You might remember that this whole weight loss thing started with the New Year’s Resolution of saying ‘yes’ to living a more meaningful life. Part of the resolution was the commitment to saying ‘yes’ to losing weight – but the other part of the resolution was meant to get me to start saying ‘yes’ to new opportunities that presented themselves … instead of running away from them (like I had been).

Several weeks ago I was sifting through my Gmail and out of curiosity I decided to look in my “spam” mail box. Mind you, I NEVER do this and must have been excessively bored. I get hundreds of SPAM emails a day and never give it another thought. For whatever reason, my eyes were drawn to a email with the subject line: “POVERTY IN AFRICA, please read!”

At first I thought it was one of those scams that try and get you to release your bank account information, but it turns out that the email wasn’t SPAM at all. It was written by a middle school student named Quinn. She and her classmates Kelsey & Hazel were doing a social action project focused on Heifer International. She was asking me to help her spread the word about this organization via my blog.

Instead of deleting the email or responding with quick reply of ‘thanks, but no thanks’ – Paige and I decided to help them out (we have a soft spot for middle school girls). We took a road trip to Bellingham, Washington to meet the girls in person to hear what they had to say and then made a little video about it:

If you enjoyed this video or want to spread the word about Heifer International – please Tweet, Buzz, Stumble or post this video on Facebook. Let’s show Quinn, Kelsey and Hazel that their voices can invoke change and even at their age, they can make a difference through their actions.

“In order to move forward, you have to give something back.”

- Oprah Winfrey, Stanford University Commencement Speech, 2008

Yep, that’s me!

Though I wasn’t selected to Skype into the show, like my Momversation cohorts – Heather, Mindy, Daphne and Karen, they did use one of my pre-taped clips (one that is completely embarrassing). The show is called, “Secret Lives of Moms” and my face is being featured in the promo (above).

Ah, my 2.1 seconds of fame.

Good gravy.

Oprah recently declared that she had been avoiding the “full body shot” for the cover of O Magazine all year because she felt insecure and ashamed of her recent weight gain. I can completely relate to her on this one (this is probably the only point that I can fathom relating to Oprah on) … I have been avoiding the full body shot for years. YEARS, I tell you.

Apparently a billion dollars cannot buy you happiness or make you skinny. But I already knew that for the most part. Personally, I have spent a small fortune on diet aids like weight loss supplements, gym memberships that I never used, books, exercise dvds, protein shakes. You name it. And let’s not talk about clothes, I have a whole range of sizes in my closet from emaciated to bloated to beached whale. I can’t imagine what a billion dollars can buy you in weight loss paraphernalia. Kudos for her for not getting the fat vacuumed out of her like the rest of them.

Here’s my weekly update. I wish I had the foresight to take a “before” picture last week when this whole weight loss thing blew up, but this will have to do.

Just so you know, I have been faithfully logging in my caloric intake on a daily basis and sticking to a regime of 1200 – 1400 calories. Except for on Sunday, when I totally went off the deep end and started stuffing my face full of carbs … something that I am trying to avoid. Luckily I tossed out most of the temptation foods already and avoided a complete derailment.

I also went to the gym 5 out of 7 days last week. This is amazing to me. On one day, I actually went twice. We must be coming close to the apocalypse.

As I was telling my friends Betsy and Kim and my fellow blogger Sharyn – should CNN choose to fly me to the mothership and interview me live (hint. hint.) I swear to God I will burst out of a fat photo of myself in all of it’s glory. Then I will dance to Flo Rida with Wolf Blitzer.

The answer is: No, not yet. From time to time, I do some consulting and I am whittling down my savings in order to change my life and be happy. Don’t try this at home. It’s scary and often times I worry about how I am going to pay the mortgage. I waited till I had a mental break down so I couldn’t work anymore.  Do not push yourself to this point. There’s a lot of crying and self-help books and Oprah episodes involved.

Aside from losing weight, I have aspirations about making a living blogging and I am writing a memoir about my dysfunctional childhood. Uh … dysfunctional adulthood. Okay, I am writing a book because I can’t afford a therapist. It has taken a lot of years to realize that at some point you just need to say, fuck it and just live your life already.

But alongside of my blog, I also do a bit of video blogging over at Momversation. The current episode features Alice Bradley from Finslippy, Rebecca Woolf from Girls Gone Child and Heather Armstrong from Dooce. Today’s topic discusses the question:

What’s Harder: Wife or Mother?

I’ve never been married. I’ve been in three long term relationships though and I have to say that being a partner is much harder than being a parent.

I’ve found that you can’t ground your boyfriend.

“I have someone else that takes over when it’s time for me to work…When I’m on stage, this alter ego that I’ve created kind of protects me and who I really am. Sasha Fierce is the fun, more sensual, more aggressive, more outspoken side and more glamorous side that comes out when I’m working and when I’m on the stage.”

She then goes on to say:

“I have out-of-body experiences. If I cut my leg, if I fall, I don’t even feel it. I’m so fearless, I’m not aware of my face or my body.”

I think I laughed out loud when I read this. She totally sounds like someone who completely lost perspective or as BB would put it, “She gone lost her mind.” But then again, if I was rolling around in millions of dollars I might come up with alternative personality just so I could justify a whole separate wardrobe – “Uh, I’m not getting this for myself, I’m getting this for Sasha.”

Regardless of how nutty it sounds, it got me thinking about alter egos and whether or not everyone else has one too. Personally, I don’t think I have the time to nurture a second personality. I have issues with the first one, thank you very much. Plus, I also have that voice in my head (the negative voice) to contend with all of the time and sometimes that is almost like an alter ego.

Take yesterday for instance, I shot some footage for Momversation and felt completely self-defeated by the end of it. The “animated” Giyen looks way strange in comparison to the “still photo” Giyen. For someone who is just getting used to taking photos of herself, shooting video footage is absolutely dreadful. You can’t imagine what a “terrible, horrible, no good, very bad day” I had beating myself up about being overweight or not feeling very clever. It’s mentally exhausting to feel that way, I seriously wanted to drown myself in a nice big mug of Maker’s Mark and hot apple cider. And then chase it down with some Reddi-Wip straight from the canister (Don’t judge, you’ve done this too).

Since I was teetering on the edge of the self-destructive spiral downward, I decided to distract myself by catching up on some blog reading and internet surfing. Two things saved the day:

First, Good Morning America did a piece on Oprah’s January 2009 cover of O Magazine. Apparently, Oprah opens up about her recent weight gain in a frank essay you can find here. I know, I know there are a lot of Oprah lovers and haters (just read the comments in the GMA piece). Whatever. For someone who just shot some home video of herself feeling not so hot, knowing that Oprah gets out there and does it 100s of times a year put things into a bit of perspective for little ol’ me. Of course, she gets compensated by the billions and I scrap up enough for the said bottle of Maker’s Mark. But then again, Oprah could just as easily retire and say a big f@ck you to us all. It takes some chutzpah to keep going when you’ve got weight issues chipping away at your self-esteem.

Second, I read this post by Roni regarding her “terrible, horrible, no good, very bad day” and thought to myself – here’s a lovely person who has won the battle with weight and even she has days that suck ass. Things don’t magically get perfect once you’ve lost the weight. THERE’S ALWAYS SOMEBODY SKINNIER THAN YOU. And that’s okay, you laugh and move-on.

Sometimes I just get so self-absorbed in my own misery that I just plain forget that one bad day out of a series of great days is just ONE bad day. Perhaps I will get to the point where I have out-of-body experiences and I’m no longer aware of my face or my body. But I doubt it.