Good With Cheese

What’s been missing these last few weeks (months?) from my body-acceptance journey is my righteous anger.

Initially in my post-diet fervor, as more and more information about the failure rates of diets and the oppression of self-hatred and the, well, bullshit of The Obesity Crisis! washed over me like waves from the Sea of Sanity, I got really, really mad.

Really, really mad that I’d bought into the idea that my healthy, functioning body was failing when it resisted my efforts to starve it.  Really, really mad that I’d been led to believe that a size 12 was somehow not as good as a size 4.  Really, really mad that I was expected to live a life defined by persistent hunger and joint-crushing hours of exercise because that was the only way I could achieve a socially-acceptable body.  Really, really made that anyone anywhere believed they could dictate my worth by my weight.

That anger was powerful stuff.  It carried me over the fear of eating and not exercising hours a day, carried me through the shock of gaining weight as I got healthier.  Most importantly, it shifted the blame away from me.  It turns out I wasn’t unhappy because I was fat or fat-inclined; I was unhappy because I was failing to reach expectations that were expressly designed to be unreachable.

That anger gave me permission to take my ball and go home; I just didn’t have to play a game with cheater rules that I had no chance of winning;  the only way I win is by not playing, right?

Getting to stop playing made me feel better.  Feeling better made me less mad.  But after the anger went away, well…I lost my gatekeeper.  I lost my absolute certainty that I’d been lied to about my value as a woman being determined by my body.  And then I started to let the lies back in.

Little Dog, the keeper of my heart, the joy of my days, is a miniature dachshund.  He is imperious and independent and Knows His Own Mind; you will never convince Little Dog he is anything less than 18 kinds of awesome.  Question that awesomeness and he’ll unleash what we call Tiny Teckel* Rage.  It’s not violent, it’s not aggressive, but it’s entirely self-protecting; Little Dog knows he must always look out for Nr. Eine.

I want my Tiny Teckel Rage back.  I know what I’m worth; I don’t want to keep believing I have to doubt it. 

*It’s a dachshund thing.  We dig the word, but it’s completely inaccurate in terms of Little Dog.  Don’t tell him that, though; he will cut you.

So, I’m back from dinner with my mom and sister, and nary a Weight Watcher word was uttered.  We all even shared dessert.  My sister, she’s good people.  She knows diet-talk is hard for me to hear, and I think she’s making a concerted effort not to trigger The Crazy. 

You know, any time I go out to eat, order what I want, eat it, then come home and don’t eat the contents of the kitchen?  Still feels like a victory.  During the dieting days, eating a meal that wasn’t planned or calorie-counted kicked off that blown-diet mentality.  I’d feel like that particular day was shot, so it didn’t matter anymore, and I should eat while the eatin’s good.  I’d graze through the cabinets, the pantry, the freezer.  Even if I was so full it hurt, I’d keep forking food in because I knew that the soon enough, I’d have to live with feeling hungry all the time again.

This evening, I came home full of a really awesome chicken salad and 1/3 of a brownie fudge sundae, and I just felt…full. Not like I’ve failed.  Not guilty or regretful.  My stomach is full and that feels comfortable and cozy, but more importantly, it doesn’t make me feel anxious or scared that this is the last time I’ll be full for a good long while. 

I’m not even heading straight to the treadmill to put in a hour or two of running.  I’m going to park my full, contented self on the bed with Little Dog, watch TV, practice folding origami cranes, and work on my list of three things to do this weekend that aren’t about my body.

Oh, and this is the third day in a row of general awesomeness — consider the streak started!

Today I woke up happier in my body.  I still feel a little wonky from the weekend, but I’m almost back to normal.  I caught sight of myself in the mirror this morning and was able to see cuteness instead of bulging rippliness and that’s a victory.*

Still, I spent most of my lunch hour today flipping through my beloved book about demand feeding because I’m getting weird about food again. It’s strange to me, because I really feel like I’ve got the obsessive exercise well in hand, but the calorie-counting is so hard to shake. Most days, even on days I feel like I’m really “doing good,” I still catch myself thinking of food in terms of shoulds and shouldn’ts. That’s crazy-making, and until I can just treat food like food, I’m going to feel controlled by it.

What’s the answer, though?  I know calorie counts .  I know what’s “good” for me and why it’s good for me and what’s “bad” and why it’s bad and food becomes a complicated morality play and sometimes I just want to eat a damned meal without worrying about balance and ratios and how to stave off hunger for hours through the magic of complex carbs.

I still feel like there’s a way to use that knowledge in a way that nurtures me and supports good health, but it requires a lot of vigilance not to let it be about my booty instead of my body.

But, hey, constant vigilance in trying to take care of your(whole) self?  Maybe that’s not a bad thing.

*What’s not a victory is the wicked case of poison ivy I’m sporting.  You know what interferes with Smoking Hotness? A rash.  Or, actually, several rashes that are charmingly placed all across my body.  What was I doing that I got poison ivy on both my left shoulder and my right outer thigh?  I haven’t been rolling naked on the lawn and I’m not so limber that those two body parts could ever come in contact with one another, so what exactly happened?  I don’t know, but I’m going to blame the dogs.

It’s been a stressful week.

My car needs to get into the shop before the brakes fall off and Big Dog is trying to lick a hole in his paw.  I can usually only deal with one Impending Crisis! at a time, and so having two in one week can throw me into a tailspin.

When the anxiety comes, it comes hard and it comes fast.  One minute I’m swimming along, mostly okay, and the next, I’m sinking, a stone.

Today I sank. 

There was some freaking out and, while at work where I can’t cry with the wild abandon I do here at home, I went for other ways of self-comforting.  Say it with me: Food.

But even in the midst of my panic, I found myself thinking, “Hey, chickie.  It’s okay.  Right now you’re upset and having this bag full of frosted mini-wheats makes you feel better and that’s okay.  But remember, food can’t fix feelings and you’ll need to take care of those when you feel up to it.”

And the bag of mini-wheats went back into my desk because acknowledging the panic and how it was causing me to connect with food?  Completely defused the moment.  I still felt panicked, but I didn’t feel like I needed to eat to calm myself. 

So, instead of crying and eating and eating and crying,  I left work a little early, took Big Dog to the vet to get his paw checked out, and made a phone call in regards to getting my car into the shop. 

My disordered eating and compulsive exercise weren’t just about my body; they were also my way of avoiding the emotional minefield of every day life.  When you obsess about your body, it pushes out all the other very real issues that are coming towards you.  It becomes a substitute for coping.

And now that I don’t let myself use that substitute?  Well, I’m finding out I’m actually pretty okay at dealing with whatever happens.

And, as long as nothing happens to Little Dog,  now I may just make it to the weekend.