My weight loss hasn’t always been healthy- pt. 1
I’ve been open about my unhealthy relationship with food when it comes to the secret eating, but I don’t know that I’ve ever really discussed the other end of the spectrum, here or back on hifitness.
Warning, some of this may be somewhat triggering. Tell me if you think I should put this under a cut (either because of triggers or length).
I have to take you way back to Christmas break my sophomore year of college- the first few days of 2002. It was the last day that Jeremy was visiting at my parents’ house. We had gone to walk around at a mall, and I had been a little bothered by the tightness of my pants the whole time. We stood in front of the mirror in the upstairs bathroom, and I asked Jeremy if I had gotten fat. He said that I looked fine. I said that surely I looked like I had gained weight*, and after me pressing him on it, he finally said I “looked a little poochy**.”
The closest picture to the time I had, this was about a month earlier and I’d probably gained a tad more from holiday foods.:
I don’t know what I weighed at the time. My parents didn’t have a working scale. But hearing him say it (even though I pushed him to it) made something click in my brain. After he left to head back to Montgomery, I spent an hour doing leg lifts, crunches, lunges, and stuff.
Starting the next day, I began to only eat when I was hungry and stop as soon as I was satisfied. Sounds like a good plan, right?
When I went back to school a few days later, I started going to the workout trailer 4 or 5 nights a week. (lol… now they have an actual fitness center, but still no real gym.) I would run a mile on the treadmill to warm up, then do a circuit of abs and legs, ride the stationary bike 10 or 15 min., do another circuit, run another mile. I would wake up extra early before class to run a lap around campus (about 1.5 mi.) 4 or 5 days a week. I continued with eating in that way. I had salad (with other things, too) every day for lunch. I usually had to snack between meals since I was eating less at a time. I bought a tape measure so I could track my progress and measure when my roommate went to class so she wouldn’t know.
Then I saw something online about getting free samples of ephedra pills. I ordered them. I took them and suddenly it was easy for me to get up so early to run because I wasn’t as sleepy. I think I might have lost a 1/2” from my waist in the 5 days I took them. This whole time I had no idea what I weighed, but I liked that I was getting smaller.
Jamboree practice started and we’d do choreography practice a few hours a night most days of the week, but still I’d go workout afterward. A friend asked me if I was okay because I had noticeably lost weight and I hadn’t needed to. I told her I was just eating healthy for the first time in my life, and it’s not like I was as small as _____, ______, and _______. No one else ever said anything.
Then Jeremy and I got engaged. The night of my candlelighting, I still squeezed in workout time right after Jamboree practice and slipped right in just before curfew when it would begin.
(Me that night after being put in the fountain)
I took the leftover cake to my room. I licked off all the frosting from the bottom of the container. You can’t have a problem if you still eat straight frosting, right?
I still felt like I had too much fat because my stomach wasn’t flat and still made rolls when I sat down and I could still pinch “a lot” of fat.
The next weekend I went home and tried on wedding dresses. Many of the samples were too big.
We found a dress that was a prom dress. It was a 5- a size I hadn’t worn since before I was done growing.
My best friend’s mom- a P.E. teacher and runner- asked me about my weight loss. I told her that I was just running again and eating better, and since I still wasn’t any thinner than her kids naturally were, she didn’t press it.
At their house:
The weekend after spring break, we went to Jeremy’s family’s house. We were lounging on the bed watching T.V., and I got up to go to the bathroom. When I stood up, I wobbled and almost collapsed. Then my stomach growled. Jeremy asked what I had eaten, and I told him I’d had a (small) bowl of cereal and some (it was probably around 5 or 6) baby carrots. That’s how little it took to keep me from feeling hungry. It was about 3 in the afternoon. He asked just how much weight I had lost, and I said I had no idea, probably around 5 pounds. He made me go weigh myself on the scale in his parents’ bathroom. 122. Fully dressed.
That meant that I was around 8 lbs less than my normal weight in high school while running & playing soccer. But the number really meant nothing to me. I hadn’t been weighing myself the whole time. Anyway, I could still grab fat.
I did go eat, though, even though I wasn’t hungry. The dizziness scared me.
I don’t think I lost any more after that. I continued with my eating only when hungry and exercise for the rest of the school year, but my metabolism had probably reached the point where I wouldn’t lose any more doing the same thing.
During the summer, it was harder because I had home-cooked meals. I was also scared about not fitting in my wedding dress. It was a little looser when I got home at first, so I relaxed some. Then it would get tight again, so I would cut back.
I was babysitting a few days a week, so on my off days, I would run. I measured it to be 4 miles. I would also take the baby for walks and do crunches when he was playing alone.
At some point I picked up a calorie counting book. I had never counted calories. I had been “listening to my body” the whole time. I clearly remember one day eating under 500 calories. I had no idea that wasn’t enough. I really thought I was being healthy. I would also only poop every 3 days or so. My waist got to below 25”, the smallest it had been. Somewhere between the lack of pooping and my waist size, I got scared and started eating more again. I still had my wedding dress on the back of my mind, though.
to be continued (probably next week, possibly tomorrow night.)
