Ch-ch-ch-ch-changes...

Yeah, the title of this post is hackneyed and such, but you have to admit Bowie's pretty great. I don't particularly care for that song, but his oeuvre (how's that for a 50 cent word) as a whole is incredible. I have seen him twice in concert and he's quite a showman.

So I have noticed some changes since I've started weight watchers, and most of them are pretty cool.

I find I'm sleeping better. My knee feels almost normal (that's due to the surgery, but I think having less weight on it makes a big difference). I pull my pants up a lot. I have more energy. I'm volunteering more. My skin looks great (if I do say so myself). Some of my shirts aren't as tight as they used to be. I'm definitely not ready for a new wardrobe yet, but it's kind of nice to dream about it. My bras aren't fitting much differently, which is unusual because normally when I lose weight my boobs shrink first (stupid poetic justice), but the girls seem to be holding steady.

I've been getting a lot of support from the weight watchers message board that I read regularly. I don't post a whole lot, but on there are people who have had tremendous success and I read their stories and it inspires me. Virtually everyone on there has a blog, and they're always about peoples' weight loss journeys, so when I think that it's never going to happen for me, I pop in there for some inspiration. It really works!

A friend from work went to Ireland, he was gone about 2 weeks, and came by to see me today. First words out of his mouth were "You're losing weight, kid." :) That felt so good. Then another friend I work with came over to chat (it's a regular Friday thing, he comes by in the morning to find out how I did at my weigh in), and he said "I'm so proud of you" and I have to tell you, that feels incredible. The support that I've been getting from my friends (that means you Alabaster Mom, and Sassy Sadie's mom!), coworkers (who are also friends) and meeting mates has just been so instrumental to my success. I never knew it would make that much of a difference but it really truly does. And the little awards I've been getting from WW have been awesome too. I have them all on my car's keychain, and I always jingle them a few times to remind myself of how far I've come.

You may notice I didn't mention family support much. My family is supportive but then again they're not. I haven't told my mother I joined WW for example. Praise I receive from my mother tends to be counterproductive. She's not saying anything different than what my friends say, at least at first. But it's all rife with subcontext. Here's a direct quote from an email she sent me after I had dinner with her a few weeks ago:

"You looked so nice Sunday. Makes a difference when you comb your hair. Looks like you shed some weight too."

I did indeed copy and paste that verbatim from her email. So, do you agree that's a bit fucked up, pardon my French? See, I'm 42 years old. But I still get comments from my mother about combing my hair. OK, not to digress, but I don't comb my hair. If my hair is dry I CAN'T comb my hair. It's just too curly. And even saying I shed some weight is heavy with meaning for me. My biggest thing is that my mother usually will say something like "You've lost weight, that's great. Now keep it up!" And that just has the whole "Keep it up because where you're at right now is not good enough, and you've failed so many times I must tell you that you need to continue."

Please don't think I'm being harsh on my mom, I beg you. I'm a good daughter. I really am. But the woman knows my buttons and never fails to push them. She just looks for stuff to get on me about. I remember once as a kid her yelling at me when we were at dinner "Stop eating with your left hand!" (She's all about etiquette and was referring to right handed people switching the fork to their right hand after cutting something). Thing is, I'm left handed. So there I was, minding my own business, and eating the way I always did, but somehow there was something wrong she had to point out. And it wasn't even wrong!

My mother is also the queen of revisionist history. I had several diaries over the years. I was a pretty crappy diary keeper, but there was one that was actually really clever, it was a 'summer' diary and it was very sort of interactive, with stickers and activities and stuff. It was fun. I was probably 10 when she gave me that. It was the summer of 76, actually, so I was 10 going on 11. It was a perfect pre-teen gift. So at one point I made a comment in my diary about my parents fighting. Well, a few days later my mother comes out with my summer diary and tells me that I shouldn't be writing stuff like that in my diary. Then she made me go inside and change it.

No, I'm not joking. She made me erase what I had written (it was in pencil, I remember that vividly) and write in something she approved.

Being on the young side I did what she said. I wasn't happy about it, and I knew it sort of defeated the purpose of having a diary, but I changed it.

As the years went on I came to realize that if I had a diary my mother always found it and read it. I remember her making comments to me about things that I had never mentioned to her. Then, when I was in high school I came home from class and she confronted me about drinking. Not long before I had written about a friend of mine who'd smuggled some whiskey to a football game. I hadn't gotten drunk or anything, but we all tried it. So, I went to where I had my diary hidden (not very well, obviously), went straight back to my mother and tore it to pieces.

She had absolutely no problem going through my stuff, and then telling me about it.

My brothers and my sister and I often comment to each other that we just don't know how we made it out. I do love my mother, y'all, I do. But I could write a book, I honestly could. I've actually had friends tell me that their parents pale in comparison to my mom. And it's not like I'm stacking the deck against her!!! I simply relay facts, but I tell you, those facts are EFFED UP, my amigos.

But, I don't want to use my blog to dis my mom. That's just not fair. And besides, that's what my therapist is for. But I did just want you to know why I don't talk much about my family and my weight loss. They're just not quite as helpful as they seem to think they are!!! Bless their hearts.

OK, enough of that. This weekend is going to be interesting. It's a 3 day weekend, and as far as WW goes, weekends are always more challenging than weekdays. So I want you to pull together for me amigos, and send some positive loser vibes in my direction, because I'm actually going to be WITH my family this weekend. It could get UGLY!