This is your brain on gardening

this is me. it is 12:00pm and i have been gardening for about an hour and a half. and by gardening, I mean trying to fix the rear path outside our back door which took out a two year old last night. (and by took out, I mean she fell down and her hand hurt a little bit after).

There were a lot of bugs. It turns out that our step out of the sunroom is wobbly because it was built on top of a weird frame of bricks and was mortared on, but all the mortar dried up and isn't holding it together anymore. I saw a spider carrying an egg sac and a spider with a really bunchy looking belly. For some reason when I have gloves on, I'm not really bothered by bugs at all. I still don't want to touch them, but I don't feel terrified. Anyway, I picked up big blocks and put them down and dug holes for new blocks and buried them in. There is still a ways to go before the back walk is how I want it to be--ideally, we would pave it with red bricks placed closely together like the roads in little italy.
It's wicked good exercise, but I was sweating like a piggy pig. As I dug, the shovel would get covered in big sweat rain-drops from my forehead. Now I'm back inside recovering and wallowing happily in my air conditioning.
Anyway, I planted a lavender plant and a foxglove, the former in the back and the latter in the front. I'm hoping the horrid ground squirrels that delight in digging up my lovingly cared-for herbs and not eating them, but just leaving them there to die will be quick to partake of my foxglove and earn their eternal reward.

Babies

This new ward is babies, babies babies! I went to a new member RS meeting tonight and I was the only person there who hadn't had a baby. It seems like all the time I'm in conversations where we say how peer pressure isn't really an issue anymore, but if anything, it seems much stronger.
I'm in a ward with tiny skinny women who have babies and bounce back into their skinny mini shapes instantly and who eat whatever they want and seem to do just fine. Over and over we hear that this is the most noble of lifestyles. We talked in church today about how everywhere motherhood is being attacked, devalued, debased, but it goes the other way, too. As a woman in the church pursuing higher education, there are many times where I feel like what I'm doing is wrong--or is at least perceived as wrong. I am selfishly putting off having children, my duty, in order to pursue a lucrative career for my own fulfillment. All the male lds married students in law school have kids already or on the way. The women lds law students are mostly unmarried. I feel like I don't fit and it goes in with my being overweight. I weigh more than most of the pregnant ladies in our ward, for crying out loud!

I like to hang out with the ladies, but after a night like this, where everybody's talking about kids and pregnancy and babies, I come home filled with self-doubt and questions. Where does a career fit into motherhood? Is it selfish to want both? If I have a child now, would it just be to fit in or because I'm truly ready? Is there even such a thing as truly ready? Should I lose all the weight I want to lose before getting pregnant? Won't that just put me on the fat-track again? I feel like I'm being forced to choose between two parts of me that both need to be fulfilled: my desire to be nurturing and to have children of my own is compromised by law school, but my desire to have feel fulfillment through a successful career seems as though it could be derailed by having kids.

In my mind I feel it's possible to have both--I probably wouldn't work full-time, but I would be working and I could also be there for my children. But sometimes I feel like motherhood is an all-or-nothing commitment. If you are going to be a mother you MUST be home at all times. I feel like there's something wrong with me for wanting both. I feel like there's something wrong with me for being concerned about maintaining my weight loss and having kids. Despite a decrease in weight this week, I just feel uncomfortable in my own skin this week. I'll try to get over it...

First Public Solo Physical Demonstration

I am super proud of myself. Today was the Nintendo Wii Summer Games at the mall. My husband and I, team Greta Force (after our dog), took third place out of all the adults today. If by some miracle that stays the same through tomorrow and Sunday, we'll be headed to compete in California.
Anyway, part of the competition was Wii Fit Hula Hoop, at which I'm something of a savant. I was really nervous all day because I had to basically demonstrate physical prowess in front of a bunch of strangers. I didn't want to choke. I didn't want people to think I was ridiculous for being overweight and trying to compete at a physical task.

Anyway, things were awesome. People were watching me--I swear I saw someone take a picture--but it didn't matter because I knew I could do it and so I did! In fact, I got the high score on the machine for the day.
It's little victories like this that keep me going. And I hope I'm going well. I have exercised a lot (some of it official, a lot of it just lots and lots of housework) but it's made me hungry and so though I've exercised more than I've eaten, I still feel a little bit nervous about what the weigh in is going to bring. I am always afraid that I'm lying to myself, too--like underestimating how much I really ate. I try not to--but there have been times where I've forgotten a snack I had here, or a goodie there. I guess I can only try my best and keep going and going and going.

Bad Pie and Dirty Fun

Part of losing weight is learning to plan ahead for meals. Frankly, it's a must-have tool for anybody who doesn't like to spend 40 hours a week at the store or eat out every night. It's something that I am not very good at. So I'm starting small. I want to prepare to have fresh fruits and vegetables to eat whenever I am hungry. So, at the store, I buy a bunch of peaches, bananas, grapes, carrots, tomatoes, etc. The other trick is to actually eat the things you buy. We had to go on a break from bananas because they go bad so quickly here--but we're back on and on our third batch of eating them while they're still fresh. For the first time last week, we ate a bunch of grapes before they went bad--and a whole tomato. Apples and peaches are tough--not when they're good, but when they're icky, it taints the experience for a while, and the rest start to get icky while you're trying to get over your first bad experience.
Anyway, yesterday was the day we restocked on our plant matter. We were also invited to dinner the next day and had volunteered to take dessert. I have rediscovered a love for Marie Calendar's razzleberry pies---we could never take on a whole pie by ourselves (frankly, I think I could, but the lower-calorie lifestyle won't support it)--and so this way we can foist most of it on other people and still get our jollies without busting our bellies. We got the pie and drove home. It's in the frozen section and has to be frozen basically right up until you cook it. But apparently, at our grocery store, just because a pie is in the frozen section does not mean that it is frozen. When I took the pie out of the bag, all of the juice (the pie weighs 2lbs 8oz and I think the juice comprises about 2lbs of that) gushed out all over the fridge, the floor, and the dog. The dog didn't mind--she even helped us clean it up off the floor (we used napkins--she used her tongue). We took the pie back to the store and demanded a refund. They refused, and so we left, but not before smearing the big glass automatic front doors with what was left of the pie. It looked like someone had been squashed when the doors closed on them. To add to the effect, I used my finger to scrawl in the mess, "[store name] kills!!" Then we ran away.

That last part *might* be a fib. We actually got a refund without any trouble and they ran back to see if the rest of their frozen goods were kaput.

So I was feeling bummed about pie. Until 10:00pm when it was time for the "World's Largest Local Pie Fight" in Coventry, a small sort of commercially-bohemian neighborhood about 5 miles from our house. Every Thursday night they have themed music and a movie--except for yesterday, when they had cartoons and a pie fight. They provided the pie crusts, and we provided the whipped cream (for future reference, if you're making pies JUST out of whipped cream, 1 can of the stuff is only good for about 1 and 1/3 pies. If you skimp you can make two "okay" pies--but that will totally exhaust your supply. Next time we will bring more than 2 cans. Anyway, there were all sorts of people there--a lot of tweens and teenagers in big groups, but also some kids our age, and even middle-aged people with their kids. When they started the fight, my husband and I immediately turned on each other. [as a sidebar, I think that we have a great marriage--but it still felt so good to throw a pie in his face--it was really primal therapy for the frustrations that can arise when you live together full-time] Most of the groups did the same--but as soon as everybody in your group had some pie on them, you just went for broke, hurling pies and cream and crust at anybody in your sight line. There was lots of whipped cream on the ground from the initial onslaught, and it was easy to just scoop some up and toss it (though I did hear a guy say to his girlfriend, "I thought this was whipped cream, but I think it's just dog poop!" before he smeared what he was holding onto her shirt. [he was kidding--i hope and pray]. It was so much fun, but as quickly as it started, it began to slow down. Everybody was coated. I had gotten off fairly easily, or so I thought, as I went to search for my husband. Then someone I passed on my quest randomly shoved a pie right in my face. It covered my eye (I had on glasses) and went in my ear. I was laughing so hard. I finally spotted my husband, but on the way I picked up a pristine pie crust. When he laughed at my misfortune, I smashed the pie crust into his hair (that sounds like it would hurt his head but his hair is pretty long and really thick so it just got inundated with crumbs rather his skull getting bruised and broken.) My husband doesn't like messes, or to be sticky, or to have crumbs on him, and so I felt like this pie fight was an amazing step for him. It was the first time he's purposely chosen to get all gross, and I wanted to make the most of it.
When it was all over, we limped up the hill, with a haze of whipped cream blurring our vision and gobs of pie crust stuck in our ears. My husband looked like he had a gross skin growth on his neck from all the pie crust. We came home and showered intensively. It turns out that cream makes your skin and hair really soft and smooth (and graham cracker crust exfoliates!!) I will definitely be going back again next year. The best part is that it was a physically active way to be involved with food, and it was so exciting that I didn't even want dessert when we got home!

Pictureless

Still working on my technical difficulties and so once again, I am without pictures.
I will, however, provide links today.

I was thinking about the things we do to our bodies for fashion. In fact, one of my prizes is getting Crest Whitestrips or something like that to whiten my teeth. My teeth are not green, or yellow or brown--they are basically white already. But I feel like I want more. In fact, I have little calcifications on the surface of my teeth that make them look a little like the albino version of camoflaged, and a while back I talked to my dentist about having those scrapped off and then filled in with regular-colored tooth compound that will respond to whitening the same way the rest of my teeth will. Last night, when I couldn't sleep, I was thinking about my plans for whitening my teeth and this image popped into my mind.

Sure, it looks kind of cool, if you can stomach the risks and have faith that people will be able to ever look you in the face without cringing. I don't mind the sight of blood but the thought of implanting something in my eye definitely makes me queasy.

The point is, that whitening my teeth can be seen as essentially the same thing. Improving on nature, not for health reasons, but merely for my own vanity. And once you're willing to do something so drastic as invade your own eye with a foreign object for "glamour" or grind down your real, perfectly functional teeth to have some fake shelack pumped in there--and who knows if it won't look just as fake--where do you draw the line?

Teeth whitening hurts. A lot. My teeth get super-sensitive, and I've never been able to stick with it to really see any difference. I'm all for better living through chemistry, but does one "improvement" simply lead to others? If my goal is to be happy the way I am, am I undermining that happiness by opening this door?

Anyway, there's still a long way to go before I reach that bridge. I should focus on the changes I need to make now, naturally, for the purpose of becoming healthier and happier.

The 3.9lb Elephant in the Room

My last weigh-in was not a success. :( It was the opposite of successful with a substantial gain: 3.9lbs. I think some of this is due to bloating, some of it is due to the fact that while the parents were here, I was a) distracted from eating a lot and b) sick a lot, so I ended up taking in a lot fewer points than normal--and I compensated for my starvation last week. Now, I'm hopefully back on track.
We had an amazing thunderstorm last night. Lots of thunder, lightening, and lots of rain. I really appreciate rain now that we have a lawn that is solely our responsibility and that we can't seem to keep moisturized with our sprinkler. The downside to the rain is that the permanent awning for the bay window in our house is leaking. I was freaking out last night so I slept on the couch, and was able to experience every drop as it worked its way down through the ceiling and out onto the floor (then the trash can that I put there, then the fleece blanket that I put over the trash can to muffle the sound).
Aside from the leak, we have two other big problems that I'm not sure how to handle: the power to the garage is totally gone. Though annoying, this is less of a problem than the sediment that comes out of our kitchen sink along with the water. I have NO idea what to do about that.
Greta's having a fun time today. Every time she hears anything outside she freaks out and yells at them. She needs a little (by which I mean a TON) of attention today.
With school getting ready to start on top of trying to finish my job which is both huge and boring on top of these house problems on top of handling my leadership positions this year on top of having to give a talk in church last Sunday (okay, so I'm over that part now), I feel super stressed. I'm at home all day working and so the old standby seems pretty attractive (I mean eating to relieve stress). The setbacks suck in this context. I need to get a to-do list. It's amazing how much better I feel when I have a clear outline of things to do.

I apologize if this post has been a bit of a downer. On the positive side, I found out that our library is awesome, has a ton of the books I like (fluffy mysteries) and has an awesome adult summer reading program which gets you actual, literal prizes each week rather than a stupid entry into a stupid contest with stupid prizes that you will never win. It hurts to pay those taxes, but it sure feels good to pretend like you're getting free stuff with the proceeds.

OVERWEIGHT!

Today is a big milestone for me. I've lost 23.9lbs and am officially "overweight" BMI-wise, rather than the horrible and depressing "obese." Now it's just "there's a little more of you to love" rather than, "aaaah!! Jabba the Hutt!!" It's amazing the difference that wording makes. As a law student, you learn to use words artfully--your goal is precision but also implication. Thus, when we complained about being fined for not picking up after our dog at our old apartment (even though we always DID pick up after our dog), rather than saying that we disputed the claims we said that our apartment was making "unjustified accusations," making them sound like crazy psychos. When their attorney responded that they were justified in making these charges, he did not claim that they had "justified accusations" but rather that we as tenants had an "inability to pick up after our dog." Not only were we unwilling to pick up after our dog, he implied, we were also so subnormal as to be incapable of taking responsibility for our pet, so the apartment complex had to and they were totally justified in charging us for that unsavory task. (even though the maintenance people at the apartment never did pick up the pet waste that others had left out).
To me, overweight implies jolly indulgences--you're pretty close to where you should be--you just need to keep an eye on things. Obese, on the other hand, implies that you are gross. You lack the self-control to keep your indulgences in check and you are waddling ever nearer to the grave in your depravity.
I don't say these things to offend people who are still in the "obese" category--or even because I think that BMI is a really accurate indicator of a person's health--I say it because as I've noticed as I've lost weight that there is such a moral component in our conception of weight loss. Fat people must be lazy--they don't take care of themselves--they don't have self-control. Skinny people, whatever else they may be, are pleasant to look at, they're in control, they're "better." We only have to look at Hollywood to see that skinniness has very little to do with the inner goodness or badness of a person--and also very little to do with how well they've got their act together. It upsets me when people congratulate others on their unhealthy weight loss. Not all weight loss is good. I was reading a blog a couple days ago, where a woman posted that she had lost 30lbs in the past 30days. Unless you're starting weight is super-super high--that's just not normal. She weighed about 30lbs more than my starting weight and she lost 30lbs in her first month as compared to my 8lbs. And yet people were congratulating her. It made me wonder if people would just mindlessly congratulate someone on weight loss if they lost 25lbs because their arm got eaten off by a shark. It also reminded me of my aunt Amy, who died several years ago of a terrible cancer. She had been quite overweight at times in her life, but toward the end of her life, she shrank down to around 80lbs. I remember the last time I talked with her, she said how girls would come up to her and say, "Lucky! I wish I could be that skinny!" She would tell them, right to their faces, that they were stupid. As a society, we seem to sometimes see weightloss as a positive, no matter what the circumstances. When people get too skinny, we worry that they have a disease--anorexia or bulimia or something. When people get too fat, we think they are lazy, gross and lack self-control. This puts enormous pressure on people who are overweight. Not only are they not in peak health, they also feel socially undesirable. It's hard to lose weight when the friend that will never abandon you--food, is also the thing that is causing you to feel unwanted in the first place.

My mother-in-law is visiting and asked me the other day why I decided to really pursue weight loss NOW, at this point in my life. My answer was probably a little convoluted. On the one hand, I don't feel like now is any different than any other time in my life. There's a lot of stress, temptation, depression, fatigue, and work to be done. On the other hand, my whole perspective has changed. I'm not losing weight because I need to redeem myself as a person. I don't feel bad about being and having been overweight anymore. I think that weight loss is finally working for me because I've taken the shame out of it. I'm willing to talk about how much I weighed at the beginning: 210lbs, and how much I weigh now: 186.1lbs. I'm not going to beat myself up when I eat a piece of cake--I'm just going to monitor what I take in more carefully. When weight loss stops being about going from bad, lazy person to good, well-balanced person and starts being about feeling good and celebrating small success, that's when weight loss will be successful. You can't lose weight when small setbacks send you right into a binge again.

I'll be honest. I get depressed when I catch a glimpse of myself in the mirror before I get into the shower, and I still have cellulite in abundance and a pounchy (I don't know if that's a word, but it seems to describe it well) tummy. But I'm starting to see changes in my body, too--positive changes. I feel better and more capable of things than I ever have. I feel like I control food rather than food controlling me. I am proud of myself and I'm learning to not fear failure--because I only have to deal with one day at a time, and if I can do it today, I can do it tomorrow.