children, have twenty rewarding (and community enriching) hobbies, delight their husbands by being slutty in the bedroom and chic and charming outside it, and maintain a 20 point BMI through their hectic schedule of marathon running, shark-wrestling and limbo dancing.

How the hell do they do it?

And if they can do it, why can’t I?

It’s a year since I embarked on my new healthy lifestyle, so I figured it’s time for an annual review.

The Measurable Stuff:

In the past 52 weeks I’ve lost 61lbs and 4 dress sizes. I started off in a size

22, and now I’m in a size 14 (US size 10).

I’ve had 40 weeks of losses, 10 weeks without movement, and 2 gain weeks.

I’ve had 335 sub-1500 calorie days, and only 17 days when I’ve exceeded my 1500-a-day limit. The highest amount of calories I’ve eaten in one day in the past year is 2200. The lowest amount is 980 (bad girl!).

I’ve exercised for at least 45 consecutive minutes on 229 days, which means that I’ve averaged over 4 exercise sessions per week. I’ve also lifted weights regularly, started Pilates classes and done over 10,000 crunches.

I’ve lost 26.5% of my starting body weight, and my BMI has dropped by 11.5 points, from 43.4 to 31.9.

Another 11lbs and I’ll be officially only ‘overweight’.

I have 37lbs to go to reach 132lbs and a ‘normal’ sub-25 BMI, and another 7lbs to go after that to reach my personal goal of 125lbs. Hence I’m 62.2% of the way to being ‘normal’, and 58% of the way to my personal goal.

The ‘Haven’t I Been Here Before?’ Stuff

So far this ‘diet’ has outlasted any previous dieting attempt by 11 weeks. I’ve lost 5lbs more than I’ve ever lost in any previous trial run too.

The rate of loss has been slower this time, because each pound has hung on like a limpet and resisted my efforts to shed it. I don’t know if that’s because I’m older, because my metabolism is shot, or because I’m not trying so hard, but regardless of the reason, I haven’t got discouraged. I’ve dislodged 61 of the little buggers, and I’m damned if I’m giving up now.

This is the only ‘diet’ I’ve ever been on when I’ve successfully endured a rocky patch and not given up, backslid all the way to the bottom and undone all my good work. That’s the thing I’m proudest of, and the thing that gives me the most confidence that I can succeed in the long run.

The Stuff I’ve Discovered (Physically)

I’ve discovered I have bony promontories such as wrist bones and collar bones, and I suspect that as the rest of my fat recedes like a melting polar ice-cap I may find outcrops of ribs and hip bones under all the blubber. All the fat has gone from my feet (I had really fat feet!) and I can see bones and tendons that I never even knew existed. I’ll be wearing sandals a lot this summer to show off my foxy feet, and I’m already scouring the shops for a really vampy, whoreish red nail polish to draw attention to my lovely skinny tootsies. 

I’ve noticed that the fat distribution hasn’t really changed a whole lot – I’m still apple-shaped, and though I’ve lost a lot of inches from my legs and midriff, I still have a belly, as well as lamentably large boobs and fat upper arms. Because of this, I still don’t like to wear sleeveless tops because the flapping sounds made by my batwings scare small children and timid dogs.

I’ve been conducting Doppler shift experiments on my stomach, and I’m pretty sure that the fat on my midriff is wobblier than it was when I was 61lbs fatter. Before, my belly was solid and unshakeable like a side of pork, but now it’s all flob-a-lobby like a big pink blancmange. I almost prefer it the way it was, and I’m beginning to realise that all the dieting, crunches and Pilates in the world won’t give me abs like Gwen Stefani.

Because of that realisation, tummy and batwing tucks have moved from the realms of “not in a million years” to “hmmm, how much of a dent would it make in ten grand?” The only things holding me back from going under the knife are a) my low tolerance for pain; b) my stinginess when it comes to spending money on myself, and c) my Lutheran upbringing, which tells me that I should be less vain and more accepting of my bodily imperfections. Cosmetic surgeons will soon get wind of this change of heart and I’ll have to be firm and unyielding, and beat them off with a big stick.

Whilst my belly is still a cause of rueful regret, my legs are a triumph and a testimony to the benefits of brisk walking and kick-ass cycling. I can now walk around bare-legged without the dreaded thigh-chafe, and instead of jeans and trainers I’ll be wearing floaty little skirts when we go to Rome in July (and sandals, of course!) so that I can stay cool and comfortable.

I can cross my legs at the knee girly-style, and I’m grasping every opportunity that presents itself to sit all cross-legged-and-straight-backed-and-sophisticated, like Tippi Hedren outside the schoolhouse in The Birds. I just need the Chanel suit, the chignon and the cigarette and holder to complete the picture.

How else has my body changed?

I’m a lot more bendy, and I can scratch between my shoulder blades without the aid of a ruler and cut my toe-nails (and paint them!) without feeling that I’ll need osteopathy the following day to realign my vertebrae. I can almost hug my shins (damn belly still gets in the way), and I can bend from the waist and lay my hands flat on the floor without feeling as though my hamstrings are about to snap like cheap knicker elastic.

I can rely on having regular periods at 28 day intervals for the first time ever, and I can walk briskly for 90 minutes without feeling tired or uncomfortable. I can do a whole advanced Taebo workout, and still have enough energy for 40 minutes of turbo training afterwards.

When I take a bath I’m not wedged against the sides of the tub like a cork in a bottle – there is free-flowing water on both sides of me, and there aren’t sudden floods and dam breaches as I move my haunches and release a pent up avalanche of water from where it’s been trapped behind my huge backside. I can almost get the water level in the tub high enough to cover my boobs if I drain the tank fully, take a deep breath, fully submerge my head, and lie flat on the bottom of the bathtub – which is an improvement over a year ago, when most of me reared above the waterline like some hideous blubbery behemoth.

Oh, and I’m officially under the maximum weight limit (to ride horses suitable for people under 5’3”) at my local riding stables, so if I wanted to take up horse-riding I could finally do so without fear of being reported to the RSPCA.

The Stuff I’ve Discovered (Emotionally)

I’ve had weeks when it’s all seemed ridiculously easy and effortless, and weeks when it’s been a huge struggle to summon up any motivation or focus at all. I haven’t yet figured out why that’s the case, but if I do, you’ll be the first to know.

I’ve realised that it really is possible to have a packet of Chocolate Hobnobs in the house for two months, and not feel particularly bothered whether I eat them or not.

Gasp. I never thought I’d hear myself say that.

I’ve also realised, though, that when I’m having a REALLY shitty day, the urge to seek solace in food is still as strong as it ever was. What’s changed, though, is that I’m able to control the urge a little better, and sometimes even rationalise it away completely. So that’s definitely a step in the right direction.

I’ve learned that patience isn’t something you either have or you don’t have, like perfect pitch or a cleft palate. Nope, I’d never have believed it, but patience is a quality – like a muscle or a skill - that it’s possible to develop. Honest to God, it’s true. My previous efforts to get in shape have foundered on the rocks of impatience and frustration, but this time is better – I’ve let go of all that pressure and expectation, and I’m simply going with the flow. I’ll get there eventually, even if it takes me the rest of the damn decade. Heh, maybe I’m growing up at last.

I’ve learned that sometimes, with the best will in the world, nothing but chocolate will fix things.

But I’ve also learned that satiety is a state of mind, not of body, and that two small bites of good quality rich dark chocolate are at least as satisfying as a whole slab of cheap milk chocolate.

Allied to this, I’ve discovered that bolting food down in secret is wholly and utterly dissatisfying, and will lead to an orgy of gluttony later on in the day. If I have a craving which doesn’t dissipate if I try to distract myself with normal activities (reading, walking, working etc), then I have what I crave. Most importantly, I indulge my craving out in the open so that I can savour it and take my time over it and experience all the sensory pleasures of it – and when I can do that, I find that a little goes a long way.

I finally see a future free from sneaking bites of a custard doughnut (cunningly camouflaged in a paper bag) into my mouth on the way home from the shops – what a victory!

Oh, yes, and I’ve realised that people haven’t been lying to me all my life - exercise really does lift my mood and make me feel better. Why did it take me 40 years to see that?

The ‘What Does The Future Hold?’ Stuff

I’m beginning – cautiously and timidly – to really believe I might succeed, though I don’t like to tempt fate by saying it too loudly.

I’d be lying if I said this was as effortless and natural as breathing – it simply isn’t. I still worry that one day my gremlins will wake up from their hibernation and start sabotaging my efforts and undermining my resolve, but the longer I stick at this, the more my confidence grows.

And I really believe I’ve found a food and exercise regimen that I can live with for the rest of my life – as long as I don’t take my eye off the ball and get complacent.

As for getting to goal? Well, I’ve never done that before, much less maintained there, so this is all new and unfamiliar territory for me. Most of the weight I’ve lost in the past year is old fat that I’ve lost repeatedly in other dieting attempts. I’ve yo-yo’d through these weights for the past decade. Soon, though, I’ll be reaching virgin fat, and dropping to my lowest ever adult weight, and that’ll be a bit scary.

But scary is good sometimes, and I should try to have a bit of faith in myself, right?

After all, Kim has faith in me, and he really believes that this time I’ll make it to goal and join the ranks of the 5% of successful maintainers.

I just hope that the next twelve months prove that he knows what he’s talking about…

I'm still dogsitting, but Kim's parents should hopefully be home this evening. I've kept up my healthy eating habits despite the change to my routine, but getting some exercise has been difficult. So I'm feeling sluggish and fat today, and I'll be glad to get home.

The guy whose funeral they've gone to dropped down dead of a massive heart attack on Monday morning. He and his wife were due to fly to Australia for a month long vacation today - as a couple it had always been their lifelong dream to go to Oz, and the poor guy missed the trip by less than a week.

They never took the trip before because his wife is a bit (not even a lot!) overweight, and she always felt inhibited about visiting new places. Like many overweight people, she procrastinated about doing many of the things she would ordinarily have enjoyed, waiting for the magical day when she'd metamorphosed into a skinny person.

What a waste of a life!

I know it's a waste, because I've wasted much of my own life in the same way. But not any longer! After Kim had his transplant I vowed I'd never again miss an opportunity to do something fun just because of my weight, because life is too precious to fritter the pleasurable opportunities away.

I'm sure if Morris's wife had realised that she was robbing not just herself, but also her husband, of their lives' dream, she'd have been on that plane before you could say CARPE DIEM. I'm sure she thought her weight and its inhibitory impact were only blighting her own life - it's so easy to overlook the impact that our outlook and the choices we make have on the people that love us.

I had a bit of an epiphany last night, and to put it into context, I’ll need to give a bit of background.

I had a really constricting childhood, with over-protective parents who never allowed me to spend any time alone and unsupervised. I lived my life under the watchful gaze of not only them, but also that of my 4 older siblings (three of us shared a bedroom), and it seemed as if I never had a single moment of private and solitary peace in the whole of my first 15 years.

Because I was overweight from infancy, my mom also monitored every single morsel of food that I ate, and blamed me constantly for gaining weight. I’m sure she thought – wrongly – that I was sneaking contraband food behind her back, and getting fat through sheer unadulterated greed. In reality she herself was the main cause of the problem, since her idea of healthy foods – homemade shortcrust or puff pastry meat and potato pies, toasted bread dipped in a bowl of pure melted cheese, everything fried in lard, every slice of bread thickly buttered, chips or heavily buttered mash with almost every meal etc. – was a recipe for dietary disaster. She had good intentions but her knowledge of nutrition was poor, and she couldn’t comprehend that the foods she was providing were contributing to the problem.

As far back as I remember mealtimes were a battle-zone, as I only had a small appetite and she was infuriated by waste, especially since money was so tight in those days. Instead of giving me a smaller portion than my siblings, she would try and force me to finish what was on my plate, bemoaning my lack of gratitude. I would be literally crying with the pain in my stomach from forcing the food down, and my sister Jinty would try to distract her so that I could sneak the food onto her plate instead (unlike me she was always hungry!).

Then, away from the table, mom would lecture me about being fat, and tell me that it must be because I was eating too much, and that the only way to lose weight was to keep my mouth shut, learn to stop when I was full, and to not be greedy.

Sigh. Parents can do your head in, can’t they? It’s a wonder I grew up so sane and normal. Heh heh.

Anyway, this tale of woe does have a point, and I’m getting there slowly. I’m about halfway through the story, so try and bear with me.

I was 16 before they went out for the evening and left me in the house completely on my own. I think they went to some school prize-giving event with Jinty, and since I hadn’t won anything I got left at home.

Yay, freedom at last!

The moment they drove away I dived straight into my mom’s worst nightmare. I started eating, and I didn’t stop eating for a couple of hours, until I was stuffed to the gills and feeling really sick. I may even have BEEN sick, in some worrying bulimic fashion (except I’d never heard of bulimia at that stage), because my stomach was hurting and I always hated the feeling of being full. It was the pain that stopped me in the end, but up to that point I was like a girl possessed.

This was my first episode of binge eating.

A couple of weeks later they trusted me enough to risk leaving me alone for a second time. I promptly launched into another binge eating episode, and then another the following week. The pattern repeated itself in every subsequent ‘home alone’ session.

A year later I left home for University, and the bingeing stopped. When I was in charge of what I could buy and eat, and no longer feeling like I was under dietary surveillance, the compulsion to eat everything in sight ceased. By and large I ate semi-healthy foods (lots of OJ and granary toast and marmite, if memory serves) in modest portion sizes, and I quickly dropped a couple of stones as a result.

Since then, bingeing episodes have been extremely rare. When I HAVE had them, though, it’s always when I’m at home for an evening by myself. And because I’m home alone so rarely, I seem to go a bit doolally, and suddenly start acting like a kid given free rein in a chocolate shop – I have no self-restraint or control at all.

Anyway, back to the present day, and last night I was ‘home alone’ at Kim’s parent’s house, dog-sitting while they’re in Scotland for a funeral. All day at work I daydreamed about the evening hours, and what delightful eating choices lay ahead of me. The possibilities were endless. I could buy pizza - or pizzas – and eat them to my heart’s content. I could stop for Indian or Chinese takeout. I could buy fish and chips. I could buy chocolate and Doritos. I could cook a huge batch of pasta and eat it with garlic bread. I could buy custard doughnuts or Danish pastries. I could buy plain chocolate digestives or caramel shortcakes. I could eat a whole tub of Ben and Jerry chunky monkey ice-cream…

But after a day of fantasising, guess what I actually did? I stopped at Tesco on the way to the house and bought a head of tender heart celery, a courgette, a couple of carrots, a couple of red onions, a yellow pepper, some red chillies, garlic, a can of organic pinto beans in a salt-free chilli sauce, a can of organic plum tomatoes and a box of six Mint Choc Skinny Cows.

Then I got in, fed the doggies, and cooked myself up a huge batch of veggie chilli bean casserole. I ate the casserole – which was DELICIOUS – with a tall glass of iced water, and then I had a skinny cow for dessert. Then I had a cup of tea and a couple of gingernut biscuits whilst I did the crossword, then I phoned Kim for a chat, then I read my book, then I jumped rope for twenty minutes, then I read a little more and then finally I had an early night.

Yay, what a breakthrough!

And, pleasingly, I didn’t even feel deprived at having missed my one solitary home-alone opportunity to throw caution to the wind and stuff myself with crap. I have no regrets at all, even though it’ll be months before I have another evening completely to myself.

I’m not ‘cured’ because I still had the bingefest daydreams, and the thought of eating all that crap still gave me an illicit thrill – just why is that, do you think? Even with all my knowledge of good nutrition, I fantasised about eating pizza and doughnuts, not something healthy like tofu and yoghurt – I’m obviously a hopeless case! But, when push came to shove, eating crap remained just a fantasy, but the reality was a whole lot different – not to mention a whole lot more tasty, satisfying, and good for my self-esteem.

The wedding was fabulous! My sister looked radiant and beautiful, the groom looked dashing, the barn dance was a hoot and there was only one (mild) fight towards the end of the evening, when two of my feuding relations duked it out in the car-park. All told, I’d call that a successful wedding.

After much reflection, I’ve decided to break the whole anonymity thing, and post a link to the photos on Flickr. It’s not as if I ever write anything horrible on here about my family, or say anything that would mortify me if any of my friends and family discovered this site, so where’s the harm? I’m so proud of my lovely sister, and I want to share with you all how beautiful she looked. The link’s here (and also on the sidebar) if anyone is interested enough to follow it.

I got a pleasing amount of compliments on my outfit, and how much weight I’d lost, and as a result I was feeling pretty swell all day. My confidence soared, I danced every single dance, and I was determinedly unselfconscious about how hot and sweaty I was getting.

Then I came home and uploaded the photos, and my self-satisfaction dissipated instantaneously.

Sigh.

I guess (and it’s nice to know!) that my family look at me through the eyes of love, whereas I look at myself through the eyes of negativity and criticism. They saw vast improvement since the last time they saw me, whereas I zeroed in immediately on how fat and hideous I look, and how far I still have to go.

So the photos dampened my mood a little, but by then it was too late to ruin my day. I’d had a fabulous time, thinking I looked bloody gorgeous, and I’m glad my bubble didn’t get burst until I was back home and it was too late to worry about it.

And that’s progress, right?

**********

The one upsetting thing was the behaviour of my parents towards each other, which cast a cloud over the whole day as far as I was concerned. It wasn’t bad enough to mar my sister’s big day, but it DID upset me and the rest of my sisters a little.

My mom was furious at my dad for having got lost whilst driving to the church for the rehearsal the night before. They arrived 90 minutes late, having missed the formal rehearsal, and had to run-through an abbreviated version so that they could be brought up to speed.

My dad is 80 in May, and long-distance driving is difficult for him. Since mom refuses to navigate, he gets lost more and more frequently, and this frustrates and upsets him. He spent the whole of his 48 working years as a professional driver, and failure in this area goes to the heart of his self-esteem and self-belief. As soon as they get into the car, mom gets uptight and starts nagging him and sniping at him, which ratchets up the tension, and makes him more likely than ever to miss his junctions and road-signs.

By the time they got to the church for the rehearsal, mom was simmering with rage, and not talking to dad at all. She burst into tears, and told everyone - at length - how dad had ruined the day for her. She was still angry when they returned to their hotel, and she lashed out verbally at dad, telling him again how he’d ruined everything for her.

Come the morning of the wedding, they were hardly on speaking terms. In itself that’s upsetting, but that upset is exacerbated by the fact that dad has an illness (Immune Thrombocytopenic Purpura), which means that he is susceptible to uncontrolled bleeding from his nose, eyes etc if he gets stressed. He could LITERALLY bleed to death in minutes (and has almost done so a couple of times in the past).

During the ceremony, dad had a nosebleed.

It wasn’t a bad one, and he successfully hid it from everyone except mom. Crisis averted. He’s fine again now, and the rest of us didn’t find out about it until afterwards. Yet, despite knowing that dad had had a recent bleed, mom continued to circulate through the assembled guests after the ceremony, bemoaning dad’s driving ineptitude and general crapness, and repeatedly telling everyone who would listen that he’d ruined everything for her.

They drove home yesterday, and phoned me to tell me they’d arrived safely. I phoned back a few hours later for an update. Mom answered the phone, and when I said I’d phoned to check if dad was OK, she launched immediately into yet another rehashing of the whole “ruining the rehearsal” saga. I tried to reason with her, saying that the rehearsal was unimportant, and at least the day itself had been a success, and that it wasn’t as if dad had got lost on purpose, or deliberately tried to wind her up.