Today, I cried about pants.

Pants are important to women.  Today, I cried about pants.  Oh, it wasn't the first time.  Usually when I cry about pants, it's because my favorite pants no longer acquiesced (had to look that up to check the spelling) to my ever-expanding waistline.  Not many things are more depressing than the day you can't button your favorite pants.   The tears didn't fall just because the pants didn't fit.  It was thump-on-the-head reality check that I was eating WAY too much and I was not getting away with it.  At church today, Pastor Don reminded us that we can't hide anything from God.  Pants are like God.  We can't hide anything from our pants.

After a frustrating time shopping for shirts at Old Navy yesterday, I headed to the mall today in search of shopping joy.  Once inside Macy's, I didn't even wander into the fat woman section.  I told myself that I wouldn't buy anything unless it was from the misses section and thus, expected to leave empty-handed.  I spotted some super cute shirts and started with those.  I grabbed the biggest size (18) and headed for the dressing room.  Now, for those that don't know, 18 is generally the largest misses size, and the smaller plus size.  However, an 18 misses is cut way different than an 18 plus. It's actually a lot smaller.  With my ample bosom, I normally have to buy a 20 plus size shirt so it fits my chesticles.  I didn't have much faith that this cute peasant top would even get past my shoulders.  Imagine my surprise when it slipped effortlessly onto my body!  I stared at myself in the mirror forever, moving my arms around, waiting for that telling pull that says "uh, you got it on.. doesn't mean it fits."  But the pull never happened!!!!  Man... I was outta control with happiness.  I was so confident, in fact, that I would take a leap of faith straight into the world of pants.

The first thing that greeted me in the pants section were several leg-only mannequins standing on a table and sporting the latest looks from Calvin Klein on their size 0 plastic asses.  Ish.  No can do.  I found a rack of Levis and started there.  The biggest size was a 16.  Shit.  Eh, what do I have to lose.  So I headed back to the dressing room and joy of all joys....THEY FIT!!!!  Not perfectly...the rise was too high for my liking and my rear looked flat instead of fab, but I did not encounter ANY resistance from the fly.  Total cooperation!  We were a pants team!  I was one with the pants!  Still, the style wasn't what I was looking for and since my confidence had increase exponentially, I was ready to battle Calvin.

As I plowed through the piles of jeans looking for a 16, (if they'd hang the damn things up it would be easier to find!!!) I spotted two sales associates standing in the petite section chatting.  (Going to digress here for a sec.)  I thought it was interesting that the whole time I was in the Calvin Klein/Lucky Brand section, nobody offered any assistance.  In the fat woman section, I'd usually have someone, eventually, ask if I was doing ok in my shopping.  But not this time.  It was weird.  I can speculate on the reasons why, but that would require me to put myself down.  Can't do that.

Anyhoo!  Oh happy day, I found a 16!  I held them up and thought...."um, no way these are going to fit", but I headed back to the dressing room anyway.  On the way, I spotted an A-DORABLE Lucky Brand shirt.  I've always liked that brand.  Thought their clothes were totally cute and, if I wasn't so fat, that would be my style.  But they're more like a junior cut.  (Yano, made for chicks with no boobs and no hips.)  Oh, what the hell...I'll try that on, too.  Wasting no time (for me, any hesitation means failure to act completely) I went back to the dressing room and said a little prayer (yes, I pray about pants, too).  One leg in... hmm... that feels pretty good.  Two legs in...we could have something here.  UP AND OVER..then the big test...button time....holy MaryMotherOfGod they fit!!!  They actually fit!!!  Oh man...this is some good stuff.  I did the obligatory half-turn-looking-over-shoulder maneuver to check out my rear.  Oh heeeeeeyyyy!!!!  That's my ass!  That's MY ass in a pair of size 16 not-from-the-fat-woman-section, modeled-by-a-size-0-mannequin Calvin Klein jeans!!!!  And so began the waterworks.  I was crying about pants again.

But I wasn't really crying about pants.  I was crying about a thump-on-the-head reality check that everything I've been doing for the last 8 weeks was paying off.  Every time I went to the gym even when I didn't want to.  Every time I ate a spinach salad with grilled chicken instead of the bacon cheeseburger I was coveting in my heart.  That stuff and much more were the reasons I could wear those pants,  not the pants themselves.  I couldn't blame the old pants for being too small, so these pants don't get the credit for my hard work.  I'm taking it all!

P.S.  Oh yeah, what happened with the A-DORABLE Lucky Brand shirt?  Ten more pounds and you're mine, bish.

Up...down... up.... down... and am I really supposed to be doing it like this??

I feel like my body is revolting.  No, well, yes, it isn't pleasant to look at but I don't mean that kind of revolting this time.  I feel like my body was perfectly happy the way it was and I'm really pissing it off with all this fitness crap.  For the last two weeks, I've been up and down 2 to 2.5 lbs and it's making me a crazy person.  See, the last time I tried to lose weight seriously, I lost 16 pounds in 6 weeks doing this:

• Cut out most sugar
• Ate smaller portions (same foods for the most part, just not as much)
• Walked every other day
• Occasionally rode a bike

Now, I'm doing this:

• Cutting out 99% of the sugar I was eating
• Not eating ANY processed food (aka nothing out of a box except Lean Cuisine)
• Eating more fruits and veggies than I have in my life and nothing but lean protein
• Consuming between 1000 & 1200 calories per day (even when I have a couple (yes a COUPLE) of baked tostitos with salsa)
• NO fast food
• NO red meat (other than a teensy piece of steak that was, I must say, HEAVENLY)
• Drinking enough water to drown a camel and not drinking any calories
• Working out at least an hour a day, 6 days a week including strength training and I sweat like a pig.  Prolly burning between 300-500 calories per workout.  (Some days I just want to walk in to the gym, smack the cute, skinny girl behind the counter, and walk out.  But I go in anyway.)

And I've lost 16 pounds in 5 weeks.  Which, comparatively, sounds fab.  16 in 5 vs. 16 in 6.  Victory!  But it doesn't feel that way.  It feels like I'm working 10 times as hard to get the same results.  I would have to be at 25 lbs lost by the end of this week to be on goal for my challenge target.  So I got to thinking....

Maybe I'm putting way too much pressure on myself for the challenge.  Honestly, other than working out for TWO hours a day, SEVEN days a week and reducing my caloric intake to that of a 2-year-old, I can't think of anything I could be doing differently.  And until I can afford a maid, a chauffer, someone to do my errands and basically handle everything in my life, that two hours isn't going to happen.  So I guess it's time to change the thought processes and stop beating myself to a pulp.

I need to focus on the life change, not the challenge.  I need to remember that it took me a long time to get this way, and it will take a long time to change it.  I don't have to be The Biggest Loser and drop 10 lbs a week in order to be successful.  If I had nothing to do with my time other than work out, I could probably do the 10 lb thing.  But I have stuff to do.  Lots of stuff.  I'm a mom and I have to work and I have to do everything to take care of my fam.  Because I'm the only one to do it.  Don't get me wrong, Kenz is a huge help!  There's just all kinds of things that the parents have to handle.  And I'm both of them.