How to Turn Me Into Bridget Jones
In the popular Helen Fielding novel, Bridget Jones's Diary, Bridget begins each entry with a tally of current weight, calories, alcohol, and cigarettes consumed. Diligently and humorously, she obsesses over the tiniest fluctuation in her weight, panicking when it spikes before a date, preening when it drops.
Since I've lost these twenty pounds, I've sort of become Bridget Jones. True, I don't smoke and don't weight myself daily, but I do think about what I'm eating, usually making excuses to justify one treat or another. "It's Thursday" (my Friday) is a favorite, or "It has fruit IN it." At the beginning of each week, as I trudge the steps to my gym, sure that the scale will reveal what my clothes and the mirror have not. Each week, I'm sure I've gained 4-5 pounds, especially if I was not particularly diligent about gym attendance the week before. After my reunion, I had two bad weeks where I only went to the gym twice and indulged in all kinds of things (I think I ate an entire bag of Kettle Chips at the beach.) But somehow, seemingly miraculously, the scale would mutely reassure me that maybe there was an extra pound there, maybe not, but everything was OK.
Until today. I stepped on the scale and slid the bar to where I'd been last week. Too light. Nudge nudge nudge. Up a pound, then another, then two more and five, WTF?! finally balancing out nine whole pounds over last week. Nine pounds?! How did I gain nine pounds in 7 days? OK, yeah, there was the pizza on Friday, Saturday's corn dog and butter-drenched corn on the cob, Sunday's pie (blueberry), pie tasted at the fair, cheese and crackers, a few glasses of wine and a few more beers. Yikes! Panicked, I vowed then and there to get back on track. Nine pounds! That's several weeks of work to get rid of! No more pie, no more mid-week beer, more vegetables, less sugar, no more bacon cookies (ok, they're almost gone anyway).
While I worked out, my brain reeled, trying to wrap itself around the idea that I could have packed on nine pounds in a week. One little voice whispered, "What if the scale was off?" Its partner, the big screaming bitch in my head that hates me, answered, "What if the scale was off all those other weeks, and you were packing it on during the last month?" In the middle of my lunges, I wanted to run back into the locker room to check the calibration of the scale, but I forced myself to finish my workout, tacking on an extra ten minutes on the elliptical machine for good measure.
Back in the locker room, finally, I zeroed out the scale. And nudged the slider up almost 8 pounds before it finally balanced. Oh, thank the heavens. One pound I can deal with. I can put Bridget Jones back in her box and enjoy another slice of that delicious pie tonight. I mean, wouldn't you?
Since I've lost these twenty pounds, I've sort of become Bridget Jones. True, I don't smoke and don't weight myself daily, but I do think about what I'm eating, usually making excuses to justify one treat or another. "It's Thursday" (my Friday) is a favorite, or "It has fruit IN it." At the beginning of each week, as I trudge the steps to my gym, sure that the scale will reveal what my clothes and the mirror have not. Each week, I'm sure I've gained 4-5 pounds, especially if I was not particularly diligent about gym attendance the week before. After my reunion, I had two bad weeks where I only went to the gym twice and indulged in all kinds of things (I think I ate an entire bag of Kettle Chips at the beach.) But somehow, seemingly miraculously, the scale would mutely reassure me that maybe there was an extra pound there, maybe not, but everything was OK.
Until today. I stepped on the scale and slid the bar to where I'd been last week. Too light. Nudge nudge nudge. Up a pound, then another, then two more and five, WTF?! finally balancing out nine whole pounds over last week. Nine pounds?! How did I gain nine pounds in 7 days? OK, yeah, there was the pizza on Friday, Saturday's corn dog and butter-drenched corn on the cob, Sunday's pie (blueberry), pie tasted at the fair, cheese and crackers, a few glasses of wine and a few more beers. Yikes! Panicked, I vowed then and there to get back on track. Nine pounds! That's several weeks of work to get rid of! No more pie, no more mid-week beer, more vegetables, less sugar, no more bacon cookies (ok, they're almost gone anyway).
While I worked out, my brain reeled, trying to wrap itself around the idea that I could have packed on nine pounds in a week. One little voice whispered, "What if the scale was off?" Its partner, the big screaming bitch in my head that hates me, answered, "What if the scale was off all those other weeks, and you were packing it on during the last month?" In the middle of my lunges, I wanted to run back into the locker room to check the calibration of the scale, but I forced myself to finish my workout, tacking on an extra ten minutes on the elliptical machine for good measure.
Back in the locker room, finally, I zeroed out the scale. And nudged the slider up almost 8 pounds before it finally balanced. Oh, thank the heavens. One pound I can deal with. I can put Bridget Jones back in her box and enjoy another slice of that delicious pie tonight. I mean, wouldn't you?