I'm just your average, everyday, divorced 38 year old girl -- overweight, tragically unhip,
and trying to make a life for myself. I live with two furry beasts, Dave and Abby, whose
feline mission in life is to choke me with their fur. Nothing special.
Saturday morning. I've got this vague sense of disquiet deep inside me this morning. Disquiet and discontent. I feel absolutely horrible, physically, because - all previous posts saying that I'd got the eating and working out figured to the contrary - I've been doing nothing but binge eating for days. No working out, either. And, I suppose, that can help explain why I feel so dissatisfied with myself. I haven't been sleeping well the last couple of days because I'm hot (that's what happens when you eat too much and you're already fat and diabetic) and my feet hurt (neuropathy, another side effect for fat diabetics who binge), and that's probably not helping my mood, but mostly I think it's just the knowledge that I'm letting it all fall apart right in front of me and not doing a darned thing to stop it. It's all very good and well to talk about how I will do this or that or the other thing but, in the end, talk is cheap. I read other journals and see how well everyone's doing, even when they're struggling at least they're still doing something, and I feel even more unhappy with myself. Not unhappy enough to actually do something about it - let's be clear - but very unhappy none the less.
Then there's TCB. He was out of town for work all week, so I didn't expect to hear from him although a quick email or voicemail message would have been nice, but there's been nothing still and he should have been home last night. Who knows, he might call today but do I really want to keep going with someone who only communicates when he's free to do something with me? Don't I want a bit more company than that? If he ever calls and if we go out, I need to have a conversation, I think, and that's not going to be fun, but I can't go on this way. I need something more than this and I need to know for sure, from his mouth, that he sees me as something more than a friend with benefits. Past evidence aside, that's just not who I am and certainly not who I want to be. I want to be with someone who thinks I'm wonderful and is proud to be my boyfriend or whatever you want to call it. Granted, I'm not proud of myself right now which is probably not helping the situation, but that's still what I want and I can't start settling for less just because I'm a fat cow who's eating her way to an early grave, now can I?
I need to go and get ready to meet my parents for an early Father's Day celebration although I really feel most like...you know, I don't know what I feel like doing! I was going to say, "sitting on the couch and doing nothing," but that's not what I want. Well, part of me wants that, but another part wants to get off my butt, pick up the mess around here, and then go out to get a manicure and pedicure. I'm fed up of feeling like crap, looking like crap, and letting this place go, too. God, I'm better than this and I don't want to be here anymore.
Friday morning. Omigosh, I'm tired. Two graduations in the last 36 hours and one still to come this morning. I brought Alcott's older brother with me to Alcott's graduation Wednesday night and also took two of his younger siblings home afterwards, then brought Alcott and his older brother to their middle brother's graduation yesterday morning at 8:30am. I had to get two teenaged boys out of bed and ready to go before 7:30 in the morning on a day without school! Fortunately for me, they are both extraordinarily good boys and were ready when I walked through the doors for them. We have one more, this morning, for his sister and youngest brother, so it's another early morning wake-up call for the boys and me, love their hearts. Of course, they can go home and vegg whereas I will be going to work afterwards. Ah, well, tomorrow is Saturday and I can sleep in, so that's okey dokey.
I was going to write something insightful and clever, but have decided to take a quick nap instead, so, um, g'night.
Wednesday morning. It turns out that deciding you're ready to get back on track is much simpler than actually getting back on track. Oh, I'm making definite progress - breakfast and lunch are perfect - but there is definitely still work to be done. I'm still not working out and dinners are a disaster. By disaster I mean that I'm bingeing out completely. I get hungry and desperate and panicky and I just "have" to eat something other than my healthy prepared meals. I really believe that working out as soon as I get home will stop that ugly pattern, but I've had something to do after work each night so that I'm not getting home until nearly 7pm, by which time my blood sugar is really low (hence the panicky feeling). I know that I need to plan a healthy snack between lunch and when I go home, but I haven't gone grocery shopping yet, so that's not happening right now. Tonight I've got Alcott's graduation ceremony (from junior high to high school), so groceries probably won't be gotten tonight, either. Well, breakfast and lunch on track is a start, right?
(TCB is on the road for work, so no contact until after the work week. I'm a little anxious about whether or not he'll forget about me, but I've got plenty of activities to keep me busy, so it's not really bothering me a lot.)
Monday afternoon. So it turns out that the way to generate interest (as measured by the number of comments) is to talk about love and romance. Does that mean that most of my readership are devoted fans of Desperate Housewives? In any case, it appears to be the consensus of the commenters that TCB is not looking for a Friends With Benefits (FWB) relationship and that this assessment is based on the fact that he invited me to a work function. To be clear, the work function is a Padres baseball game, not the upcoming formal dinner/dance, which he's mentioned but not invited me to. (Should I worry that I'm not invited? Should I hint around that I want to be invited? Ugh, dating is so much more complicated than I remembered!) Still, I think I agree with the majority in this case that's he's thinking in terms of a romantic relationship even though he isn't physically demonstrative most of the time (which is the only thing that has me questioning his intentions, FYI). He's off on a business trip this week, so I probably won't hear from him much until the weekend, which will, no doubt, engender all sorts of insecurity and analysis-paralysis from me - fair warning!
On a different yet related note, I think I might have found the thing that it takes to put me back into The Zone. You know, that magic place where it's easier to do what it takes to be healthy than to sit on my butt and eat until I burst? To be completely accurate, I'm not really in The Zone but I'm in the PreZone, which is nearly as good. The PreZone is where I'm just so fed up of listening to myself, thinking about this junk endlessly, and feeling so poorly about myself that I drive myself crazy wondering if a boy that spends most of the weekend with me really likes me or is just sleeping with me because he doesn't have anything better to do. Oh, and then there's the fact that I weighed in at 229 this morning. Yes, you read that correctly, I now weigh nearly 30 pounds more than I did in March before I left for New Orleans. I was so furious when I read the number that I very nearly exploded with rage. This time, however, the rage was clean and pure, not messy and destructive as in the past. I know what I want and I have this knife edged determination to make it work. Fortunately, today was the first day of going back to three-a-day of my healthy prepared meals, so that takes care of one part of the equation although I'm hungry (my tummy's growling) and cranky right now, but that's beside the point. After this little scale incident, I grabbed one of my co-workers who has the same problem as me - she's fat - and who I used to work out with a few years ago and told her that we'd be starting to work out again this week. I'm very lucky that she'd recently reached the same place as I was and agreeably said, "OK," so I've got three days a week of 30 minute sessions each day on the calendar now. That leaves me with only two days a week on my own and I can handle that. (I was going to add "I think" to that last sentence but have decided that this is just the way that it is, so no thinking involved.)
I feel like the StaPuft marshmallow man, the Michelan man, and a Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade float all bloated into one. I'm letting my unhappiness about my body affect the way I perceive TCB's attentions to me. I'm dreading going to a water park with Alcott and his siblings because of how I will look in a swimsuit. All of these things are important, but the most important thing is that it's time...it's just time.
My brain isn't functioning well enough to come up with a clever title - use your imagination
Sunday night. I don't know how to describe my date with TCB other than to say that he left tonight, reluctantly, at about 8pm after over 26 hours together and I was sorry to see him go. We went to the movies, we got a late dinner, we browsed Barnes & Nob1e, and we went to my place. I was surprised (pleasantly) when he fell asleep and just settled in for the night in my room and it was wonderful waking up next to him, too. After, um, a good morning cuddle, I thought for sure he'd announce that he was leaving and would see me soon, but instead he asked if I wanted breakfast. After two quick showers - one each - we set off for breakfast at the beach and a walk around La Jolla (ritzy beach village in San Diego). Again, I headed for home assuming that he'd be wanting to go, as he asked if we could go walk around Mission Bay. I think that, at this point, I must literally have been glowing with happiness and confidence. I wanted to scream, "this cute boy likesme...he could go out with any girl he wanted to, he's this great catch, and he likes me!" Instead, I just walked next to him - I'd guess about 2-1/2 miles - joking, laughing, and just chatting about every thing that came into my mind. He didn't even mind when the other CASA called to tell me about the tragedy that had befallen Alcott's oldest brother's brand new iPod and actually told me to take the call because it was important. As we drove from the Bay to my house, I was certain that he'd be leaving as soon as I gave him an allergy tab (poor thing has terrible sinus problems), but he sat down, put on the news channel, and proceeded to fall asleep in my big, velvet comfy chair. He napped and I napped on the couch for about an hour, and, when we woke up, he asked what my plans were for dinner. Dinner! With TCB! Heaven. OK, it was only fish and chips, but it was a little piece of heaven for me. Yes, he did go home after dinner, but it was with great reluctance, and I say that because it was palpable in the room.
No kissy facing, no cuddling in public, but I can just feel that I'm becoming important to him. Does that make sense? I'm sure to some this seems boring and bland, but, to me, it's actually starting to sound really good. The overly emotional, over the top guys that I'm usually attracted to just play into my drama queen tendencies, so a man who doesn't play games or mince his words could be a real help in making my life more moderate, less extreme. Oh, did I mention that he invited me to a public function involving his work in 11 days? That has to be a good sign, right?
You know, I hope he's not thinking I'm a "friend with benefits"...that would really suck!
