INT. AN INNER CITY CAFE
TREE is sitting at a table, staring at a glass of water. She looks nervous, like she's about to do something that she feels very uncomfortable doing. Her eyes dart to the door whenever somebody comes in.
The door is flung open, letting in a gust of cold air. HER FRIEND has arrived. She could be TREE'S identical twin, except she's 30kg heavier. She walks in like she owns the place, casting a hungry eye over the cakes on the counter. She approaches TREE'S table.
HER FRIEND
Sorry I'm late, sweetie. But getting to this place! I had to WALK! And you know how I HATE walking! Couldn't you have picked somewhere closer? Something I could have caught a tram to? Never mind, sorry I'm late. Did you get a look at the cakes? Mmmm, yum!
HER FRIEND bustles around her seat, peeling off her coat, arranging her bag and generally making a fuss. TREE stares at her glass.
HER FRIEND
I mean, what made you pick this place? Although it will be nice to order a coffee and a big slab of cake. There was lemon tart in the window. I know you like lemon tart.
TREE
(quietly)
I don't want any, thanks.
HER FRIEND
No lemon tart? But you love lemon tart. That's not like you. Ohhhh, I get it, you're holding out for the Mars Bar cake, aren't you? With a lovely hot chocolate with marshmallows in it. Heh.
TREE
No, I don't want any, thanks.
HER FRIEND
What, you on some kind of diet or something? Bah! Diets schmiets.
TREE
I'm not on a diet. I just don't want any, thanks.
HER FRIEND
Don't be ridiculous. Of course you do. The cakes look fabulous. We'll both get a piece, how about I get the lemon tart and you get the Mars Bar cake and we share? How's that sound? Where's the damned waiter? I'm perishing here.
TREE
(coldly)
I don't want any.
HER FRIEND
Well, what on earth are we doing here then?
TREE
We need to talk.
HER FRIEND
Talk? Happy to talk. Although I don't know why you dragged me all the way out here to talk. We could have done that at your place. I could have brought over some Tim Tams or some Shortbread Creams and you could have made us chai and we could have talked for hours. Ooooh, and some Mint Slices and Doritos, I know you're a fiend for those. And some Cherry Ripe bites. Why don't we do that now? We can swing by that supermarket on the way and pick it up. That's a great plan. We'll grab some nummies, head on back to your place and talk about anything you want.
TREE
(through gritted teeth)
We're going to talk here.
HER FRIEND
Sweetie, what's wrong? You sound so stressed! I know, we'll go get some videos and a pint of Baskin Robbins Cookie Dough ice cream and have a lovely girly night in. We'll order pizza, that seafood one with the garlic butter melted all over the top. Wouldn't that be fantastic? Wouldn't that make you feel SO much better?
TREE
No. It would not make me feel better. I want to sit here and talk.
HER FRIEND
(sighs heavily and rolls her eyes)
Fine, fine, Miss Party Pooper. What is it you want to talk about? You know, there's a donut shop just up the road, how about we go up there instead and have some chocolate iced donuts. You LOVE chocolate iced donuts.
TREE
STOP IT!
HER FRIEND
(blinks)
TREE
Enough! I can't do this anymore!
HER FRIEND
(puzzled)
Can't do what?
TREE
(gesticulates wildly)
THIS! You! Me! This whole relationship! I can't do this anymore!
HER FRIEND
I don't get it. What do you mean?
TREE
You and the food. Always with the food. Always looking to food to make things better.
HER FRIEND
What's your problem? Why are you so angry at me? What have I done wrong?
TREE
I can't keep using food to solve my problems. You keep wanting to solve my problems with food. It's not healthy for me anymore... I can't keep...
HER FRIEND
(outraged)
What, you're dumping me? Is that it? You're abandoning one of your closest friends like that? After all I've done for you? Jesus! I have been there for you, day and night, seven days a week, for as long as you can remember! I helped you through EVERYTHING! I took care of you, I got you through, I gave EVERYTHING to you, and this is how you treat me?
TREE
I acknowledge what you did. You helped me when there was nobody around to take care of me. But...
HER FRIEND
But what?!
TREE
But it's not helping me anymore. It's hurting me.
HER FRIEND
Oh, I take care of you for all these years and now you decide I'm not good enough for you? That I'm responsible for all your problems? You ungrateful little bitch. I can't believe what I'm hearing!
TREE
Please, I don't mean it like that. Yes, you supported me through some really difficult stuff. And I appreciate that you did that. I really do. I needed you for that.
HER FRIEND
But what, now you don't need me anymore, you think you and your fancy, schmancy new eating habits can make it on your own? Well, let me tell you, you'll be back. I just know it.
TREE
(quietly)
Yes, I probably will. It's going to take a long time to learn not to rely on you like that. You're a huge part of my life. You've had a huge impact. But I've got to move on. Yes, I'll come back to you, but each time I'll be one step further away.
HER FRIEND
(breaking into tears)
But I LOVED you! All I wanted to do was take care of you! To take away all your hurt! To make you feel good! I LOVED you!
TREE
Yes, I know that. But in doing that, you were hurting me.
HER FRIEND
(weeping piteously)
I would NEVER hurt you! I loved you! I just wanted to take care of you! How can you abandon me this way?
TREE
I don't want to abandon you. You are the strength I never knew I had. But you can't keep supporting me with food. We have to find another way.
HER FRIEND
(snarls)
What, you think you're better than me, huh? That you've outgrown me? Why should I change? Why? Let me tell you something, missy. Believe me, I know you better than ANYONE, probably better than you know yourself. You don't have the strength to do this. I know you. Hell, I AM you! This is just a phase. You think you're stronger than me, but you're not. I know you're not. I know where all your buttons are and I know how to push them. A word from me and you're halfway through a family block of Cadbury. One nudge and you're ordering chicken schnitzel sandwiches instead of salad for lunch. Hell, you can be in the middle of making dinner and I'll have you spooning peanut butter straight out of the jar.
Tree
(looks at HER FRIEND sadly)
Yes, you can. But why would you want to do that to me? Why do you want to control me like that? Why do you want to hurt me?
HER FRIEND
(silence)
TREE REACHES FOR HER FRIEND'S HANDS AND HOLDS THEM TIGHTLY.
TREE
I need you to be my friend now. To really be my friend. For this not to be about control and abuse and hurt. I need you. I need you to support me, but in a positive way. In a way that doesn't hurt me. OK? I need to be able to make choices about how I behave and eat and take care of myself and not be controlled by old behaviours and baggage.
I need your help to feel good, really good about myself. But it can't be about food. Can you help me do that? Please?
THE CAMERA PULLS OUT, LEAVING THE TWO OF THEM STARING AT EACH OTHER SILENTLY OVER THE TABLE TOP.
Apologies for going periscope down last week. I wasn't proud of my performance and didn't want to face the music. But I am back and I'm looking to pick your brains.
It was my blog-iversary on Saturday. A somewhat bittersweet one at that.
Why bittersweet?
Twelve months ago, I was on a mission. I'd already lost 8.6kg (18.9lb). I had identified my goals, I had envisioned my future.
I had a fantastic WW leader and I had found a whole raft of incredible women online who were taking the same journey I was. The support was (and still is!) amazing.
Along the way, I had various health issues, including being diagnosed with major depressive disorder, something I'm wrestling with still.
But, no matter what, I still remained on target. Slow and steady losses, both weight and measurements.
I've lost 20.7kg (45.6lb) since I started this blog, 29.3kg (64.5lb) in total.
So where is the bitter?
Well, in the last four months, I've only managed to lose .4kg (.8lb). I've been bouncing up and down, little gains, little losses. My focus has drifted and my eating habits have slid. I'm still exercising, which is helping keep things under control, but I'm not excited by it the way I used to be. I'm doing it because I know it's the only thing stopping me from heading right back to my top weight, not because it makes me feel good.
Now the news is not all bad. I may only have lost .4kg, but I've lost 20.5cm (8"), which is great. So part of it is my body shedding fat and replacing it with lovely, compact, fat burning muscle. But seeing that tiny amount of weight lost over a period of 4 months still really brought me down.
I'm now working full time in an environment where they have a lolly jar, a biscuit (cookie) tin and constant supplies of fundraising chocolate. I do my best to resist, but it's harder to justify not having, "just one". I'm nearly at goal, just one won't hurt... It's positively lethal.
I'm looking for alternatives to my exercise. While the weights are still kicking my butt and some of the pilates exercises are still making me sweat, they don't excite me anymore. I spotted this online recently and I'm thinking of giving it a go. Of course, it's not been released in Australia yet and they don't know when it will be, but we have a US PS2, so I can order it from the US and play it at home.
In my last entry, I mentioned that I had achieved most of my goals. A lot of those 100 things just aren't relevant to me anymore. I'm there.
It's clear that I need to make another set of goals, a set that focuses on my future as a woman at her goal weight trying to live a healthy life.
I need to find the passion again. I need to feel the fire in my belly again.
I know some of you have been here before. What have you done to ignite the fire again? And, for anyone reading this, imagine yourself in my shoes. You're 5kg (10lb) from goal weight. What would be the new goals you set yourself for a future as a fit and healthy person? What would be some of your 100 reasons?
Fortunately, these revelations don't involve biblical freakishness, but they are revelations nonetheless.
But first, no change in my weight this week. A bonus, as I was expecting to gain. Of course, this means that I have no chance at Slimmer of the Year, but that's fine, I can enter next year, having lost and maintained my weight. It's all good.
Now, onto the revelations...
I thought I was going crazy. Well, technically I was already crazy, but I thought I was completely losing my mind.
Now, I'm not surprised that this has grown fairly old. I've been doing this for over a year now, and anything you do for a year straight can get boring. The honeymoon is over, the excitement has worn off and I was looking at what I was doing and thinking, "This is it. For the rest of my life."
It was depressing. Like my entry last week, I was looking for the final reward. Weight loss nirvana - when I finally achieve my goal weight and I maintain and it's dead easy and I never have to worry about it again.
But the scales were falling from my eyes. I WAS going to have to worry about it for the rest of my life. Maintenance wasn't going to be that much different to losing, it was going to be a long hard slog where I kept having to just try and make the best decisions I could.
Real easy to get whiney here. Why did it have to be so hard? Where was the big payoff? Why couldn't I go off into the sunset never having to worry about being a fat chick again?
Not only that, but I'd achieved a lot of my goals. I can buy the clothes I like now. Hell, I can go into chi chi designer stores on Chapel St (exclusive shopping area for non-locals) and try on whatever I like. I was THERE. I felt DONE. But I wasn't quite.
And I had nothing motivating me to take it over the finish line.
Slimmer of the Year was a failed attempt to give me one more thing to work for. Now, don't get me wrong, I'm not stopping here. I'm not done. I want to see 65kg on the scale. Preferably for the rest of my life. But I'm not the girl I was in February 2004. I don't want the things she wanted so desperately, because now I have them.
I'm not that girl anymore.
Enter I Am That Girl Now. I found her from a link in a comment on another site. I followed the link.
Revelatory.
This woman had been where I was. She spoke my language, she knew what I felt and she'd stood on that edge, that slippery, slidey edge between staying on target and keeping the weight off or giving it all away.
And you know what? It was hard for her too. It still is. It's hard, there is no weight loss nirvana even when you get to goal. Just more of the same.
I wasn't going crazy. This was NORMAL.
Such a fucking relief.
Like treatment for my depression, it was just enough to hear I wasn't alone, I wasn't nearly as out of my mind as I thought I was and that it was OK, I would survive.
I was down, but not out.
This week, I've been very kind to myself. This week it's about water. That's all I have to concentrate on. If I get my exercise, great. If I stay within my points, fantastic. If I track, bonus. But the water is the thing.
There's no point freaking out and trying to focus on everything, because in the end I'll focus on nothing, feel like a failure and then I will give it all away.
So this week, water. 3 litres (100 ounces) every day.
Baby steps. It doesn't matter what size they are, every step forward is a step closer to goal.