I went.  I weighed.  I lost.  If you don’t recall, last week I lost 6.4 pounds.  I went today and I lost another 3.6 pounds.  That, my friends, is a cool 10 pounds in 2 weeks!  I also lost another 1 1/2 inches off of my waist and another inch off of my hips for a total loss of 3 1/2 inches from my waist and 2 inches off of my hips!  I am so proud of myself for these accomplishments.  I have worked hard and I think it is paying off in many ways.  It makes me want to work out and keep going.  I love it.

I am off to the John Michael Montgomery concert at a casino about an hour from our home and then we are staying over night as part of an early Valentine’s Day celebration.  The concert tickets were a gift from one of my daycare families for Christmas.  I am really looking forward to the concert because I have seen JMM in concert 2 times before and he is very entertaining.  I love him.  You guys all have a great week and I will try to catch up on commenting on Tuesday.

Hey Kids…..What Time Is It?

If you said Lazy Daisy’s weekly trip into the Valley of Humiliation then you were right! It’s my weekly Weight Watchers meeting and once again I am abandoned by my friend who swore that we we see this thing through “Thick or Thin!”

So far I’m the thick and she is well on her way to thin…..Now I ask you does that seem fair? She is my “nutritional counselor, point counter, cheer leader and “butt kicker” and she’s not even here!

Bear in mind that I’m not the kind of girl who enjoys doing anything by myself, much less willingly going into “Miss Perky’s Palace of Positive Prattle” without a body guard. (For her protection, not mine!) Since neither one of us could afford my bail, she quickly heads me out the door in case of a likely verbal meltdown.

I went, I persisted, I endured. I lost no weight. There was no victory lap, no happy dance to the chairs, no recapping how many sticks of butter have been lost—just a quiet retreat into myself

“What is….is! It’s a number! I’m not a one dimensional person defined by my weight,” I declare to my inner self, visualizing The Helpful Hulk ripping the scale into nano bits of metal. (Who am I kidding? The scale is an instrument of the Devil, it lies, it cheats, it laughs in defiance to all my efforts. It whispers words like “only one person at a time please”.)

I find my seat listening to the positive chatter of “the core” group……”How’d you do?”I’m asked by several friendly ladies who have endured my verbal outburst before. “I smile weakly, and lie through my teeth….”Ok, how bout you?” Not that I’m interested in hearing their reports…I just want the spotlight off me for the moment.

The meeting begins:

Spotlight on Perky who begins passing out paper plates….

ME: (Hopefully thinking this to myself and not audibly ) Oh good, at least I’ll get fed…..this may not be so bad.

Perky begins passing out plastic cutlery one piece at a time. I scan the room viewing various receipes that have been posted.

ME: Great, I bet it’s a tasting party…..boy am I lucky, I’m starved!

Perky to me: Here you go! (passing me a plastic knife)

Me: Excuse me, this is a knife.

Perky: I know! We’re just pretend eating.

Me: ( Pretend eating? #@*!##………)

Perky then instructs us to write down “What do you want?” on the paper plate. She flips up a poster that reads, “Life is a Cafeteria”. Since there are still several bewildered looks she explains further. A cafeteria is a restaurant in which the customers are served at a counter and carry their meals to tables. In ordered to be served you must get up and go get it yourself.

She then interjects a story about a immigrant to America that was hungry and came to a cafeteria. He sat down and waited to be served. No one came to take his order. Finally a lady with a tray laden with food sits down at his table. She explains to him that in order to get what he wants he must “Get up and get it yourself” and then be willing to pay the price.

So again, she encourages,” What do you want?….what do you want to get from these meetings?” After a few minutes she begins to ask people to share what they wrote down on their paper plates. The answers are no surprise.

“To get into my hot pink outfit!” is one response.

“To get off my blood pressure medications,” is another response.

“To gain new eating patterns and be healthy”, is the answer Perky has been waiting to hear.

After each response Perky asks “What do you need to do in order to reach that goal?”

After the person has given their response she counters, “Can you do that?”

Followed by the real kicker…..”Will you do that?”

If the participant has answered all the questions to Perky’s satisfaction she gleefully gives them Monopoly money followed by clapping and “Atta Boys”.

Finding time on her hands and no one else volunteering, Perky turns to me and asks?, “What do you want?” “What did you write on your paper plate?”

“What? “I think,” is she sucidal?” ” Doesn’t she know never to ask me a direct question? This has got to be a set up.”

“What do you want?” she teases.

“I want to be Miss Magnolia” I confess to the laughter of everyone there. (Miss Magnolia has lost 101 pounds and attends the meetings weekly as a life time member.)

An inspired Perky runs over to Miss Magnolia and whispers something in her ear. Turning back to me she says, ” Miss Magnolia has some advice for you from both of us.”

With a twinkle in her eye, Miss Magnolia smiles sweetly and says to me, “Get up and get it yourself!” The room breaks into howls of laughter ……..maybe it didn’t happen exactly that way but it did “to my weigh of thinking.”

I’ve been doing fairly well as far as working out goes. I worked out most days this week. I lifted or ran almost every day. Last night I was sitting on the couch and I realized I could feel shoulder muscles! I told Mr. FLinger, “Feel this!!” and he gave the fake enthusiasm a supportive husband would give. “oohhh, la la!” “Shut up! I feel it!”

That was my motivation for doing it all over again today.

I said I was going to just do it and one day I’ll be motivated because there are results. I don’t SEE the results, but I can feel it. The scale is not moving unless, that is, you count the additional three pounds it read today. When I reflected on my eating I understand where I’m going wrong. I feel that this week I did well working out so next week I will ADD in the good eating part. My goal is still to lose down to 155 by the end of February, which is now two weeks and five pounds away (again) but at least I’ll have buff arms by June.

I wrote this entry in my “diet blog” last evening and it’s something I’m really going to try to put into practice.  It makes so much sense.

Much more sense than the two cheeseburgers I had for supper last night!  Oy!  And — big surprise — the scales were up a pound this morning.  Sometimes, I think stupid is my perpetual state of mind.

I’m having a great day today, and I hope you all are, too.  There’s nothing like being a bonehead to get me back on track again.    Hang in there, gang!  Saturday is just another day.

So today was my Weight Watchers Weigh In. All went well I had an additional 5 pound loss according to their scales. That makes a 12 lb total with weight watchers. (This was my fourth meeting, third week.) At home I show a loss of 19 lbs and that is simply because I know what my overall highest weight was over the holidays–by my scale. I really need a new scale.

So I’m feeling pretty good.

Then the Meeting Leader starts talking about having the desire to lose weight and how we think about it and the kind of mindset it takes to reach your goals. Then she hit a nerve. She mentioned how there are people who believe they don’t deserve to lose weight. She asks if anyone in the room felt that they didn’t deserve to lose weight. And that’s when it all went to hell.

“I used to.” I pipe up.

“You did? What changed that?”

And that ladies (and gentlemen–are their any men on this site?) is when I lost it. I froze. I opened my mouth to try to answer and started to blubber.

“My kids.” I finally managed to squeak out.

It was the simplest answer I could come up with. I mean really did I want to go into EVERYTHING that was involved in finally flipping the switch and moving me in the right direction. They don’t want to hear all about my personal tragedies. As it is I could feel the discomfort rise in the room like smoke trying to suffocate me.

Suffice it to say I didn’t meet anyone’s eyes for the rest of the meeting.

Great, now I will forever be that woman that cried about her weight at the Saturday morning Weight Watchers meeting. Sometimes It really sucks being such an emotionally sensitive person.