Keeping it real

Driving home last night, my cousin told me she would be reading my blogs. I didn't think much of it at that moment, but today I began to think about people I know reading what may be some very high highs and some very low lows, as well as lots of dark thoughts. Then I thought good, its too damn hard trying to keep that stupid curtain closed pretending to be the great wizard of my own dysfunctional oz. I can only be me. Whether its whining, crying, fussing, laughing, loving, fearing, cussing or committing crimes its me and either folks can understand that or hopefully they'll just move on.
So, I'm reading Geneen Roth's book, When Food is Love. I am thoroughly enjoying it. Its actually a quick read, but its so filling for me that I read a bit and stop to process it. For years I looked for a man who would love me so good that I would feel whole and complete. Then I started looking for other things to make me whole. Things like the perfect job, the right car, the perfect friends, the perfect piece of clothing and when that didn't seem to be working out, I looked to weight loss to be the avenue to feeling complete. This is my paraphrase (get the book for her exact words). Geneen tells a story that her husband had issues with his feet. His mother made his shoes, and his family had no really significant dysfunction. Her mother on the other hand was twisted. Get the book if you want to know what I mean by twisted. She says that the opportunity for that kind of nurturing and parenting has passed. Man I did not want to hear that, but its true. Life is not fair. Let me repeat that for those of you, who like myself can have grand pity parties about stuff. Life is not fair. Suck it up and accept it. What you didn't get at that time is gone. Even if my dad had lived, gotten sober, and taken parenting classes, the opportunity to impart certain things into me that I would need in life would be gone. We would forge a new relationship based on who we both are as adults. So where do I go from here? According to Geneen, (let me add right here, I don't hold anyone as the final authority on anything. Information gathered from other human beings is like eating fish. You eat the flesh and spit out the bones.) you are now responsible for getting you what YOU need. To make this relevant for me. When I start feeling insecure because I don't feel loved the way I think I need to be, but whats actually going on is that the 10year old me inside wants someone to tell her that she is worthy of time, attention and love, I can't pass her off to someone else. It is on me to acknowledge that I am important and a person deserving of love. If someone is truly not loving me in a healthy manner than I have to rectify the situation. That may mean asking for what I need, giving it to myself or removing myself from a relationship that is not able to give me love. Now the catch here is that I have to distinguish if what me and/or the 10 year old is asking for is a reasonable request. Make me feel good enough is an unreasonable request for someone else to fill. If my childhood was twisted enough I may not even have it within myself to give and require assistance in developing it.
Easier said than done. Especially when there are so many messages coming at us everyday to do whatever it takes to make us happy...of course the majority of those messages are focused on acquiring something or someone that will make us happy. Buy the right mini-van so that your family will travel peacefully and happily wherever you go. Buy the right flea collar and your dog will love you so much he will sing. Buy your clothes at the trendiest store and you will look smart, dance with other attractive people...stop right there. Same folks selling you this bill of goods also takes it upon themselves to tell you what attractive IS, and more than likely you don't fit the definition. You wouldn't need what they have to sale if you did. Anywho, listen to music with the latest electronics and you will exercise, be wise, more productive and all sorts of other things. My favorite is when a particular person says read a book you MUST read that book!!!! This one never ceases to amaze me. You don't become rich, you don't get to have a personal chef, you don't get to be the only person on a particular major airline that can purchase a first class ticket for your pet...you just get to read the book and talk about it with others who HAD to read it too. WTF!!??? Don't get me wrong, if I ever complete my book I'd sit right there on the couch smile and silently pray my book will be the next IT book. Momma didn't raise no fool.
I have conquered a couple of my "get this it will make me happy," voices, but still got lots of work to do. That's the thing most people don't want to do. Speaking of what would make me happy right now, I gotta go snatch those red ruby slippers from that ditsy chick with the hairy dog, but I want to get a little irreverent next time and talk about work, God's part, our part and what we like to shove off on Him in the name of religion.

Waiting to start living

I started a new job in the Spring. In fact I started the new job specifically to get the surgery. That's part of the 10-year journey I mentioned in an earlier post. Lots of companies hide behind the excuse that it cost more for the surgery especially if there are complications. That's baloney. There are enough varieties of the surgery for a company to limit their employees to one surgery, a few select surgeons and approve only those with the highest weights or BMI's, or only those who suffer with certain co-morbidity's. Imagine you have someone who has high blood pressure, diabetes, heart disease, and arthritis and they are 100 or more pounds overweight. Sure you can play the old southern patriarch looking out for the good of all the field hands, and put them through YOUR ideal weight control program. But in the end I will bet you the plantation that the company is gonna be out more when its all over. I am not saying they don't work. People lose weight, but as I've told my family every doggone time they come to me with a new diet someone they know had used to lose lots of weight, "anyone can drop the weight, come back to me when after 2-5 years they still have the majority of the weight off". So you have company newsletters displaying workers who lost 25, 75 and even some centennial pounds. When the outward incentives and attention are gone, what happens? Each case is different but for those that gain the weight back, you run the risk of now having to pay for therapy, or lost wages due to depression. You also have to pay for illnesses that re-occur and typically its worse, because they gain it back quicker and more of it. Bariatric surgery is not a miracle cure and 5% find a way to gain the weight back. However, 5% is a fairly decent number, when you consider that some experts say 95% of those who lose on a diet gain it back, that your typical dieter can expect to gain back 10% of what they lose, and worse of all 31% not only gain the weight back, but quicker and more.
Use those numbers the next time a well meaning lover, friend, relative or busy body brings you the latest greatest diet. Just know though that they will eventually trump you with "I don't want you to die" or the knife twister "I can't stand by and watch you kill (do this to) yourself". At which point, if you have not worked through some of your issues, you will dutifully take that "eat all the rhubarb you want and still lose weight" diet and go out to by rhubarb.
As I was saying before I got off on this tangent, I changed jobs to have weight loss surgery. My two previous employers specifically wrote an exclusion for weight loss surgery. I am rushing through the approval process and all along the way I meet doctors, nurses, psychologist etc, who are as excited as me that this is about to happen for me. Each one talks about the drastic changes that will occur in my life. Friends tell me the same, and many are excited. I, of course am excited as well...I think.
If you have ever had a monkey of any type on your back you know that mindset of "I could be a contender if I could only get this monkey off my back." I call it waiting to start living. My mom would say that she stayed with my alcoholic father because kids need a father, and that when her mother who stayed with us passed away she was going to leave. I went off to college and granny died but she went no where. In fact she was looking forward to spending her golden years with him. She now says something similar about her place of worship. Don't hold your breathe. My good friend says he'll say no to people who impose on him one day. Since he reads this, I'll save my thoughts for him personally. My old co-worker says she's gonna leave her job when she finishes school, but she takes 1-2 semesters off at a time. I say that I will get the love I want from a partner and get married and live happily ever after when I lose the weight. I've turned down two proposals and dumped 2 nice guys along the way. I've been in several relationships that any idiot could see were dead ends from the beginning. We are waiting to start living, and its a powerful dream. Its also more exciting and tantalizing than the mundane stuff that living life is made of. It allows us to remain cordial to people and things we really shouldn't even give the time of day to. Leaving my father would have meant ostracizing herself in a world of families. None of my mom's siblings have ever divorced, no matter what. Men have left, but the women waited faithfully for them to return. You got to have some pretty big ones to buck that kinda trend. If you are under 40 its no biggie to change jobs, but slower baby boomers still remember their parents retirement parties and the names of their parents co-workers. Besides my old co-worker is the first in her family to land a "good" job. You don't just walk away from that. My friend would have to explore who and what else he is and what his value is to those who impose if he told them no. An "acquaintance" of mine has a Master's in making you feel guilty for telling her no, AND because of her victim persona she gets others upset with you for telling her no. Who wants to be bothered with that? Real commitment to a real relationship means facing the possibility of someone knowing me and rejecting what they find. Why would anyone want to move out of the waiting to start living mode?
When I really start thinking of living life after surgery, I think about not having weight as a defense against unwanted attention, my chances of being a victim of crime increases, if I fail at something or if someone doesn't like me I can't blame it on the weight. What will I fixate on if I am not dealing with my current diet, the diet I plan to go on, the latest book I'm reading on space, earthworms, the reduction of nuclear weapons and how it relates to why I gain weight? What on earth will I do without this lifelong companion and nemesis?!!!!!!.
Hopefully I will have the courage to find out who I really am, what I really want, my habits both good and bad, my negative emotions that I've hidden behind layers of fat, I'll hear my real voice saying what I really think and feel, and most importantly maybe I'll know what its like for someone else to know and love me for just plain ole me.