Is there such a thing as a trigger food?

Some of my listservs and bulletin boards have been discussing trigger foods lately. I find myself agreeing with everyone. I know that logically I shouldn't be afraid of food. A "normal" eater would allow the brownies to get hard and stale and not care if she had to throw them away -- or would a normal eater not make brownies, knowing that they are very high in calories and she doesn't need them for proper care of her body?

Sheryl from normaleating.com says, "I don't think it's ever good to put so much power in an inanimate object outside yourself that you need to shun it and flee from it. The power to decide - to choose - is in you. It's important to know that and believe it. You have the power! Feelings do not mandate action. It's possible to have feelings that you don't act upon - really, that's the definition of maturity. "

Well, yes I do believe that, but.... don't you think that most people who are naturally slender don't buy junk food and don't bake very often? I have tried for YEARS to be able to eat certain foods (good ice cream, homemade brownies, homemade bread, homemade chocolate chip cookies, and graham crackers spring to mind first) in a "normal" fashion and have failed miserably most of the time. No, they don't "trigger" a binge in me unless I'm trying to diet. But I almost always eat a larger portion than would be considered "normal". I eat a large bowl of ice cream or 2-3 brownies or a whole inner package of graham crackers. I always laughed at diets for which you are allowed "1/2 cup of ice cream" or "2 graham crackers". That would never satisfy me in a million years. Most of the time I just avoid those foods, rather than deal with a big struggle.

Oddly, I have been able to normalize some foods. I can now have chips, m&ms, cheese, and sugary cereal in the house all the time and rarely feel the urge to eat a bunch of it. I definitely wouldn't have been able to say that 15 years ago. Why the change? I think part of it may be the "not wanting to waste food" thing. I know that T and the girls will eat chips long before they go stale, and the other things take forever to go bad. My "problem" foods are all things that will get hard, stale, or otherwise ruined if not eaten fairly quickly.

I haven't been doing very well with leaving a bite of food on my plate and each meal and that probably relates. I do serve myself rather small portions, but still -- I want to be able to leave at least ONE bite on my plate. After all, I can go back and eat more food whenever I want. I'm an adult and no one will tell me I can't eat!

I rode my stationery bike this morning and tried doing a "program", as opposed to just 40 minutes on level 3. HOLY COW! I'd been doing level 3 and sometimes 4, but this program went up to 8 at times. I was so out of breath at one point that I had to reduce the resistance. Something to work toward, I suppose. I did the "weight loss" program at the gym on the elliptical on Wednesday and had the opposite experience. I had to keep upping the resistance. Huh.

I'm getting my bike back from the shop tomorrow and I'm pretty excited. I hopped on it a couple of weeks ago and slowly rode up and down the street. I wasn't nearly as scared as I thought I'd be, but it still felt too big for me. The bike shop said they'd switch out the seat for one that goes lower and crank the handlebars a notch closer to the seat and see if that makes a difference. I'm also going to try out the next smaller size and a totally different bike that is a bit more recumbent and thus, lower to the ground. They were super nice and said they'd replace the seat and odometer for free! I told them it wasn't their fault I crashed and broke my leg!

My ACTION plan!

I'm actually alive and feeling rather good these days. After foundering around for a few weeks trying to "legalize" food and eating too much, I realized that legalizing doesn't HAVE to mean buying every food I ever deprived myself of and having it in my cupboard. It can simply mean giving myself permission to eat whatever I want, provided it is truly what I want and as long as I'm hungry. Whew. Having a bunch of junky food in the house just stresses me out -- What if it gets stale? What if no one eats it besides me? What if I have to throw it away? ACK! Having grown up in a house where NOTHING was EVER wasted or thrown away, I can't deal very well with the concept.

After spending a week writing down each time I ate when I wasn't hungry, I found some patterns. I wrote down the time, where I was, who I was with, what I ate, and any thoughts or feelings I had at the time. I found that I eat mainly due to boredom/procrastination, anxiety/stress, or anger. Some of the thoughts I had were "what the heck I already ruined my healthy eating for the day" sorts of thoughts, some ANTS, and anxious thoughts regarding either T or the girls or both. My problem times are dinnertime and just after, while reading the paper, during celebration/holiday meals, restaurants, and my days off. Soooo.. I have an ACTION plan! That makes me laugh. Anyway, here's my action plan:

boredom/procrastination -- just DO whatever I'm procrastinating (duh!) or at least leave/stay out of the kitchen

anxiety/stress -- ask for help

anger -- ask for what I need

for problem times:
dinner & after -- get up from the table as soon as I'm done and LEAVE the AREA! Remind myself that prolonging a meal does not stop it from ending.

reading the paper -- take it elsewhere in the house to read, away from food

celebrations/holidays -- remind myself that I will never run out of food. There is NOTHING I can't eat tomorrow that I'm eating today. There will ALWAYS be more food

restaurants -- eat slowly and try to keep to half of what I'm served

days off -- keep busy, care for myself, don't spend the entire day doing chores

My plan in general is:
exercise 3-6 times a week but don't obsess about length or number of times a week

eat more healthfully -- make most of my choices healthy ones, but eat french fries and the like with no guilt if that's what I truly want. Remind myself that deprivation and insatiability go hand in hand.

cut down on the desserts -- eat it every other day for a while, cut down to twice a week, then make it once a week, eating a truly great dessert

take smaller portions than I think will satisfy me, knowing that I can go back for more

eat with a plate always, sitting down always, and slowly

start leaving one bite of food on my plate at each meal

If I want to eat but I'm not hungry, stop and ask myself what it is I want from food since I want to eat more than I need. Remind myself that feelings come and go, but don't go away because I'm afraid of them. I can't feed a feeling with food. Change requires action.

I'm back from vacation

Our ten days in Europe were really great, but exhausting. We walked a LOT -- nine miles on a couple of days. I don't think I lost any weight, which kind of surprises me. More later...

the eye of the beholder

I found out last night that Aunt Alice said to T "S looks great! How does she stay so slim?" I'm feeling rather foolish to imagine that anyone would care that I weigh 15 pounds more than I did at Christmas.

PT this morning went well. I did 22 minutes on the elliptical and I've been able to increase my ankle weights to 4 lbs for all of my leg extensions. For some weird reason I can't increase the weight on the leg extension machine. The sub PT guy a couple of weeks ago said it was probably due to the angle of the machine. Okay, whatever. I think my squats with the ball are getting easier and though it could be my imagination, doing the step-ups seems positively easy. Now if only I could actually walk up a flight of stairs like a normal person instead of one step at a time like a toddler. Ah well... I still have 3 months til the first anniversary of the accident. At least I now actually believe I will be "normal" again eventually.

I'm really getting excited about our trip -- nine days til we leave. I'm going to zip out to the mall this week on my day off and see if I can't find at least one more new top & pair of jeans -- maybe some Dockers too. I'm not happy with the way any of my non-jean pants look and A&P said to bring a few pair to wear "out" in the evening.

I fell a bit behind I see

Okay, let's see. I weighed myself, giving myself the big lecture that I wouldn't be disappointed if I'd only lost one pound. Imagine my dismay to see that I had GAINED a pound. I couldn't believe it. All that non-bingeing, all that exercise.... ARGH. The bad thing is that I allowed it to lead me to a mini binge one evening shortly afterward. I caught myself, realized why I was eating, and stopped.

I did well after that, except that I can't seem to stop eating before I feel too full at dinner. I think I just feel gypped that so little delicious food is enough. We went to Chili's and if I had honestly stopped when satisfied, I would have eaten two little quesadilla triangles and a couple of bites of rice. Instead I ate half of the platter they served me. That's an improvement, but I can't expect to lose weight if I continue to eat beyond satisfaction. The most important goal for me is still to normalize my relationship with food, but of course I want to lose weight too.

PT is going well. I joined the gym so I can keep up my exercise after PT ends next week. I did 21 minutes on level 6 on the elliptical on Saturday. I went on to do some weight work and it felt pretty good.

I was totally stressed out about this past weekend. Andrew & Patricia were here from London, so it was "all family all the time" for Easter eve and Easter. There were going to be 50 people at Ellen's on Sunday for brunch who hadn't seen me since I had gained anywhere from 15-25 pounds. I felt completely anxious, ashamed, and unattractive. On Saturday I was disappointed that we didn't have our usual family attendance to Easter Vigil services -- everyone was going on Sunday. I allowed it to get to me and after Saturday dinner ate 4 cookies, 2 pieces of cake, too many chocolate-covered almonds, and some more candy after we got home. I felt yucky.

On Sunday, for some reason, things were better. At the brunch I got very small helpings of a few things, ate them slowly, and had a piece of A&P's cake later. I sat with my feelings and tried to socialize. I actually ended up having a good time, though I still felt incredibly self-conscious. I cruised past the buffet tables many times during the afternoon, gazing longingly at the delish food, but I didn't want to stuff my feelings. We left in the late afternoon and A&P came over to discuss our upcoming trip to London. We waited far too long for dinner and I was ravenous by the time our pizza came. I ate two pieces, and managed to sit long enough to realize I was done. I still ate R's crust and a chocolate bunny, and a couple of Hershey miniatures, but that was it.

Even though I engaged in some binge behavior on Saturday, I feel okay. I recognized why I wanted to eat, I shared my anxiety with T before we went to the dinner (he said, "I like how you look honey" -- sweet man), and even though I did eat, I didn't continue with out of control behavior at the brunch on Sunday.

the good and the bad

Well, Saturday evening wasn't so great. I felt panicked about being tempted to eat a pretzel. For pete's sake when will I learn that attempting to restrict my food intake only leads to bingeing! No, I didn't binge. But I grabbed some leftovers and ate them on the way to the movies. It wasn't exactly a satisfactory dinner. At the movies I ate some of T's popcorn, the rest of C's M&Ms, and I really wanted ice cream for some reason. We didn't have any at home, but when we got home I ate an ice cream sandwich with chocolate sauce and whipped cream on it. Then I ate something else (I can't remember exactly what but it wasn't anything too horrible). Then I told myself I was being an idiot and went to bed. I should have just planned to eat the damned pretzel -- I would have avoided the deprived feeling and been fine. Live and learn, live and learn.

Sunday was okay as far as I remember. I did eat dinner slowly, though I still ate a bit too much. Still working on that. Yesterday I got home from work and R told me they had gotten me a surprise. They had gone to Cheshire for lunch (my FAVORITE place for ice cream because they make it themselves and have hot fudge sauce that tastes just like Grandma S's!) and had brought me home a HUGE chocolate malt. They drew a heart on the cup and wrote "for mommy because we love you sooooo much! from daddy and R". My first thought was dismay -- oh, the calories! I caught myself immediately. I was really hungry and knew it would be a while till dinner was ready, so I split the malt three ways and shared it with the girls. It was delicious and guilt-free. I ate my very small piece of potato pizza slowly and mindfully. I was too full for anything else. Ahem...except that I shoved in another very small piece while putting away the leftovers. Ay yi yi.

Today after PT I went to breakfast with Aunt Peg. I ate my entire omelette, piece of toast, and half the cinnamon roll. I was quite full. But I didn't panic -- just waited until I was hungry again to eat. That wasn't until 4:50pm! Amazing when you really pay attention to your body.

I am dying to weigh myself. I keep telling myself that my pants fit the same so I haven't lost any weight, but I feel skinnier. Maybe it's just because I feel so much better about everything. I think I'll wait til next Tuesday and hop on. I will NOT let the number bother me, no matter what it is. I can't let this become about weight.

I feel good!

I went to see Lisa (therapist) yesterday and she was very pleased with my progress. I told her that I finally got it through my thick head that no one was going to wave a magic wand over me and take away my compulsion to eat. I actually need to do the work myself to heal. I gave her my description of what my eating would look like if it were "normal" and she gave me the suggestion to reframe it more positively. One of the things I wrote was "I wouldn't think about food first thing in the morning, last thing at night, during church, etc". She said to rewrite it, saying when I would think about food.

She also suggested that rather than trying to force myself not to think about food, that I consciously think about something else. I said that I picture a STOP sign, but it doesn't always work. She said, as an example, that if I'm in church I should think, "Hmm..what is the priest saying? What does that mean? How does that relate to my lfe?" so that I give my mind something else to contemplate.

I told her that the Managing Your Moods class has really helped me day to day, being able to recognize and stop negative thoughts and attitudes. I don't know if that's why I haven't had a strong urge to binge or not.

Yesterday I was tempted to eat (day off) but kept asking myself why? and what did I need to do instead? I ended up being able to relax and watch an episode of "Gray's Anatomy" on DVD, do some reading, & bake some cookies (and only ate 1 1/2 & no dough!). I had gone to breakfast and ate the two pieces of toast, the Egg Beaters, and only a couple of bites of hash browns before I was stuffed. I took the rest home. I felt a bit odd making and giving the girls lunch and not eating myself, but I wasn't the slightest bit hungry until almost 3pm. So I waited until then to eat lunch. At dinner, I definitely overate. I took too big a portion. I didn't eat it all, but ate until I felt very full. I ate too fast, as usual. So my goal for this week is to eat more slowly at dinner, putting my fork down between bites if I have to.

Tonight will be hard -- right after I get off work we're going to see Ice Age 2. I won't have eaten dinner and I don't really want to eat theatre food. I ate a bowl of vegetable soup an hour ago, and grabbed a Pria bar to take. Hopefully I can hold off til I get home and eat some real, nutritious food for dinner. But if I'm too hungry and eat a pretzel, so what. That doesn't mean I have to eat more when I get home, it doesn't mean I have to cut back tomorrow, and it doesn't mean I am a failure, right?

There would be a skip in my step today

There would be a skip in my step today -- if I could skip yet.

I went to PT this morning and had my hardest session ever -- almost a full hour. I went 11 minutes forward on the elliptical, 5 minutes backward, 6 minutes backward on the treadmill at an incline (more directly works the muscle on my leg that's the weakest apparently), and then half an hour of working my legs with the weights. Whew! I felt so good when I left. My knee is rather sore now, but I've been wearing a brace for the past few days and it really helps with the soreness.

I feel as though I'm really getting a handle on being able to pause and stop myself when I am tempted to reach for food when I'm not hungry. I've done it several times in the past couple of weeks. BUT my impulses have been mild. I haven't been hit with one of those strong, out of control needs to eat for a couple of weeks.I still eat too much at dinner, but I don't beat myself up over it. I know that's one of the last things to master. For the most part I don't eat over a 5 at breakfast or lunch, but probably eat to a 7 at dinner. Then I'm almost always tempted to eat more, but have been able to ask myself what it is I really need or want and then go do that.

Doing well

So, I have eaten like a "normal" person for four days now -- no overeating, no bingeing, and allowing myself to eat when hungry (for the most part). Even on the weekend, though I had a small issue with some cookies I made, I didn't allow "last supper" syndrome to take effect. I waited until I was hungry again to eat and didn't take it as permission to binge. So my last real binge was a week ago yesterday.

I'm eating very small portions at meals, but leave the table satisfied. I have been tempted several times to eat foods that aren't so healthy, but have decided that I wasn't really craving them or wasn't truly physically hungry. The thing is that it's fairly easy to resist things if I'm not hungry and haven't been craving them. It's when I get blindsided by the urge to EAT and EAT NOW! (even though I'm not hungry) that I can't seem to resist. I'm sort of waiting for one of those urges to hit. I've been trying to visualize it happening and me setting the timer for 15 minutes and sitting with my feelings, seeing what comes up, and resisting the food. Hopefully, my visualization will become reality. I feel as though I just need ONE victory over the urge -- to know I can do it. Then the next time will conceivably be easier.

I ate a cupcake after lunch yesterday when I wasn't hungry anymore. I didn't feel guilty, but thought perhaps I should have waited until I was hungry again to eat it. It didn't taste all that great. I had some chocolate ice cream after dinner on Monday and again, wasn't hungry anymore before I ate it. However, the ice cream tasted fabulous. I suppose if I want dessert I should eat even smaller portions so that I'm still a bit hungry.

I feel good, but worry that I'm "dieting". I just finished a book called "Life Inside the Thin Cage" by a woman who was a chronic dieter. It was mainly aimed at women who are not quite anorexic and need to gain some weight, but much of the mindset was the same as a compulsive eater. I find it a bit depressing that all of these books by people who've recovered from eating disorders all say the same thing. These people crave healthy food and don't like sugar and white flour much anymore. Now, I love healthy food. I eat fruits and veggies every day -- probably more than the 9 servings one is supposed to eat. I like chicken breast, yogurt, etc. BUT I also love french fries, cheesecake, chocolate chip cookies, Cheetos, and the like. I can resist them yes, but I can't imagine going to a restaurant, opening the menu, and not wanting to order french fries and a hot fudge brownie sundae. I know I can have them and just stop eating when full, but if I eat them all the time, I certainly won't be healthy, let alone lose any weight.

Celebrate!

I saw Dr M yesterday, who was thrilled to tell me I had gained an entire inch of muscle on my leg since my last visit. What a difference PT has made!

I've been riding my bike -- trying for 3 times a week, 20-25 minutes on level 3, and the rest on level 2. Whoa, is my knee sore afterward. But I've been icing it and Dr M said to take Alieve to keep the swelling down. Today at PT I used the elliptical for the first time -- 5 min forward and 5 backward. My leg was really tired by the time I was done with everything. Hopefully that means more muscle building is going on!

My eating has been so-so. Still eating too much overall -- tight pants today. I had a mini-binge on Saturday night with a couple of frosted homemade brownies. I asked myself "what is it I want these brownies to do for me?" and the answer was to procrastinate putting the girls to bed. T was out playing bball. I knew I'd have to put them to bed no matter what, so I threw the rest of the brownies down the disposal (they weren't all that great anyway) and went upstairs.

same old, same old

Ay yi yi. I'm still having a problem overeating in the evening, right after dinner. Last night I got home and I was soooo HUNGRY! I can't figure out how to solve that problem. I get hungry in the afternoon and have a snack, but by the time I get home at 5:15pm I am so hungry I end up gobbling my dinner like a starving woman and looking around for more. Last night I had some lettuce with dressing, a piece of pumpkin bread, a few soy crisps, and a few strawberries while I was making dinner. I was still so hungry I scarfed down my pancakes like someone was going to steal them from me. I was no longer hungry, and ate a girl scout cookie & a little pudding cup for dessert. Then T went out to get the mail and I promptly grabbed C's plate (she was done) and shoveled in the rest of her pancake. WTH?

I think what I absolutely, positively NEED to do is break this habit. As SOON as we're done with dinner I need to get up and LEAVE the eating area. LEAVE, LEAVE, LEAVE!!! As Sheryl at normaleating.com points out, compulsive eating is an addiction -- not an addiction to food, but an addiction to the act of bingeing or overeating. I need to start creating new patterns to break the addiction. Tonight I have my first "Managing Your Moods" class, and Friday is craft night at Michelle's mom's house (ugh, food fest), but Saturday -- a new approach. Stay tuned...

normal eating

I just finished the book "Losing It" by Laurie Fraser, which is a fascinating look at the dieting industry and sort of an expose of how all they want is to make money, etc. Anyway, she had a description from Ellyn Satter of normal eating that I thought was good:

Normal eating is being able to eat when you are hungry and continue eating until you are satisfied. It is being able to choose food you like and eat it and truly get enough of it -- not just stop eating because you think you should. Normal eating is being able to use some moderate constraint on your food selection to get the right food, but not being so restrictive that you miss out on pleasurable foods. Normal eating is giving yourself permission to eat sometimes because you are happy, sad, or bored, or just because it feels good. Normal eating is three meals a day, or four or five, or it can be choosing to munch along the way. It is leaving some cookies on the plate because you know you can have some again tomorrow, or it is eating more now because they taste so wonderful. Normal eating is overeating at time; feeling stuffed and uncomfortable. It is also undereating at times and wishing you had more. Normal eating is trusting your body to make up for your mistakes in eating. Normal eating takes up some of your life and attention, but keeps its place as only one important area of your life.

In short, normal eating is flexible. It varies in response to your hunger, your schedule, your proximity to food, and your feelings.

It sounds so simple, doesn't it?

the importance of the pause

Someone on the conscious eaters list reminded me of the importance of the pause when I posted about trying to do something different. She wrote:

When you have the urge to eat when not hungry, delay acting on this impulse for at least 15 minutes. The best way to spend these 15 minutes is in quiet inward reflection with your eyes closed because this is when you will get the greatest insights into yourself, but even if you spend the pause running around in circles in the kitchen, you must pause.I'm reading a really great book called "First Things First" by Stephen Covey (author of "The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People"). I was very interested to see that he also made a big point of the importance of pausing between impulse and action, and he wasn't talking about anything related to eating. He identified it as a core skill needed for individual growth and development, for becoming a better person.You don't go from acting instantly on the impulse to eat, to never acting on non-hunger eating urges in a binary way with nothing in between. Children learn to crawl before they learn to walk. You learn to not act on non-hunger eating urges bit by bit, and the very first step is to pause. If you can't pause, you can't forego acting on the urge at all. You have to pause before you can stop.You must pause between non-hunger eating urges. It's possible - anyone can make the decision to wait 15 minutes before acting on the urge to eat, and when you do, you exercise a "muscle" that, in the future, will allow you to stop acting on these impulses altogether.

Don't be so sure that you fully understand the reasons behind your non-hunger eating. A primary reason that people eat when they feel upset is to avoid full knowledge of what is upsetting them - it's a huge distraction.It's easy to say you eat, for example, because your co-workers are bothering you, but that's not the whole story. The feelings that are triggered inside you by another's behavior are all yours, and are based on many factors - often originating in old issues that you haven't fully resolved. There's an expression from the recovery world that expresses this well: "If it's hysterical, it's historical." If someone is doing something that really gets to you, it's probably pushing a button.It's not enough to know that your co-workers (for example) are pushing a button. You need to know what the button is. It's the "button" (so to speak) that you need to surface and deal with. This could be profound self-doubt, discomfort with your own anger, or any number of other things. That's the level of "why" you need to get to to resolve this.It doesn't sound like you are sitting with the feelings when you have the urge to eat when not hungry - allowing a pause between impulse and action. Are you? You need to sit quietly, as I wrote to Emma in a previous message, and see what comes up. Allowing a pause between impulse and action is absolutely crucial to recovery in Normal Eating.(1) It's the first step towards not eating when you're not hungry, and(2) It's the time of discomfort when you will get the most important insights into what's really going on with you. As soon as you act on the impulse, the underlying causes become much harder to access.Pausing is crucial!! The first "reason" that pops into your mind is almost surely not the whole story. If it were, you wouldn't still have the urge to eat with the same intensity, because one of the main reasons for wanting to eat - to hide from the real reason - would be gone.

So, the next time I feel the urge to eat when I'm not hungry, I am going to pause -- sit or lie down with my eyes closed for 15 minutes and just see what comes up. Last night was great -- I had a small shredded beef bbq on a bun, a very small bit of cole slaw, some grapes, and a very small dish of pumpkin pudding with fat free whipped topping. I was satisfied -- not too full. Okay, well I still was tempted to eat more, but didn't. I was hungry by 9 o'clock, so had a 100-calorie bag of popcorn -- not because it was 100 calories, but because I was honestly craving popcorn. It tasted sooo good! I was actually still hungry after that, but went to bed.

don't worry mom...

Awww, my little R is so sweet. I was gazing longingly at a catalog of exercise DVDs from collagevideo.com last night and she asked if I'd ordered anything from it. I said, "Not recently, but the exercise DVDs I used to do came from this company" and I kind of sighed. She said, "Don't worry mom -- by next Christmas you'll be able to do your aerobics again and you'll be back in shape in no time!"

Last night was okay -- I think because I was conscious that Wednesday is a problem night and determined not to let it be a problem this week. I made Pierogies for the girls (no meat on Ash Wednesday) and a veggie burger on a low-cal bun for me with strawberries and yogurt for all 3 of us. Of course, I would have been fine with my own dinner, but ate the rest of C's yogurt & fruit, one of her Pierogies, and some pumpkin pudding with fat-free whipped topping. Then I felt really full and a bit panicky. I kept telling myself it was OKAY. I kept busy doing dishes, putting laundry away, and cleaning while the girls had their dessert (which oddly was goldfish crackers and a 100-calorie pkg of peanut butter crisps -- faux cookies). I did have a few crisps and a couple of goldfish, but kept reminding myself that eating more would only make me feel worse. FINALLY they were done and we went upstairs for baths and reading. When T got home I did go back down to read the paper with him, but honestly didn't feel tempted by his can of Pringles. I was actually physically hungry by the time I finally fell asleep at 11pm or so, but of course wasn't about to go eat that late.

Today I was again reminded of two of my "rules". I let myself get too hungry before lunch (I was doing storytime so I was too busy to eat a snack -- and had eaten a Lean Cuisine Panini for breakfast, so didn't think I should be hungry) and I let myself get too full. I ate my leftover enchilada casserole and rice I'd brought, cut a piece of the cream cheese danish coffee cake someone brought (and ate it even after tasting it and finding it wasn't all that great), ate a peanut butter cookie that wasn't all that great, AND ate the yogurt and fruit that was to be my mid-afternoon snack. By the time I realized I didn't want that much food I was really, really full. I let my anxiety get the better of me for a few minutes and ate a small piece of applesauce bread from the breakroom. Then I regained my senses and thought "oh well, it's done, and maybe now I won't get hungry for an afternoon snack".

I had the alarm set to get up and ride my exercise bike this morning, even though I have PT this afternoon. My knee was hurting so much last night I almost took some Vicodin. I couldn't fall asleep and couldn't stay asleep, so I turned the alarm off after C got into bed with us just before T got up at 4:30am. I will try to ride tonight though. I don't honestly know that it's doing any good -- PT guy Jason told me not to increase the tension unless I can still ride at 80 rpm. That's darn fast -- at level 2 I can barely keep it in the upper 70s. But I don't feel like I'm really getting a workout. I'm a bit breathless and break out into a very light sweat, but nothing like when I used to do step aerobics.

I was so tempted to weigh myself this morning, but resisted. It's just a number. My pants aren't falling off me or too small to zip, and whatever the number is, knowing it is never a good thing for me. I want to immediately run to the kitchen if I've gained two pounds or if I've lost two pounds. I'm not sure I'll ever weigh myself again.

life is good

I feel on a pretty even keel this week. I've been trying to concentrate more on working while at work, feeling that fooling around on the computer leads to guilt, which leads to eating. Last night I had brief "what the heck" binge thoughts on the way home from work. Tuesdays are always a problem for me. Working 11:45-8:15 just screws up my eating, no matter what I've tried so far. I need to keep trying new things, I guess. Anyway, I was hungry on the way home and wavered on whether to eat or not. I really had already eaten what I'd consider a full compliment of food for the day. I had bingey thoughts. When I got home, I decided to have a smallish snack. Luckily, while I was starting to eat, R came downstairs and started talking to me. I thought "DO SOMETHING DIFFERENT!" and grabbed the paper and went upstairs with her. After my snack I was still a little bit hungry, but didn't really want to eat more (being 9pm and --okay -- feeling that I "shouldn't") so I just went to bed.

I'm feeling apprehensive about tonight -- Wednesday is another problem day for me when T goes to basketball. I'm trying to decide whether or not to take the girls to church for Ash Wednesday services. They really need a bath and I'm not sure we'd have time for both, but R asked me yesterday if we were going and said she really wanted to. How can you not take your child to church when she wants to go? Maybe we'd have time for a short bath after church.

do something different

I saw the therapist for the second time yesterday. When I mentioned that I just couldn't figure out WHY I binged or ate when I wasn't hungry, she said that it's not necessary to always try and figure out why. You just have to change the behavior. So, if the time after dinner is always a problem for me, I need to change the pattern. Instead of sitting around at the bar in the kitchen or at the dining room table reading the paper, I need to leave the room and do something different. I can't wait until the urge to binge strikes and then try to force myself not to eat -- rather I need to live "as if" -- as if I'll feel the urge every day -- and figure out how to head it off. I need to not put myself in trigger situations. It sounds so simple. I made cookies today. They were small and after I ate two, I told myself to do something different. So I left the room and foudn something else to do. It worked! The urge to eat more passed.

She also asked me to write out a detailed description of how my relationship with food would look if it were "normal". What would I be doing, what would I be eating, what would I be feeling, etc. So I need to start working on that.

day two of logging

It was interesting yesterday to log my food intake, along with my feelings and thoughts before and after eating. It's HARD to figure out what my thoughts and feelings ARE -- most of the time I just felt "hungry". I suppose that's because yesterday wasn't a day I felt a huge urge to binge. When I got home from work I did feel the urge, but I was physically hungry also. I ate a Kashi bar with a bit of peanut butter on it. I was still hungry and then ate about 6 cups of Sun Chips. It wasn't exactly mindful eating -- I was standing up and shoving them in, but I stopped there and didn't go into a full-blown binge.

A few things I've learned about myself over the past few weeks about my binge triggers:
I can't let myself get too hungry before I eat
I can't let myself get too full when I eat
I HAVE to get out of the kitchen when I feel the urge
I need to stop procrastinating and just DO whatever it is I need to do
I have to have a specific plan for what to do when I feel anxious or am in one of the above situations

I also have been thinking that I need to remind myself that just because I can have any food whenever I want it, that doesn't mean I should always eat it. It's just common sense that eating healthful foods will be better than eating crap all the time. During the legalizing stage, Evelyn Tribole and Geneen Roth recommend having lots of your previously forbidden foods around. BUT then I think they become beckoners for me. There's a big difference between longing for ice cream for days and then eating some and enjoying it and eating some just because it's in your freezer. I think for me, it would be better to wait until I have a real, true craving and then go buy the food, rather than have the cupboards full of stuff that will jump out at me when I open the cupboard door. Then I constantly second guess myself -- do I really want a Pop Tart or do I just want one because I saw the box?

the real work starts

Yesterday was disastrous. I didn't binge, exactly. It was more of a foodfest from breakfast til bedtime. I ate a normal breakfast and took some soy crisps and a Kashi bar with me to our inservice day. They gave us a snack baggie with animal crackers, peanuts, a bag of M&Ms, and a blow-pop in it. I skipped the large breakfast spread (wasn't hungry -- had just eaten). At the first breakout session I was hungry. I ate my soy crisps & Kashi bar. I still felt hungry -- ate half my peanuts and all of my animal crackers (which weren't very good). I even ate some M&Ms. Picked up a Little Debbie frosted brownie -- you know, the kind that isn't worth the calories. I was full, but not stuffed.

At lunch I had a turkey breast sandwich on a kaiser roll, about 5 Terra Chips, and some fresh fruit. I was full, but not stuffed. After the afternoon session, I picked up two cookies at snack time and ate them. I wasn't hungry and felt quite full afterward. I then ate the rest of my M&Ms, the rest of my peanuts, and my blow-pop. I felt reallllly full and promised myself I wouldn't eat dinner if I wasn't hungry. I went home and ate a dinner roll, some chicken breast, a piece of garlic bread, some salad, a chocolate chip cookie, and a small dish of ice cream. I was very full, but really not stuffed. I rode my exercise bike. While T was putting the girls to bed, I read the paper. I proceeded to eat about 5 or 6 more chocolate chip cookies. I wanted more, but stopped myself and went upstairs.

Sooooooo -- today I started logging my food on the food log from normaleating.com. I resisted, telling myself that it was too much like dieting, but I think that was just an excuse. I need to check in with my feelings before I eat, and this will force me to do so. I simply have to start doing the work. No healing is going to magically take place without some real work on my part. This can't simply be the "eat when hungry diet".

progress, not perfection

So far, my list of things I enjoy:
walking
cooking
eating (ha ha)
scrapbooking
reading
rubber stamping
going to the movies
gardening
ice skating
reading blogs
bicycling
playing cards

that's it so far. I can say that some of these aren't really things I enjoy as much as I enjoy the results -- gardening isn't fun, but I like seeing the flowers and nice yard that come of doing it. Cooking -- is it fun, or do I just like hearing people say "mmmm... this is yummy!" I can't walk, bike, or ice skate til my leg heals. I can't scrapbook or rubber stamp until I get the stuff unpacked after our move. So I guess I'd better get unpacking.

Someone posted this on the normaleating.com bb and it definitely resonated with me:

"I'd like to also add that all of my cravings for food that would constitute disordered eating are linked to one of two things and only these two things:
1. I am not expressing something that needs to be expressed.
i.e. Mad about something and not talking about it
Excited about something and not sharing it with another person
Sad about something, but not taking time to just sit and be sad without having to rush around and fix the sad.
Remembering stuff that I am trying to forget (which needs to be remembered and expressed) OR
2. I'm not taking care of meeting my needs.
i.e. like staying up late cause I don't want to miss out on anything and not getting sleep working too many hours and not taking time to play with play-doh
not getting enough hugs
not taking appropriate breaks
So the way I FLEX my EMOTIONAL MUSCLE is by finding a way to either EXPRESS what needs to be expressed, or find other non-food related solutions to getting my needs met. By the way expressing emotions doesn't always mean I'm a crying-teddy-bear-clinging-thumb-sucking-bundle-o-emotions. Some times expressing myself means playing the piano, drawing, dancing, doing my karate, writing in the Forums here with y'all. it can take many many creative forms. There are lots of outlets for self-expression."

I have definitely realized that my emotional eating mainly stems from boredom, procrastination, frustration/anger, loneliness. I can fix the first two easily -- by entertaining myself and -- for pete's sake, just buckling down and doing what needs to be done. I so often overeat when T is gone and I'm alone with the girls. I shouldn't be lonely or feel stressed -- I'm a good mom and I'm perfectly capable of taking care of them alone. I'm just lazy about doing fun things with them. I need to get over that -- they're only little once and I remember feeling so excited every time my parents would play with us.

I took R to see "Hoodwinked" on Friday -- clever movie for older kids. C definitely wouldn't have appreciated the humor. I was unpacking sb stuff before hopping on the computer. I made chocolate chip cookies this morning and one (admittedly large) one was enough. Then I ate one after lunch too -- procrastinating coming down here to unpack. I don't feel tempted to run up and eat the whole container of them, however. Progress, not perfection.

an odd realization

I almost always have problems with late afternoon and evening -- overeating and bingeing. Any time I binge, it's almost always after dinner and if I overeat at a meal, it's almost always dinner.

I think part of it is that I'm almost always STARVING by the time dinner is ready. I'm not sure how to help this problem. I've tried eating a snack if I get hungry in the afternoon, but sometimes I'm not hungry until 4 or 4:30pm, and I can't usually take a break then. Yesterday I ate some yogurt, fruit, and flaxseed meal at 5:30pm, thinking that would tide me over, but I was so hungry by the time I got home that I ate a dozen of my kids' french fries before I got my salad ready to eat. Then, in spite of being full, I kept eating until I was quite overfull -- a Pop Tart, some pie, some potato chips, some ice cream (all junk food, you'll notice). Then I felt icky and sort of bewildered as to why on earth I do this to myself.

Anyway, besides that issue, I realized that I often don't want dinner to end. I think for me, it signals that it's almost bedtime (we usually are upstairs putting our girls to bed shortly after 8pm and stay upstairs, going to bed around 9 -- dh gets up for work at 4:30 and I get up at 5:30 to exercise). Bedtime means an end to the day and I'm never ready for that. I rarely feel as though I did anything constructive or fun and I get down that life is flying by. I do work full time, which, though you could say is constructive, I don't LOVE my job. To be perfectly honest, I wish I didn't have to work -- or at least not full time. I guess life just seems a repetitive grind to me and eating both puts off going to bed and adds some excitement.

We don't usually do anything fun in the evenings. After dinner and dishes, we usually only have 30 minutes or so til the girls' bedtimes. We read the paper, open the mail, and poof! It's 8pm. Of course, none of this navel gazing would explain why I have trouble staying out of the kitchen on Saturdays. I suppose that I need to start doing fun things for myself. I guess I KNOW that, but I'm having difficulty putting it into practice. My current excuse is that it's very difficult to do anything with my leg still hurting as much as it does (not an untrue excuse). The honest truth is that I have always felt horrible guilt whenever I do something that takes away from my family.

It doesn't help that my dh has confided that though he realizes I need to have a life away from them, he feels very stressed out by taking care of the girls by himself. Guilt, guilt, guilt.

I think I will put a smallish plan into action. Each weeknight I will make the effort to either do something directly with the girls (play a game, etc) or do something I enjoy. On the weekends I will do at least one thing just for myself -- one thing -- at least once during the weekend.

catching up

I took my girls to see the movie "Curious George" last Friday. It was okay – they, of course, loved it. C giggled every time George did something cute. It was fun to listen to her. At every preview, R asked, "Mom, can we go see that movie?"

On Saturday T and I went out to eat – to Smokey Bones. YUM! I had pulled pork BBQ and it was soooo delicious! Tim had pork and brisket and said it was a tie between that and the pork as to which was better. Mmmmm…nothing like good BBQ. After dinner we went downtown to the museum to see the light show. They have three – 2 Pink Floyd and one Radiohead. We saw the Radiohead show – the CD "OK Computer". The Pink Floyd ones are laser light shows, but the Radiohead one is just a lot of pictures and computer-generated images. It was good, but some of it made me dizzy and I had to close my eyes. The music was good though.

I had PT again yesterday. I laid there tensing and relaxing my muscle with the biofeedback machine on (woo hoo…not too exciting). I had to do some leg extensions, which hurt my knee – not to mention the horrible crunching noise you can hear when I do them. Then they put me on a treadmill going backward at about .9 mph at an incline. Then I got on the exercise bike for 5 minutes. I told her I’d just ridden my exercise bike at home that morning for 30 minutes, but she just nodded and ignored me. Maybe she didn’t believe me, who knows? Finally, they iced my knee with a machine that has a big ace-bandage looking thing. It gets really, really cold. So, all in all, not too thrilling.

I just hope it works. I’m sick of walking with a cane. People stare at me and I feel very self-conscious. But I will say it’s not as bad as when I had to use a walker before I could put weight on it. Good grief – I felt about 95 years old and people REALLY stared at me then! The wheelchair was the worst – people didn’t even look at me. We went to R’s school open house and people who would have known me from the library didn’t even look at me long enough to see that they knew me! It’s funny – I guess they don’t want to stare, but I ended up feeling rather invisible yet like the "elephant in the room", if you know what I mean.

So, today is Valentine’s Day. I work until 8:15pm on Tuesday nights, so T took the morning off to spend it with me. We went to breakfast. I must say I love thick sourdough toast. He gave me some roses and a card. I gave him a card and a shirt that said something about the Seahawks being league champions. He seemed to like it. Then I came to work and they had cupcakes, chocolate, cake, cookies…it’s like a foodfest around here. T told me Ryan was taking his wife out to dinner and having flowers sent to the restaurant – for $66!! Sheesh – that’s a lot of $$$$ for something that will only live a week at most.

My doctor is sending me to a class on relieving stress. Now, why would he think I’m under stress? I hope it’s a good class. Last spring he sent me to a class on lowering your cholesterol and I could have taught the class. In fact, the teacher made some statements that were just plain wrong and I bit my lip to avoid correcting her.

T and I watched the Russell Crowe boxing movie, "Cinderella Man" the other night. It was pretty good, though it was heavy on the boxing, light on the storyline for the second half. The boxing sure was gory though – I had to close my eyes during several scenes. I don’t get boxing as a sport. How can it be entertaining to see two guys sock each other silly? I know lots of people like it though, so what do I know?

This Friday is the daddy/daughter dance at school. T and R are going to go out to dinner with his best friend Chad and his daughter Megan and then go to the dance together. We can buy ridiculously overpriced pictures (just like prom!) too. I’m sure she’ll have a great time. I, meanwhile, will stay home with the little one. I invited my parents over for dinner – haven’t seen them much since Christmas. Bad daughter.

So I haven't binged since seeing the therapist, but I've definitely overeaten at several meals or on several days. I'm trying hard not to have the "last supper" mentality. That Pop Tart/piece of chocolate/ice cream will really, honestly still be there tomorrow -- and if I can eat it whenever I want, I don't have to eat it all now, right? Evenings are hardest for me. It's almost like I don't want dinner to end because that would mean it's almost bedtime and the day is almost over and I haven't done anything fun or meaningful...day after day after day. Then again, weekends are hard too and I can do whatever I want all day. Hmm... I will have to ponder this more.

physical therapy, round two..and the depressing number on the scale

I had my first visit back to physical therapy yesterday and I'm going to spend most of my time trying to strengthen the interior quad muscle, which is depressingly concave. I'll be hooked up to a biofeedback machine that will let me retrain the muscle to fire, instead of having it laze around letting the outside quad do all the work. Then I'll spend a few minutes walking backward on a treadmill (at a snail's pace of .8 mph), which apparently also helps.

I think (dare I say it?!) that I'm finally able to ride my exercise bike without consequences, as long as I ice the heck out of my knee afterward. I've been riding for a week and a half for 30 minutes at a time, and my knee has been sore but not unbearably so. I'm really, really down about how out of shape I've gotten since July.

I weighed myself this morning and it was 158.2. Let me repeat that -- 158.2! I am shocked. I haven't weighed this much in many, many years. I broke down and went to the consignment shop yesterday to buy new pants. Apparently, I was in complete denial because I took size 8s to try on. Out of 8 pair, one fit well enough to buy. I switched to 10s and even some of those were tight. I haven't worn a size 10 for over 2 years (except my Levi 505s). I was very sad -- I am very sad. I have on a pair of size 10 pleated pants today that are really tight in the waist.

I cannot go on another diet. I simply cannot. It doesn't work, it has never worked, it never will work. I need to learn to make peace with food.

Some insight

Someone posted this on a bulletin board and OMG, it makes so much sense!

"I'm really learning something the last few days about me eating/weight obsession. Before I share, let me inform you that this is something that I've discovered before- a 'truth' that's affected the way I think and behave- but it's hit me recently again. This is a testament to the sort of upward-spiral path that recovery follows; a path that brings us back to what seems like the same place, but we are actually farther along than we were before.Anyway, when I binge/starve/obsess about my weight/search in books for the 'key' to solve my eating issues, I am trapped in a fake world that keeps me numb from the real world. This food/weight world is full of drama, it consumes my thoughts, it constricts my problems to the issues of overeating and undereating and promises me happiness and a life free from anxiety and shame and confusion when I can just find the key to set me free from bingeing. The world of food obsession is a painful place to be, because there is no way out and the script is repetitive: binge, starve, obsess, feel hopeful, control, binge, starve....When I eat according to my physical needs and don't allow myself to engage in obsessive thoughts, I am wracked with anxiety. This overwhelming anxiety is almost always the precursor to a binge. I've known this for a long time already (that anxiety leads me to binge, I binge to 'let loose') and always am convinced that the anxiety is a result of my resisting the urge to binge. Eventually, the urge is too strong and I need to give in. Now, I am really understanding that there is something other than the urge to eat (and the struggle not to give in) behind that anxiety. Sitting with this for months before every binge, every episode of overeating, it's finally starting to click. The anxiety is a result of life. This anxiety is accompanied by the fear of it. Life is painful, and confusing and overwhelming, and some things- some problems or struggles- aren't fixable in the moment. Some problems are huge, or are confusing- there are no fifteen minute fixes or even year-long fixes (ex. the pain of my sister's death). I thought that if I could just not ever binge, if i could just stop eating compulsively, I wouldn't feel confused, I wouldn't struggle, I wouldn't feel pain that couldn't be fixed, I wouldn't ever feel torn, I wouldn't make bad decisions, I wouldn't procrastinate, I wouldn't be lazy. It's not true- it's not true that life would be good if I could just stop eating compulsively. I was completing a list from Geneen Roth's book about what i would be like if I didn't have food issues. I basically thought life would be dandy. Sure, I'd have pain, but I'd be able to handle it. I would always make the right choices, I saw myself as happy and in control when I was not being compulsive about food. I read my list and recognized the 'magical thinking' laced throughout it. I've been realizing that, even without compulsive eating, I am confused about a great many things in my life. I only see these things, these real life issues, when I don't allow myself to binge and get caught up in food obsession. The last few days I have been sitting with the discomfort of feeling like I don't have the answer to my struggles with spirituality right now. I hate not knowing what I believe. It's incredibly stressful and I hate it and I want it fixed and I'm tempted to binge so I don't have to feel so upset by it and can just focus on food obsession. I can't fix my spiritual search in one day, there are no quick fixes. That is painful. That's hard to accept. It's the truth though. No matter how perfectly I eat, that issue will still continue to be an area in my life in which i'm struggling right now. My living situation is causing a great deal of stress right now as well. Though I'm working on a solution and trying to figure out how to set better boundaries, it's a tricky situation and won't be solved in 15 minutes. It causes me great anxiety but bingeing about it so I don't feel it removes me from the discomfort of real life and leaves me with the discomfort of my pseudo-life of food obsession.Even without compulsive eating in my life, i will still struggle with procrastination sometimes. I often blame laziness on my eating, on being full after a binge. "When I eat perfectly", i tell myself, "I'll be happy and passionate and energized and always want to work". I guess what I'm realizing is that there is pain in revolving my life around food obsession, but there is also pain in everyday life. I know I've recognized this before, but it's hitting a new level with me. I guess I'm realizing that, even though i have some real-life-issues that seem unsolvable or confusing or just plain stressful, eating doesn't help. Bingeing just shifts my focus from real life onto food obsession and gets me nowhere except back on the hamster wheel. I don't know if any of this makes sense...it just comes down to me realizing that I can either live in a made-up world, or in the real world. And also that, my life without food compulsion is still the same life, just without food compulsion. My life will always have struggles and I will always be human and experience good and bad emotions- it's my choice whether I feel them and deal with them and accept them or whether I numb myself out. The problem with compulsion is that when I numb myself to life's crappy moments, I numb myself to the experience of real pleasure and joy too.

Saw Dr M on Monday

Dr M was encouraged by the progress I've had since my last visit. He said the loose PCL can't really be fixed without surgery, but mine is "grade 1" (grade 3 is the worst) so it can be helped by strengthening the quad muscle. The crunching in my knee is due to roughness on the back of the kneecap and may go away as I use my leg more and more. If it doesn't, they can smooth it with some surgery. He said to keep doing the straight leg raises -- as many as 200 a day. Yikes -- I've been doing about 36 every other day. I can ride the bike as long as my knee doesn't swell to much and as long as I ice it afterward. Yeah, like that's going to happen.

I did ride the bike for 15 minutes on Sunday and it was okay. My knee was quite sore Monday and Tuesday, but that may have been due to all of the walking I did without my cane over the weekend. I only used it at work. I'm going to try and ride tonight after dinner and then ice it.

Eating is okay. I continue to be amazed at how little food it takes to satisfy hunger. We had pierogies and chicken, broccoli, and bread sticks the other night. I took two pierogies, about 3 bites of chicken, a cup of broccoli, and a bread stick. I was stuffed! Now, if I could only get rid of the damn sweet tooth. I'm always too full to eat dessert, but eat it anyway or I feel deprived. How can I overcome this? I love dessert and would rather eat it than dinner. I did eat a small piece of cheesecake for a snack in the afternoon the other day (I was hungry), knowing that I'd be too full to eat it after dinner. I still WANTED a dessert after dinner though. I ate a small piece of dark chocolate and part of C's Hostess cupcake.

I know the emphasis right now is not supposed to be on losing weight, but I am so tempted to count calories. I feel so hugely fat. I know many women would love to be my size, but after being so small for so long, I feel gigantic. I feel self conscious all the time about my size. Every time I look in the mirror, I have "bad body thoughts" and I can't seem to short circuit them. Buying larger pants would help. My size 6s are so tight as to be uncomfortable.

A nice Sunday

I've been having a rather lazy day, which is nice for a change. Last night T and I watched the DVD "Mad Hot Ballroom", about NYC kids in a ballroom dance competition. It was very cute.

I hopped on the exercise bike today for about 6 minutes and I was whipped! Good grief, my aerobic capacity has gone straight down the tubes since I broke my leg. My leg muscles were hurting and I was getting out of breath. If my knee doesn't swell up like a balloon, I'll get back on tomorrow for 10 minutes.

I feel terribly fat. I looked in the mirror before my shower and was so down about what I saw there. My jeans were incredibly tight on Friday night -- and those were my previously baggy size 10s. I'm trying not to hate my body, but I feel as though I'm fighting a losing battle in that regard. It's enough to make me want to start counting calories again. BUT I WILL NOT!! I am going to beat this #$*^%($#) eating disorder if it's the last thing I do!

I tried some "self care" today -- watched 2 episodes of "Lost" on DVD, sat around reading the paper, did my leg exercises, and now I'm on the computer. It's nice, though I feel as though I'm neglecting the girls.

Okay...one day at a time

I've had one binge in the past 2+ weeks -- a definite improvement. I've actually only overeaten a few times and had a few times when I ate something when I wasn't hungry. I'm still sort of waiting for the other shoe to drop. It seems as though I can eat like a normal person for a stretch and the the pressure just builds up until I explore in an eating frenzy.
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Well, I started this post on Thursday. It's now Saturday and the other shoe did drop. Yesterday I woke up and somehow I just knew I'd binge. I'd been feeling that way ever since Thursday. I fought the urge all Thursday evening and ate 1/2 a Hostess cupcake, a few graham crackers, and a smore after dinner, but managed not to have more than that. Then Friday, I just fell apart. I didn't work (since I'm working today) and I had my usual breakfast, then added 2 Pop Tarts, a Hostess cupcake, some jello cheesecake pie, some more graham crackers with peanut butter and as smores... that might be all. I felt overfull.

I went off to see "Brokeback Mountain" with Jacque V and Ruth G at 10am. They had popcorn and candy, but I wasn't even tempted. After the movie, we went over to The Pita House for lunch. I wasn't really hungry. I had a brief struggle (internally) over eating, but I felt that since I had suggested the restaurant it would be weird if I didn't eat. If I were to be 100% honest, I'd also have to admit that I didn't want to "miss out" on eating there. I ordered a chicken kebab pita and ate the whole thing, along with parts of Jacque and Ruth's giant cookies. As Geneen Roth points out, if you don't wait until you're hungry to eat, you have no cue of when to stop. I probably wouldn't have eaten even half of the pita had I been hungry and stopped when I wasn't hungry anymore.

In the evening we went out to celebrate Ryan's birthday. We had dinner at the Rio Grande Steakhouse. I was hungry, but had a heck of a time decided what to get. I really just wanted some fries and a piece of bread. I would have felt strange just getting that, so I ordered a mug of chili too. They brought the chili first. It was good and if I had just eaten half of it, I wouldn't have needed another thing. I ate the whole thing, a piece of bread, and the fries. I was stuffed. Then we went to Ryan and Carey's for chat and games. I guess I figured "what the heck?" and managed to down a giant piece of birthday cake, 2 peanut butter chocolate bar cookies, several macadamia nuts covered with chocolate and several chips & dip. I felt rather sick.

It's obvious that, though I think I have legalized all foods, I definitely haven't. Otherwise, I'd have been able to skip lunch, eat just the fries I wanted, and skip all the food at Ryan and Carey's house.

Today I "started over", so to speak. I had my ww tortilla with LC cheese and turkey breast for breakfast, and packed a lunch of a large salad with some turkey breast and cheese on top, and a snack of jello cheesecake, vanilla yogurt, a banana, and a few strawberries. I was quite hungry at midmorning and thought about the bagels June brings every Saturday. I decided I'd rather eat the snack instead and eat a bagel in the afternoon if I got hungry. That worked out because I always feel stressed out if I don't eat all the food I bring. I know that sounds idiotic, but it's true. At lunch, I was not hungry anymore after my salad, but ate some soy crisps anyway. It was okay though.

Eating in the Light of the Moon

Someone on a bb I read posted this from the book Eating in the Light of the Moon and it really resonated with me:

Addiction keeps us from being fully present in the moment with ourselves, our feelings, our friends, our lovers, or with whomever or whatever might have captured our attention. Instead, we find ourselves agonizing over how many calories we ate earlier in the day. Rather than being in contact with life, we withdraw from it, into our obsessive thoughts about binging and dieting. By putting our energies into planning that next binge or preparing for the next diet, we remove ourselves from the present

So true -- so many times I eat to put off doing something or remove myself from a stressful situation. On Wednesday night I was so stressed out about T being at basketball. I had to take the girls to Pizza Hut and grocery shop with them by myself. C wouldn't eat, I had an entire medium sized pizza looking at me, and when we got home the girls needed baths. I so wanted to EAT! At PH I ate only one piece of pizza, though I picked a bit at the girls' personal pan pizzas. I was satisfied after my salad and one piece of pizza, but resisting eating more was difficult. I didn't want dinner to end because it would mean going to the grocery store. Ugh. Then when we got home the girls went upstairs to bathe and I stayed downstairs. I really wanted to just sit and relax but knew I should be upstairs washing hair and keeping an eye on the kids. I wanted to eat everything in the cupboard. I opened the door about 5 times, and ate two potato chips. Then I told myself that if I binged, I wouldn't enjoy the food, I'd still have to go upstairs, and I'd be upset and feeling horrid. I calmly sat with one Twinkie and a cup of hot chocolate and slowly ate and read the paper. Then I went upstairs and bathed the girls and put them to bed. I felt so good about not giving in to my urge to stuff myself.

More from the book:

To recover from disordered eating, we must be willing to go beyond food itself to discover the presence of the real hunger that underlies the urge to eat compulsively. With disordered eating behaviour, our true needs and innermost desires are hidden behind urges that only symbolize those real needs and desires. When we are engaged in addictive eating, that is the time to look for what the real hunger is because that is the moment in which it gets presented to us in its symbolic form. By simply eliminating certain foods or striving to restrict our behavior, we deprive ourselves of opportunities to learn of the true meanings behind those symbols. Someone who is addicted to eating is actually starving on an emotional and spiritual level. Her longing for food is a longing for emotional and spiritual nourishment. It is often a longing for the ideal mother, the archetypal Good Mother who nourishes us, soothes us, and loves and accepts us just the way we are. Frequently, this is the "something" she searches for as she stands in front of the fridge. This is what she is really in pursuit of when she sets out for the grocery store. No matter how much ice-cream she eats, how many cookies she consumes or muffins she devours, she cannot fulfill this longing because she is filling her stomach, not her heart, not her spirit. For a woman to recover from disordered eating, she must recognize that she is starving. She needs to understand that the food she requires is not material food. She must be able to name her hunger and recognize its symbolic nature in order to nourish herself.

I think the thing is that I can recognize that I feel anxious, but I don't know how to get behind (beneath?) the anxiety and find out what is causing it.

Geneen Roth is a genius

I swear Geneen Roth is writing directly to me (or about me) in some parts of her book. I had three or four great days of conscious eating and then I suddenly freaked out on Wednesday and had a big binge. WTF? I'm so angry with myself -- not because I binged so much as because I was very aware it was happening and I didn't take any of the steps that one is supposed to take in that particular situation. I printed out the steps and stuck them in the drawer to pull out next time. If I am not willing to do the work to heal, I am never going to heal.

I saw a counselor on Tuesday morning about my compulsive eating. She says I should try to get the HMO to refer me to a psychiatrist because a generalist just isn't going to cut it. She feels that I have a bit of obsessive/compulsive disorder, mild depression, and an eating disorder and could benefit for medication for anxiety and some psychiatric sessions. I made an appointment for my yearly checkup so we shall see. If worse comes to worse, I will bumble along until open enrollment, switch to a PPO and make the damn appointment myself!

C starts gymnastics tomorrow. I asked if she wanted me or T to take her and she said me. She told me, "I don't like daddy very well. He drives me crazy!"

good weekend

I had a good weekend. I started re-reading Geneen Roth's book and taking notes on it to re-read (and re-read and re-read). I really concentrated this weekend on not overeating and sitting down when I do eat. I realized how many times I pop something into my mouth while standing up. I really made a conscious effort to sit before eating and it made me not eat quite often because I'd think, "I am NOT going to sit down to eat one potato chip. I'll just have some the next time I'm hungry." Of course, when I was actually hungry potato chips weren't what I wanted to eat at all.

One of my coworkers always brings bagels in to work on Saturdays and there are always some left over. I've never taken any home because you know -- too many calories, can't eat those..blah blah. Well, I took three home on Saturday. R and I each had on Sunday morning for breakfast and I sat down and thoroughly enjoyed it. I was full til after 1pm. I felt anxious when it got to be lunchtime and I wasn't hungry, but told myself that the food in the kitchen wasn't going anywhere and I could eat when I got hungry. I ate the second bagel for breakfast today, but had to eat it while multi-tasking, since I was getting my lunch ready and getting my kids ready at the same time. I definitely didn't enjoy it nearly as much -- and what's worse -- I sat in the van on the way to work feeling unsatisfied and wishing I had something to eat! Just goes to show you what mindful eating will do...

I didn't play with the girls for an hour, but did make some time to unpack boxes downstairs AND asked T to help so I wouldn't feel resentful. The whole family played Candyland after dinner, which kept me out of the kitchen and kept me from even being tempted to cruise the cupboards or fridge.

intimacy issues

Well, I told T last night that I feel I subconsciously keep people at arm's length to prevent myself from being hurt. I think sometimes I cook, bake, or eat to put off playing with my kids, calling a friend, or being with T. That sounds so sad. The guilt probably compounds the problem. It's rather sick, however, when I realize on a Saturday that I've spend several hours in the kitchen -- hours I could have been playing Candyland or making love.

I made an appointment with the Employee Assistance Center for this Tuesday. She said for eating disorders they usually refer you and work with your insurance. Well, that should be interesting since the HMO has their own counselors and I've already met with the one at our health center. She was absolutely no help whatsoever. I saw in the paper a blurb about a support group for eating disorders that meets twice a month. I called for info and had to leave a message on their answering machine. If it's a group that is honestly trying to get better, I'd like to go. I don't want to go listen to a bunch of whiners who aren't actually trying to do anything about their problems. That's harsh -- especially since I'm sort of one of them. I've almost finished reading Geneen Roth's book on overcoming compulsive eating, yet yesterday when impulse struck, I ate -- even though I was totally aware of what I was doing.

I didn't even try to figure out why I had the urge. I was planning the binge in the car on the way home from lunch with Barb, Gail, and Jacque. I don't get it. Yes, I was very hungry on the way to lunch. But she served us a delicious, healthy lunch. I didn't overeat and I wasn't hungry. I felt like I might be getting hungry, but wasn't yet. Even so I ate until I had that slightly sick, too full tummy feeling -- a couple of brownies, a bunch of soy crisps, a bunch of organic animal crackers, a piece of crustless pumpkin pie with fat-free Cool Whip, 2 Hershey kisses, and a few potato chips. Then I promised myself I wouldn't eat again until I was hungry. I drove off to the Girl Scout cookie sale meeting, only to find that I had the wrong day. When I got home the family was eating pizza. I ate a piece, another brownie, a few more cookies, two more Hershey kisses, and a cup of hot chocolate. ARGH.

So, I have the day off tomorrow. My goal is to play with my girls for at least one hour and lay around with T during C's naptime and make love if we didn't do it in the a.m. AND to only eat when I'm hungry and stop when no longer hungry (as opposed to "full").

Holidaze

The "holidays" have passed in a haze of too much food and not enough relaxation. The new pants I bought just 3 weeks ago are tight. ARGH!! My knee still hurts like heck and it still swells up like a balloon when I try to ride the exercise bike. I rode for 8 minutes the day after Christmas and it hurt even worse than usual for 3 days, as well as swelling up horribly.

I can't even say Christmas was fun. I felt fat and awful. I spent part of Christmas Day addressing our New Year's cards and since I felt so sorry for myself, I ate about four pieces of fudge and 12 frosted cut-out cookies, as well as an assortment of other food. At dinner at my parents' house I ate so much I actually felt sick. It's been a long, long time since that has happened. I checked out Geneen Roth's book on compulsive eating from the library. I nod and think "yes!" and "that makes total sense" about everything I read -- yet I can't manage to put it into practice. I think it's because I'm not willing to give up trying to lose weight and truly allow myself to eat anything I want. I'm too afraid of gaining yet more weight.

Feeling hopeful...

I have been so frustrated by not being able to exercise, so I ordered 3 chair dancing DVDs from Amazon.com this week. Reviews assure the reader that it really is a good workout, so here's hoping.

T and I went to CORE on November 5, which was fairly enjoyable, but I'm getting sick and tired of some of the couples' making little digs at each other. Have they learned nothing from Retrouvaille?!? It's embarrassing to listen to.

T took the girls to see "Chicken Little" while I worked during the day on the 5th. He said it was cute -- the girls, of course, loved it. R mentioned casually that she was thinking of asking Santa for Harry Potter or Hermione's wand. I panicked, but after googling "Harry Potter wand" and finding a very cool online store, I'm thinking I need to reinforce her suggestion.

Sunday we went to the mall to have C's third year portraits taken. They actually turned out darling! I was amazed. I went into a couple of stores, but by then T was completely stressed out by being in the mall and my knee was sore. It was really sore by Tuesday afternoon. Ugh. I feel scared that it will always be this way and I'll never walk normally again. I can take a few lurching steps without the crutches, but my leg feels as though it's bending the wrong way or buckling or something. My knee always hurts. Surely by spring, when it's completely healed, it won't be sore anymore? I will feel awful if I can't do aerobics ever again, but I suppose as long as I can do the elliptical and walk I'll survive. As long as it doesn't hurt and I don't limp permanently.

Happy Halloween!

I'm happy T will be going to R's halloween party at school. I know he values his time to himself on his day off, but your kids are only little once.

On Saturday we went out to Lowell to go to the haunted showboat. R was very excited, but they closed early because "no one had come for a while". She was so disappointed she was almost crying. The annoying thing was that we had already paid and they closed while we were getting our faces painted. We got our money back, but mom was really upset. She said she was going to write a letter to the paper. Then our bad experience continued as we had dinner at "The Big Dish". It took 75 minutes to get our food, some of it was lukewarm, and some of it was wrong. What a day. We had carved pumpkins in the morning and I have to give T credit -- he did 99.9% of the work.

Yesterday I worked. Haiden came over to play all afternoon and ate dinner with us. T had a great time teasing her. His basketball was canceled, and we planned to watch "Hotel Rwanda" after the girls were in bed. Ha Ha. He was asleep before 8pm and I think I might have made it until 10, reading in bed. We're such a wild couple...

I dressed as Winnie the Pooh today. I'm ROASTING, but the kids' reactions are worth it.

the big bet

T and I started a bet today, to end December 2. Whomever loses the largest percentage of body weight wins. The loser has to plan a date for us. I think we'll be winners no matter what, but he is so competitive this should be fun. I'll be happy if I lose 5 pounds, though it would be fabulous to lose more.

I've gained 12 pounds since my lowest weight after getting out of the hospital. I did so well with eating until I could get out of bed and walk again. Since then I somehow totally lost control of my emotional issues and I'm at my highest weight in 2 1/2 years! I need to lose 14 pounds to get to my lowest weight and I'd love to lose 20, just to see how I look. Somehow I don't know that I'd ever get that low, but I never thought I'd see 136 and I did it for my 40th birthday -- so you never know.

It's frustrating not being able to exercise much right now, so I'm really going to have to watch my portion sizes and try and eat extremely healthfully. I hopped on the exercise bike for 23 minutes this morning on level 2 -- that's as high as I can go without my knee hurting. I'll be able to go to Novacare this afternoon, so I'll ride their bike for 20 more minutes. I can usually do level 3 on theirs without pain, but I think I'll stick with 2. I don't want to overdo and be sorry tomorrow. My leg seems as though it's definitely getting stronger since my disastrous one-crutch experiment, so I can't take a chance on screwing it up again.

C's Birthday Party

C turned 3 yesterday and her party went swimmingly. We had 18 for dinner -- Mom E, Dad E, Mom M, Dad M, Julie, Cade, Caleb, Doug, Ellen, Rachael, Chele, Matt, T, R, C, me, Michael, and Kim. I had made spaghetti sauce on Monday, Mom M made a huge tossed salad, Mom E made a huge fresh fruit salad, Julie brought bruschetta, Ellen brought a veggie tray, and I made garlic bread. We had a TON of food left over. I had baked a chocolate cake with peanut butter Oreo frosting for Matt and C had chosen a white Dora the Explorer cake with white frosting. It was darling. We had ice cream too of course.

C had a zillion gifts and after she opened them she handed them to whomever had given them to her. This morning she came downstairs and said, "MOM! Everyone forgot their presents!" I explained that the gifts were FROM those people and she was happy and wanted to start playing. We gave her a book (How Do Dinosaurs Eat Their Food?), a DVD (the 10th anniversary of the first Toy Story), a little doghouse with a stuffed puppy, bone, food dish, and ball, Ariel pajamas, and a Dora the Explorer backback. Mom and Dad M gave her a backyard treehouse for her talking Dora house, the nursery for the house, and some other accesories for the house. They also gave her a stuffed animal, a net and chain to hold stuffed animals, a doll playpen, a bee change purse, and $50. Ellen and Doug and family gave her a big box of Duplos, Michael and Kim gave her a Dora bath toy, and Julie and family gave her a play vet kit. R gave her a little fairy with "October" stitched on it. She chose it from her own dolls, and wrapped it herself. It was very sweet.

Caleb is the sweetest, happiest little 3-month-old. He contentedly sat on anyone's lap who wanted him. R had a great time holding him a few times, and she was very nice playing with Cade. We're going to drive over the Grand Ledge on Wednesday so we can see Chris and Jacob. R can't wait to see Jacob.

I've been trying to research digital cameras, but it's totally mind-boggling and confusing to look at the different features and try to decide what to buy. I think I'll look at Consumer Reports -- or maybe wait until they come out with ratings on the 2006 models -- if they do, that is.

saw the doctor yesterday

Dr M said I just need to be patient and let my leg heal when I told him about my disasterous experiment trying to graduate to one crutch. The x-ray looked good and I didn't screw anything up. There's a horrible crunching sound in my knee when I do a leg extension and he doesn't quite know what it is. It could be a ligament rubbing or the hardware in there. He said we just have to see if it goes away or not. He seemed a bit puzzled by the fact that my knee hurts so much, especially when I do a leg extension.

He was thrilled with my flexion, however. They had measured it at 128 degrees at Novacare on Friday and he said he never thought I'd get that much bend in it with the severity of the injury combined with the closeness to the joint. That made me happy, yet made me sad. That means it is unlikely I'll get much more bend out of it, and will never again be able to sit cross-legged on the floor or crouch down to tie a shoe. I'm trying to be thankful that I can walk, ride a bike, etc., but I still mourn the loss of flexibility I had before. T and I went to see the movie "A History of Violence" on Saturday and there was a scene when the wife seduced the husband. She was on top of him and all I could think was, "I wonder if I'll ever be able to do that again?" I forgot to ask the doctor if it was safe to kneel (like in church) on it. I imagine it would hurt.

Our neighborhood had its first block party on Sunday afternoon and it was a lot of fun. We got to meet several neighbors for the first time, and everyone was very nice. There are three little girls in the neighborhood that are close to C's age, which is great. R had a great time -- carved a pumpkin, dunked for apples, and ate too many desserts. C also had a great time.

Tomorrow is C's third birthday. I spend the morning wrapping presents and baking a cake. She chose a Dora the Explorer cake from Meijer, but since we're also celebrating Matt's birthday with the family I had to bake one too. I'll have to zip to Meijer in the morning to get a small cake to take to C's daycare. We somehow ended up with 19 people coming to dinner! Julie is in town from Seattle with Cade and Caleb, Ellen's whole family is coming, both sets of parents, and Michael and Kim. I made a double recipe of spaghetti sauce last night, so I'm not quite as stressed out as I'd normally feel. Mom is making a tossed salad, T's mom is making something with fruit, and Ellen and Julie may bring something, so I think we'll have enough food.

Our weekend

Not much excitement over the weekend -- R had soccer Saturday and I worked. In the evening R went to "Little Cats Night" at the local high school. The cheerleaders have a fundraiser some Saturday evenings for kids K-gr6. They babysit and entertain the kids from 6-9pm for $6. R swam, ate pizza and several desserts, and got her face and arms painted. She had a wonderful time. While she was there, T and I took C to Burger King for dinner and to play for a while. She also had a wonderful time.

On Sunday we took the kids to The Country Basket to pick out pumpkins. They were ecstatic because they got to pet a kitten. Now R is on her "I wish we had a kitten" kick again. We got apples and freshly made donuts too. To be honest, the donut wasn't that great -- definitely not worth the calories. I hate when that happens.

busy weekend

R had a soccer game Saturday morning. I didn't go -- had an appointment to get my hair cut & colored at noon and didn't want to get too tired. I had to go to someone different and she cut it too short and colored it too dark. Oh well.

Saturday evening we went to Dan & Megan's wedding. It was a very short wedding and the reception was a the Van Andel Museum. It was a lovely place to have a reception -- cold though. They had beautiful huge bouquets on the tables -- white hydangeas, white roses, and some other white flower I didn't recognize. T got quite toasted -- he was dancing with four or five women at one point. We sort of danced a couple of slow dances. My ankle was hugely swollen by the time we left around 11:30. It was fun though. We sat with TJ & Lisa, Ryan and Carey, Steve, and someone who didn't show up.

Sunday I worked. It was busy and my knee ached by the time I was done. We went out to Sears after I got home to buy me an exercise bike. T already put it together. I'm afraid to overdo, so I only rode 5 minutes today -- just to warm up before doing my exercises. After Sears we drove out to Logan's to meet Michael & Kim for dinner. I managed to stick to mostly healthy choices, but ate two rolls.

Yesterday after work I went to Novacare to work out. Jason was too busy to help me much, but he measured my knee angle -- still 120 degrees. I rode the bike for 2 15-minute segments and the area of my tibia break started hurting when I tried to go up to level 3. I turned it down to 1 and it seemed to be okay. I've been really concentrating on trying to keep most of my weight off the crutches. Maybe it's working -- this morning I managed to walk around for a while with only one crutch! I'm beginning to believe that I really will walk without help again.

I don't know what is wrong with me though -- I ate lunch and then polished off the goldfish crackers, the pretzels, a bunch of spray cheese, and a small bowl of ice cream. ARGH! I'm beginning to wonder what on earth it is. While I was confined to bed I did so well -- ate very small portions and lost 10 pounds. I've gained it all back though. I can't seem to stop myself. Before my accident I thought it was work. I definitely don't love my job and feel sort of stuck in it. I don't hate it, but don't enjoy it like I used to. I feel very pulled in many directions between working full time, running a household, having a husband, having 2 kids, and trying to have a social life too. But I really missed work while I was off. Besides, I've had a bingeing problem off and on since I was 13 or so. I try to stop and think about what I'm feeling when I get the urge, but even if I can pinpoint my feelings, it doesn't help. The only thing that has really helped is to leave the situation. Next time I am going to make a concerted effort to walk away and get involved in something else when I get that urge. I don't want to gain back all the weight I've lost!

last physical therapy visit

I wrote a note to Dr. M asking him to increase my work hours to 20-25 a week and he did -- yea! He shook his head and sighed over the therapy issue and dictated a letter to the HMO. It probably won't do any good, but it is very nice of him to try.

I practiced walking today and Jason told me to try and develop a smoother gait, not worrying about how fast I'm going. I need to start standing with equal weight on both legs, instead of putting most of my weight on my good leg. I also need to spend some time each day shifting my weight from leg to leg to build up to putting all of my weight on my bad leg. He said I won't be able to walk without crutches until I can balance on my bad leg with all of my weight on it. I stood on the scale there and was able to put 135 pounds on my leg, which is only 10 pounds shy of all my weight. That was good, since on Monday I only put 75 pounds on it. My knee hurts like heck tonight. I always worry that I'm pushing it too far and I'll mess up the healing process.

I rode the bike for 11 minutes and then 12 minutes. I almost broke a sweat. He said I can add a few minutes each day unless my knee starts hurting too much or getting too swollen. Sears has an exercise bike on sale til Tuesday and I think I want to go and try it out. I need to have one at home.

Betty came to clean today -- I love coming home to a clean house! I feel as though I'm ripping her off only paying her $45. I'm definitely going to keep her even after I'm better.

Feeling better today

I felt so depressed yesterday -- I couldn' t summon the energy to do anything. I found out that tomorrow is my last day of physical therapy and the HMO is refusing to extend my benefits. In fact, Dr. Kerby apparently said that in his 20 years there, no one has ever had benefits extended. I find that difficult to believe. So anyway, I'm being left twisting in the wind when I'm not even walking unassisted yet. I feel frightened. Jason (the physical therapist I've been seeing this week) says I can pay $40 to work out there for a month and he can provide me with some guidance, but it won't be like he is my therapist. At least I can do that, but I feel rather discouraged. My foot is still so sore to walk on, my calf muscle is still so tight all morning, and my knee still doesn't bend much past 100 degrees without a lot of stretching. There's no way I can do the kind of stretching at home that the therapists do. I'm beginning to be scared that I'm never again going to be able to sit cross-legged -- or even put my sock on without a struggle.

I just called the after-school care program to tell them R wouldn't be there today or tomorrow and Crystal said, "Oh, I'm sorry she won't be here -- she's such a great little girl. Give her a hug for me and tell her we miss her". Wow -- that's nice to hear. She is a sweetheart. I worry sometimes -- okay, a lot -- that I'm doing more bawling her out than praising her. Actually I worry more that I don't spend enough quality time with her. Even now that I'm working only 12 hours a week I somehow don't have time to do fun things with my girls. How can that be?!? Somehow I have got to carve out more time with them. Poor C has been so neglected. At least R had a few years when T worked nights and we'd do lots of fun things while he slept during the day on the weekends.

When I'm walking again, I'm going to make some concrete plans to spend several hours on my weekends off just playing games, coloring, scrapbooking, cooking, and doing other things they like with them. Life has to be about more than work and household chores, but somehow that's all my life has become in the past few years. Well, that and exercise before mid July. I need to shift my priorities in that respect too. I was spending way too much time exercising just to be able to eat junk. That is totally screwed up.

At home today

I'm at home today, fighting the desire to go eat everything in the kitchen. Sigh. I feel so out of shape. I can't wait until I'm walking again so I can buy an exercise bike. I'm avoiding the scale for now. I saw the physical therapist yesterday and he was very pleased with my progress. He thinks I'll be able to give up the crutches in a week. Oh, I so hope he is right! I know that exercising again after 3 months will be worse than starting from where I was 2 years ago -- at least then I'd been walking fairly regularly. Now I laid in a hospital bed for 8 weeks, and sat around for 4 more.

Having Claudia here for the weekend was so lovely. She is one of my dearest friends, even though we go years without seeing each other. When we do see each other, it's like we just start off where we left off and we're very comfortable with each other. I wish we lived closer together. We couldn't do much with me on crutches, but we went to R's soccer game on Saturday and then to her school carnival. She took R to the mall and bought her two outfits and a dog from Build-a-Bear. They had dinner together too. T and I went to CORE to hear a speaker talk on communication. It was very interesting, but not too applicable to our everyday lives as a couple. There was a great turnout -- probably 12 couples. That was awesome to see.

On Sunday we went to Anna's House for breakfast, and then met my parents at Meijer Gardens. They've done a lot of work at the gardens since I was there a few years ago and it is really an incredible place to visit now. I did a bit too much walking and had to get a wheelchair. Thankfully, my knee didn't swell up any more than usual. We weren't hungry til dinner, so we drove up to Rockford to eat at Sam's Joint and get ice cream at Rocky's. There was definitely an eating theme to our weekend. T was working overtime and then went to play basketball, so wasn't with us. On Monday morning we took Claudia to The Garden Cafe for breakfast before her flight. When R came home from school she told us that she had started crying on the way to school because she didn't want Claudia to go back home. I'm so glad she now has a godmother she knows and loves instead of just a godmother who is a voice on the phone who sends her packages in the mail.

Friday was our tenth anniversary, but we didn't do anything to celebrate because of Claudia's arrival. We'll celebrate in a couple of weeks. We did exchange cards and T wrote the sweetest note in mine about having found true love twice in a lifetime with the same person, thanks to me and Retrouvaille. I'm beginning to think that someday I may be able to live without doubts about us. He's been so great this summer, never blaming me for my accident (even though it was alllll my fault!) I'm not sure I could have done the same had the situation been reversed. Well, R is due home any second and we have to go pick up C from daycare. She's staying with us tonight instead of going to T's parents' house. It will be a trial run for me to make sure I can get her up and dressed and to daycare by myself on a day when I work. I think it will be okay.