HM-OMG

Question: Why did Joseph and Mary have Jesus in a manger?

Answer: Because they had Kaiser.

I've been going through a series of health related crisiseseses lately. Been feeling like I'm 100 years old, having very low energy, and lots of twinges in the hinges - and as if all that wasn't enough, there's more!

And just in time for the holidays! Here's the scenario: at a friends house for dinner - just sat down for the salad course - totally enjoying the company and anticipating the meal that my better-than-average-as-a-cook friend just "whipped" up for us - start feeling whiggly - more whiggly - whiggly morphs into pains in my side - pains in my side morph into full on bent over, very embarrased, puking in the toilet, I think I'd better go now pains.

By the time I reached my home I'm all better. Uh? Two days later - waiting to take my 2 kids into the Happiest Place on Earth - start feeling whiggly - uh, oh, not again - yep again - puking and moaning, moaning and puking. We leave, with 2 incredibly disappointed youngins in tow. I head right to the doctor where I'm told a bunch of malarky. Upon pushing further they consent to a CAT scan which reveals that I have a kidney stone. More malarky - medicine that I don't actually need (I find out 5 days later) - don't let the door hit you in the ass on the way out. Oh, and wait for the postcard that refers you to see a Urologist. I get the postcard 5 days later - it's for an appointment 3 weeks later. ???

I HATE my HMO. HATE. Oh, don't get me wrong - Kaiser is perfectly lovely ------ as long as you are healthy! But just present them with a challenge and they get all deer in the headlights with you and act kind of annoyed that you are confusing them with all these questions.

I won't bore you with any more of the details. Now it's just a waiting game. Wait for the stone to pass --- with any luck it'll make it's way down and out within 6 weeks. Until then, hope for no more attacks and don't let the door hit you in the ass on the way out.

Ah....good times.

Pi

Here's an updated DTBMMLF equation for pi: A 51 year old woman who has been present at 52 Thanksgiving tables to date* - many of which were spent trying to avoid pie (or mashed potatoes or hor dourves or cocktails) in a ridiculous attempt to lose/maintain weight will only end up miserable and possibly fatter. Pi R round. And so is my stomach.

It suddenly dawned on me a few years ago that the concept of not eating or "eating lite" on this particular day doesn't make a whole heck of a lotta sense. Cause let's face it - a week or a month later, and you'll be off the wagon and eating everything that's not nailed down. So why choose one day, and in particular - this one day (that's pretty much all about eating) to torture yourself? The freedom of this little lightbulb has had the exact opposite effect on my Thanksgiving food gameplan. I eat less now than I ever did on this particular day. Now mind you, I'm not foolish enough to think that I'm eating like the bird in the middle of the table - a calorie's a calorie and I consumed plenty of them on T-Day, but all in all I'm really more about relaxing and spending time with friends and having the freedom to eat as much - or little as I choose on this particular day is my only gameplan.

The rest of the year is a whole 'nother thing.

*I was born in October.

Writing

And now for something completely different. I've done it all, and at 51 years old, I'm fed up with being fed up. I guess I wouldn't be in this pickle if I wasn't always "fed up" (or if I only ate pickles for that matter). I've tried every diet known to modern man and then some. I am a professional dieter. I am a gold medalist dieter. Oh sure, I've lost weight - plenty of it. If you added up all of the weight that I've lost since I started dieting at the age of 16, my weight would actually be stated as a negative number. But, as cliche as it sounds, I always end up with a higher number than I actually started with. Does this make any sense at all? No.

So here I am. I'm at my highest weight ever (including when I was pregnant!). I am dangerously close to 200 lbs --- a number that I never, ever want to see on my drivers license. But really, how long can I fool the DMV with that 150 lb number? One of these days I'm going to get stopped by a cop and he's going to call me on it.

But this blog isn't really about dieting per se. It's about this body and this mind. It's about the possibility of spending the 2nd half of my life as the person that I want to be - be it a thinner me, or not. It's about self-love and self-loathing. It's about being noticed and being invisible. It's about family and friends and happiness and sex and parenting and body image and ageing and staying young and growing old gracefully and....

So now I'm decided that I'm going to "Write.....Write.....Write Myself to a Thinner, Happier Me". My hope is that this process will be a catharsis. It doesn't matter if no one is reading this. At the very least I figure that I've got to be burning some calories by typing, right? Or being busy writing, maybe I'll have less time to eat (unless of course I'm eating while I'm typing).

So this is my jumping off point. Welcome to my world.