Warning:
This entry may or may not discuss diets, exercise, fatness, and all that other crap that everyone else seems to be preoccupied with these days. I will not blame you if you deliberately yawn and get as far away from here as possible.
Before I begin, please allow me to establish some facts about myself.
A.) While I am not technically overweight now, I have been in the past and am pretty much teetering on the edge again. It might have been my potato and chicken wings diet that I had going on for awhile this year, or...
2.) Portion control my arse! Super size it? Yes, please! In fact, gimme two of 'em! I've always been a big eater. For a long time I used food as comfort to help cope with my depression. I don't eat as much as I used to, but I would if I actually could.
D.) Exercise? Is that the thing where the priest goes all, "THE POWER OF CHRIST COMPELS YOU!" with the holy water and tries to get demons out of girls with a proclivity for projectile vomiting? Oh, wait...that's an exorcism. Then what the bloody hell is exercise?
The hilarious thing about this is that I happened to be an athletic child. I loved sports, basketball in particular. I collected cards with my favorite players on them, practically worshipped Michael Jordan as my own personal deity, took the opportunity to shoot some hoops whenever I had the chance, and could own the much taller adults in HORSE or PIG (assuming they didn't let me win, the scoundrels). Back then I was on a ramen and Dorito diet (mostly by choice), so that probably explains why I didn't contribute to childhood obesity statistics.
Once I hit puberty that athleticism disappeared like it had never been there in the first place. I decided to focus on my burgeoning "talents" on the artistic side of things and didn't look back.
Anyway, the point is, I'm not really one to take enjoyment in physical activities these days. I've tried several times and have given up because it bores me and hey, it's been two months and WHY DO I LOOK EXACTLY THE SAME?!?! Screw this, I'm going out for a Whopper (they're better than Big Macs). Then, I'm gonna eat an entire cake by myself. Huzzah.
It's not pretty. Not at all.
Which brings me to the next topic of discussion. Healthy eating. It hurts. Big, juicy steak, or salad? I can only have one. Get the salad away from me, ASAP, or I'm throwing it at the wall. This would be every day with me. I'm a meat and potatoes girl. Always have been. Occasionally I'll have vegetables, but only if I'm getting everything else I want too.
However, since I've moved in with my boyfriend and his family, I'm doing a bit better since I'm not the one doing the cooking most of the time. His mom cooks healthier meals than what I'm used to.
I'm also doing better with the exercise. Zach (boyfriend) is fairly in shape already and likes to work out. Last week I started doing it with him. My first day on the exercise bike, I couldn't even burn 50 calories before I felt like dying. I think I only made it to 35. Yikes. Last night I made it to 130. That was a huge struggle, especially toward the end. I was panting, sweating everywhere, and gritting my teeth while Twisted Sister's "We're Not Gonna Take It" blasted into my ears.
Tonight I did a total of 150, with other exercises in between. According to the scale I've dropped 2 pounds already. Probably water weight, BUT IT'S PROGRESS!!!
I'm also trying to do it for health reasons, as my health isn't the best to begin with and Zach gets upset when I joke about dying from a massive heart attack at the age of thirty.
We shall see if it sticks. I am a notorious flake about, well, everything. My bad.
Tuesday, August 23, 2011
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I used to enjoy playing sports too. I loved watching gymnastics on TV. My parents had me play softball when I was in junior high, and I ended up playing in all the positions at some point, except for 2nd base, randomly. I don't know how I managed to handle it with all those eyes on me.. but I was pitcher for a while. Then high school came. JV and varsity leagues. I didn't feel inclined to go on with softball after middle school, but I had started up with volleyball in 7th grade too. I actually loved how it felt to leap up and smash the ball to the ground by spiking it. It's such a release, and feels so good when you feel that strong and coordinated. I loved playing it, but then, ugh.. puberty hit like you said, and it's embarrassing to admit, and even more mortifying at the time.. but you know what happens when a girl reaches that age. I was always paranoid from that point on about wearing the required spandex volleyball shorts. I hated it. So much. I still loved volleyball, but that killed it for me. Also, I was never really into how my teammates made me feel like I had to be peppy and do victory cheers. I felt I was good, but couldn't handle the performance aspect anymore. So I left it, but still enjoyed bumping the ball in the air to myself at home in our yard, alone.
ReplyDeleteWhen I was little, I also adored roller skating, and then moved on to roller blading. Call me a dork, but I still secretly would love to go out and roller blade again. It was so much fun going to the skating ring and skating and twirling around like a fool to Disney music and Nsync (that was the children's skate.. not sure what music they played during adult time, because I was never there at that time).
I also still remember the rush when I rode a bike without training wheels for the first time. It was one of those old bikes with the long banana seats. I steadied myself on that, and before I knew it I was whizzing in circles around our house.
I also liked Skip-Its, jump roping, and hula hoops. I also liked drawing hop scotch courses with sidewalk chalk on our porch.
Good lord. No wonder I'm so weak and out of shape now. I see myself as a 'skinny' fat person. I don't look big, but I don't feel like I'm particularly lean.. or pleasantly plump. I don't have much muscle on me. I feel frail.
You probably wouldn't guess how many doughnuts I can eat in a day. I don't know where the weight goes, but I know nevertheless it can't be good for me in some way I don't even know. I'm trying to change my eating habits by cutting that out and eating more substantial meals. I'm making it a point to take in more protein, and vegetables. I eat too much bread. I've actually heard bread and in general foods made from grain may not be the best for us.. if you're looking at it from a caveman diet point of view. They were hunter gatherers.. ate meat, occasional wild vegetables, berries, etc. No bread there. No agriculture around yet. No processed food for sure. And were likely running around like crazy a lot of the time. I don't know if they were completely ideally healthy.. but I'm pretty sure they weren't fat at least, or laden with diabetes and other preventable diseases brought on by overly-processed high sugar and salt foods in many people's diets now.
So this is why I'm really excited I've decided to finally get a new bike this week (that's another thing I forgot to mention. After a quit softball and volleyball, I continued riding my bike. It was always one of the most calming escapes to me.. to just ride wherever I wanted around all the back country roads where I grew up. I would do that and ride down and sit by a creek. Rolling by fields of swaying wheat like a giant golden sea. Or passing by a row of pine trees.. that amazing smell. Or just having time to look up at the sky as the clouds drifted by, opening my mind to dream.
ReplyDeleteSo I need to get back to that again. I completely know what you mean about flipping my priorities to creative inclinations. But, I've also found, that a balance between mind and body has to be kept. I've been way down to the place where I'm deep within my mind, and letting my physical self get so weak. It's been worse for me than it is at the moment, but I can tell I still need to work at making more time to just be active in reality too. So yeah.. I can't wait to finally get that bike :)
I've tried regimented exercise at times before too.. and just like you, I get bored. I hate feeling like a hamster on a wheel, and don't like buying, or being surrounded by tons of exercise equipment. I like the thought of not being dependent on many things. So I prefer the thought of just finding something fun to do that doesn't take too much equipment, and that doesn't make me feel like I'm setting aside time for it. It has to be something I can't wait to do, for the reason of it being fun or adventurous. I have to feel like I'm developing some quality of myself with it other that just soley trying to build muscles or melt fat. It has to feel adventurous and useful and fun in other ways.
Hey, Cindy! Thanks for commenting. :)
ReplyDeleteI also played softball, when I was in 4th grade. I pretty much quit before the season was over because I was more into basketball. I never got the opportunity to join a basketball team, though, because my mom and I moved a lot. In softball I was mostly a base/outfielder person. I don't think I ever pitched.
When I got to middle school and started being more artsy, I developed a fierce hatred for jocks. It had been starting in 5th grade, but got worse after I moved to the district I had to stay in until I graduated high school. They treated non-sporty people like garbage and I wondered if I would have been like that if I'd stuck with it. And of course puberty didn't make things any better. My depression actually developed that year. >_<
I practically lived at the skating rink as a kid! I remember when the Macarena was popular and they'd play it a lot and people would do the dance while skating. And some of us would show off by skating really fast backwards and stuff like that. It really was a blast.
I did all that other stuff as well. It seems like that was so long ago and that I never did any of it at all. XD
I have the genetic misfortune of having a somewhat larger build. Broad shoulders, tree trunk legs, wide ribcage, etc. So I'm never really going to look "thin." However, despite my lack of muscle, I'm mistaken for being muscular, lol. It'd be nice to actually be muscular though.
I'm not really a big fan of bread, but that doesn't matter when I can pack away a pound of potatoes in one sitting. But I agree. Most processed foods really are awful (some of them make me sick), and often we're forced to eat them in some way. The obesity rates are highest in the poor because those kinds of foods are what they can afford and they sometimes don't have a lot of opportunity to exercise. It's really annoying that healthy food costs more, and not everyone has the ability to grow their own fruits or vegetables, you know?
I haven't owned a bike in like 10 years, but I'd like to have one someday. A friend of Zach's rode his bike across the entire state of Washington once. That had to have been an amazing thing. I hope you have lots of fun. :)
Right now I'm only using an exercise bike and weights, and if I was by myself I would have quit already. I feel exactly like that. Eventually I hope to be able to go other places or do other things.