Once More With Feeling!

                                       
 The New Year has started and along with it the dreaded realization that, once again, I have not lost any weight, but in fact have gained 5 more pounds. If I continue at this rate, by the time my kids have to take care of me, they are not going to be able to move me! This horrifies me and make me incredibly sad. Why is it I can see other things to fruition, even obsess about things, and yet not be able to do something as simple as watching what I eat?? I think about this all the time. Every season I watch Biggest Loser and marvel at the way Jillian Michaels can get at the root cause of a person's problem. I even looked into being a contestant, but something was always more important to me than being a part of that year's season - a new baby in the family, a wedding...its just the way I am programmed. My family means more to me than anything on this earth, including me. I actually determined to try this year and of course, this year they are only accepting families of 4 more than 85 lbs overweight. I don't have anyone in my family like that. It's just me. I thank God every day they don't have this struggle in their lives, but I am sure they struggle with other things that I don't see. In truth, the show scared me because I was afraid that whatever it was that started this drop into the rabbit hole of food addiction, would be something that would hurt a loved one - and to me, having that come out on national television, well, that would be more horrible than dealing with this.
      I haven't a clue why I am doing this to myself. I was pretty normal as a kid. There was one time when I was 6 when the doctor put me on a diet as I was getting a little chunky, but my mom did a great job and I lost the weight quickly and never gained it back. Back in the '50's, we really didn't see a whole lot of overweight kids. You know the story...in the summer we went out early in the morning after breakfast, came home for lunch, and went out again till dinner time. More often than not, we went back out again till bedtime. School season wasn't too much different...other than homework, we were outside. We were always busy - playing dodge ball, kickball, ringalievio, kick the can, red light green light 123, wolf, roller skating, bike riding, putting on shows - there wasn't time to get fat! As a teen I was normal, a little zoftig compared to the other girls, but wore a size 10/11. I never really worried about my weight. I knew I would never be a size 2, just wasn't built that way. As a young woman I was busy working and doing theater at night, no problems.

   After I got married, I had something called a pituitary adenoma - a kind of tumor in the brain. It did crazy things to my weight -especially after they put me on steroids. I gained 50 lbs in 3-4 months. After the tumor was resolved and some weight was lost, I got pregnant and gained 50 lbs. Thus started the nightmare every mom goes through of not quite losing the baby weight and getting pregnant again, thereby adding more to your frame with each pregnancy. By the time I was pregnant with my last child, I was tipping the scales at a bit over 200 lbs. A few short weeks later I ended up with an emergency gall bladder operation and that started this weird problem that gave me IBS which in turn gave me weight gain. It was a losing battle. I would get some off and put it back on with an extra 5 lbs. How often do we hear about yoyo dieting and think it will not happen to us? Because it does.
     So that brings me to where I am now...slightly depressed, way overweight and at a loss as to how to pull myself together. I am trying something new this time. I am going to blog this journey in hopes it will keep me on track - and maybe help some of you out there. I am going on a cruise next November, one that I am really excited about as it is a cruise with Celtic Thunder. The thought of being at the pool looking like this and having people see me this way - it's just not something I want to happen! So I have joined a group of ladies on Facebook who are also going on the cruise and are in the same boat - needing to lose anywhere from 25 lbs. to 100+. I keep thinking if we can just hold each other up and listen to each other, we can do this. So here's to 2014 and finally getting this monkey off my back!