Comfort, Relief & Change…

I am just past the half way mark in my 30 day challenge and up till these past few days it has been awesome. I have been full of energy, sleep has been amazing and I have been feeling really good. It’s amazing the difference eating barely any sugar can make in one’s life.  Then I tweaked a muscle in my hip and I couldn’t work out for almost 4 days. My chiropractor told me that going from working out 2-3 days a week to 5 days a week naturally increases the risk for injury if not careful and I didn’t listen to my body.  Standing looking at myself in the mirror it was the first time I noticed some changes in my body. I have two distinct lines down either side of my abdomen indicating that all the planking and core work I have been doing is paying off.  The little bulge in my tummy is distinctly smaller. The pants I put on defiantly were fitting smaller. A giant set of stairs I used to get winded climbing, I practically ran up them…. What did I do…panic.

A distinct sense of panic set it. I dealt with this panic by eating Jellybeans, followed the next day by a cookie, followed the next day by a donut. CRAP! Food, for me, has always provided a sense of relief, a sense of comfort and as I ate all this sugar and what I would have considered some of my “go to” foods, that familiar sense of comfort never set it. What set in was a gross sugar coma feeling. What set in was a tummy ache, not a sense of relief or comfort. This was quickly followed by tears and an emergency meeting with a couple members of the Skinny Cheerleader Posse (Click here to read about Skinny Cheerleader Posse).

These changes are scary for me. The layer of protection that I spent many years building is slowly slipping away. The bad habits I used to find comfort in are no longer comfortable. The foods I used to love to eat, no longer taste as good as they used to. This is all a good thing, despite not feeling that way!

Change happens. I ask for it and it is coming. Now my goal is to find new, healthy forms of comfort. For example, when panic sets in I go for a walk or a run. I call a Skinny Cheerleader Posse member and talk it out. I write a blog post, which is what this one is now, while sitting across from a Skinny Cheerleader Posse member. Allowing this change to happen is going to take a level of courage and vulnerability. It’s going to take me acknowledging and letting go of all my little self-sabotaging habits that have kept me overweight all this time.

Breathe….just breathe…I can do this. 

30 Day Fitness Challenge…

Well I have gone and done it now… I am on Day 4 of a 30 Day Fitness Challenge with Seva Fitness.

The challenge goes from Feb 1 – March 2. We are required to submit photos and measurements before and after and the winners are judged not only based on amounts lost in pounds and inches, but also in our participation. So, how actively am I participating and interacting with other challengers? Using the online forum?   Am I utilizing the access to 2 trainers, 2 physiotherapists and a holistic nutritionist? Did I attend all my boot camps and nutrition classes, etc… Then at the very end I have to submit a 200 word essay or vlog on how the challenge has affected my life.

I jumped at the opportunity to register when I got the invitation. However, as Day 1 got closer and closer  panic was setting in. Friday, I had my regular session with Emilia and we were doing photos and measurements for the challenge and I had to wear a tight fitting top. My normal attire for the gym is a baggy t-shirt, but I didn’t have that option this time. I was super uncomfortable in the studio with all the other trainers and people working out around me. I refused to do an exercise facing the mirror, but Emilia wasn’t allowing that to continue, so I faced the mirror and had to look at myself. Looking in the mirror for me, is like staring down the barrel of a loaded gun; scary and something I never wanted to face.

Day 3, Sunday, was my first bootcamp class. It has been some time since I have participated in any form of group exercise.  In fact, I tend to avoid it at all costs because it reminds me of high school and PE Class and the discomfort I would feel on a weekly basis. The snickers and looks from other kids, never being as good as everyone else in the class, being the last chosen for teams, not being able to keep up. On top of all of this, there was the self-talk going on in my head. I walked into the studio this morning and I was faced with 16 other women and 1 man all participating in the challenge. All those thoughts, fears and feelings from PE class came rushing back with force.

3 days into a 30 day fitness challenge and I have had to face two big fears square in the face. I had the thought today that I don’t know if I can take 27 more days of this! What I am getting is that going back is no longer an option. I am closing the back door and sealing all escape routes, so that the only option I have left is to go forward, move forward, to keep pushing through the fear, through the garbage to see what’s on the other side.

So if my only option is going forward then let’s go because this isn’t about the next 27 days, this is about living the width of my life, not the length of my life. I want to live this life with everything I got for however long I got. Having the ability to look any fear in the face and tell it to F off is really the best superpower anyone can ask for.

Let’s get er’ done! 

Fat B*tch’s Apology to Skinny Cheerleader…

Thank you Google Images for the photo

As I have shared previously I am making my way through a very confronting book, A Course In Weight Loss by Marianne Williamson. It’s never a mistake that an hour after posting on my blog about Forgiveness I pick up this book to continue reading and this chapter is too about forgiveness.

This chapter talks about our deepest fear is one of being acknowledged as beautiful, that the idea of being healthy and skinny frightens me. For the first time in a long time this is one fear I won’t deny. I think about being healthy and having this body I have seen in my mind’s eye before but truth of the matter is, I don’t know how to navigate the world being that. I know how to navigate the world being a plus size girl. I know how to navigate comments, doorways, airplane seats, etc. I don’t know how to handle or what the world would be like as a skinnier version of me. The chapter continues to talk about trusting that you are strong enough to handle being beautiful and trusting that the world is not a dangerous place.

This chapter took a little digesting and as a result the exercise in the chapter is to write an apology letter, so once again what better place to share this than here…

Fat B*tch Apologizes…

Dear Skinny Cheerleader,

                I know that I haven’t been the nicest person to you. Stuffing you away with all the food and trying to ignore the fact that you exist. I’ve never actually seen you because I started to get heavy at such an early age so it’s hard to believe you really exist. Although, I’m certain I’ve seen glimpses of you in the mirror and it did make me smile. I want to love you, but the consumption of fear at time is overwhelming and the eating of food so easy. I’m hoping, praying and trying to trust that if I stay the course I’m on, you’ll be revealed. With the help of my trainers, my friends and some Divine guidance I will embrace all the love that you are. I’m sorry.

                                                                                                Bare With Me,

                                                                                                                Fat B*tch

Skinny Cheerleader Responds…

Dear Fat B*tch,

                I’m right here, pom pom’s in hand. Ready when you are.

                                                                                Ready to be Exposed,

                                                                                                Skinny Cheerleader

                P.S – Yes that was me you saw in the mirror. 

Forgiveness...

Being home in Vernon always proves to be an interesting experience for me. It’s kind of like returning to the scene of the crime. Vernon is the city I grew up in, the city that I gained a majority of my weight in. The city where I formed many opinions and judgements about myself based on what others said and did. I have been here for a few days and the word that keeps popping into my mind is forgiveness. Forgive those whose words I allowed to torment me and forgive myself for choosing food as my coping strategy.

Forgiving myself would then mean accepting myself as perfect, exactly the way I am. I think that is one of the hardest lessons of all too truly learn and breathe into your core. I am whole exactly the way I am. I am beautiful exactly the way I am and I am perfect exactly the way I am. We spend mountains of time telling ourselves all the things we do wrong, all the things we need to change, fix and make better and we forget to appreciate exactly where we are.

I know as humans we like to make forgiving someone one of the hardest tasks possible. It feels like if I forgive the kids in high school for their torment and comments I am somehow excusing their behavior  but I know this isn’t true. When I really look at this, it is myself that I really need to forgive. I chose eating food as a way of dealing with the emotions I felt around their words and actions. If I forgive them I have to forgive myself. By doing this I continue to repair the unhealthy relationship I have with food.

Making mistakes and choices that don’t turn out like we thought is hard to accept, but making them is part of being human. So if I know that no matter what I am going to keep making them, why not learn from them move on because making the same mistake over and over again…no longer an option. 

This video seems to perfectly describe my journey, so I thought "Of course I am going to share it with you guys!" Amazing voice, amazing lady! 

 

Skinny Cheerleader's Posse...

So the response I have gotten from my last post has been slightly overwhelming and I have wanted, a few times, to delete it from the website. Revealing and sharing those letters was a “putting my heart on display for all to see” experience. Mostly, what I’ve discovered….Skinny Cheerleader has partners! Not only partners, she has a posse of people on her side. I have come to call them Posse O’ B*tches (P O’B’s). Can you tell I am welcoming them with open arms? LOL.

For the last few weeks it has been a S.T.R.U.G.G.L.E for me to stay on the eating healthy path and doing my own workouts over and above my workouts with Emilia or Taren. There were days where I was fine and days where I was so far off the path that I didn’t know which end of the spoon was up in the ice cream. Now, my normal response to this is to beat myself up with a sledgehammer and although I did spend a little bit of time doing this, I wasn’t allowed to do it to long because someone for the P O’B’s was always right there to remind me. This week it was Emilia.

It was weigh in and measurements week. I didn’t do so well in the weigh in portion, but I still lost inches. How this works is beyond me, but I trust the measuring tape, still hate the scale though. Emilia reminded me that set backs are not ways to take yourself out, they should serve as reminders to focus on your goal and to not get too cocky or confident with your habits.

Although I may not be welcoming the P O’B’s with open arms I am glad they are around because the help keep me focused. Remind me of my ultimate end goal and support me along the way. I am not going to do this journey perfectly and I am beginning to accept that, but it's still my journey. 

Fat B*tch Vs. Skinny Cheerleader

** Fair warning that this is a longish post**

Well my weight loss journey has hit a new bump in the road in the form of a book called A Course In Weight Loss by Marianne Williamson. I have had this book in my arsenal of books to read because I had the pleasure of meeting and hearing Marianne speak a year and a bit ago and it really struck a cord with me. It has been one of the books that I pick up, read the first page, look at the first exercise and that little annoying voice inside my head goes “Nope! No way, Retreat! Retreat!” So the book quickly goes back on the shelf. I have brought it with me on vacation several times and still the same response.

A few weeks back I picked it up and told myself that no matter what I am going to begin this book. I am on Chapter 4, but last week, in Chapter 2, I had to write two letters that were probably the hardest two letters I have ever had to write. The lesson in Chapter 2 “…involves you getting to know, and to love, the part of you that overeats…” and healing the relationship between the part of you that eats wisely and the part that does not. So I wrote my two letters to “Not-Thin Me and Thin Me”, or as I came to call them Fat B*tch and Skinny Cheerleader.  As previously stated the point of the exercise is to heal the relationship between these two parts of your psyche. As soon as I finished I felt exposed and vulnerable so what better place to share those letters than here. 

Skinny Cheerleader writes to Fat B*tch…

Dear Fat B*tch,

I’ve spent a lot of time and energy into building you, adding layer upon layer of fat and protection. My intent was to protect you from the mean people, places and things in this world and to keep you isolated and alone, so that you never have to experience the ridicule and hurt again. I’ve used you as my out for not acknowledging my greatness. I blame you for my unhappiness and misery. I know you were created out of fear; 1 pizza at a time, 1 pint of ice cream and 1 burger at a time. I’m sorry to say your fat b*tchy ass is being kicked to the curb honey.

The ice cream, treats, sweets and food that you eat in secret won’t win anymore. It’s time to shine some light and love on the darkness from which I shoved you into and you were created. Those kids from elementary and high school don’t deserve your power anymore. You don’t need the protection anymore. It’s time to put down the reason and excuses. It’s time to shine and let love in. It’s time to make those dreams of wearing a bikini a reality. It’s time to let your greatness shine and love spread.

I know at times I’ve done and said some very nasty things about you and I’m sorry. Let’s forgive and love. The fat, sarcasm and disconnect between our mind and heart is time to heal. It’s time to climb more mountains! How about The Chief? Let’s go explore the world wearing smaller clothes. It’s time to wear those cute little dresses and high heels and live the life worthy of us. I’ve given you a lot of power for a lot of years, but no more sister! So let’s work together and make sh*t happen! .

                                                                                      Yours in Love & Light: Skinny Cheerleader

P.S – Skinny taste better than fat, Bob Harper says so! 

Fat B*tch responds to Skinny Cheerleader…

Listen hear Skinny Cheerleader,

Take your superhero pom pom’s and shove it! We’ve been here before. You give me some grand speech about letting the greatness shine, but then you disappear, so you’ll excuse me if I don’t jump on this bandwagon at warp speed with you again.

I don’t deny that I’m getting tired of lugging around this extra weight. Trust me pouring it into a pair of jeans isn’t easy. It would be awesome to slip into that cute little dress and heels to go dance the night away. I agree with you, but how can I trust you won’t bail again?

I’ve spent a lot of time curled up on the couch secretly eating because it’s safer here. It’s less scary. I’m having a hard time letting go. Letting go of the belief that life doesn’t have to be hard; that it’s ok to let love in doesn’t happen overnight. I’m having a hard time trusting you, trusting us, trusting that we can do it. I’m getting there, it’s just hard to hang out on a cliff or ledge not knowing how it’s gonna turn out.

You’ve been a pain in my gigantic ass most of this year and I’m glad you’ve stuck around longer than normal and I’m sorry for recently trying to stuff you away with ice cream and pizza. I’m getting there, but working “together” is hard for someone that likes to do everything alone. So seriously, put down the pom pom’s I’ve got some vegetables and fruit in the fridge and I’m trying to meet you halfway.

                                                                                                   Coming towards the light: Fat B*tch

P.S - Everyone knows Jillian Michaels is the sh*t!

Girlfriends...

 If there is one thing that I have come to appreciate and love more than ever it’s my girlfriends. Surviving female friendships can be hard. I truly believe that saying “people come into your life for a reason, season or a lifetime.” (click here to read). It is up to us to figure out which they are.

For the sake of this post, I’m talking about those girlfriends that are here for a lifetime. They are the ones that are there for the good, the bad, and the times you can’t even get out of bed. The ones that can see the massive mistake you are about to make and despite their best efforts to warn you, you make it anyway. It is because of these girlfriends that you can stumble through life so fearlessly, knowing that, no matter what; they will be there to catch you. They are also that one’s whose love and support can come in the form of a 2X4 to the head. They give tough love when it’s need and have this uncanny ability to talk you out of a funk or off a ledge. They say the things you don’t want to hear, but give you the encouragement to succeed. In return, you do the exact same for them, no questions, no conditions.

It can be hard to find girlfriends like this.

I have been blessed to have some of these kinds of girlfriends in my life. This year has been full of ups and downs, twists and turns, and I don’t know where I’d be without them, so to them, I say thank you. Thank you for being you. Thank you for pushing, pulling and peeling me off the floor, even when I felt like there was nothing left. Thank you for joining in the celebrations and love with a 2X4, because Lord knows, stubborn is my middle name at times. I love and appreciate each of you. I’m thankful every morning that we are in each other’s lives and look forward to the many years ahead, despite distance, space and time. I am the woman I am because of you.