Poison Control

I’ve now upgraded myself from Idiot to Complete Buffoon.

First, I weighed in last Saturday at 155.50 pounds, down another 2 big ones since last week. I’d lost so much weight while on WW maintenance that I weighed in wearing a sweater AND in my favorite cardigan, and I almost stepped on the scales wearing my shoes. I have to tell you, it’s an awesome problem to have, explaining to Maria the Spectacular why I’m dropping weight on my maintenance trial period.

I worked out 4 times in the last 7 days, and at the last workout, I was running 2 minutes at 4.0 mph for every 1 minute I walked at 3.0. It was tough going but I was handling the running times, and even enjoying them a little. Seriously, why did I wait so long to start exercising? Scratch ‘Complete Buffoon’. Insert “Utter Moron” right here.

I was so motivated by my loss and my workouts that I went the Elmhurst YMCA for some GroupSweat with Howard. I logged 32 mins on the elliptical, something considerably easier than running (and with fewer calories burned (annoying!), so I did it a bit longer). We also did some lifting. As I’ve mentioned before, I LOVE lifting, so I was careful not to overdo it—too much. We capped the evening with Chicago-style sushi and I laid down that night, feeling virtuous and successful.

So much so, in fact, that I’d almost forgotten the near-hit I had earlier in the week with the chocolate-stash drawer at work. As you know, they’re serving dark chocolate miniatures now, and there’s something mysterious and captivating about that dang file cabinet that jabs at me every single time I walk by. Several times during the last PMS episode, I actually planned to stay late at work, so that all the cubies near the stash would have gone home, and I could raid it without witness.

That’s a dangerous thing for me-alone with sweets. I know it, too, and so I made sure to leave for home early. I lost almost 2 hours of billable time that week, protecting my weight loss and keeping the Chocolate Overdose at bay.

Then my period came, which usually signals the end of the Cocoa Sirens temptations. I did a lunch run to Walgreen’s to pick up some supplies, and was on my way out when the newspaper rack lured me in with a Discover magazine cover on the brain. I am a closet brain freak. I know very little about the brain, but it is a lay fascination for me, and it’s become moreso since DS’s diagnosis (Asperger and PDD-NOS being classified as neurological disorders). I choked on the $7.95 newsstand price but figured that learning is good, even at market premiums and I pointed my wallet toward the cash register.

And that’s when I realized that I was in the candy aisle.

Oh, Walgreen’s, maven of the Greatest Sunday Fliers, home to the lone place where I can buy my tampons, purveyor of seed packets, Diet Coke in 20 oz bottles, and enough office supplies to sate me without emptying my wallet. Mistress Pharmacy you lured me in and then dumped the golden goose at my feet. Whatever is a Weight Watcher to do?

Duh. I panicked, of course.

But rather than race to the register, my eyes fell to the packaged jewels in front of me. I’m not looking for anything, I rationalized. I’m just seeing what nasty post-Easter drek lies on these shelves. I’m just congratulating myself that these no longer tempt me. I don’t have any desire to….hey! That’s a bag of dark chocolate miniatures.

Oh, friends, the pain of confession is indeed the Greatest Rift of All.

I held them in my hands. I read the nutrition information and I balked. I knew the reality of what I considered. I wouldn’t have just one mini and then donate the rest to the drawer. I’d shovel the whole of that 5-serving bag into my erstwhile trained mouth, downing most (all?) of it before I made it back the 3.2 miles to the office. Whatever remained I would sneak upstairs in my bag and devour at my desk before I even finished dialing in for my voicemail messages. Danger, danger, danger!

The Fat Lady bitch-slapped my psyche as I stood there, contemplating a 90+pound weight loss against the quiver of my taste buds and the flutter of my tummy, freshly underfed with my standard chicken breast wrap. I held the chocolates, I fought back every WW thought I owned and held dear, battling with all things from my old life. The 251 pound Queen of Rationalization held court in my head, and for several moments, I could not have told you anything that happened around me other than the crinkle of the bag in my hands and the silent whir of my brain counting POINTS against the calorie count on the package. One POINT per mini. Twenty-five POINTS in the bag. More than I eat all day. More than I used to eat in 2.

I put them back.

No, that’s incorrect. I chucked them back. I spoke aloud, to myself, talking loud enough that the clerk looked up from his Sudoku book to check on me. “No,” I said. “I’m not getting them.” I hurled the bag back into the bin, and then I did sprint to the cash register. Had I not needed the other supplies in my hands, I would have bolted straight for the door.

I worked out that night, something I rarely do when I’m having my period. Normally, it’s too much trouble. My body is exhausted from draining me, and my hormones are all over the map. Adding oxygen deprivation, a sweaty t-shirt and a chatty preschooler to the mix really does ask for me to pummel someone for smiling a ‘hello’ anywhere in my direction. But I climbed aboard the treadmill and I huffed it out for half an hour. I listened to my music, but all I could hear was the crinkle of that bag and the chop of my “No” in the fluorescent pharmacy air.

I don’t know how I can still be tempted by these things. I really don’t like dark chocolate, I got fat eating those very minis, with their deceptive, ‘oh look how little! But how perfect. You can have just one and be satisfied!’ I like my vegetables and my whole wheat wraps and the zing of the wasabi-speckled soy sauce dripped over my Sashimi dinner. I want to be thin, and I’ve battled every day for 39 weeks to get to here. I’m 155.50 pounds, and I’m so close to the big 100.0 pound loss that I can literally see it from here. In a few weeks, allowing for exercise and sanity, I could drop the big bar down to ‘100’ from ‘150’ and then never, ever have to put it back up again.

That’s what I want. Those are the things that inspire me, and make me celebrate. I don’t even think of food as celebratory anymore. I eat sushi when DS is with X, but it’s just our date food and really, since we don’t eat the rice and we don’t order anything with mayo, avocado or tempura, its’ really a thinner meal than what we eat during the week. I had angel food cake for my birthday, and I liked it, but I threw out the rest of the cake after dinner (which was most of it), and I didn’t even give it a second glance. It was a ritual, and once it was over, the need for the food in the house vanished with it.

So what happened? I was alone, I was hormone-deprived, I was curious…or maybe I was just tempted. I think I’ve come to decide that I will never stop the temptations. Each victory makes the next battle easier, but it will never be easy. I’ll never look on chocolate with indifference. I’ll never shrug at dessert and mean it. I’ll decide it isn’t worth it, I’ll celebrate my strength, and I’ll respect myself in the morning, but the urge will always remain.

I think it’s enough to know this, and to know that while I consider myself a Recovered fat person, rather than recovering, that the beast of who I was will always live in me. The lure of the Instantly Gratifying or the Because I Deserve It, or even the deceptive ‘Oh, It’s just one little thing every once in a while’ still holds sway with me. The Fat Lady lives on. She’s inactive for sure, but she’s far more Mt. St. Helen’s than she is Diamondhead.

Howard says this was a victory. Maybe. I did win, I suppose. I was almost persuaded, but I walked away. It was more retreat than march, but still, I left without the bag, and I haven’t been back to visit. But it doesn’t feel like a victory so much as a Death Battle. I won, sure, but I’m battered and bloodied and weakened from the fight. For the first time in my life, I feel lucky to have 3 weeks between PMS bouts. I need every moment to rest and recuperate before Princess Toblerone sends her tendrils up my nose.

It’s Day 14 now, and I’m walking past the drawer at work without a glance. I left tonight with the place surrounded by cubies and I didn’t care. But I did notice. And I also know that next week, I will wage war yet again.

On the up side, I bought a Calvin Klein suit today in a size 6, and 2 blouses over the weekend in a size Small that are almost too big for me. I’m battle-worn and weary, but I sure do look good in my ‘bandages’.

A the C(ocoa Free)