Weighty Issues
Sunday, November 16th, 2008
Several years back I went to a Chinese acupuncturist in the University District who was a 6th Generation Doctor of Oriental Medicine from Beijing. When he was a child his parents sent him to a Buddhist monastery where he studied medicine just like his father and his father’s father and his father’s father’s father and so on and so forth etc. etc. etc. This man had the smoothest skin you could ever imagine beholding. In fact you could almost get hypnotized staring at his poreless porcelain visage. That is, if were not for the fact that it takes your full concentration to decipher what he was trying to say. And I am a seasoned when it comes to understanding what Asian people are trying to say in English – I could hardly understand him.
When I first went to go see him he looked at my tongue, checked my pulse and read my palm. He then looked at me and said, “You have lots of emotional stress.” No shit, I didn’t need to pay anyone $110 to tell me that. Then he said, “Too much belly fat. Lose weight. ” Again, did I pay for this? Thinking back, that juncture I wanted out of my relationship so badly that I just ate and ate and ate my way through the stress. I didn’t need acupuncture, I need a new life. I started out at 148 lbs back in 2001 and after the implosion of my relationship, a job implosion, depression and a mid-thirties crisis, I’ve gained 40 whopping pounds. You do the math.
Suffice to say, I have reached the limits of ‘emotional stress’ and ‘belly fat’ and am now working achieving a better life balance. I am on the path to being the happiest that I have ever been, yet I am the unhealthiest that I have ever been. If you were wondering how this feels – it totally sucks ass. It’s like being in an ill-fitting outfit. Like all of the time.
So I am, as with many aspects of my life, making decisions and taking massive action. Getting in shape is just another one of those things that is so important for me to accomplish once and for all. As much as I like to think that my weight issues don’t bother me, it totally does. I am sooooo over it.
In honor of my commitment (and to get over my fear of the camera) I am going to take daily self-portraits so I can document the changes in my face leading up to the Jingle Bell 5k. I got the idea from this blog that I am addicted to. Sharyn is doing a series of self-portraits called 365 days + 1.
Her photos are much more clever and creative than mine will be.
Tags: sharyn morrow, shrinking giyen, weapons of mass distraction, weight issues, weight loss photos
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