Previous post on weight & health: Doing depression right
I’ve been eating very healthfully for five weeks. I’m happy to fit into my size 2XL shirts (down from my 3XL shirts), to be able to wear my rings again, and to hear my friends say I look slimmer. But the scale doesn’t reflect it. My weight has stayed the same! In my frustration and disgust I asked my holistic practitioner, “Is my body going to hold on to the weight no matter what? Would it be possible for me to reach size 14 and still weigh 200 pounds? Could I reach size 12 and still weigh 200 pounds?”
She says what’s going on is that my body had a lot of inflammation and, for the past five weeks, the inflammation has been going down. So my mass isn’t changing, but as my body becomes less inflamed, it reduces a bit in size. She said eventually the inflammation will be gone and then my weight will change.
Five weeks worth of inflammation! That’s a lot of inflammation to have to get out of the way before I can lose any actual poundage, but it makes sense considering the amount of sugar and carbs I’d been eating daily for years. I imagine many Americans are as inflamed as me and that’s why so many of us diet and diet but the scale doesn’t change and then we give up. What a mess we are.
I asked my practitioner when my inflammation would be gone and when I’d start losing actual weight and she said I’m on the cusp of that happening now. I realize that my bitterness is a terrible attitude to have, but I feel like, “Great! Only a few more weeks of no wheat, sugar or dairy and I’ll finally lose five pounds!”
I’ve been writing down everything I put in my mouth (besides water and plain tea) since April 24th and the practitioner has been monitoring it to make sure I’m on the right path. Sure, I’ve had some desserts, sweet snacks and coffee with sugar, but apparently that’s okay as long I’m mostly eating well. She also says I’ll be able to eat everything again once my health is better.
That was all to say that O Lord, I have been INFLAMED! But I shall be INFLAMED no more!
Any week/month now my inflammation will hit zero and I’ll finally get below 200 pounds, which would be really great considering that I’m only 5 feet 2 inches tall (1.57 meters). If you – the person reading this – are thinking you wish you weighed 200 pounds, remember that you’re probably taller than me, so 200 pounds on me is fatter than you at 200 pounds. (I could also describe myself as BMI 37.)
Because it’s hard to see weight loss in photos unless you take the pictures in the exact same conditions each time, I’ve chosen a photo I took in December to use as the “control.” Here’s an updated photo I took this week: same clothes, same pose. As I continue my new way of eating, I’ll keep comparing it to the one I took in December. Can you see any difference?
