Thursday, April 18, 2013

No "success" is still progress?!? : Plateaus, bloating and bathroom problems.

I have hit another annoying plateau. We all hit them. Some of us hang out around those weights or sizes and it seems no matter what we do we can't break past them. I'm there. Although I was able to get the scale to move past that horrible 205 mark, I can't get it to pass the 203 mark now. It is frustrating to say the least. It is the same with sizes. I'm stuck at that 14 and it won't budge.
THIS IS STILL A SUCCESS!

How is this a success? Well for one I'm still working at it. And two I'm not gaining.

I will be totally honest (because that is the whole POINT of this blog right?)...my weight fluctuates GREATLY throughout the week...from day to day and from week to week based on nothing that makes any sense other than, my body is confused. I'm not building muscle or  anything like that so lets not get all carried away with the whole "muscle weighs more than fat" because a pound is a pound is a pound.....but a pound of muscle LOOKS better than a pound of fat does. My weight can be 203 one morning and then the next day it will say 206.....the next day it will say 207 and then it will say 203 again. I eat pretty much the same foods every day... I have to because of my dietary restrictions...it just makes it easier to have staples in the house that I CAN eat and that I don't have to try to figure out what to eat. The problem is my "irregularity" I am sure....AND I realized this week that I can't have barley in addition to the wheat. :-( Any time I have anything with wheat or barley I puff up. I get so bloated, so uncomfortable, my stomach is killing me, I get dizzy, migraines, itchy skin you name it....and the bathroom issue strikes too....I end up looking pregnant I am so bloated.

It turns out that I have more and more signs of Celiac's, the more research I do. It might be time for a new doctor for me, because the one I have seems to be dismissing me again. If you don't have diarrhea then you don't have Celiac's...and yet the #1 dismissed symptom is constipation....hmmmm. Drink more water they say, eat more veggies they say...Um, I don't eat bread or pasta so I eat veggies....and I drink 144-164 ounces of water every day. Try a laxative they say, those don't work on me.....no matter how many I take....which is a major indicator that the patient should be tested for Celiac's. sigh. Regardless of having the diagnosis or not...ever...I won't go back to eating gluten. I just feel so horrible when I eat it. It might not make me lose weight to be gluten free, but at least now my body can heal (it takes about a year for an adult to heal the villi) and I will get proper nutrition from the foods I eat. So that is another type of progress I'm making.

But, I'm still working at it. I'm not "trying" I AM losing weight. It is slowly and often seems like there is no progress at all.....but even when I don't have a success on the scale, or in dropping a size, I'm still making progress because it is another day that I have made GOOD choices.

No scale loss or size shrinking or better fitting clothes does not mean  you are not making progress or having any success. Sometimes the success if found in that you are not giving up....and this week that is my success.

Tuesday, April 2, 2013

Wait.....what?!? You need clothes again?

Ok so today is a different kind of post.

Yes, I'm still a fatty, no I didn't exercise today or at all after my last post....ok so I went to the Columbus Zoo on the WORST day (they had a huge Easter event the Saturday before Easter and it was PACKED) and walked for what seemed like 100 miles, but was more like 3. I had Easter with my family up north which was nice and my  kids are on Spring Beak but I am not.

The topic is clothes. How do you dress a body that has...how do I put this....shape?!?

 I find that at 34 years old, 2 teenagers and being in college full time that I dress like I'm 16 still. Chucks, t-shirt, hoodie or sweater.....yup. THAT is what I have been reduced to. I'm too short for the average size clothes, everything must me taken up so that it fits me. Then you have my hips and my chest coupled with a relatively small waist (at least when you compare it to my butt and boobs it is small)....they just don't make clothes for me. Being so short (just barely under 5'2") if it fits my chest it is too big everywhere else....if I get something that doesn't fit too horribly then it is too broad in the shoulders. Then there are the pants, skirts, dresses.....if it fits my hips it is too big in the waist, if I get something that fits my waist I can't get it up my thighs. And don't get me started on my post 2 babies flabby tummy that seems to bulge and sag and wobble no matter what I do. I don't want to have to wear spanx in everything I own just feel like I'm not some disgusting sausage stuffed into a too tight casing.

Clothing manufacturers don't help any. They market to "the beautiful people"....the "thin" people and then try to get them to be skinnier. I wasn't always extra curvy with a side of curvy....I know, I was "thin" once. Though even by industry standards I was fat, I was a size 2-4...a muscular, yet curvy size 2-4.  But I was made to think I was grossly obese. Now that I truly am obese, my options are basically boxy, large clothing in fabrics that remind me of old women and styles that make me look matronly...or thin, flimsy overpriced attempts at giving us something SORT OF like what the beautiful people get to wear. Sure there are a few places that I can find clothing I genuinely like and would wear, Torrid, ModCloth, PinupGirlClothing....but lets face it, $75 for a pair of pants (on the "cheaper" end of things) that will wear through from "chub rub" with in 3 months OR that I will either grow out of or shrink out of in that amount of time is a bit ridiculous.

I used to love to shop....even though I couldn't dress in all the stuff my friends wore growing up I still loved fashion and always managed to find something I could wear and feel pretty in. Now, I have a panic attack just planning to go shopping....at least if I'm buying for me. First off, I have to drive 45 minutes just to get to a store and try stuff on. Even then there is no promise that they will have anything that fits me ok....pants aren't too bad because the main issue I have with them is the length at Torrid....but shirts, what are they thinking sometimes?!? The shoulders are so broad that I look like a football player. OR they are so shapeless in an attempt to hide imperfections that I end up looking like I'm wearing a potato sack!


So basically we are to either look like we are 15 or like we are 50. I just want to grab the fashion industry by the neck and shake them...violently. I want to prop their eyes open and force them to see that  "fat" girls need cute, flattering clothing that doesn't make them feel worse about themselves. Providing me with unflattering materials (polyester) that do not move, breathe and flow with my curves by skimming them is not going to make me not be disgusting.....it actually makes it more likely that we will end up squeezing into the styles that you DO provide, in sizes that don't fit us just so that we don't walk around naked and further offend anyone.

Sure we can order online, but then we have to wait 7-10 days to receive clothing that probably won't fit right since we can't try them on..then we have to PAY to send them back and get the "proper" size, which may or may not fit either. Don't even get me started on those "size charts".....really?!? A size XXL in one store is a 4X in another and an XL in yet another. SIGH. I find too that when I measure myself to determine the size they say I wear, it is often WAY too big....or WAY too small when I get it!

The truth is that I'm 34 years old and I don't want to look 40, I don't want to look 20... I want to look like me. I'm funny, sweet, outgoing, creative, friendly and easy going, I'm a mom, a wife, a sister, a daughter and a friend. I'm also a student and like to have comfy days that don't require baggy sweats and my husband's sweatshirts. I deserve to feel beautiful regardless of the size on my label. I deserve to look cute and not like I'm in my 50's. I deserve to feel beautiful regardless of my weight and not hike my pants up to smooth out my belly, topped with baggy sweatshirts and tops which only make me look LARGER. Just because I'm "cursed" or "blessed" with curves doesn't mean I should be ashamed of them because they don't meet the fashion industry's standards of anorexic.

And this is what I face...4 weeks before my graduation....I don't want to settle for "what fits"... I want to feel like I was able to find something I LOVE rather than just something I "like". I feel like I constantly settle....for what fits and for what I can afford that sort of fits. It doesn't seem fair that those of us that are deemed "fat" not only have to dress ourselves within the parameters of our wallets like the rest of the world, but we also have to work within a set of guidelines that are set for us, in order to avoid causing those around us to vomit, to not offend anyone else and also to be ok with looking either childish or matronly.

So the search continues......

At this point I am still determined to not "settle".....I still feel like I have a right to look GOOD for my graduation and for my party afterwards.