Getting to know us

I'm trying to play catch up with everyone's blogs as most of us took a blog vacations over the long weekend.  I'm feeling back on track; had a good day yesterday and again today.  I got a good long brisk walk in yesterday, with backpack - that somehow managed to torque or twist a low back muscle.  I woke up this morning seeing stars when I moved in a certain direction and despite 2 mega doses of Ibuprofen (some blogger, I forget who - calls it "I be hurtin"!) it's still a bit spasm-y.  It actually feels fine when I'm moving now, but sitting here typing, I really feel it.  I'm telling you, folks - it's amazing how virtually nothing can throw a body part out of whack when you hit "a certain age". 

One of my favorite bloggers, Karen of Waisting Time, tagged me to answer 4 questions.  By the way, if you haven't read Karen, I highly recommend you do just that.  She writes beautifully and creatively, and has been a real comrade for me on this journey.  Ahh, the friends I've found in blogdom...BUT!  I digress.  Here are the questions:
1.  What has been the hardest part for you about losing weight and/or adopting a healthy lifestyle?  What's been the easiest?  Without a doubt, the hardest aspect for me has been my addictive nature and tendency to eat away feelings.  I do this with such precision that I'm honestly not aware of what the feelings are, what I'm trying to avoid or at least numb.  My eating feels almost like a conditioned response - think Pavlov's dog.  The urge to eat hits - and like a heat seeking missile I find and ingest food.  Once I eat something this way - really anything - all bets are off as to whether I will be able to stop at a reasonable amount.  I have had sustained periods where I am able to not react to the food urge - and therefore successfully begin to move down the scale, so I know it's possible.  It involves a few rough days of sitting through the food obsessions, which really do pass when they aren't fed.

The easiest aspect for me has been exercise, because I really love being active.  Physical issues in the last year have gotten in the way a bit, but haven't kept me from continuing to strive to do some form of exercise most days.  Even if I just walk - I work to maintain a fast pace and cover several miles each time.  It isn't hard the way resisting food's love call is hard.

2.  If you could invite anyone, living or dead, to a dinner party, who would you invite and why?  Feel free to invite more than one.  I would invite both my parents.  Dad died when I was 11, Mom when I was 23.  (I was an only and really had a kind of lonely and screwed up childhood.) I was too young when my Dad died to know much about or remember him - what he was like as a person (he was 59 yrs older than me), what was important to him, what his own family was like.  When he died, I sort of went underground emotionally for years, and while I had a decent relationship with my mom, I got all teen-ager-y pretty soon and uninterested in her or her life and what made her tick.  She had a lot of pain in her life with her parents divorcing and a lousy stepmother entering the picture (who was the only "grandmother" I ever knew), losing her "real true love" in the military, then losing my dad; but I was too young and self centered to even ask her about all that.  I totally regret not knowing my parents much at all but recognize that circumstances were such that it wasn't possible.


There are a few famous people I'd invite - Abe Lincoln, the Dalai Lama, Bill Wilson and Dr. Bob Smith, the founders of AA - but in my own little life the biggest chasms are where my parents should have been.

3.  What would you do if you won a million dollars?  What about 100 million?  With a paltry million, I'd pay off every cent we owe (student loans!), which would still leave a lot.  Then a Volvo for myself (the SUV), a redo of our house, and the rest to cancer research.  With 100 million - all that and more to charity.  Maybe Haitian relief as a major cause.  Lavish my kids - though they're not too into $.

4.  What role does blogging play in your life?  Blogging gives me an opportunity to write, process and connect with the world outside of my head.  I certainly have plenty of that in real life, but I talk about things here I don't elsewhere, so this takes on a different dimension.  Do I see it changing over time?  Yes, I'd like to morph into a less weight loss effort centered blog and more point of view and think pieces.  I love writing, and this venue where at least someone else is reading once in awhile is a wonderful satisfying endeavor.

Blogging has also introduced me to countless people I think of as friends, though I've only met one of them in person to date (Hi Tammy!).  I love love love love people.  I love getting to know you and getting to be known.  This unique community of "intimacy suffused with anonymity" has enriched my life beyond measure, and I'm grateful.

Now, in the interest of getting this posted, I'm going to end, but tomorrow will tag 4 more folks with 4 new questions.  Put your thinking caps on!