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I blog. I also mother, wife, create, preserve, recycle, cook, act, quilt, exercise, laugh, write, lolligag, work, volunteer, sing, and sometimes sleep.

Friday, February 13, 2015

Announcing the Break Up

I've been watching my weight since I was 7.  Parent divorce, abusive stepmother, genetics, general trauma, food is tasty, exercise is hard, whatever. It happened. I've been on a diet since I was 8, been playing the old character parts since I was 10, went to fat camp at 12, developed an eating disorder and got skinny at 22, got better and happier but fatter at 24, got diabetes at 26, had 2 babies by 30, had cancer by 32...and now it's been another decade...luckily pretty uneventful, comparatively...but I'm still on a diet. And I'm still fat.

I have a great nutritional cleansing program that I love and when I use it, I feel great, I have awesome amounts of energy without coffee, I feel better in general...and I even lose weight.  I mean, some. Not enough where people notice, but some.

After seeing my success and how much I love doing it, my husband decided that for the first time in his life, he would try my "diet". He has never had any issues with eating, in fact he's never had to follow any kind of diet at all. A month later, and he's had great success following the plan, and loves it like I do, but came to a realization last week.  The scale sucks. All scales suck. He's lost weight...about 15 pounds in a month...but he had weeks where he got on the scale, felt it should have moved more than it did, and felt disappointed.  Feeling great, making a commitment to exercise more and eat more cleanly, getting more sleep, being successful with those goals, living a more balanced life in general, but disappointed.  What's the problem?

Well, turns out that the problem is that all of those things can be happening and then you get on the scale and it hasn't moved (enough) and all of a sudden you're sad...sometimes upset...sometimes annoyed..sometimes angry. And as it turns out, none of that helps. My brilliant husband once again came to a brilliant conclusion: we are measuring the wrong thing.

He came to me after a day that I was despondent about my self imposed daily weigh in.  He shared with me his conclusion about how we are measuring the wrong things. He pleaded with me to consider getting rid of the scale. He argued that we should be measuring life a different way. Not by weight, not by our measurements, not by our paychecks, not even by our ages or occupations or any of the things we usually use.  But that didn't mean we shouldn't be measuring at all.  We are human.  We like to count.  We like to measure. So he argued that I should stop using the scale and continue my commitment to being kind to myself, to eating well, to counting my steps, even counting my calories would be okay...but to please stop looking at the scale. And today, I pulled out my enemy, from where I hide it so that my children don't develop the same issues I have, and got on it.  Despite doing everything right this week, yesterday included...I was up a pound since yesterday. Now, the insulin I take makes losing weight a bear.  And I was up way too late having fun last night and didn't get enough sleep.  And I HAVE been exercising a ton, so one could argue that muscle weighs more than fat and maybe that's why. I certainly was feeling good in general this week, stronger, happy, proud of all I had accomplished...until I got on that scale.  And then, once again, for probably the 27,000th time in my life, I felt worthless.  And like I failed.

So, all day I considered the words that my brilliant husband has repeated a few times over the last few weeks, and I decided he was right.  Like he so often can be (don't tell him I said that)...so I'm tossing the scale. Well, not TOSSING. BUT I'm making him hide it. Weighing myself is an addiction, and it isn't good for me and I don't need it. I need to eat healthfully (and I do).  I need to make good choices.  I need to be kind to myself.  I need to keep exercising, pushing myself and making my fitness goals higher and higher.  I need to do the things that make me feel good and feel RIGHT about what I am doing, and I need to stop letting the numbers on the scale dictate my sense of accomplishment.

We're done, scale. I'm measuring new things now. I'm done with you.

4 comments:

Liza Cranis said...

Brilliant, inspiring and beautiful. Oh and what you wrote was good too! Spot on.

W Ellen said...

Go, you!
Good choice.
<3

Pam B said...

Totally agree! The scale is not our friend!

Stacy McKenna said...

Woot!