First foods

Between my own struggles with excess bodyfat and all the wee ones in my life, this article caught my attention.

Based on this, our food preferences are set by age two - and your finicky toddler will never starve, so don't chase 'em with the spoon.

Rethinking First Foods

It's not a diet it's a lifestyle...

One of the reasons I began this blog was to chronicle my journey to a healthier incarnation of myself. Done a damn good job avoiding those types of posts, dontcha think? Why, you ask?

Well, because it's not a diet. It's my life, now and forever.

Why, you ask?

Because I know diets too well. I'm good at diets by the way - restrict calories for a predicted amount of time, scale number goes down, get compliments, buy new clothes, stop diet, gain weight back. Lather. Rinse. Repeat. I ROCK that formula. And, it's all good, till we hit the weight gain portion of the festivities. Even though I ROCK that part of the formula too, it S-U-C-K-S.

It's very boring life really. Very tiring, to be on this treadmill (no pun intended) and every time you start the cycle, well the comments suck; they sting. But, you know what stings even more... the comments that roll in when you start to succeed on this new diet, er, lifestyle.

I started working with a trainer at my gym in November 2005, but had to take a four month break for medical reasons from December '05 to March '06. The start back was slow going and I didn't say a word about being on a diet. I just dedicated myself to eating well, consistent gym time and learning - - frustrating this new lifestyle is, because well, the scale stays put most of the time. Improvements were made and commented on - and like most fat (formerly fat, once again fat, perma fat, and reformed fat) girls - I was too hurt and bedraggled to comment on the comments one way or another.

This past July, irony of ironies just before my wedding, I made the move to an online trainer, who does diet and training. The guy knows his stuff cold and vast improvements have been made, culminating in my brother telling me I looked like a hobo and asking if he should call my husband and get me some money to buy new clothes?

This was actually a rare 'good' comment. My brother is so lean you can bounce loose change off various parts of his body 365 days a year; and he's my brother so you know he's a wise ass. "Oh Sister, you've lost body fat and your pants are positively falling off your svelte new frame" will never pass his lips. Plus, the truth is, I had been feeling silly about my shaggy new look.

Today's shopping trip saw me leaving the store with clothes in smaller sizes than have been in my closet for a long while. Now, I feel like I should be rejoicing but I am not able to, because the styles out today are pretty fitted and wearing fitted clothing freaks me out a bit. I bought some pretty ribbed, knit tops (size medium); ignoring the sales woman (ok, she was kind and helpful and pointed out some styles I wouldn't have tried, but looked pretty good on) and my husband who both felt the shirts fit better in size small. Why... well, I thought they might be a bit too fitted for work. My wardrobe has to pull double duty people.

Truthfully, I'm a pear shaped, so my torso shrunk first (so much even I can't deny this anymore) but I've still got plenty o'junk in my budunkadunk. I was in the outlet store of a designer who makes her name designing clothes for 'real women's bodies' meaning pants and skirts are cut for a woman who has hips and some junk in ye ole budunkadunk. Trust me, she is my new hero. And, the pants are in size that's new territory, too.

So, I didn't look like a hobo in the dressing room mirror, but I'm weary of wearing any of these new threads to work on Monday. Why?

It's those damn comments - and that cycle is as predictable as the diet cycle. I don't want to hear it. The comments are rude and they hurt and I'm not a wussy kind of girl, but that hurt is real. Very real.

The most cunning saboteurs are those who mean well, your friends who comment on how great you look and push you to cheat... "try a bite, you'll love it" they say, or the invites for lunch, dinner, drinks and the pissed off, snide comments when you decline. My favorite - heard many times, in many incarnations, from many, many people... "well, when will you be able to (enter category here) drink again, eat pizza again, shovel back a 4,000 calorie dinner again" that hurts because the implication is that we can't be friends if food/drinks aren't involved and the friendship is on hiatus until said time. Maybe the hiatus is permanent?

My favorite - though I've not gotten it yet this trip - is YOU'RE TOO SKINNY. OMG, have a sandwich, you're anorexic. Trust me, I will never be confused with Nicole Ritchie. E-V-E-R.

These comments hurt as much as when someone calls you fat, but our society condones them. In fact, I think they hurt more. These comments imply you were really really fat before but now you look really good, which means you looked like shit and no one told you 20 pounds ago.

They hurt because the people making them are the people you call friends and now you're unsure if you are still friends. You don't know if you belong with this crowd anymore. If this is where you belonged and you don't belong anymore, where do you belong? It's scary that a better, healthier you isn't embraced.

You don't mean to threaten anyone, but you do, and you know when people start asking for advice and whine about how they need to lose weight and they shouldn't be eating this or that but they eat it anyway (while you drool) and complain the whole time; that's when you know the friendship is on the wane. I'm not talking about a random comment, I'm talking about when every conversation centers on their need to lose weight for some event and they just don't shut up about it. The memories come back in a rush of pain and they still don't shut up, even as your eyes glaze over and you think, please, please, shut up. You have flashbacks of all your diet failures and they still whine endlessly. Why is this an issue, because this new lifestyle is about you, not them. Yet, you realize you're a threat, you're no longer on their side, on their team (in their minds) and well, you're fucked because you no longer belong and it's not safe anymore.

What should I do? What will I do? Don't know, really I don't. This time the course is uncharted because when you get to the rebound gain, you mend the broken friendships and start the cycle all over. This time I am not dieting so I hope there will be a new balance and a mending will occur, but it's not guaranteed.

Challah

Have you ever watched The Shawshank Redemption?

I love that movie. It's one of a half dozen films I watch over and over - if I am flipping channels and it's on, I'll sit and watch through to completion, no matter what else I was supposed to do.

For the last couple of weeks I've been taunted by a scene in the movie. Andy Dufrense has escaped Shawshank Prison and Red is pensive and distracted as the other inmates joke and recall Andy's antics. Red starts to ponder the brightness of some birds and how they shouldn't be caged.

The exact line Red narrates is: I have to remind myself that some birds aren't meant to be caged. Their feathers are just too bright. And when they fly away, the part of you that knows it was a sin to lock them up DOES rejoice. Still, the place you live in is that much more drab and empty that they're gone. I guess I just miss my friend.

It's that last line that's been getting to me lately, because, well, I just miss my friend.

In August she moved a couple of hours away. I wish that meant we were visiting, and chatting and emailing. I work six days a week, so a four hour round-trip drive gets relegated to Saturday; the day all my other chores, cooking shopping and todo's are relegated to. She needed to move and in the past month I've only been able to visit once. She still hasn't had her internet connection hooked up; she's finally straightened out her mail delivery. I sent her sugar-free peppermint candies this afternoon.

Tonight, I made challah for Rosh Hashanah. My husband is Jewish, and every year after the challah was made, I'd slip over to her house for warm bread and a cup of tea. I wish she was here. She is regaining her health and I'm happy and grateful for that, because as a friend she is stellar.

She is a genuine friend - has only rejoiced when fortune has smiled on me, she's never made snide remarks to deride my successes. Never pooh-pooh'd my affirmation that I still have weight to lose; and if I call and admit a binge or a missed workout, well, she knows when to ride my ass and when to listen. She doesn't sneak or fib, she's never put me down to feel better.

Lately, I've been running into some weirdness from other friends. Pushy comments about my diet - which I haven't shared the details with many about - but declining invitations for drinks, dinners and nights out have gotten snarky comments. It gets tiring and it makes me sad.

I know I'm not unique in this and I know some friends will fall by the wayside; especially as things progress. I just miss my friend. I miss talking through these strange things with her. I miss hearing her sassy mouth spout: Screw 'em, there really not friends if you bettering you is a problem.

I am delivering her challah on Saturday.

APPLES

Rites of Autumn

Alright, so it's not 'officially' Autumn yet, but today the Alpha Buck and I embarked on what I consider the most sacred rite of Autumn: Apple Picking!!!

The first time I went to pick apples, I was a wee pixie of 5 years - and it was a wonderful day with Mom and Dad (and no siblings - too young, left with Grandma) in the fresh air. We drove the 90+ minutes from our city home to the country and plucked ripe juicy apples off the trees. This family tradition kept going until I left for college nearly some twelve years later. I really loved this tradition, the same orchard year after year - noticing what was different, added or deleted. I loved this so much I went apple picking on my own every year after we stopped going as a family bringing various roommates, boyfriends, friends and even going it alone one year.

The second week in September is the earliest I've ever gone to pick - but - a postcard announcing THE APPLES ARE READY FOR PICKING came in the mail last week, and with a hectic schedule for us newlyweds it was this weekend - or not at all this season.

We hit the orchard shortly after opening and had a wonderfully serene walk through the fields. The trees were so laden with fruit, they were lush and fragrant; a sweet, slightly tangy smell, enhanced by the apples littering the thick grass, sampled by deer, raccoons and who-knows-what-else that roams the deserted fields at night. I don't remember ever being the only person in the orchard, but today that's just what happened - it was me, AB and a few of the farmers, each offering a friendly Hello as we happened to meet. One gent tipped his cap at me, another stopped and chatted with us - and pointed out apples he promised would make the best applesauce. He let me in on a few sauce making 'secrets' too.

There was something so idyllic in that early hour (ok, just to clarify, early for us, I suspect the folks working the farm were ready for lunch). The air was still cool - even though the sun was strong - and there was a calm, quiet over the landscape. No cries or whines or giggles from wee folks beginning family traditions; no young couple's smooching or old couple's bantering. Just some bees buzzing, hovering close to the layer of partially eaten fruit on the ground and us and the farmers.