21 Days of Accountability – Day 1

This is going to be deep. I warn you now that there may be things you find offensive in the next 21 days, particularly today’s post so if you don’t want to get into that type of post, stop reading now.

They say it takes 21 days to make something a habit. I remembered this today and realised it was the first thing I did when I went from this:

to this:

It took eight months. Eight months! That’s all. I spend more time pregnant. There’s a 100lb difference in these photos. Seven dress sizes. Ignore my friend, she’s all of 40kg.

So over the past few day’s I’ve been preparing. I knew Campbell Live would make me vomit in my mouth when I saw myself but I did it anyway. I am not my size. As much as I hate being fat, I am strong enough to know that my self worth is more than a bunch of numbers. It doesn’t mean I want to stay this way though. As you all know, I’ve been really struggling since Boston’s birth to shift this weight. What you didn’t know is how the weight came back and why it hasn’t moved. I told you all before that a fat person is fat for more than just eating too much. So I’m going to enlighten everyone on how one doubles in weight over a short amount of time.

I’ve had a lot on my plate the past year-two years. When we fell pregnant with Boston we were over the moon. We sat down and made plans on how the next year would pan out. I was going to take a break art-wise because as soon as I fell pregnant, and I mean the instant, I stopped functioning. I spent all day sleeping and it still wasn’t enough. I tried to exercise but I would nearly collapse. I worked out once at 5 weeks and again at 16 weeks pregnant. That is it. Twice. I remember because working out was really important to me and I was so disappointed I had to stop. I had grand plans of continuing the entire pregnancy.

Instead I threw up for 25 weeks straight, which takes my total amount of time vomitting in my lifetime up to about 3 years. Giving bulemics everywhere a run for their money.

When I was 9 weeks along I started bleeding. It came out of nowhere and a few scans later they couldn’t see anything and told me it may have been a tear but they couldn’t locate anything, anywhere. Then I started to clot and eventually I passed what appeared to be a fetus. I have shared this story once. I don’t talk about it. It makes me uncomfortable because the thought is very hard for me to wrap my head around. I lost a baby but I didn’t feel anything. I may have cried my heart out when I began bleeding but they found a heartbeat at the hospital and that was good enough for me. I was still getting a baby. I only ever knew of one baby. I was put on bed rest for a month. My thighs swelled in the first week…and I was useless at bedrest. Puhh lease! I have kids, there’s no such thing as bed rest.

When I was three months pregnant we had some family move in with us and live in our spare room. This turned out to be a  very trying time for me. All of us really. I was exhausted physically and the emotional stress I ended up experiencing during the whole thing made me a very angry, bitter person. Honestly, even my close family and friends wouldn’t believe how mean I became.

I could no longer relax in my home because of the tension and as much as I tried to be a good person I was so sick of what was going on I just couldn’t be nice anymore.

Financially we were now supporting two extra adults and although I’m sure they were grateful for the help they received I really don’t think they ever understood just how much help they were receiving.

My hubby, kids and I began eating out as much as it took, just to get away somewhere. We hated it but needed sanity space. My sleep schedule deteriorated and I found myself stuck somewhere between insomnia and constant sleep.

I no longer had the extra money air marked for the baby I was already pregnant with. Instead it was all going on supporting someone who seemed to despise my very existence. I was no longer emotionally strong or financially comfortable. I watched one of my best friends get cut off from me right under my nose and my heart broke. This impacted me in so many ways.

To make money stretch for everyone, the way we shopped had to change. The quality of food dropped and the healthy food was thrown out the window in exchange for enough to tie everyone over each fortnight. I also had to stop cooking because the exhaustion was too much. I could just never shake it. My husband is a brilliant cook but I had been the one monitoring what went into recipes and portion sizes. It was me that made sure every meal in a day balanced. This stopped as soon as I stopped.

They moved out when I was seven months along. My whole attitude had completely changed by now. I felt broken. Take aways were now a means of survival and the exhaustion never disappeared.

Other things that happened in the course of the weight gain causing stress and anger:

• Our rental property got completely trashed and we had to fork out money for repairs. At eight months pregnant I was cleaning up complete filth, pulling up tiles and replacing them in the rental bathroom.
• I stopped believing in the religion I was raised in.
• My Dad had a heart attack.
• Unexpected trips.
• Swine Flu.
• While everyone else was celebrating Christmas and New Years I worked straight through, many, many late nights to line up work for 2010. It paid off very quickly but we’re 8 months on and I’m only just about to take a breather.
• A delivery destroyed my body. I lost my ability to walk. I had to use a wheelchair. I cried the time a nurse tried to tell me I had to walk to see my new baby. I didn’t make the walk, it was so painful. I couldn’t move my legs onto the floor on my own.
• For 4 months I needed someone to help me stand up. It was painful to sit & stand and walking was excruciating.
• It took until June 2010 – 11 months later, until walking wasn’t really painful.
• I still have pain in my hips. It’s hard to bend.
• I get shooting pains in my vagina. Like right now for example. Sometimes the pain shoots from there right up my spine and down an arm or right down to my toes. Once again, a nice leftover from the delivery.
• I pushed so hard to get Boston out, I know the exact moment I lost control of all of my pelvic muscles. They are completely destroyed and if I have the slightest urge to use the bathroom I have to go right then or else there would be trouble. It disgusts me. I understand I had no choice but to push and ruin the muscles or have a baby die inside me though. I made the right choice.
• My insomnia took itself to a whole new level. I can go up to 8 days with only 2 hours sleep. This is not a fun statistic to know. It sucks big time.
• I have had 4 days off (away from kids, especially my gorgeous but clingy 1 y/o). I call them days off but I was travelling for work.
• Kindergarten accused us of having dodgey stuff going on at home because they stopped seeing me (exhausted with a small baby) and Davis regressed back to wetting himself for a few weeks. I took it to them. A phone call would have been appreciated rather than accusations.
• I have no babysitter. Ever. The longest I’ve spent away from my kids in the past 5 years is 2 hours. Not counting school or the hospital of course. I wish I had family.
• I had to take a stand over an issue at my arts council. It made waves and I got really depressed over it. I’m glad I did it though, it seems it took me to stand up and say it wasn’t right for others to speak up.
• I caught my son stealing, lying and forging. It took months of thought out parenting discipline to finally get through to him. Hardest parenting experience by far. He’s usually the most well behaved, easy going kid. These behaviours are so random.
• Our latest tenants owe us over $1100 and they’re going to mediation again tomorrow. Thankfully we have a new tenant taking over the lease this week.
• Blog Idol 2 brought up some really nasty memories I thought I’d put behind me.
• My husband went through a really hard time and I had to be the ‘strong’ one.
• A year later it was my turn to battle the black dog. It had been 7 years since I’d felt so low.

So there’s just a glimpse of what’s been going on in my life behind the scenes. Of course these are just some of the crappy things. I definitely believe there have been far more positive experiences! This is not meant to be a downer post.

Once again, this is me very happy just a few months pre Boston’s pregnancy:

and this is a not so happy me after this last pregnancy:

So why is this post called 21 Days of Accountability? Because today is my first day of building new habits. For the next 21 days my blog posts will be solely about weight loss. Twenty one days. I’ve been through the realisation of being fat already, I’ve been through the breakthrough moment where the tears flow. At the end of 21 days, instead of the things that helped me gain weight, the list will involve the things that I’ve begun doing to lose the weight.

Now it’s time to share my journey. Move onto the next stage in my life. I have no support locally so I’m using my blog. Everything and everyone else can just wait. I’m putting me first. Come along for the ride.

Now I’m off with Boston for a walk. See you tomorrow.

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