PREPARING FOR REAL CHANGE....OR, HOW DO YOU EAT AN ELEPHANT?

OK, OK...We all know the answer to 'how do you eat an elephant' is 'one bite at a time...but it is going to take a lot of changing and a lot of 'bites' for Allen and I to eat the elephant we've created for the past eighteen years! Unfortunately, our elephant has to do with our 'health'.

So far, Allen is not as 'keen' or committed as I am (at the moment) to begin the long journey into major personal changes for the future, but my turning '60' recently resulted in my own inner 'rumbling of discontent' and 'moments of clarity'... I think most human beings experience when a change in their lives or lifestyles is upon them.

A new door appears on the horizon and it becomes incumbent on us to pass through it. I find myself peering into the keyhole as I write this, and have been preparing myself to walk through it for a few weeks now.

Not everyone has to read "dieting for Dummy's" to get a grasp on what is healthy as opposed to unhealthy when providing fuel for the body, but I needed that book. I spent so much time in my youth looking into a mirror and loathing everything I saw, I would experience horrible dreams if I gained a few pounds over the holidays. Until I was 43 years old (and thought life itself not worth the living) my life was lived pretty much in reaction to 'what everyone else' around me thought....and worse, trying to please everyone into being happy. What a losing concept that was. To compensate for all those feelings of 'less than' so were so generously heaped on me since childhood...I learned to (not eat), drink and be merry...sort of.

Considering that 'perfectionism' I always failed to meet, it should come at no surprise that when I finally found relief from the terror of someone finding out I was ultimately some sort of failure and loser dressed in clothing of success...when I entered therapy and discovered that it was my "whole way of thinking" that haunted me...rather than any perception based in reality. As I worked to mend systemic emotional abuse (first by others, and then to myself) and find my own spirit...the rush of freedom was almost intoxicating. I embraced my new found freedom with the zeal of a crusader and the gusto of a soprano performing America the Beautiful at Madison Square Garden.

At the same time, life around me was crazy...friends were crazy...and I was crazy...so I got married to a therapist to 'fix it'... which led to another whole set of anguish, laughter, folly and comedy in life I'll save for another novel. I was also sick with a serious blood disease that was depriving my body of oxygen...so it screamed out for food 24/7 and I fed it. I was free to eat whatever my heart desired without suffering deep self loathing later, and I was encouraged not to worry about gaining weight by my husband...so my 124 frame started increasing the load at 5 pounds a month until I actually realized that 'chub muffin' looking back at me from the mirror actually was me...and we were 100 extra pounds down the road!

"Denial' is a handy thing to have in life, but sometimes it can cause more trouble than it's worth.
After two years, I finally put the breaks on and managed only to lather on about 20 more extra pounds over the next seventeen years. I was fat...but I was holding. Looking back at my life before 43, I really don't know how I managed to do all I did without being on some sort of speed...but I did. "Perfectionism", or more aptly, (the pursuit and perception of it) is a relentless driving force only those so afflicted with it can truly understand. Some would call such people 'tightly wound', but that wasn't the half of it.

Is it any wonder that when the 'spring sprung' a reckless abandon took over and continued on course until that '60' year old doomsday that almost knocked me out with the realization that I have been dancing on quicksand for a long time now...and time was running out on any expection for the 'dumb luck' I've had to continue on relatively 'healthy' in spite of my own efforts which were all pointing at an early grave.

Allen's recent experience, and watching him 'fall apart' at the seams almost overnight... was the final veil lifting that I needed to finally take a real gander at the 'elephant' standing right in front of me I was now going to be charged with turning into a 'senior citizen' of somewhere near average stature, which I know is a long term committment to 'change'.

"Change" is not something most human beings embrace with vigor. Oh sure, we can all walk a marathon or chase a piece of lettuce around the plate, or eat only bacon and steak, or measure every morsel, or buy some ready made cocktail...for about two weeks without much fanfare...but for most of America...(who's citizens suffer obesity of varying degrees)...such miracle 'cures' elicit such a sense of 'deprivation' we give up in sheer desperation!

Then we run for the bag of potatoe chips or cookies or lasagne with such a fervor we end up even fatter than we were when we started that whole 'dieting' thing. So, I know that in spite of the zillions of dollars my fat friends have spent (including me now and then over the years) that 'diets' don't work for 99.99 per cent of us.

Cause it's an elephant to be eaten, not a flea.

I'm walking around my 'elephant' right now, much like a prize fighter sizing up his opponent.
I'm looking at my elephant's strong points and weakness so I can prepare the best defense I can when the elephant doesn't want to be eaten. I'm of the opinion that many of us allow ourselves to become fat because we need that fat for some reason.

For me, it was probably because people don't 'expect' as much from fat people as they do thin people...and for me, that provided great respite from the overwhelming 'expectations' others had of me, and I had of myself 'back in the day'. It's a little like going into hiding in some ways.

There's payoffs and price tags for everything we do in life...and until now, the price tag wasn't high enough to elicit the 'coming out' party I was terrified to face ever again. 'Expectations' almost killed me once, and I have learned to love life and strangely enough, my genuine self by carrying this girth for many years. Walking around the elephant means that I have to look at the pay offs and price tags from several angles...before really attempting to 'bite off' something I may not have what it takes to actually 'chew'.

There's a sort of 'catch 22' I've had to acknowledge and evaluate as well. I have bad knees and an ankle that didn't heal properly after an untreated break a few years ago...so jumping jacks carrying my 100 pound back pack just isn't going to work. Now, if I could just take the back-pack off overnight...I'm pretty sure the knees would respond in gratitude, and the ankle wouldn't squawk as much going up and down stairs, but the back pack is coming off one thread at a time...so the process itself calls for consideration.

So, I've been trying out "walking" for the past week and a half...and experimenting a little about a month before that. First I walked a little more that I 'had to' at the store or anywhere I went so I could build up a little stamina and endurance before dining on the elephant for real. Recently I found out that we have a natural 'track' here at the ranch of 'one quarter mile', so quietly and without fanfare I would take a walk now and then around the track and tried to rachet it up some without causing my knee or ankle to 'quit' on me in the middle of the upper road where my screams for help would go unheard and I would have to crawl back to the house on my belly dragging my leg along like some useless appendage.

I tried a mile and a half finally and that is a little much for me right now, but one mile seems about right because I don't wake up screaming with leg cramps and feeling like someone stabbed me in the knee with a hot poker. So while walking around the elephant, I found a starting endurance level I can live with, and since learning the 'joys' of owning and operating an ipod...can enjoy beyond measure. Even better, as I walk around the 'track' listening to all of the great songs Allen has downloaded from his collection...I often break out 'dancing' to the music...and there is no one there to witness such acts of such comedic value...except the family of course...and their smiles are those of support and amusement rather than of ridicule, and that makes a difference to me.

Another part of that 'getting ready to eat an elephant' is about accountability (remember all that therapy back in the day and all those lessons I learned to 'simply notice' for awhile and then proceed ardously applying in an emotional and spiritual sense for the past 18 years?), and when making life changes and committments, it is helpful if we establish some measure of accountability. In otherwords, we have to let others know what we have committed to...because 'that alone' often keeps us 'on track' when we really would 'rather not' follow through on a committment when it gets 'hard' to do what we know is right for us. I'm sharing this journey through this blog with all the good, bad and ugly I know will go with it.

For some of you, who's 'elephant' is the size of a grapefruit...all of this must seem 'much ado about nothing', but for those who have walked in these shoes awhile it is something entirely different. It is the natural human being who seeks the 'softer, easier way' only to find the results far less gratifying and successful than those who attempt to actually push rocks uphill because it is the only way to get them over the mountain, eventually.

I've shed seven pounds just walking around the elephant (although it doesn't make a dent in a physical sense yet) and my method is the old 'tried and true' counting of and awareness of calorie intake and expenditure as demonstrated in my little new book, "Dieting for Dummies".

It's a small bite I know, but it reminds me that change...lasting change...never comes like a theif in the night. It happens in increments, sometimes so tedious it hardly seems worth it...but as I look at my husband I know that love really means having 'his best interests at heart' and without my leadership toward healthful living...his road will be far more difficult. When I look at pictures of my youngest grandchildren I think, "I really want to be around for their graduations and marriages' and maybe even some 'great' grandchildren too...so I can watch my own kids enjoy their 'grandparenthood' as much as I do.

Every journey begins with a 'single step', and this is mine. I'll always warn you when I am going to write about this particular part of my journey, so if your day is busy and filled with events more entertaining...you can change the channel for that post.

So, here's to 'seeing less of me' in the days to come.