discontent disconnect

I recently saw a friend share an image of herself from several years ago, you know, a memory, and she said, “I wish I was skinny again”.

Now, this friend is by no means a fatty. She’s a beautiful, vivacious, beaming, kind hearted and nurturing individual….gorgeous, outside and in. But right now, she is feeling discontented with her body.

Remember, our bodies are just the shells of us. We carry them around in a far more cumbersome way than we may carry our emotions, our deepest fears, our anger, our love and our sadness…but our bodies, nonetheless, many times, are what people judge before they even know what greatness resides within.

Of all the comments on there, “I’ll join this program with you” or “I know a good outdoor thing going on near where we live, lets support each other and do it together” there was the one “you are FINE the way you are, don’t let anyone tell you otherwise”.

You know, this one message, as wonderful and PC as it is, is what encourages the disconnect that keeps someone discontented.

There is a clear message of “I am unhappy with where I am right now” and it doesn’t need the encouragement to “Stay where you are right now”

In this day of skinny shaming, fat shaming, slut shaming, and god-knows-what shaming…

I think its important to acknowledge someones pain and encourage a way to help them overcome the obstacle, not fucking keep them right there.

Think this one through.

Its taken me almost 2 years to lose 14kgs. 8 months of that was spent being serious and I lost 13 kgs in those 8 months.

My 3 year old and my almost 5 year old, they weigh a little over 14 kgs each.

That is the same amount of weight I lost. They are fucking heavy to carry around!

Put into perspective. If I had not cut down what I ate, drastically, learned to work out and learned to not hate it. If I had not gone for the DEXA scan, if I had not done the caliper tests, if I had not owned a weighing scale, or a measuring tape, if I had not taken any initiative to actually gather information on markers, I would not be where I am now.

Where I am now is not some high and mighty place of being full of myself, its a place of self-awareness. I am aware of how far I have come, I am aware of where I am, I am aware of how far I have to go, I am aware of how much I am willing to put in to get there.

If you had asked me 2 years ago what hunger was, it would be something I felt every fucking moment I was awake! If you ask me now what hunger is, I will tell you that…its something you feel in your mouth and in your throat…not in your stomach, and certainly, I now know the difference between boredom hunger, emotional hunger, hormonal hunger and just plain pissed off with life hunger.

I would never have thought I would get to this point where I can still enjoy food, but it doesn’t control me. I would never have thought I would get to a point where I look at wine and think of the number of calories in every 100ml. I would never have thought I would get to a point where I say no to Diet Coke because I know the crap that is in it and I actually consider how harmful it is.

I came across a meme recently and it said, “If you continue to eat the way you are currently eating, you will continue to weigh what you currently weigh”.

I will go out on a limb here and say, if you want to lose weight but expect it to happen overnight, it won’t.

If you continue to eat and drink as you are right now, but you just so happen to want to lose weight, that ain’t gonna happen, if anything, you will weigh more than you do right now, if you continue to eat and drink the way you are…for the next 2 years.

For the 2 years it will take you to lose all your unwanted weight, you could consider how much you would gain in the same time if you choose to instead disconnect from that discontent. That feeling of being down about a minor factor in your life, that won’t go away, it will stick around. It will become as much a part of you as the weight itself.

What drove me was this feeling of “Ok, enough is enough.” I had been carrying that weight around for 2 years after giving birth to Micah…and it was my discontent with the numbers on a scale that drove me, nothing else.

Let me be truthful, I never really saw how fat I was. I can see it now, but in my mind, I was still the me I remember when I was 18! I mean, 3 kids and all, in my mind, I still felt like me. Its only when I caught an unflattering picture of myself that I thought, What The FUCK, is that me??? How the hell did I get this fat and not notice it?

On my 5’1 frame, carrying 68kgs does not sit well!

There were other issues…the bladder control problems when I put any stress on it (forget my chances of becoming a trampoline star), or the swelling in my knee, or…and this one is for real, the swelling in the joints of my hands…all the way in my fingers…so much so that I thought I was developing arthritis. I was sleeping shit, I was depressed a lot, I was tired a lot, I was not active.

Food is the most over utilized anti-depressant there is…and exercise is the least utilized anti-depressant there is.

But exercise alone ain’t gonna get you there.

Its true, 80% diet, 20% exercise.

You don’t get anywhere when you eat pizza, drink beer and train an hour a day.

If you think you already eat healthy…like you are eating quinoa, avocados, grilled chicken and salads…then rethink your portions, keep a food diary for a week and be honest with yourself. What you will find is that your portions are out of control. A quarter of an avocado is about right…not a half an avocado with eggs cooked in butter.

Macronutrient density…you don’t have to become a food scientist, but you have to figure out what each thing you put into your body contains.

If you were a car that ran only on super unleaded, you wouldn’t chuck diesel in it because that would ruin the engine…its something like that.

And seriously, rethink the booze.

So many people convince themselves that the booze doesn’t matter, that they worked hard and so they deserve this one thing. I am not saying you will have to give it up for good, lord knows, I haven’t. But I certainly don’t consume it as often as I used to…and I certainly don’t think about it as much as I used to.

What you think is impossible, something becoming a habit, something becoming second nature…its possible. Just needs time.

Give it time.

You are totally worth all the effort you will put in.

It took years to gain weight, it will take years to lose it.

You won’t just try one method, you will try many, but remember that all the methods you try are because you know you are worth it.

Nothing will be a quick fix. It may seem like its taking too long, it may seem like you are miserable, but after a while, you will learn to hear the encouragement coming from others and you will learn to decipher the voice of the ones who want to keep you where you are…and you won’t resent them, you will understand that they still have their own journey to get started on.

You can only do you.

You can only fix you.

You can only make you a better you than you were last year or the year before.

But its gotto come from within.

No one else goading you into it is going to change a damn thing.

You will learn to appreciate the gym as “me time”. You will learn to enjoy a salad. You will learn to appreciate the wine that comes once a month…and you will learn to appreciate drinking 3 liters of water a day. Your hair will look better, your skin will glow, your sleep will be better…and you will have more energy.

Initially you won’t notice.

Initially you may feel like its 2 steps forward and 1 step back…or 1 step forward and 2 steps back…but as long as you keep picking yourself up when you fall down, dusting yourself off and keep on trucking, you will get there.

You do this not purely for yourself, but for the quality of life you will have when you are 60. To run after grandkids and to carry them without breaking your back (coz remember, they will one day weigh about 15 kgs and still expect to be picked up when they have a boo boo).

You will do it so you care about being there for your spouse and not having them look after you in your old age…

Do it so you can travel…so you won’t be immobile…so you can age with grace and be happy of all you have accomplished.

And although I say 80% is in the kitchen…you still need to get exercising.

Get moving.

Start with walking…

I remember how badly my thighs and my inner arms used to chafe.

It used to depress me.

But I still ran a chaffed up half-marathon.

I remember how I had 3 spare tires hanging round my belly and bath time would have me looking at my body like I was a beached whale…but I still got into crossfit.

I remember how I looked at my bingo wing arms and thought, fuck this shit, its never going to happen for me…and then I had tickets to the gun show.

No, none of this happened overnight.

But it happened.

And I have never been that one to tell a friend unhappy with their weight, “Keep it! Keep feeling that way! Hang on to it!” coz, well, if you are unhappy, shit or get off the pot.

Do something.

Be proactive about combating this feeling.

If it means you call me, surround yourself with other friends who would support you, who would even do this together with you, something I benefited greatly from by having my own best friend by my side…

Well, do that.

Do what works for you, do whats right for you…and know you are loved more than ever, even as you are…everyone you know who loves you, will still love you the way you are, regardless of how much you weigh…but the only one that matters, is YOU.

YOU have gotto love you.

So if you are honestly happy with you right now, then stick with it. But if, like me, you are honestly not, then do something about it and know you will totally succeed at it.

Don’t be that person who convinces yourself you are happy when you aren’t.

Don’t settle for who you are if you know thats not the who you want to be.

We are not static, our lives are not on a linear path…we are fluid, ever changing…and the future is full of endless possibilities.

Pick the future that suits you best.

Set goals, work towards them, when you meet those goals, move the goal posts…keep at it until you are satisfied with your efforts and know, you did this, not anyone else. Others would have helped get you there, your trainer, your dietician, your nutritionist, your bestie, your mum, your spouse, your kids…who knows, just others. But YOU were the only one who could do the exercise, put down that fork when 80% full, cook that kick ass meal, or order that kick ass meal, lol. You did it.

Always be you, know that the you that you are is always changing while still being you. You will never stop learning, never stop discovering, never stop evolving…until the day you die.

So go on out there and be awesome.

You know, I used to crack this joke, “My body is a temple…The temple of Doom”

And I’d laugh. But deep down, I was mad about it, sad about it, depressed about it.

Not any more.

I am far from being some Mayan built structure…and along the way I have had a lot of naysayers saying I am obsessed or doing something unhealthy or whatnot…but I know me, I know where I am at, I know how I feel, I know how I sleep, I know how I cope with stress, and I know…thats all that matters.

I am still getting to enjoy a crazy wine binge with friends. I am still enjoying my szechuan meal on a weekly basis. I am still living my life to the fullest, maybe even fuller than before…I am just doing it with 14kgs less of me to carry around with me.

I have put in an order for a shitload of gym equipment to use at home, and one of them is a 12kg Bulgarian bag. I laugh coz I know how heavy that feels, and then I remind myself that is less than the weight I have lost in the last 8 months.

Phew.

Relief.

But the journey never stops.

I don’t slack off too much.

Coz if I do, I will gain it back.

Some may say, “Thats not living!”

Well, thats what it is to live a healthy life…you don’t eat crap.

People always say, “That sounds like a diet” without knowing that a diet, by definition, is – the kinds of food that a person, animal, or community habitually eats.

Thats it.

You can call it what you want, restriction, starvation, whatever negative thing you have heard and believed.

But a diet is merely what you eat, habitually.

So maybe change your habits.

Coz right now your diet could do with a serious upheaval.

Portion control, that is important…if it means you bust out a weighing scale to weigh food before you eat it, do that until you understand what a portion is.

Measuring cups, tablespoons, teaspoons…and so on and so forth.

Do it until its a habit and you know, in your gut, what you are supposed to be eating.

I have a bad habit, I bite my nails.

I have tried everything I can, short of brainwashing, to stop myself from biting my nails.

I no longer bite them till they bleed, this is a good thing, its still hardly a good thing for a 40 year old woman with 3 kids to be doing.

So I paint them…and then I don’t bite them. Its like a switch goes on in my brain and there is no urge whatsoever.

You would think, then why don’t you paint them all the time?

Coz I am lazy.

Coz the paint starts to chip and then I wait till it chips some more and finally I take it off with remover when its so unsightly I can’t stand to look at them…and then I begin biting again.

This is kinda what stops many people from being proactive about something as simple as a diet and how we eat, habitually.

We do whats easy, we do what allows us to cope with stress…and we are, deep down, just not ready to do the hard work it takes to bring about a change so monumental it would no longer be holding us back.

What I am going to do is…I am going to keep my nails painted for the rest of the year…I am going to avoid biting my nails for the rest of the year…and so if I can do that, its just another thing I have accomplished with a little bit of effort and a whole lot of discomfort (I hate sitting still at a nail salon!).

Please…in no way am I saying anyone else is lazy…I am saying I am. But where I am going with this is that even though people think I am a go getter and I am really dedicated, know what I am far from these things…it takes serious fucking effort for me to be these things. It doesn’t come easy to me, and it doesn’t necessarily come easy to other hard core fitness nuts who are waaaaaaaaaaay fitter than I am or even dream of being…but we all start somewhere. We all work with what we have and we make a habit of it.

I wasn’t good at snowboarding, but I got in the habit of going even when I hated winter (I did…still kinda do) and I forced myself to go even when sometimes I would quietly cry on the slopes after a fall and my frustration got the better of me…like, “Why the fuck am I even doing this??? I am crap at it!”

But I kept at it, year after year…and everytime my husband or friends would ask me how it went, I would say, “Awesome!” and not voice the real answer, “I don’t know why I bother!”

But then…this year…something just clicked…and I found my zen. I found my joy where I was lost in the moment. Where I was doing something for the sake of doing it and somewhere in there I found my source of great inner peace, quiet and earth shattering joy. I found control, control of my body, control of my mind, control of nature underfoot.

Seven fucking years.

Thats how long it took me to find my zen.

Like I said…that shit doesn’t happen overnight. But keep at it.

Much love…and never fear what you do not know…

You are totally capable of so much more than you let yourself believe.

I learned this lesson…maybe coz I am turning 40, its more real and more obvious to me now…but who knows, the point is, the lesson is in me, the lesson is me.

Anything is achievable if you put your mind to it.

The only thing stopping you is yourself.

Many pintrest accounts and blogs and fitness websites have HIIT (High Intensity Interval Training) that you can do at home, even for beginners, that only utilize body weight)…you can always start there. If, like me, you are embarrassed to train in front of others, do it at home. Don’t be discouraged that you feel dead after 10 mins, its only a place you start at.

In a month the same shit will be easy.

But start.

Start somewhere…and start soon. 🙂