Happy Post Holidays

I really had meant to post over the holidays. I really did. And then, as always seems to happen, life kicks in.

For the first part, I have no excuses except that we were really busy with in-laws and other family. Had a great time with them.

For the second half...

I checked my kid into a mental health facility over the last weekend. We got a message from the parent of a friend who gave us some information that we didn't have before. We have our kid on medication and in therapy - but unless someone talks to the therapist, or to family, it can be HARD to know what's going on.

My general reaction to things like this is to pull inward on myself. And that is how I have been feeling, and what I have been doing.

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Cut to several days later. I have let this post just sit there, not knowing what to write. I just feel drained, physically and emotionally. This has been a terrible year and a half. I am finding that I really have no idea how to be a parent to someone that doesn't want me as a parent.

My kid came home two days ago. So far it appears that things MAY have changed a little. I don't know. He doesn't appear to be in any danger, which is what you want from inpatient treatment. But I am at a loss as to how to rebuild his trust when I don't know how I have lost it.

I feel as if my parenting has been cut off at the knees. Either I let things go that I shouldn't - not reminding him of homework, not having him shut of electronics after a certain amount of time, giving a pass when he is late to classes - or I call him on things and he doesn't want anything to do with me.

What do you do in that situation?

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Of course, on what is ostensibly a weight loss blog, the question is rhetorical. I suppose I'm just building up the case for why I withdraw within myself and medicate with food. It's not a good choice. But it is what has been happening.

Intellectually I know what I need to do - I need something for a kick in the pants and a bit of accountability. But when I start to head down there I just put it off again. I know that starting off on this journey again is going to be hard up front - when you're as addicted to food as I am it makes you grumpy when you quit cold turkey. Withdrawal symptoms, I know.

It's just that during this time of extra stress I can't seem to get myself to add another stressor. In reality it is also removing a coping mechanism. What would I have to do then?

Face my feelings? Face the reality of what is going on? 

I don't know if I'm ready for that today. I know I should be. (And I'm told that I am not supposed to use the word should). But for now...

I'm just making it through today. Maybe later I can work on a plan. But for now...

I will talk to you tomorrow.

-Silas

Building a new person

I think that my posts will most likely be of the "snackable" type - that is, much smaller posts, hopefully more often. I assume that this will help to make them happen more often as well.

To start, though, I'm trying to figure out how to build a new person. A new me. To do so, I guess I have to start with where I am.

I'm a 43 year old male. I suspect that I'm somewhere between 340 and 345 pounds right now. Professionally my life is going pretty well. Personally? I feel as if I've lost contact with who I was, and I'm not quite sure who it is that I want to be.

Here are some things that I do know...

I have an officially diagnosed eating disorder now. I've started to go to therapy for an unrelated anxiety disorder, but she gave me a questionnaire, and told me that I have Binge Eating Disorder. I could have told her that, but it was nice to have her arrive at it on her own.

I have a LOT of other issues. A lot. That's why I'm going to therapy. I don't really like who I am or my life in general. There's not a lot about my circumstances that I can change - but there are a lot of things about ME that I can change. I can become the person that I remember, or at least more like him.

I think that I have become inherently lazy and complacent when it comes to myself. I have a ton of responsibilities what with a kid in college and three others at home. It has become easy to submerge myself in all of my other priorities and let my other interests just fall by the wayside.

Part of the issue is that it is inherently hard to make progress. It takes work to accomplish anything of worth. And when you take everything else into consideration, I am usually exhausted by the end of the day and it has become all too easy to just sit in front of the TV and let someone else do my thinking. I mean, Frasier is a funny show! And it's more intelligent than most! And...I end up spending my time on inconsequential things.

I guess what I need is some sort of organizing principle for my life. I need to decide what it is that I want to be, first of all. Then I can go about quantifying how I can become that person. Does that make sense? It does to me, at least for the moment.

So there you go. There's my "snackable" content for today. Both more than I had expected, and not as much as I need. I think I am going to have to spend more time on this concept over the coming weeks.

-Silas

Is the third time really the charm?

They say that the third time is the charm. And of course, when "they" say something, it MUST be true. I mean, this was a saying even before the internet for crying out loud!

Honestly it's just a catchy name for this new blog, and a way to try to motivate myself towards actual change.

My name is Silas. I've had several blog incarnations over the past ten years or so. My most prolific and useful one was the original Journal of a Fat Loser back on journalspace, before they lost everything and went down hard.

I've had another couple of incarnations of that, another couple of non-starters, and now this one. What do you consider the third time?

Well, at one point I lost 132.4 pounds. It was amazing.

And then it came almost all back.

Then I lost 84 pounds. Almost down to the lowest.

And then it came back. And then some.

I haven't weighed in a long time. I'm pretty dang sure that I'm at a higher weight now than I ever have been before.

So...even though there have been several starts/stops, there have been only 2 real times where I've lost a lot of weight. This is what I want to do again, and what I want to be for the long term.

It's time to figure out how to do it. Because, you know - it's just that easy.

One of the things is blogging. And it's not just about losing weight - it's about a lot of other things as well. Weight is only one of the things in my life that I'm wanting to change. I'm 43 years old now and I'm going through some sort of mid-life crisis I think. Nothing serious, but I'm not what I want to be. Professionally, I'm on track to be great - I'm a dev manager for a large web company. I get to work with a great team. But in about every other facet of my life I'm disappointed.

So it's time to make some changes.

I will be back to post more about it.

-Silas