I had this entry all planned this afternoon, after I returned from working out. It was going to be a happy bubbly entry all about how I’ve started actually looking forward to working out each day; how I’m actually having fun when I’m there and how six weeks of going to Curves every weekday during lunch time has had the benefit of improving my cycling skills, to the point that when we went riding on Saturday for the first time in months, I could actually maintain a faster speed for a longer distance than I ever could before.
Yay exercise and better muscle tone. Blah fucking blah. That was before I went to the Weight Watchers meeting this evening and saw, once again, just exactly how I am going absolutely nowhere.
I’ve been going back to Curves now for about six weeks. I expected to gain weight because unlike apparently the rest of the world, when I exercise, I gain weight. Lots of it. This time a whole whopping 4 pounds of it. Go me. Way to really make a girl feel like she’s accomplishing something. The fact that my BMI dropped a miniscule amount (0.2%. Whee.) did little to make up for the fact that that stupid scale showed a number higher than when I’d started after the first month’s measure day.
For the past four weeks I have also dutifully recorded my Points and followed the Weight Watchers eating plan and done my best to drink enough water and eat enough vegetables and fruits. And yes I may not always get the full 5 servings of veggies per day, but I never did back when we were on the plan before. And back then, when I was actually being diligent about the diet (because it *is* a diet, people, no matter what they try to say to pretty it up with words and call it a ‘lifestyle change’), I would actually see a weight loss over time. It was slow coming off but at least it came off, and gave me enough incentive to keep on trying.
Well. After four weeks of weigh-ins I’ve managed to officially keep off a whole whopping 0.6 pounds. Yes folks, you read that right. Just a hair over half a pound. After four stinking weeks of being on Weight Watchers and six weeks of Curves.
And I am tired of it. I am so incredibly tired and frustrated that I don’t even know what to do anymore. Every time I get off that scale I feel this close to bursting into tears. The rational part of my brain can natter all it wants about muscle weighing more than fat, and how it’s more important to focus on the fact that eating healthier and exercising is really good for me in the long run, and how studies have shown that people who are overweight can be just as healthy as skinny people if they work at it. None of that matters a damn when I’m standing on the scale. None of that changes the fact that the scale reads a number that, according to those wretched weight tables, puts me in the dangerously overweight category. 50 pounds overweight, and it isn’t budging at all.
If I was suddenly losing massive inches around my body maybe I wouldn’t be so frustrated by this whole thing, but I don’t even have that to console myself with. A few paltry quarter-inch losses here and there make no noticeable difference in how my clothes feel, or how I feel when I look in a mirror. And they certainly don’t make one damn bit of difference to how I feel when I step on that blasted scale every week and face the glaringly obvious reiteration of how much of a failure I am, yet again. I am surrounded by people who can manage to lose weight – yes, even with a bit of a struggle and sometimes a few steps backwards, but overall they succeed. Yet here I am, following the rules and even exercising regularly – 30 minutes a day just like I’m supposed to – and what do I get? Nothing. A big fat nothing. Just the overwhelming sense of failure, week after week.
You know, I joke occasionally that if I’m destined to be a fat chick, at least I can be a fit fat chick, but that joke is only to make other people laugh – to cover up the fact that I am hurting inside with each passing week where I see no signs of success. It’s not like I’m trying to be model-thin. It’s not like I’m one of those perky little women who comes skipping into Weight Watchers and loses her 10% body weight, which also conveniently puts her at her lifetime weight because she only had 10 pounds to lose anyway, all in less than three months, and somehow we are all supposed to applaud her as if she had even one idea of how much the rest of us have to struggle. I *am* fat. I am 5’3″ and right now I weigh 185 pounds and no amount of massaging of the data can ever make that a healthy weight for me.
Right now I don’t know what to do. I do know that I cannot keep putting myself through this every week because it is sucking every bit of my self-esteem away. I know that the modern independent woman should never be so wrapped up in a number on a scale, but knowing and feeling are two different things.
I’m so tired of spinning in circles and going nowhere. I have avoided (mostly) talking about this here, so this might come as a little bit of a surprise to my readers, but for the past few months I have been struggling with issues of depression and low self-image about practically everything outside of my job and my marriage. So the last thing I need is another glaring reminder (at least to me) of how worthless I am. Lately it doesn’t take much to send me spiraling down into the ‘woe is me’ cesspool, so this weekly reminder of failure is not helpful.
I’m not looking for pity. I’m certainly not looking for ways to accept my fat and flabby body and embrace my unhealthy weight. I am not looking for platitudes of ‘oh it will get better’, because in my more rational moments I do realize that eventually it has to get better, some day, some year, some millenium. I’m just venting because I am tired of feeling this way and I don’t know what to do about it. I don’t know how to fix this. I don’t know how to make myself not care so much about what the scale says. I don’t know how to go in every week and get on that scale and not come home and cry. I don’t know how to look at myself in the mirror without feeling disgust. I don’t know how to make myself feel better about myself again.
Honey, do I understand. If you want to talk about some of this stuff privately, drop me an email.
*hugs*
I also understand how you are feeling. On the NK discussion boards we have a great support system going for those of us working on our health. You might want to stop in and talk about this because you will get great support from them! :^) There are others out there dealing with these exact same issues and talking to them might help you to not feel so isolated anymore :^)
I have trouble dropping pounds too. Obviously.
Even walking as much as I do.
Even being careful about what I eat.
I’ve changed how I eat so much in the past five years, and yet I’m still a good 80lbs overweight.
The only thing that seems to work in my family, and may be true for you too, is exercising a lot. My brother kicked off 50 lbs by biking everywhere AND going to the gym every day for an hour on top of that. That was the committment he had to make in order to lose weight and keep it off. That prospect scares me a bit, because if that’s the level of activity I need to maintain, I don’t know if I’ll EVER lose weight, given that I usually only have about a half hour a day to assign to exercise.
It’s like there’s a certain burn point that has to be reached before my body will actually start to move fat off and I have to also be eating enough so that my body doesn’t decide to conserve instead.
It’s a delicate balance that seems to take a lot of experimenting to find.
And yeah, it’s hard to see other people finding that burn point so easily. People with perky metabolic rates who can diet and exercise for a few weeks and have dramatic results, while I continue to languish around up here in size 20, 22, 1x and 2x.
All I can say is, I hear ya hon. And maybe … stop getting on that scale? If the numbers are haunting you so much, maybe it’s time to give yourself a bit of a break and try to orient yourself around slightly different goals. You seemed very excited about hitting all of your biking milestones when you guys were biking regularly.
It also seems to me that those are really laudable fitness goals and that being able to bike 15 or 30 miles without being totally breathless and in pain (like me) are great signs of being in shape and nothing to sneeze at.
*hugs*
You know where to find me if you need to vent more:)
First thing, throw the scale into an incinerator. How hard gravity pulls on your body is an inherently inaccurate measure of your general health.
Second thing, keep going to Curves, and continue to eat healthy. The combination of better nutrition and exercise will lead to better health, and a better attitude towards your body.
You mention it yourself early in your post. You’ve been going to the gym for six weeks and already your body has responded by becoming stronger, faster, and increasing its endurance to a point that you’ve not experienced before.
The scale will never show that. Only a gradual lowering of your heart rate at rest, increased physical capabilities, and a lower blood pressure can be a measure of how “in shape” you are.
You’re my age. It’s taken at least ten years for your body to reach it’s current shape, maybe more if you’ve always been a chunky chicky. It will take longer than six weeks of gym work to reshape your body. But it will reshape. The sad thing, especially in this age where visual confirmation of change is demanded fast, fast, fast is that a change in body shape comes last. Your body will increase it’s muscular efficiency first, then it will start shedding the excess fat it’s stored, then your skin will readjust.
The scale will never show you that. It will always read a number, that when compared to a universal chart, will NEVER give a satisfactory result.
If you want your scale number to go down fast, weigh in at Echo summit. Gravity will exert less force on your body at 7,000 feet above Sea level than it does in Dixon.
Seroiusly, throw out the scale. Measure your healt by what you can DO and not what you can SEE. Your shape will adjust.
Next Post: SuperPheemy’s anecdotal story about weight training, sport, and being a big guy.
Ditto what DIHBFP said about the scale. Eat intelligently, stay active. DO NOT go to weight group meetings, which are designed to humiliate you in public. Self-flagellation does damn little for self-esteem, although it seems to work for some people. (But for how long?) I’ve got extra pounds, but I also have a good fitness level. My dr. doesn’t fuss at me about the pounds. But stay away from the losing contest.