Fallout

Ahem. So the Week 2 Weigh-In turned into a big debacle. I DID NOT BINGE, THOUGH. But boy, did I cry. I didn't cry all morning, but when I was on the phone with C, my partner, that afternoon, I just started to bawl and bawl and bawl. The first bawl was out of embarrassment. I felt like an ass because I'd been yammering on relentlessly about how wonderful it feels to finally be eating healthy and losing weight, and it turned out that I hadn't lost any at all! The second bawl was out of fear -- fear that my years of yo-yo dieting have finally caught up with me and my body was incapable of losing weight. The third bawl was because I felt like I had no control. I don't mean that in the sort of somebody-stop-me-I'm-out-of-control way. What I mean by control is that I have been closely monitoring my calorie intake and what I *thought* was my basal metabolic rate and calculated that I should have lost 3-4 pounds. So when I in fact gained weight according to the scale, I felt as though I didn't have a way to be in control of my weight loss. It's not enough for me, frankly, to eat healthy and exercise. I need to be able to predict my rate of loss and all that -- this entire episode showed me I was a control freak, that's for sure!!!

Anyway, I ended up going to see the doctor, not because I thought something was wrong, but just to get her advice. What I got was a grimace, and a "You're doing everything right, just increase your exercise." I said, "Can't you test my metabolic rate or something?" She said, "You have perfect blood pressure, perfect cholesterol, perfect blood sugar. There's no reason to test you." I said, "I have a BMI of more than 50. That's not a reason?" She said, "Not according to our medical guidelines." I think my eyes bugged out of my head. It was an eye-opening and frightening experience about our medical system.

So I ended up doing a lot of research and bought a scale that measures weight as well as body fat and water weight. Except my body fat percentage is too high right now to get a reading! Anyway, I hope/expect that will change over the next several weeks, but in the meantime, I've still got to rely on just my weight as a measure. However, I'm not as nervous about the new one because unlike my old scale, this one produces the same number if you stop onto it and off of it 5 times. My old one would fluctuate as many as 2 pounds up or down if you did the 5-time test. By the way, on Saturday night, after dinner, I weighed 344.5. If I had gotten that reading on Thursday, the freak out could have been avoided. But alas. As a result of my new scale purchase, and not knowing how the calibration is compared to my old scale, my new weigh-in day will be Saturday. So don't freak out if you don't hear from me on Thursday -- I'm not skipping!