Hi fellas, it's me. I know I've been spending a lot of time and energy writing about health and fitness and weight loss and, well, myself. I'm my own favorite subject and when you combine that with my affection for hearing my own voice (er, reading my own words?), you end up with a blog by me about me. But today I'm going to broaden the subject area a little bit so that it includes me but is not exclusive to me. We're going to talk about the latest reason to buy a Kindle, Fifty Shades of Grey.
First of all, though this should be pretty fucking obvious, there will be spoilers in here. If you haven't read the entire trilogy (yes, for those of you who don't know, there are three books) and there's even a slight chance you might someday wish to do so, GTFO. For everyone else, another brief disclaimer: despite the far-reaching title, I cannot hope nor do I wish to represent all women. I am the owner of a single vagina and while I may empathize with other vagina-wielders, that does not make me a Vagina Master. Subject-matter pun somewhat intended.
Fifty Shades is a trilogy about a recent college graduate (Ana) who meets a mysterious and powerful young CEO (Christian) to whom she is hopelessly attracted. The two begin a sexual relationship under the terms of Christian's BDSM contract. Yeah, I know, just roll with it. Although Ana never actually signs the contract, the pair explore Christian's kinky desires and begin to form a non-traditional-but-still-more-than-purely-sexual relationship which eventually becomes a fully-realized romance. They face many trials, both in opposition to one another and united as a couple against outside forces, and eventually fall completely in love, get married, and have kids. Also, there is a sex scene every fifteen or twenty pages. Maybe that's an exaggeration. I'm fighting the urge to go count.
The incredibly sudden popularity of this book (which many attribute to the widespread use of e-readers, which allow for a more discreet reading experience) has made it a common topic of discussion in the media and among friends and co-workers. It has been dubbed "Mommy Porn" more than once, and when you understand the content of the books, it's not hard to see why. I myself heard about the series from a co-worker (and shortly thereafter was repeatedly told I should read it by several other friends) and decided that I should essentially read the first book ironically, much like Mark Wahlburg in The Other Guys learning how to dance to make fun of another kid. I figured I would read it, make fun of the shitty writing, roll my eyes at people swept up in the romance, and move on. I was wrong...I was very wrong.
The story is completely engrossing. I've always been a fan of contemporary fiction (unlike some of my English teacher peers, who find themselves more interested in a book the less comprehensible and more archaic the prose is), and I get wrapped up in emotionally-dense dramas fairly easily. The most memorable book I read before this trilogy was Outlander, and if you haven't read that, well fuckin' A, you have about 800 pages of craziness waiting for you. I certainly didn't anticipate being just as drawn into the story of Fifty Shades as I was with Outlander, especially knowing that the former had originated as Twilight fanfic. The popularity of Fifty Shades, despite its rather dark and left-of-center sexual content, is actually very revealing about what many women value and find attractive in a general sense. I'm not talking about physical characteristics here - in fact, all I know about Christian is that he has copper-colored hair and grey eyes. Like that's even a thing that happens genetically. [Side note: According to Wikipedia, Ian Somerhalder has expressed interest in playing Christian Grey in a movie version. If fucking Boone plays Christian, I'm out. Fuck that guy. Michael Fassbender or Ryan Gosling would be fine, of course...I mean, did you see Drive?!?]
What I am talking about are traits in a partner and a relationship that appeal to women (henceforth I will use the broad term without qualifying it with many, but let it be understood that I'm not talking about every single uterus - the same goes for when I say "men"). From here, if you'll go with me, I'll move into list format:
1. Women want to be impressed by you. This is not to say that you need to be rich or supremely talented or speak 6 languages. All of those things could count, but they are not a comprehensive list. Things like generosity, a quick wit, or academic achievements can do the job just as well, provided that you're trying to impress someone who does, indeed, find such things impressive. A pragmatic, stingy girl will undoubtedly look down on you for leaving an overly generous tip (also, on a related note, be careful about tipping hot waitresses much more than 20% if you're on a date...it's not too much of a stretch to misinterpret that). In Fifty Shades, Christian is rich, influential, notorious, and very much in charge. Although Ana isn't in it for the money, she can't help but appreciate that the dude is so successful, and frankly a bad-ass at business. So, you want to make this desire work for you?
Get Some Tail: play to your strengths, don't be too shy about your accomplishments and skills, take a girl on a date where the activity makes you look awesome (as long as it doesn't make her look un-awesome)
Yeah, But Dude, Don't: act overly self-assured/cocky, compete with your date (at least, not at first and not with any real gusto), focus more on yourself than on your date
2. Women want to feel desired. This should be pretty fucking obvious, but if my own experience means anything, it's apparently goddamned rocket science. There are many, many, many ways to let a woman know you want her. Simple compliments are always a good standby, and can be based on appearance or not. More complex, time-consuming maneuvers can put a lot of goodwill in the bank - things like elaborate date nights, big surprises, and the like. If it involves planning, then it counts. In Fifty Shades, this communication is accomplished most often with a subtle but intense look - there's a lot of eye-fucking in these books, and body language is just as important as spoken dialogue. Going out of your way to close the distance between you two can translate to I want to be near you. An intricate home-cooked meal that requires a lot of prep on your part can mean I thought about you all day and did something for the single purpose of making you happy. And, well, "You look hot" means pretty much what it says. If a woman is confident that you want to be all up on her, she is much more likely to feel inspired to reciprocate and to allow herself to show you her desire as well.
Get Some Tail: make eye contact with her whether in silence or at significant points in the conversation, be open and honest about your desire for her, use words and touches that make her feel sexy (not self-conscious)
Yeah, But Dude, Don't: give her a compliment and then wave your boner around like you deserve a treat now, talk about how often you want to sleep with her to the extent that she might worry that her libido can't possibly compete with yours, assume that honking her tits every time she walks by is the same as telling her that she's beautiful
3. Women want to feel needed. Christian in Fifty Shades goes from zero to First Officer Needypants pretty quickly in the series, which Ana seems cool with in general. In this particular case, Christian's sexual desire for Ana is tied up in his emotional need for her, and her acceptance of this ties into #4. Of course, all of this is intertwined to some extent, but it's hard to parse out too distinctly in Fifty Shades. The reason that Christian's need for Ana works so well for both of them is that it's not a burden to Ana. She does sometimes feel suffocated by Christian's possessive and controlling tendencies - which they discuss and deal with - but in general she is comfortable with how much he needs her because it mirrors her own need. He operated independently of her before, so he is capable of doing his own thing (and often does, because of his hectic work); at the same time, he would spiral into an emotional hell if he were without Ana permanently, which would be an issue if she didn't feel the same way. The intense emotional connection that goes beyond passion into true need is shared and is therefore comforting and wonderful. If she needs you more than you need her, it's incredibly un-fulfilling and damaging for her. If you need her more than she needs you, it's just sad and emasculating.
Get Some Tail: allow yourself to show her that you are disappointed when she's not available or that you miss her when she's gone, use clear and accurate language when talking about your feelings (if you could live without her just fine, then don't say you can't!), let her take care of you sometimes if she wants to
Yeah, But Dude, Don't: act like you're a child and she's your mother, be overly clingy or needy for extended periods of time, use the fact that you "need" her to justify petulance or bad behavior on your part
4. Women want to fix you. This is probably the most misguided of all of the things here, and it can encourage really awful relationships to go on way too long. The tale has been told and retold more times than I can count: man and woman meet, they fall in love, man reveals horrific personality trait (he's abusive or something), woman debates whether to stay or go, eventually the power of her love changes him so that he is now the model partner, everyone is happy forever. With Ana and Christian, it's at least portrayed warts and all, with Christian's "improvements" coming slowly and after much work with a series of psychiatrists, but it still clearly has the "she loved him so much that he became a stable and loving person" thing going on. Women want this to be true of all the flaws and fuck-ups they deal with in their relationships. "If I care for him enough, he won't need to drink so much." "My love will make him see that he doesn't need to put his dick in anything that moves." "He won't hit me anymore if I give myself to him completely." Yikes. The reality is that everyone has the capacity for change, and that a loving relationship can foster that change, but only if the person in question wants to change. Someone who likes hitting people isn't going to stop doing it just because you care about that person. But women are shown, over and over, the fairy tale of fixing a man, which only encourages them to tolerate unacceptable behavior and nag their boyfriends/husbands in the hope of inciting change.
Get Some Tail: uh...I can't really recommend any ways to take advantage of this desire because it would be horrible to do so.
Yeah, But Dude, Don't: let her believe that she's "fixing" you when she's not, tell her you want to change if you don't, wait until she moves in to release the crazy
5. Women are dynamic creatures, and want you to at least understand this, if not be the same way. In Fifty Shades, Ana is repeatedly surprised when Christian seems to know what her subtle reactions translate to ("she raised an eyebrow, therefore she is jealous but not angry"). She appreciates how intuitive he is with her and becomes frustrated when he is unable to understand where she is coming from. His mind works so differently from hers sometimes (given that their concerns, histories, and goals are different), they approach the same situations from such different angles that it's hard for them to see eye to eye. Ana is delighted, however, when Christian takes her feelings seriously and tries to understand her.
This is probably one of the scariest and most frustrating things about women, at least as far as I can tell since I'm not a dude. If you tell her today that she looks nice, she smiles and is happy. Tomorrow, you say the exact same words in the same tone, and she snorts and says, "yeah, I bet." WTF happened? Well, a whole day happened. Inside a woman's head, everything is connected to everything else. That's why a woman will so often tell a story about, for example, buying a can of bug spray but somehow also end up telling you about the terrible headache she had two days ago and the time she saw a co-worker at a restaurant and had that awkward moment where she had to decide whether or not to say hi. All that shit is connected, if not by direct fact or time, then by emotion or sensory input or words...and at least in a story you can hope to follow those connections. When it's just reactions and feelings, seemingly coming from out of no where, it can be confusing and even infuriating for the person being reacted to. Basically, here's the sequence:
Man: Your eyes are beautiful.
Woman: Whatever.
Man: Fuck you then.
Woman: Fuck you too.
What you don't realize from the dialogue is that the man ignored the woman an hour earlier and didn't hear something important she said, and she was annoyed. He has already forgotten it. She isn't really still mad about it specifically, but she hasn't warmed back up to him. He has no idea that his earlier slight has anything to do with her current mood, nor does he see any connection between the two interactions. They're not related, they have nothing to do with each other, so they exist exclusive of one another. To her, she has no reason to be warm towards him because he was kind of a dick earlier. His compliment is meaningless because compliments given from the dog house (whether he knows he's there or not) are inherently manipulative and underhanded. When he apologizes, or when an arbitrary amount of time has passed, then everything is okay again. (Of course, the fuck-you interaction is going to extend the amount of grumpy time.)
The basic problem here could be solved by communication (see #6), but the disagreement is still rooted in the fundamental perspectives native to each party. The issue that I have encountered personally and that seems to be prevalent in pop culture is that the male perspective is considered standard or normal while the female perspective is flawed/crazy/foolish/whatever. I'm not a hyper-feminist anti-patriarch sort of gal, but it seems silly that in a world where the population is split down the middle between males and females, typically-female traits or behaviors are considered substandard or in need of modification to fit the norm.
[Side note: This discussion brings up a lot of other issues regarding gender identity, society-imposed gender roles versus physical sex, and sooooo many other things, but I'm just not going there. Again, take the categories with a grain of salt - we all know men and women who behavior counter to or outside of the expectations of their gender, but I'm talking about the majority or average, not the exception.]
Get Some Tail: respect her perspective and feelings (and treat them as valid), tell her openly and honestly when her behavior or words are confusing, do your best to understand where she is coming from (but don't feel bad if you don't)
Yeah, But Dude, Don't: treat her feelings or actions as frivolous symptoms of PMS or some other "chick thing", use the word "crazy" fucking ever, fail to distinguish between a dynamic woman and a psychopath - or it could be your ass
6. Women's vaginas thrive on open communication. In the same way that it caused Betty Draper's ass to expand to three times its original size, poor communication in a relationship can pretty much halt any bedroom shenanigans. While there is angry sex and meaningless sex and all those other kinds of fornication, most intercourse is born from a mutual affection between partners. The more passion people feel for one another, the more boom boom you get in the bedroom. It is very hard to feel this way if the emotional basis for the relationship is faltering or injured in some way. While there are many valid and perfectly reasonable excuses to skip a night of lovemaking, like being tired or stressed or busy, there is an easy litmus test to tell if it's "I don't want to bone" or if it's "I don't want to bone you." Think of an amazingly sexy person that you would totally do if you could (say, True Blood's Eric Northman. Mmm.). If that person walked in and wanted to get it in, would you be down? If you answered yes, then I'm sorry, but it is something personal.
That's not the end of the world - in fact, in established, lengthy relationships, it's easy to pass up on sex when you're feeling borderline because, well, you'll have the same opportunity pretty much forever. No need to pounce now. That being said, wouldn't it be nice to want to pounce now? This is where open communication comes in. When Christian in Fifty Shades starts telling Ana about his dark past, all his fucked up demons and shit, she wants to comfort him. With her cervix. It's not the content of his revelations that gets the party started, it's the fact that he's sharing personal feelings with her. A dude opening up to a chick will light alllllll the candles on her cake, if you get my meaning. The same goes for having those dreadful relationship conversations where you talk about an argument you had or discuss your feelings or come to some kind of compromise on a recurring disagreement. The conversations themselves are often painful and uncomfortable. But afterwards, if the conversation is truly open and everyone walks away feeling heard and respected, the vagina is back on board. When it is safe to truly commit yourself to a person, to feel passion without fear of immediate conflict or discord, that opens a lot of doors. And by doors, I mean legs.
Get Some Tail: encourage her to be honest with you about her feelings and concerns (and actually listen), bring up your own concerns in a civil and open way, make upfront relationship-related communication a normal part of your day so you don't have to have huge Talks all the time (a friend of mine calls these "State of the Union addresses")
Yeah, But Dude, Don't: groan and roll your eyes when she says she wants to talk, minimize or disregard her concerns (even if you sincerely think they are trivial), internalize your own concerns in order to avoid conflict
7. Women need to know that they affect you. When Ana bites her lower lip, Christian is seriously affected. It turns him on, and he is very clear about this when she does it. There are many other ways in which Ana affects Christian, but they are all the same - Ana does or says a thing, Christian gets horny/happy/excited/shy, Ana feels a thrill and satisfaction. This is mainly an issue of ego, I suppose. In order to feel validated and comfortable in a relationship, a woman will want to know that you care for her as much as she cares for you. Much of this is accomplished with a simple exchange of words, often monosyllabic. But beyond that "me too" thing, there is also the woman's desire to have an effect on a man. This is related to (but not the same as or as harmful as) #4. There is a lot of satisfaction to be had if a woman can look at her man and say "I did that!" whether that is an erection or just a smile. Sure, there's something to be said for a guy playing it cool - after all, a first date is hardly the time to whip out your schlong and cry, "See what you've done to me?!?" But once emotions are involved and there's a relationship to speak of, it's time to let your guard down a bit. Part of this is simply sharing the feelings you would normally omit from conversation because they are embarrassing or irrelevant. Telling your lady friend that you missed her, or that you thought of her when so-and-so did such-and-such thing, or that you're really glad she did whatever thing she did...all of those let her know that she's under your skin to some extent, in a good way. Some of that comes from, I think, a desire to have power over a partner who is perceived to be stronger/bigger/in charge. You could also consider those feelings to be the symptoms of their love, if that makes sense - you can tell a woman over and over that you love her, but if you don't show it, she'll doubt you. Showing it doesn't mean flowers every day, or at least it doesn't have to; showing your love means (in this case) revealing things about yourself that demonstrate how affected you are by her and her love.
Get Some Tail: articulate to her how your life is better in a specific way now that she is in it, allow her to see your reactions to her (if you're playing video games and she touches your shoulder and it makes you happy that she touched you, then smile, jackass!), incorporate this sort of dialogue into bedroom sexy talk (if that sort of thing works for you)
Yeah, But Dude, Don't: minimize your reactions to her in favor of being Captain Cool Guy, assume that sending her a winky face and a heart via text is the same as looking in her eyes and telling her how you feel, value your ego over your relationship
8. Women enjoy attentions that are impractical, frivolous, immature, creepy, or otherwise over the top. This one comes with many extremely important exceptions and conditions, but I'll do my best to explain by example. Some of the most iconic and beloved romantic gestures of all time, when viewed under a practical and pragmatic lens, come off as way too much. Romantic language is full of exaggerations and hyperbole which we all quietly understand to be false. "I would go to the ends of the Earth for you." Would you now? Because last week you wouldn't go to 7-Eleven for me. The Trojan War was fought over a woman. That's fucked up. Even far more recent shit - Lloyd Dobler outside Diane Court's house with a boombox raised over his head (playing the song to which they first made love)...it's a little stalker-y. But it's still so romantic. This is tied very closely in to #7. Love makes you do stupid things. It makes you go above and beyond the normal parameters of interpersonal relationships and do things that are counter-intuitive or just plain idiotic. And if a man does those stupid things for a woman...well, he's affected alright.
That being said, there is a delicate balance here. In Fifty Shades, when Christian's jealousy and need to control Ana interfere with her career and friendships, she is appalled. They argue, sometimes repeatedly concerning the same issue. But when his hyper-attentive nature matches Ana's needs, they are completely in sync and she delights in his affection. How is a man supposed to know where the line is? Well, you can guess or you can ask. That's basically it. There's no hard and fast rule. If you think something would be creepy or way too intense, maybe don't do it. But if your lady friend talks about how sweet it is that plastic bag boy from American Beauty burned Jane's name into the lawn...well, maybe it's time to invest in some lighter fluid and some good homeowner's insurance. Basically, it comes down to combining two of a woman's needs: show her that you desire her by demonstrating how she affects you.
Get Some Tail: steal a line of dialogue or a part of a scene from a movie she finds romantic (avoid the Spider-Man upside-down kiss though...ugh), make a moderately-silly and immature romantic gesture like writing her a love note or carving your initials into a tree by your house, freely use hyperbolic language to talk about how you feel and what you would do for her (as long as it's based in real passion)
Yeah, But Dude, Don't: hurt yourself seriously while trying to be romantic (she'll just feel bad or maybe get embarrassed), draw attention to her if it makes her uncomfortable, exaggerate or demonstrate affection to the extent that it's disingenuous (don't use the L word unless you mean it!)
Springer's Final Thoughts: Notice how none of these points include things like "be super jacked" or "have a trust fund"? That's because the basis of a real relationship is not that goddamned shallow. Seriously. Also, please don't start threatening to spank a girl on the second date...less than 1% of women would find that attractive, and it's much easier to suss them out on a website than it is to go through a hundred slaps in a restaurant before one lady gets all sex-ified by your proposition. For now, it's time to wrap this up...it's taken me far too long to write this and it's already about ten pages too much. Sorry 'bout that.
Lengthy Addendum: In my haste to end and overly-long post, I neglected to discuss directly the reason anyone gives a shit about this series: sexy time. The love scenes in these books are without a doubt pornographic, despite the fact that E.L. James manages to avoid using any slang terms for vagina. Thank god. The success of the series goes to show that women like porn, too. Most people, I think, assume that porn is something exclusively for men, and certainly they are the bulk of the market, especially for the stuff that's out there. Men are often visual creatures, so videos of some 19-year-old "naughty schoolgirl" getting plowed on a desk by a moustachioed "professor" do the trick pretty well. Senses beyond sight and touch are irrelevant, or at least secondary, and unless you're going to pay a hooker to touch you, then you watch some porn and do the dirty work yourself. Some women work the same way, and god bless 'em. I think most women, if you catch them in the right mood and show them a porn with at least moderately attractive people in it, are capable of being turned on by straightforward videos of sexual activity. However, and I think I can speak for at least a significant minority if not a majority of women, there are a lot of ways that a porn can become a turn-off or just plain old sad. Stilted dialogue and awkward interactions (verbal and physical) are bad. Poor production value is bad. Gross dudes are bad (obvs.). Balls-flapping-in-your-face camera angles are bad. Dispassionate sexy talk (especially extra vulgar for no reason) is bad. Distractingly awful background music is bad. And as we discussed earlier, women operate from a state of interconnectedness and everything-all-at-once-ness that differs from typical male compartmentalization; that means that distracting or unattractive elements in a porn make the whole thing bad. And if you've seen more than a few pornographic videos, you know that this spells doom for the relationship between women and visual porn.
The existence of erotic fiction ameliorates or solves many of these problems. There are no unattractive men, bad camera angles, distracting songs, or awkward interactions in erotic fiction (unless they are written that way, so basically never). The person reading the story has to construct the scenario themselves given only the written word, which means that the translation from text to image is the best possible version for each individual reader. What's more, it's far easier for a reader to insert themselves (okay, let's be honest, herself) into the scenario being described because there is no constant visual reminder that it's not you, it's the 19-year-old naughty schoolgirl. Despite the lack of direct sensory stimulus with reading (relative to visual media, anyway, which at least gives you sight and sound), the experience of reading erotic fiction can be surprisingly immersive.
The problem with erotic fiction is that most of it is terrible. The desire to write sexy stories seems to be practically mutually exclusive from the ability to do so well. Bad grammar and awkward phrasing permeate most stories, and even the ones written with a competent grasp of mechanics are often plagued by issues of pacing, character development, organization, and clarity. Although I cannot claim to have comprehensive knowledge of either pornographic movies or pornographic fiction, I suspect that there are just as many badly-written erotic stories as there are badly-acted/-produced porn movies. Which is to say quite a few. The prevalence of low-quality erotic fiction is one of the reasons that women don't interact with porn more often, though it's not even close to the primary reason. While many criticize the writing in Fifty Shades, with its repetitive phrasing and some awkward prose, I can tell you now, it's the fucking Shakespeare of erotic fiction. Not saying it's good writing. Just saying.
This is only a theory, but I think it makes sense: women do not seek out porn because they are worried what it means if they do. This has several sub-categories. Women's misconceptions or preoccupations about porn (of all formats) keep them from accessing it: it's a guy thing, looking for porn makes me a slut, if I'm in a relationship then I should not want or need porn, porn is dirty (thanks Pilgrims!), porn is not for someone like me, and so on. They believe that porn is only for the hypersexual ho-bags who have no morals (in fact, this is how many women starring in porn are portrayed, but that's another issue for another day). For many women, seeking out porn means stooping to a lower level, giving up something essential and holy about themsleves, shoving aside the superego in favor of all id, all the time. The negative associations with porn are legion and many of them stem from the Puritanical view of sex as a filthy and depraved act that should be suffered through rather than enjoyed. In America, we use sex and sexuality to sell products and entertain ourselves, but when it comes to the act and the enjoyment of the act, we clam up, believing that sexual pleasure is something to be ashamed of, or at least hidden away in the darkest recesses of our lives. We have become experts at sexual doublethink, much to the detriment of our own happiness and fulfillment.
Fifty Shades of Grey helps dispel some of the trickiest issues for women when it comes to porn and sex. It is popular, so it becomes normalized. It's written from the perspective of a woman by a female author pretty clearly writing to females, so it's not a guy thing. Many of those who are reading it are married women who are neither over-sexed nor without morals. Additionally, the way it is written and the feelings of the protagonist help ease women into a comfortable place with the story. Ana has doubts and insecurities, she questions her own feelings but allows herself to take chances, and she has some of the same internal debates that most women would have if they found themselves in her extremely unlikely position. She is a normal, successful, kind woman who enjoys sex with her partner (and often, that sex includes elements of kinkiness). Her initially-shy conversations with Christian about her sexual preferences and desires - and, more importantly, his welcoming and open responses to her thoughts - model a way for women to open up to their partners about their sexual needs. Even if she doesn't want her husband to spank her, for example, a woman reading this book now has access to a Mad Libs version of a conversation where she can fill in the things she does want and approach her husband about it.
This is why, gentlemen, you want your lady friends accessing porn. While some of you may already feel this way and you want to high-five everyone you meet if your girlfriend is cool with acknowledging that porn exists, some dudes are more conservative, uptight, or just unsure about it. What if she is going to porn because I'm not enough for her? What if she prefers the guys she reads about/sees to me? If she is feeling sexified, why isn't she initiating some boom boom with me? How the fuck do you think she feels about your interactions with porn, ass? Nobody is going to choose porn over a warm body in general. Sometimes masturbation/porn is the answer to a given situation because the other person isn't available or the time window is too short or whatever (if you jack it twice a day, then yeah, porn becomes an essential survival tool). But porn is nobody's competition. So chill. Do that whole "communicating" thing we talked about earlier and you'll figure it out. But seriously, imagine that your lady friend watches/reads some porn, gets an idea for a new thing to do in the bedroom, and then tries it out with you and it's amazing? You have porn to thank for that. It's also a great way to open up communication about preferences - using the impersonal critiques of others ("Whatever that dude was doing with her feet was NOT working for me.") can be a safe and straightforward way to share information without hurting anyone's feelings. Also, porn can also make excellent foreplay. This only works if it's something that gets both people going, but when it works, well hoo boy.
While Fifty Shades is pretty clearly escapist fiction, it doesn't have to be a source of distance in a relationship. Some articles about the series seem, at least to me, to characterize it as something that chicks read when they're unhappy, undersexed, dissatisfied, and bored in their relationships. While I'm sure it would be a great temporary one-sided fix for that, this series does not have to be competition for or an enemy of a healthy romance. A dude rubbing one out to a Victoria's Secret catalog might suggest that he is dissatisfied in his relationship, but more than likely it just means that the new bra line is rather flattering, and everything is fine. If your lady friend is reading Fifty Shades and you're worried about what it means, just frickin' ask her if it bothers you that much. Just please, I'm begging you, do NOT look up the basics of BDSM and then try to implement them with her sans discussion. Nothing ruins a good book faster than a clumsy, poorly-executed version of the juiciest scenes. Explore together; it's more fun that way.
Tuesday, May 15, 2012
Sunday, May 06, 2012
Mud For Your Lives
On Saturday, May 5th, I participated in Run For Your Lives, a zombie-themed obstacle course 5k. The anticipation of this event had been building for several months, ever since I heard about it back in the fall. As I stated in my previous post, I had been developing some moderate anxiety about the event, the cause of which was not entirely known to me. Hilariously enough, I inadvertently distracted myself very effectively in the days before the event by beginning the novel Fifty Shades of Grey. If you don't know anything about it, well, let me tell you. I have a long and pleasant history of reading erotic fiction surreptitiously on the internet, but never have I had such materials delivered to me via Amazon's Prime shipping service. Say whatever you want about the origins of the novel (Twilight fan fiction - yes, seriously) or its not-overly-impressive prose, but I can tell you from experience - this is as well-written as this shit gets. I'm not saying it's great, or even very good...I'm just saying that most people who write sexy stories think they're F. Scott Fitzgerald but are really just some dude named Scott. I started the novel on Thursday night, the day I received it in the mail, and finished it today (Sunday). I was genuinely disappointed last night that I was too exhausted from RFYL to stay up and read. It's rather engrossing.
Back to the 5k. I hesitate to call it a run because there was, in truth, not much running involved. It had rained several days the week before the race and even on low-precip days, the cloud cover meant that not much drying was happening. I knew to expect mud, but I had no idea what I was talking about. When Dan, Marion, and I pulled into the Poland Springs parking lot after our delicious Friendly's lunch, we saw people getting off shuttle buses; they had clearly come from the event and seemed at least a little muddy, if only on their lower legs. We knew it was going to be messy and neither Marion nor I wore any clothing we were worried about ruining. We arrived at Amesbury Sports Park roughly a half hour before our wave start time, 3pm. We checked in, stowed our gear, hit the extremely crowded port-a-potties (which we later realized were about 200 feet away from not-at-all-crowded ones), and lined up.
As we waiting to start, we nervously watched people descend the penultimate obstacle, a giant slip-n-slide of tarps down a huge hill used for snow tubing in the winter months. Every so often, a runner would hit a bump just right and get launched several feet in the air, landing on their coccyx with cringe-worthy force. Knowing that this fun but possibly painful "ride" was waiting for me was both exciting and disturbing - it also made me wonder, however, about the scale and painfulness of the other less obvious obstacles.
The first was very straight forward: climb up this big, muddy, steep hill.
It was probably not the best way to start out a 3.1 mile adventure. The climbing was very tiring and I was out of breath fairly quickly. Many individuals attempted to run up the entire hill, despite the fact that there were no zombies until you got to the top. I guess they were trying to get a good time, but if I've learned anything from my foray into running, using up all your juice in the first two minutes is a huge mistake.
When Marion and I reached the top of the hill, we encountered our first handful of zombies. It became clear that they had "zones" of coverage and that you had to evade them within a relatively small area (usually the width of the course with a depth of 5 or 10 feet). We both got through the first two or three zombies without getting our flags taken, and we felt awesome about that. Neither of us expected to "survive" the race, so getting around the first wave was a big success for us. We even attempted to jog from this point to the next zombies, but soon after realized that this was neither wise nor necessary. It was only a few minutes before the mud situation (and it was a situation) became severe enough to slow us to a walk at regular intervals.
Probably about 30 zombies in, we each lost our first flags. We felt good about still having any, but the ease with which we had evaded most of the walking dead made us a little hopeful about our chances...losing a flag harmed those chances significantly. After a little under a half hour, we encountered a water station. I assumed this was the halfway point. Which was cute of me to think. In reality, it was roughly one mile in, or just under a third of the distance. At this pace, we would finish in 90 minutes, or about twice my actual running 5k time.
The obstacles we encountered were actually sort of bunched together. The first man-made obstacle was a crawl-through tube which was basically just a way to get your hands and knees dirty. Immediately thereafter, two obstacles came back to back: a water pit (waist-high) and something which might have been labeled "Slaughterhouse" though I can't remember. The slaughterhouse was a pitch black room which you had to enter via cut-outs in the front wall. The bottom of the windows was about two inches higher than my inseam, so it was a bit more invasive than I anticipated. The interior of the shack was completely dark and filled with smoke, which was a nice touch. There were hanging wires that you could just barely make out in the dark - I assumed these were electrified and avoided them. A few minutes later, there was a "maze" of several tall panels that everyone seemed to have figured out by the time we arrived. Marion and I were separated at this time by about 50 people; she ended up caught in a bottleneck at the exit of the maze, where a dozen people crammed the doorway in an effort to avoid being the first ones to have to face the zombies just outside the maze. I had no such bad luck, thankfully, though I must say that there were many sandy vaginas on full display at some of these bottleneck points. The zombies seemed to respect the people who put in effort and tried to juke around them instead of waiting indefinitely outside the zombies' jurisdiction.
It was around this time that Marion and I got down to one flag a piece. We saw lots of scumbags picking up lost flags from the ground and putting them on their belts, which bothered Marion very deeply - a Lawful Good if I ever saw one. Most of these runners seemed to have gotten what was coming to them anyway, since probably 3 in 4 participants seemed to have lost all their flags by the end (official results peg the survivor percentage for the day at 17.6%). Throughout this time, I kept my eyes peeled for "health packs" that were supposed to be scattered around the course (which would restore life as long as you carried it across the finish line). It was not until the end of the course when we talked to other runners that we found out that the health packs had been removed from play because runners were getting into fist fights over them. Considering it was a key part of the strategy, I was a bit miffed to find this out after the race, not before. Even so, the chances of me getting one was slim regardless.
About 45 minutes or an hour into the race, I lost my final flag. I acted as a meat shield for Marion as best I could during this time, but 15 or 20 minutes later, she ended up the target of a fast zombie and lost her last one as well. Although we were disappointed to be "out", we both felt accomplished, especially since we made it almost to the halfway point (in Marion's case, I think at least halfway, though it's impossible to tell). A lot of people we met at the end of the race had very whiny sob stories about how zombies had done such and such unfair thing or had behaved uncharacteristically, so it wasn't fair that they lost their flags, blah blah. Some stories did seem genuinely bothersome (one dude had run at full speed past a zombie, accidentally hit a girl ahead of him, stopped to make sure she was okay, and the zombie came over and took one of his flags...that seems cheap), but for the most part there were just a lot of sore losers covered in mud.
And let me tell you about the mud. By the time we got to the first water station, it was clear that our shoes (which were going to be donated to an on-site charity anyway) would be completely unusable after today. Marion had some really impressive mud strata on her bare legs that differed in texture and color based on how old the mud was and how deep it had been. Our shoes continuously threatened to come off in the deeper, gloopier parts of the course, and for other runners this was a reality. Thankfully that never happened to us, but it very well could have.
After what I assume was the midway point, an obstacle in which we had to crawl under a length of sawhorse teepees in a sand pit (that's an obstacle?), there was a HUGE stretch of time in which we saw no zombies nor obstacles. Most likely this was due to the terrain, which was hilly and dotted with trees, and had become completely liquid from the rain and the previous six hours of runners. The slippery ground and all its unevenness made this easily the most dangerous part of the course, and not really in a thrilling way. Our progress was very slow and treacherous, and my hand ended up going three inches into the mud on a few occasions when I had to catch myself from falling. Ironically, Marion was doing better during this portion because she had aggravated an existing ankle injury early in the race (like, on the first hill) and was now enjoying the benefits of a cold mud pack on her ankle and the softest possible ground. Even so, we were both becoming increasingly exhausted and we had almost no frame of reference for how far we had come. We finally arrived at a second water station and figured we were two-thirds of the way through the race, a fact that was simultaneously dismaying and comforting. "We're only that far? Well, we know how far we have to go."
After a genuinely dangerous natural water obstacle (a stagnant pool filled with hidden logs and vines), we emerged to slightly drier ground and were at least able to walk almost like normal people. We encountered many more zombies at this point and thoroughly enjoyed interacting with them now that we were already "infected". We tried to act as meat shields for other runners, sometimes with no indication to the runners but often through verbal offers of assistance. We were surprised and a little offended when so many people didn't even bother to acknowledge that we had spoken to them or offered help - and we're not talking elite runners here. These were people who were just as slow as us and had only a single flag remaining, but still did not deign to accept the help of two eager zombies-in-waiting. After a while, we stopped trying to help anyone and instead joked with zombies and sometimes gave undead high-fives (like normal high-fives, but with less oomph and more groaning). Although some of the zombies were clearly bored and tired by this point, presumably having been there for a few hours, several were in on the joke, so to speak, and responded playfully to our interactions. When Marion taunted a "pregnant" zombie with "hit her in the baby!", the zombie pointed at Marion like she was calling her shot.
After about 90 minutes, we arrived at the end of the course. There were three obstacles stacked together at the end. The first was an elevated water slide with wooden scaffolding to get you to the top and a big water tank at the bottom for the landing. After that, there was the aforementioned slip-n-slide down the tubing hill. At the end, which we did not see until we got right in front of it, was an electrified fence that had been pulled up to allow people to crawl under it with about a foot of clearance. If Marion and I had had access to these obstacles, we would have finished in under 100 minutes easy. Unfortunately, there were apparently several logistical issues with both water slides that caused repeated backups. We waited for the first of the three obstacles for about twenty or thirty minutes. We had cooled down completely by this point and were not looking forward to the pool of muddy water at the bottom. Throughout the race, I had been coughing and and hacking (the remnants of my awesome cold from the end of April), often having to spit phlegm into the woods. Caught in the crowd at the end, however, I was forced to spit into the muddy water in which we were all standing. Ew.
When we finally approached the wooden lattice to climb the first slide, it became increasingly apparent that this was not simply a ladder. The "rungs" were between three and four feet apart, which is a serious distance for someone not much over five feet tall. Each step up was a significant effort, and at the top I had to launch with both feet and haul myself up to the platform, scraping my palm on the un-sanded wood in the process. The slide was at an angle significantly steeper than I would ever go down on purpose in my life, and because it was continuously wet by a hose (like a traditional water slide), there was no good way to regular your own speed. It was a short drop with a sudden stop, the stop being a disgusting muddy tank of water at the bottom in which I was completely submerged. While I had managed to this point to go only waist-deep in any mud or water, there was no coming back from this. Hours after the race, I went to the bathroom and found mud in my cooch. This pit was no joke.
Perhaps the only moment - and it was but a half second - in the whole race in which I thought I might fail was when I got to the edge of the water tank. The tank itself had edges over four feet high with no step or edge below that to use to exit the tank. Without hesitation (or checking if I was about to kick someone in the head - yikes), I flung my body sideways onto the ledge and made it out, scraping my other palm on the wood. Somewhere in there I also clocked my arm on something, which is the only serious bruise I have and happens to be right on the part of my wrist that wants to rest on the edge of the laptop as I type. Ow.
After escaping the tank, we lined up for the slip-n-slide. I had mud in my eyes, ears, nose, and mouth. I had to use the few dry square inches of Marion's shirt to get enough mud out of my eyes that I could see where I was going. After that, the real obstacle became the cold. It was about 55º out, certainly not freezing, but we were exposed at the top of a hill and soaking wet. We waited anxiously to go down Tailbreak Hill, if only to get closer to our changes of clothes. The tarp system they were using was clearly flawed from design to execution, and constant fixes were needed to keep it in working order. We were so cold that we began shivering, as did several others in line. You can see the extent of the backup here:
That line wraps back around its full length, and considering that they were sending people down about four a minute with frequent two-minute breaks, we're talking a 10-20 minute wait at minimum. Once the tarp problems became rather severe, some runners decided to run down the hill next to the slip-n-slide (also pictured) and jump into the mud at the bottom so as to "complete" the obstacle. It took us less than a minute to decide to follow this course of action. Although we didn't get to experience the ass-destroying power of the slide, we did get to warm up, and that was all we cared about at this point.
After one last treacherously muddy descent, we reached the final obstacle, the electrified fence. Dan had been standing there waiting for us for over an hour, and had gotten a great chance to watch people harm themselves on this obstacle. The electrified nature of the fence should have been obvious to everyone (there was a sign telling people that they were in the presence of an electromagnet, plus it was making a fabricated buzzing noise every few seconds), but many people went willy-nilly under the fence and allowed themselves to get zapped. Dan's favorites, he later reported, were the people who touched the fence and jerked upward, causing themselves more zappage.
Once we crossed the finish line (2:11:51.9), we received our medals (the zombie equivalent of participation trophies), turned in our tracking chips, and headed for the "rinse off" area, which was a huge fan blowing cold mist. It was rather ineffective. We retrieved our gear and got into the changing area, and were finally given a chance to de-mud and get out of the soaked clothing. It was here that I discovered that the interior of my sports bra was caked with mud. Because, you know, that's normal for a Saturday.
Although Marion and I were not feeling super tired at this point, we weren't enthralled by the entertainment and food offerings in the "safe zone" and decided to board a shuttle bus back to the car. From there, we went to the Ninety-Nine (at which point I ate my second chicken finger plate of the day - you know, a normal Saturday). Dan mercifully stopped at a Dunkin' Donuts so I could get a hot chocolate, and we rode back to Boston feeling pretty good. Upon discovering that Marion had never seen Thor, we pretty much made her come back with us to cuddle the dogs and get all Thor'd up. We actually stayed up through the entire movie, which ended around 11pm, and Dan graciously offered to drive Marion home to Somerville (I have to give Dan props on the day - he drove a lot, stood around a lot, and then drove some more, and was cheery about the whole thing).
It was not until this morning, 18 or so hours after the race, that I discovered exactly what kind of sore I would be. My hip flexors are completely shot. I guess it makes sense that pulling my feet out of mud for two hours might mean that the muscles responsible for lifting my legs miiiight be a little tired. But seriously...putting on pants is a challenge. My glutes/hammies/quads all feel totally fine - it's just my hip flexors. I hope they're better by tomorrow because having taken Thursday, Friday, and today (Sunday) as rest days means that I really need to get back into the gym. I guess if I skip deads tomorrow, I can still do all the upper body work. If I can climb the stairs to get to the gym. Heh.
For now, it's nearly midnight and I'm already setting myself up for a very sleepy Monday. My kids are finishing Feed tomorrow and it's sure to be an emotional conversation (they've actually become invested in the story, so the ending just might destroy them), so I need to be at the top of my game. I'm sad that I already finished Fifty Shades of Grey today and have to wait a few days until the other books in the trilogy arrive this week. Though to be honest, the way Dan reacted every time I went to read that book, you'd think I was eloping with the damned thing in Vegas. Just goes to show you how men and women differ in their regards to erotica - men see it as the consolation prize if no ass is to be had, whereas women seek it out as a viable alternative/supplement to getting ass. At least, in some cases, I should say. Let's hope he gets a hold of himself by the time I start the second book.
Good night, all. I'm still exhausted with a zombie hangover, though I'm happy to say I feel a quiet sort of accomplishment about finishing the event. I'm much prouder of the work I did leading up to it, even if Marion and I did joke the entire time that training for a "run" was the biggest waste of time for this event. I'm not done improving myself and my body, not by a long shot, and I look forward to finding new ways to impress myself. For now, enjoy a little aesthetics:
Monday, April 30, 2012
Diary of a Fat Girl - Episode 18: Rule #1 - Cardio
Two hundred and twenty four days ago, a close friend of mine e-mailed me, my fiancee, and our mutual friend a link to Run For Your Lives, the zombie obstacle course 5k. Having been slowly increasing my exercise regimen and vaguely focusing on fitness for about three months prior to that, I was intrigued and energized. I find it hard to describe the humming, churning, bubbling feeling I had inside of me when I first read about it. This, I thought to myself, is the funnest thing that could possibly exist on the planet. Yes, I was so excited that I used the word "funnest" in my inner monologue. I looked at the obstacles, figured out how long this mysterious "5k" length was, and got to work that same night. It all started simply - a half hour on the elliptical, a few squats and lunges, an afternoon date with Turbo Jam. At the time, I weighed 186 pounds, about 11 pounds less than my largest. I didn't have much of a training plan, but I knew that getting my weight down was going to be priority #1 when it came to being able to finish an obstacle course race.
My initial efforts looked nothing like my current habits and routines. In the couple of months following my decision to do RFYL, I alternated between my elliptical (aka the clothes rack) and Turbo Jam DVDs, often extending dog walks on non-exercise days. I felt like I was being so incredibly active, but looking back at my exercise logs on My Fitness Pal, I was really only exercising about 2-3 days a week. Still, for someone who rarely made the effort even weekly, it was a big shift. The real difference for me and the thing that helped me lose a bunch of weight relatively quickly was calorie counting. I kept to about 1500 calories on rest days and ate back exercise calories on my active days, losing between 1 and 2 pounds each week (most seemed like 2-pound weeks, with several no-loss or plateau periods in there). Even though I'm on a stricter budget now, eating 1300-1400 calories most days and rarely eating back exercise calories, it felt harder in the beginning because it's such a chore to have to care at all. Now, I weigh everything I eat and it doesn't bother me. I don't obsess if I'm not sure of the calories in something, and I don't worry about going over budget for a day or two. Now that I have spent more than six months taking good care of my body, I feel that I understand it better and am better able to care for it properly.
A lot has changed in my fitness regimen over the last seven months. I use the elliptical mainly as a warm-up tool, and then it's usually at the gym before I lift weights. Strength training has become just as important to me as running, particularly because I enjoy it significantly more than almost all other fitness activities. Running does give me satisfaction and a lovely adrenaline/endorphin rush if I have a good run, but the act itself doesn't make me smile. Lifting heavy things does. I'm still firmly a n00b - my form is not great, I am not lifting impressive amounts, and I have no intention of becoming a powerlifter. Yes, there is a huge tub of protein powder in my cabinet, but frankly it doesn't taste very good and I'm not lifting enough volume to justify a shake every lifting day. That being said, I feel entirely confident entering the weight room at my gym, a far cry from my insecure and unsure self just three months ago when I started. The more I am able to do and the happier I become with my body (both in appearance and ability), the fewer shits I give about what others in the gym might or might not think of me. Yeah, I might be dead lifting in a smith machine (no oly bars? rly?), but at least I'm dead lifting instead of doing 15 different tricep exercises trying to "spot tone". See, I'm learning.
My path to Run For Your Lives has educated me beyond what I had imagined. I know more about fitness, weight lifting, cardio, running, my body, and nutrition than I had even planned to know. Even though I still have so much to learn, I at least feel like, if I were left to my own devices, I could take care of myself reasonably well in the future. Who would have thought that a silly 5k would have prompted so much change, growth, and awesomeness?
Well now it's time to face the music. I have built up this race so much in my head that my anxiety about it is getting a little out of control. It's not that I'm worried about my running performance - I already know that my goal is just to finish, and if I can run the whole thing that's great, but I'm not expecting to "survive" with all my flags or even make decent time. It's not that I'm worried I will have trouble with the obstacles - although I'm not what I would call "strong", I'm no longer embarrassingly-weak and the obstacles aren't designed to be that difficult. I don't really know what is making me so nervous. Part of it is that I really hate being chased, as I mentioned in my original RFYL blog post. Although I think the race will be fun, there is an element of terror involved with people coming for you. It's not something that I suspect I will enjoy, at least on a primal level. But even assuming that I find the zombies fun to evade and do not pee my pants when I encounter the first several, there's something else, something I can't put my finger on. I guess there has just been so much anticipation around this mythical, infinitely-in-the-future event that its immediacy and reality are overwhelming to me.
At the same time, I look at how far I have come, ostensibly because of the inspiration gained from training for this race, and I can't help but be happy and excited. I have lost 45 pounds total, 34 of which came off after the zombie 5k was brought to my attention. I have completed Couch-to-5k, or more accurately, I used the first six weeks of the C25K program to get to the point where I could run a 5k. I have made very real, very satisfying strength gains in my bench press, shoulder press, and dead lift. I am significantly closer to being able to do a chin-up. I comfortably fit into size 8 shorts, and had to go to Old Navy yesterday to buy pants that fit considering I have now given away all but two pairs of work pants. And today, even though I am tired from a typical Monday of teaching, and even though I have a significant amount of work to do when I get home, I will put on my leave-nothing-to-the-imagination compression pants and I will run hills outside my house, because I need to work on my speed and acceleration. That's not the kind of thing I really ever expected to say about myself. But I'm happy to say it. It feels important and genuine. And anything that strokes my ego is welcome here.
Although I do have two runs scheduled for this summer (Pug Rescue of New England 5k on June 1st and the Color Run 5k on July 28th), neither of them inspire the same kind of zeal and fury that I felt when I first heard about the zombie 5k. I'm not ready, physically or mentally, to start gunning for things like Tough Mudder, which would be the next logical step if I end up enjoying RFYL. I'm still floundering a bit with my "what next?" crisis, of which I have spoken. I'm not exactly worried that I'll fall off the wagon if I don't have a singular focus, but I do know that I work harder and better if I've got something in mind. One of the best motivations for me on the hardest C25K days was imagining zombies chasing me at a speed juuuuuuust a little faster than my current one. I never had to repeat any runs or take extra breaks. What will be my next inspiration? What amazing and innovative physical challenge is a mere 224 days away?
It feels strange to see the weather for the zombie 5k on the forecast. That's always how I've measured the proximity of events - if the milk expires beyond the date, it's close. If the weather forecast includes the date, it's very close. With both of those true, I am giddy and terrified. Four days, 22 hours, 24 minutes. And counting.
My initial efforts looked nothing like my current habits and routines. In the couple of months following my decision to do RFYL, I alternated between my elliptical (aka the clothes rack) and Turbo Jam DVDs, often extending dog walks on non-exercise days. I felt like I was being so incredibly active, but looking back at my exercise logs on My Fitness Pal, I was really only exercising about 2-3 days a week. Still, for someone who rarely made the effort even weekly, it was a big shift. The real difference for me and the thing that helped me lose a bunch of weight relatively quickly was calorie counting. I kept to about 1500 calories on rest days and ate back exercise calories on my active days, losing between 1 and 2 pounds each week (most seemed like 2-pound weeks, with several no-loss or plateau periods in there). Even though I'm on a stricter budget now, eating 1300-1400 calories most days and rarely eating back exercise calories, it felt harder in the beginning because it's such a chore to have to care at all. Now, I weigh everything I eat and it doesn't bother me. I don't obsess if I'm not sure of the calories in something, and I don't worry about going over budget for a day or two. Now that I have spent more than six months taking good care of my body, I feel that I understand it better and am better able to care for it properly.
A lot has changed in my fitness regimen over the last seven months. I use the elliptical mainly as a warm-up tool, and then it's usually at the gym before I lift weights. Strength training has become just as important to me as running, particularly because I enjoy it significantly more than almost all other fitness activities. Running does give me satisfaction and a lovely adrenaline/endorphin rush if I have a good run, but the act itself doesn't make me smile. Lifting heavy things does. I'm still firmly a n00b - my form is not great, I am not lifting impressive amounts, and I have no intention of becoming a powerlifter. Yes, there is a huge tub of protein powder in my cabinet, but frankly it doesn't taste very good and I'm not lifting enough volume to justify a shake every lifting day. That being said, I feel entirely confident entering the weight room at my gym, a far cry from my insecure and unsure self just three months ago when I started. The more I am able to do and the happier I become with my body (both in appearance and ability), the fewer shits I give about what others in the gym might or might not think of me. Yeah, I might be dead lifting in a smith machine (no oly bars? rly?), but at least I'm dead lifting instead of doing 15 different tricep exercises trying to "spot tone". See, I'm learning.
My path to Run For Your Lives has educated me beyond what I had imagined. I know more about fitness, weight lifting, cardio, running, my body, and nutrition than I had even planned to know. Even though I still have so much to learn, I at least feel like, if I were left to my own devices, I could take care of myself reasonably well in the future. Who would have thought that a silly 5k would have prompted so much change, growth, and awesomeness?
Well now it's time to face the music. I have built up this race so much in my head that my anxiety about it is getting a little out of control. It's not that I'm worried about my running performance - I already know that my goal is just to finish, and if I can run the whole thing that's great, but I'm not expecting to "survive" with all my flags or even make decent time. It's not that I'm worried I will have trouble with the obstacles - although I'm not what I would call "strong", I'm no longer embarrassingly-weak and the obstacles aren't designed to be that difficult. I don't really know what is making me so nervous. Part of it is that I really hate being chased, as I mentioned in my original RFYL blog post. Although I think the race will be fun, there is an element of terror involved with people coming for you. It's not something that I suspect I will enjoy, at least on a primal level. But even assuming that I find the zombies fun to evade and do not pee my pants when I encounter the first several, there's something else, something I can't put my finger on. I guess there has just been so much anticipation around this mythical, infinitely-in-the-future event that its immediacy and reality are overwhelming to me.
At the same time, I look at how far I have come, ostensibly because of the inspiration gained from training for this race, and I can't help but be happy and excited. I have lost 45 pounds total, 34 of which came off after the zombie 5k was brought to my attention. I have completed Couch-to-5k, or more accurately, I used the first six weeks of the C25K program to get to the point where I could run a 5k. I have made very real, very satisfying strength gains in my bench press, shoulder press, and dead lift. I am significantly closer to being able to do a chin-up. I comfortably fit into size 8 shorts, and had to go to Old Navy yesterday to buy pants that fit considering I have now given away all but two pairs of work pants. And today, even though I am tired from a typical Monday of teaching, and even though I have a significant amount of work to do when I get home, I will put on my leave-nothing-to-the-imagination compression pants and I will run hills outside my house, because I need to work on my speed and acceleration. That's not the kind of thing I really ever expected to say about myself. But I'm happy to say it. It feels important and genuine. And anything that strokes my ego is welcome here.
Although I do have two runs scheduled for this summer (Pug Rescue of New England 5k on June 1st and the Color Run 5k on July 28th), neither of them inspire the same kind of zeal and fury that I felt when I first heard about the zombie 5k. I'm not ready, physically or mentally, to start gunning for things like Tough Mudder, which would be the next logical step if I end up enjoying RFYL. I'm still floundering a bit with my "what next?" crisis, of which I have spoken. I'm not exactly worried that I'll fall off the wagon if I don't have a singular focus, but I do know that I work harder and better if I've got something in mind. One of the best motivations for me on the hardest C25K days was imagining zombies chasing me at a speed juuuuuuust a little faster than my current one. I never had to repeat any runs or take extra breaks. What will be my next inspiration? What amazing and innovative physical challenge is a mere 224 days away?
It feels strange to see the weather for the zombie 5k on the forecast. That's always how I've measured the proximity of events - if the milk expires beyond the date, it's close. If the weather forecast includes the date, it's very close. With both of those true, I am giddy and terrified. Four days, 22 hours, 24 minutes. And counting.
Thursday, April 19, 2012
Diary of a Fat Girl - Episode 17: An Open Letter to My Former Gym Teachers
Dear Beverly gym teachers from Briscoe and the high school (years 1995-2002),
You probably don't remember me. While I think it's safe to say that many of my teachers, especially those in the English department, at least have a fair shot at remembering me because of my strong work ethic and endless brown-nosing, I doubt that either of those traits came through in the work I did for you. In fact, I was probably firmly seated among the least memorable students, because I never caused much of a ruckus nor was I one of the elite who seemed to excel so easily at the various activities we did. I enjoyed some of the games, stayed in the background for others, and walked the mile we were supposed to run for the Presidential Fitness Test. Well, in middle school I at least tried to run it, but it became apparent by high school that I was not capable. In fact, I spent most of my teenage years thinking I probably had asthma because of how difficult it was for me to breathe while running. Turns out I was just fat and out of shape.
Gym class was one of the only places in school where I consistently felt like a failure. I guess that's a good thing, from a certain perspective - most of the time, I did well in school and had a decent amount of success, Accelerated Algebra II notwithstanding (Mrs. McCarthy, go fuck yourself. I still like math despite your horrible teaching). But in gym class, at least the majority of the time, I was constantly reminded of how bad I was at everything. It is only now, over a decade since my last phys ed class, that I am starting to understand that it was not my fault.
The curriculum was not exactly great. If you look at what schools are supposed to be teaching in a gym class (or at least, covering between gym and health, which are separated for some reason), it sounds all well and fine, but that was not what you taught me. We did a different sport every few weeks, rotating through them on some mysterious schedule that none of us were privy to except for you. A few weeks of volleyball, then floor hockey, then flag football, then basketball, then tennis, then pickleball (aka "hey, go get that"), and so on. We were rarely given any direct instruction as to the rules of these sports, but instead were expected to know them already, I guess from previous gym classes. We had no advice as to strategy, and for team sports like flag football, indoor kids like myself were all but encouraged to keep to the side and stay out of the jocks' way. There were no objectives, no goals, and no purpose. Once we got changed and did our obligatory warmup, we were to wander over to the equipment bin or the field or whatever made sense for the "unit" we were on. Your job was apparently to yell at kids who didn't want to play and make sure that no one hurt themselves or others too badly.
In fact, I don't recall you doing any instruction at all. It seems a little strange that a teacher would be a full-time babysitter who just watches kids play for 45 minutes at a time. What exactly did you go to school for, anyway? I know that some of you were pretty old school and were gym teachers back when Kennedy was elected, but Jesus, even a gym teacher is a teacher. It's right there in your title. If nothing else, couldn't you do a little game theory? Or strategies for the games we played? Maybe I would have enjoyed flag football a little more if someone bothered to explain to me that there were four downs and that the goal was to get the ball ten yards closer to the other team's end zone. Why did I have to wait until my brother explained football to me when I was 16, when I supposedly had been playing it since sixth grade? With even the lowest possible expectations, wasn't that your job?
Of course, playing a series of sports (badly) doesn't have to be, nor should it be, the foundation of a gym class. Where was the instruction on nutrition? The guidance on how to be fit outside of class? The information about anatomy and physiology that would help us understand our bodies and get/keep them in shape? Even assuming that a health class would cover many of the topics pertinent to teenagers, like reproductive health and substance abuse/addiction, I suspect that there's more to fitness than shooting baskets by myself on the far end of the gym because I can't run enough to play an actual game. I don't know if the blame for this immense lack of content should be placed on those who write the curriculum or those who teach the gym teachers or just the gym teachers themselves. I don't think I can blame you entirely, because the dramatizations I've seen of fictional gym classes seem pretty similar to my experience, so at the very least, this goes beyond Beverly.
[Quick note: I'm not saying that playing sports has nothing to do with fitness or that sports are not a good use of time. But first of all, what we were doing was NOT really playing sports, it was some people playing sports and some people pretending to play sports. Secondly, look at an athlete's training schedule. 100% of his/her time is not spent playing scrimmages. There's other stuff in there. Like, a lot of other stuff.]
What I find most frustrating is that there were brief glimpses of actual fitness work at least a few times per year. In high school, you unlocked a little room underneath some of the bleachers that we called the "Nautilus room" - which I now understand to be the brand of equipment contained therein. And you let us go to town. The boys mostly went across the gym to the other little room that had free weights and barbells in it, but we ladies stuck to the less-intimidating machines. Preacher curls, tricep extensions, chest presses, shoulder presses, leg extensions, and even hip adductors/abductors (which we so cleverly called "the sex machine"). You didn't really tell us what to do or give us any advice - in fact, you usually spent the whole time across with the boys, presumably making sure they didn't drop a 400 lb barbell on their necks - but I loved it. There's something primal and satisfying about moving weight around, and this was my favorite "unit" of the year, with the possible exception of floor hockey, which is one of the few things I am terrible at but still enjoy.
Perhaps if you had let me work in the Nautilus room instead of making me stand around like an asshole waiting to miss a tennis ball, I might have developed a real appreciation for strength training. Like, in 1999 instead of in 2012. I'm not saying it would have necessarily happened, and it's possible I would have just screwed around in there and learned nothing. But it's also possible I would have actually gotten something out of gym class beyond confusion and shame.
Remember around the end of the school year when we were forced to participate in the Presidential Fitness Testing? Of course you remember - it was the only time that any outside standards or expectations tried to hold you accountable for doing anything with us. It's like the MCAS of gym. The five activities we performed for these tests were: V-sit (flexibility), mile run, shuttle sprints, pull-ups, and sit-ups. You know what would have helped me do better on those tests? IF WE HAD EVER TRIED DOING ANY OF THOSE THINGS BEFORE BEING TESTED ON THEM. The most you ever made us run was doing a lap around the gym for a warm-up, which was less than a quarter mile. And forget pull-ups and sit-ups, that shit was totally foreign to me until test day. That's like leaving me in a library to pick my nose and then giving me a reading comprehension test. Yeah, I was surrounded by the tools that could improve my skills, but if you don't show me how to use them and work with me, what the fuck am I supposed to learn?
More than anything else, I feel disappointed about the wasted opportunity. You had my undivided attention for 45 minutes every single day. If I had spent even half of that time being truly active, I might not have gone from a size 10 to a size 16 over the course of high school and college. Sure, my eating habits can take the brunt of the blame for that, but now that I know it's possible to ignite a passion for fitness inside myself, I'm angry that it took this long to happen. YOU were the ones who could have helped me. YOU were the ones responsible for my physical education. YOU had the knowledge, the equipment, and the time to spare to help me get fit. And you didn't. You wasted my time, you made me dislike the very activities that I should have been engaging in regularly, and you judged me for it. Maybe you think we don't notice the disdain with which you interact with the "non-sports" kids. Maybe you think we can't see the eye rolls or the heavy sighs of impatience when we don't jump at the chance to go run around for a half hour. Well, it was obvious to me, and I'm sure to the other kids too, exactly who you felt was worthy of your time. And it sure as shit wasn't the chubby girl who couldn't run a mile.
I know there are a lot of barriers to having high-quality physical education in American schools. No Child Left Behind and its test-based accountability has forced districts to emphasize the core subject areas to the detriment of electives, extra-curricular activities, sports, clubs, and even recess in elementary schools. In Massachusetts, the MCAS tests students in English, Math, and Science. All other subject areas and interests must be considered only after those three subjects have been covered thoroughly, which takes up a substantial portion of the day. From a district-level perspective, I can understand that it's easy to cut phys ed requirements to make room for more academic considerations. But gym getting the shaft makes it even more important that you make the best possible use of the time you have with kids. You need to find ways to improve your curriculum and your teaching, and emphasize core skills and knowledge with what little time you do have. I'm a teacher, so trust me; I know what the fuck I'm talking about here. You don't have time to screw around with pickleball. If you don't have control over the requirements and the administrative decisions, at least don't be a fucking asshole when it comes to decisions you do control. Help kids. Teach them. Encourage them to develop skills for life in a safe, nonjudgmental environment. Try differentiated instruction for once, you twats.
It's been a decade since I graduated high school, and I now teach in an alternative high school program for students who are struggling to graduate. When students are admitted to my program, their schedules are created and their path to graduation is mapped out. You know what we do to make the numbers work? We get gym and health requirements waved. Do you know why we do this? Because it's easy. Schools don't give a shit about those requirements, and since we have neither the staff nor the facilities to teach those subject areas, we get them waved. And it fucking sucks. Because every day I teach a bunch of overweight, unhealthy inner city kids who eat McDonald's at least twice a day. They don't know any better, and I'm just the English teacher - the best I can manage is to tell them how many calories they should be eating a day and how many of those are covered by the extra large coffee coolata they got from Dunkin Donuts. Then it's time to get down to academics, and leave the health stuff behind.
One of my students has clinical depression and also happens to be probably a hundred pounds overweight. When I started losing weight, we had a few conversations about his own goals and how he was struggling to achieve anything with his inconsistent efforts. At his request, I printed him the treadmill version of Couch-to-5k for him to try at home, which he has done a few times, but with limited success. I gave him a Jillian Michaels DVD (that I hated because she's too mean, but he loved) as a reward for coming to school on time on a Monday (a near-impossible feat for many of my students). But every day I see him, I know he's still struggling. I wish I could communicate to him how much his life could change if he focused more on fitness. I want to show him research studies that support regular exercise as a valid treatment for depression. I want to spend time with him talking about his habits and goals, discussing food diaries and exercise plans, but that's not my place. In fact, it would be YOUR place. But you did fuck-all for me, so maybe I shouldn't lament that my school waves phys ed. After all, what good did it do me?
Sincerely,
Amber H.
BHS Class of 2002
45 pounds lost in 9 months
12:00 mile
Fuck You
You probably don't remember me. While I think it's safe to say that many of my teachers, especially those in the English department, at least have a fair shot at remembering me because of my strong work ethic and endless brown-nosing, I doubt that either of those traits came through in the work I did for you. In fact, I was probably firmly seated among the least memorable students, because I never caused much of a ruckus nor was I one of the elite who seemed to excel so easily at the various activities we did. I enjoyed some of the games, stayed in the background for others, and walked the mile we were supposed to run for the Presidential Fitness Test. Well, in middle school I at least tried to run it, but it became apparent by high school that I was not capable. In fact, I spent most of my teenage years thinking I probably had asthma because of how difficult it was for me to breathe while running. Turns out I was just fat and out of shape.
Gym class was one of the only places in school where I consistently felt like a failure. I guess that's a good thing, from a certain perspective - most of the time, I did well in school and had a decent amount of success, Accelerated Algebra II notwithstanding (Mrs. McCarthy, go fuck yourself. I still like math despite your horrible teaching). But in gym class, at least the majority of the time, I was constantly reminded of how bad I was at everything. It is only now, over a decade since my last phys ed class, that I am starting to understand that it was not my fault.
The curriculum was not exactly great. If you look at what schools are supposed to be teaching in a gym class (or at least, covering between gym and health, which are separated for some reason), it sounds all well and fine, but that was not what you taught me. We did a different sport every few weeks, rotating through them on some mysterious schedule that none of us were privy to except for you. A few weeks of volleyball, then floor hockey, then flag football, then basketball, then tennis, then pickleball (aka "hey, go get that"), and so on. We were rarely given any direct instruction as to the rules of these sports, but instead were expected to know them already, I guess from previous gym classes. We had no advice as to strategy, and for team sports like flag football, indoor kids like myself were all but encouraged to keep to the side and stay out of the jocks' way. There were no objectives, no goals, and no purpose. Once we got changed and did our obligatory warmup, we were to wander over to the equipment bin or the field or whatever made sense for the "unit" we were on. Your job was apparently to yell at kids who didn't want to play and make sure that no one hurt themselves or others too badly.
In fact, I don't recall you doing any instruction at all. It seems a little strange that a teacher would be a full-time babysitter who just watches kids play for 45 minutes at a time. What exactly did you go to school for, anyway? I know that some of you were pretty old school and were gym teachers back when Kennedy was elected, but Jesus, even a gym teacher is a teacher. It's right there in your title. If nothing else, couldn't you do a little game theory? Or strategies for the games we played? Maybe I would have enjoyed flag football a little more if someone bothered to explain to me that there were four downs and that the goal was to get the ball ten yards closer to the other team's end zone. Why did I have to wait until my brother explained football to me when I was 16, when I supposedly had been playing it since sixth grade? With even the lowest possible expectations, wasn't that your job?
Of course, playing a series of sports (badly) doesn't have to be, nor should it be, the foundation of a gym class. Where was the instruction on nutrition? The guidance on how to be fit outside of class? The information about anatomy and physiology that would help us understand our bodies and get/keep them in shape? Even assuming that a health class would cover many of the topics pertinent to teenagers, like reproductive health and substance abuse/addiction, I suspect that there's more to fitness than shooting baskets by myself on the far end of the gym because I can't run enough to play an actual game. I don't know if the blame for this immense lack of content should be placed on those who write the curriculum or those who teach the gym teachers or just the gym teachers themselves. I don't think I can blame you entirely, because the dramatizations I've seen of fictional gym classes seem pretty similar to my experience, so at the very least, this goes beyond Beverly.
[Quick note: I'm not saying that playing sports has nothing to do with fitness or that sports are not a good use of time. But first of all, what we were doing was NOT really playing sports, it was some people playing sports and some people pretending to play sports. Secondly, look at an athlete's training schedule. 100% of his/her time is not spent playing scrimmages. There's other stuff in there. Like, a lot of other stuff.]
What I find most frustrating is that there were brief glimpses of actual fitness work at least a few times per year. In high school, you unlocked a little room underneath some of the bleachers that we called the "Nautilus room" - which I now understand to be the brand of equipment contained therein. And you let us go to town. The boys mostly went across the gym to the other little room that had free weights and barbells in it, but we ladies stuck to the less-intimidating machines. Preacher curls, tricep extensions, chest presses, shoulder presses, leg extensions, and even hip adductors/abductors (which we so cleverly called "the sex machine"). You didn't really tell us what to do or give us any advice - in fact, you usually spent the whole time across with the boys, presumably making sure they didn't drop a 400 lb barbell on their necks - but I loved it. There's something primal and satisfying about moving weight around, and this was my favorite "unit" of the year, with the possible exception of floor hockey, which is one of the few things I am terrible at but still enjoy.
Perhaps if you had let me work in the Nautilus room instead of making me stand around like an asshole waiting to miss a tennis ball, I might have developed a real appreciation for strength training. Like, in 1999 instead of in 2012. I'm not saying it would have necessarily happened, and it's possible I would have just screwed around in there and learned nothing. But it's also possible I would have actually gotten something out of gym class beyond confusion and shame.
Remember around the end of the school year when we were forced to participate in the Presidential Fitness Testing? Of course you remember - it was the only time that any outside standards or expectations tried to hold you accountable for doing anything with us. It's like the MCAS of gym. The five activities we performed for these tests were: V-sit (flexibility), mile run, shuttle sprints, pull-ups, and sit-ups. You know what would have helped me do better on those tests? IF WE HAD EVER TRIED DOING ANY OF THOSE THINGS BEFORE BEING TESTED ON THEM. The most you ever made us run was doing a lap around the gym for a warm-up, which was less than a quarter mile. And forget pull-ups and sit-ups, that shit was totally foreign to me until test day. That's like leaving me in a library to pick my nose and then giving me a reading comprehension test. Yeah, I was surrounded by the tools that could improve my skills, but if you don't show me how to use them and work with me, what the fuck am I supposed to learn?
More than anything else, I feel disappointed about the wasted opportunity. You had my undivided attention for 45 minutes every single day. If I had spent even half of that time being truly active, I might not have gone from a size 10 to a size 16 over the course of high school and college. Sure, my eating habits can take the brunt of the blame for that, but now that I know it's possible to ignite a passion for fitness inside myself, I'm angry that it took this long to happen. YOU were the ones who could have helped me. YOU were the ones responsible for my physical education. YOU had the knowledge, the equipment, and the time to spare to help me get fit. And you didn't. You wasted my time, you made me dislike the very activities that I should have been engaging in regularly, and you judged me for it. Maybe you think we don't notice the disdain with which you interact with the "non-sports" kids. Maybe you think we can't see the eye rolls or the heavy sighs of impatience when we don't jump at the chance to go run around for a half hour. Well, it was obvious to me, and I'm sure to the other kids too, exactly who you felt was worthy of your time. And it sure as shit wasn't the chubby girl who couldn't run a mile.
I know there are a lot of barriers to having high-quality physical education in American schools. No Child Left Behind and its test-based accountability has forced districts to emphasize the core subject areas to the detriment of electives, extra-curricular activities, sports, clubs, and even recess in elementary schools. In Massachusetts, the MCAS tests students in English, Math, and Science. All other subject areas and interests must be considered only after those three subjects have been covered thoroughly, which takes up a substantial portion of the day. From a district-level perspective, I can understand that it's easy to cut phys ed requirements to make room for more academic considerations. But gym getting the shaft makes it even more important that you make the best possible use of the time you have with kids. You need to find ways to improve your curriculum and your teaching, and emphasize core skills and knowledge with what little time you do have. I'm a teacher, so trust me; I know what the fuck I'm talking about here. You don't have time to screw around with pickleball. If you don't have control over the requirements and the administrative decisions, at least don't be a fucking asshole when it comes to decisions you do control. Help kids. Teach them. Encourage them to develop skills for life in a safe, nonjudgmental environment. Try differentiated instruction for once, you twats.
It's been a decade since I graduated high school, and I now teach in an alternative high school program for students who are struggling to graduate. When students are admitted to my program, their schedules are created and their path to graduation is mapped out. You know what we do to make the numbers work? We get gym and health requirements waved. Do you know why we do this? Because it's easy. Schools don't give a shit about those requirements, and since we have neither the staff nor the facilities to teach those subject areas, we get them waved. And it fucking sucks. Because every day I teach a bunch of overweight, unhealthy inner city kids who eat McDonald's at least twice a day. They don't know any better, and I'm just the English teacher - the best I can manage is to tell them how many calories they should be eating a day and how many of those are covered by the extra large coffee coolata they got from Dunkin Donuts. Then it's time to get down to academics, and leave the health stuff behind.
One of my students has clinical depression and also happens to be probably a hundred pounds overweight. When I started losing weight, we had a few conversations about his own goals and how he was struggling to achieve anything with his inconsistent efforts. At his request, I printed him the treadmill version of Couch-to-5k for him to try at home, which he has done a few times, but with limited success. I gave him a Jillian Michaels DVD (that I hated because she's too mean, but he loved) as a reward for coming to school on time on a Monday (a near-impossible feat for many of my students). But every day I see him, I know he's still struggling. I wish I could communicate to him how much his life could change if he focused more on fitness. I want to show him research studies that support regular exercise as a valid treatment for depression. I want to spend time with him talking about his habits and goals, discussing food diaries and exercise plans, but that's not my place. In fact, it would be YOUR place. But you did fuck-all for me, so maybe I shouldn't lament that my school waves phys ed. After all, what good did it do me?
Sincerely,
Amber H.
BHS Class of 2002
45 pounds lost in 9 months
12:00 mile
Fuck You
Thursday, April 05, 2012
Diary of a Fat Girl - Episode 16: "Now, a clever man would put the poison into his own goblet..."
I have been noticing lately that my engagement ring feels loose. Not quite falling-off loose, but not as secure as I would like. I've had it for over 3 months now, so I know it's just not that it's new and I'm hyper-conscious of it, and it's not run-of-the-mill paranoia about it falling off. I've lost exactly 17 pounds between the day I first donned the ring to now (and was about 10 lbs heavier before that, back when he asked me oh so subtly for my "jewelry sizes"). So of those 27 pounds, if even a few ounces of those came from my fingers, then yeah, it makes sense that I would be a different ring size. My high school ring (which I lost many years ago and still miss, because it was awesome) was a size 5½ I think, and that fit my right ring finger. In college, a size 6 was correct. At my biggest, 6½ was my ring size. When Dan asked me my sizes, and I was about 10 lbs down from my biggest, I told him that 6 or 6½ was my ring size. He went with 6½, which was correct at the time, so I can't fault him for it. It fit fine when I got it, which is why I didn't take advantage of the jeweler's free re-size period of 60 days.
However, as I descend firmly into the 150s of weight, a territory unknown to me for at least the last decade, I find that I don't know what my ring size is. And I certainly don't know what it will be when I lose another 10 or 15 or 20 pounds. I don't even know what weight I'm shooting for, much less whether my sausage fingers will still be little sausages at such a weight. But I do know that I keep my ring on its designated holder on the bathroom sink more and more often these days, so paranoid am I that I'm going to calorie deficit this ring right off my finger. And an engagement ring that you can't wear is kind of lame.
So, knowing that a re-size was in the near future, I casually dropped this information into a conversation with Dan the other day. Here is a reenactment:
Knowing that Dan didn't know what the fuck he was talking about, but also knowing that I wasn't sure of the price hike for platinum, I went online and searched around. Information was pretty all over the place, but every forum and website I saw suggested that it would either be under $100 or free, depending on the jeweler. I went on the website of the company that made my ring and did their little customer service chat thing. Cost of resizing this ring? $50.
There are several things that really bother me about this whole thing, and it's certainly not about paying no goddamned fifty bucks to re-size a ring. First, Dan's reaction was so overwhelmingly negative that I was pretty taken aback. I did expect him to frown upon an additional cost associated with our engagement/impending marriage, but I didn't expect him to shit bricks. And at least a brick or two did, indeed, get shat. I know that he doesn't understand what I'm about to say, but...seriously, you're mad about something that is a result of me losing weight? SERIOUSLY?
[Tangent: He certainly wasn't upset when I gave away trash bag after trash bag of clothes, totaling now three separate trips to Good Will. Does he give a shit that I just lost probably $2000 worth of my accumulated wardrobe? Nah, honey badger don't give a fuck. When I express any disdain for having to get rid of so many clothes, some of which were not cheap, Dan is Captain Silver Lining, saying that it's for a good reason and now I won't have such a crowded closet, yadda yadda. He's allllll about positivity then. And I will tell you why. Dan believes that the amount of stuff I own is significantly greater than the amount the I need and/or the amount that any person should own. He owns like 5 pairs of pants, so therefore everyone should own 5 pairs of pants. He has 25 t-shirts, so therefore everyone should have 25 t-shirts. If I have 30 t-shirts (and I assure you, the number is far greater, even with the repeated wardrobe cullings), then that is too many, regardless of the sources of the shirts, my use or need of them, or my storage of them. Moreover, it seems to irk him, slightly but constantly, that I have "too much stuff". I will be the first to admit that I have lots of things. I follow George Carlin's philosophy/critique of using a house to keep all your stuff while you're out getting more stuff. My personal policy is that as long as everyone can be "put away" whether it be a closet or a drawer or what have you, then you're fine. If stuff is just out and that's where it lives (hoarders-style), then that's too much stuff. Dan and I do not have the same benchmarks/standards for this, and while I don't really care if Dan is a bit spartan in his possessions, he certainly gives a shit when I'm sybaritic in mine. /Tangent]
So the fact that Dan was so up in arms about my ring getting to be too big for me bothered me. I'm not saying he has to celebrate every inconvenience that comes with dropping 3 stone, but maybe don't treat my weight loss as a burden, you know? He already laments how he doesn't get to order takeout as much anymore because I won't order with him (what, are his fingers/legs broken that he can't get his own dinner?), which he's not saying to make me feel bad but is just saying what's on his mind, but holy shit, Supportive Jones he is not. Another, weight-unrelated issue I had with our conversation about ring resizing is that he assumed that the financial burden was his. He never thought about the possibility of me paying for this process, despite the fact that I'm the one who took action that directly resulted in the ring no longer fitting. Maybe he assumed responsibility because he bought me the ring, or maybe it was because I bothered to say something to him about it so he figured that meant I expected him to pay for it. I don't know. But dude, I got this. All fifty dollars of it.
A few weeks ago, Dan and I were talking with some mutual friend of ours whom I can't presently recall, and that person mentioned my blog. Dan regretfully said he still hadn't read it, which I find funny because I told him about it once five years ago and have nary mentioned it again. He later asked me if he should be afraid to read it and if I spend the whole time bad-mouthing him, and we had a good chuckle over that. I told him that I would never be offended if he didn't read it, but that he was welcome to do so. As I look back at past entries, I find a surprising number of them either are directly inspired by conflict with Dan or at least offer passing critiques of him. I guess it makes sense that the person I love, live with, and plan to marry would end up being a frequent subject in my blog, but it bothers me to look at my own entries and see this sea of negativity, much of it directed at him. It certainly was never my intent with this blog (nor could it have been, since it's been around longer than he has), but it seems that it has become a slightly different animal over time. Even as I go back and obsessively reread this very entry for typos and spelling errors (which still seem to sneak through no matter how much I proof it), I'm a little surprised at how angry I sound/am.
I think I use this blog primarily the way I would use a therapist. And rereading this shit, I think I might have a need for a real one of those. This blog does a great job at accepting me for who I am and not judging me for the numerous mistakes I've made, but it doesn't offer much in the way of probing questions and insightful advice. Yesterday I spent a half an hour looking up information on Selective Eating Disorder (what they're now calling us grown-ass picky eaters), and found that there's an eating disorders specialist at Tufts Medical Center downtown who works with selective eaters. Should I get a referral from my PCP and just go? Am I ready to start treatment for a disorder? It sounds so grave when I say it like that. Would this specialist be able to then refer me to a boring ol' psychiatrist? Do I really want to have two shrinks when before I had none? Oye. It's all getting very complicated. When I wanted to lose weight but couldn't seem to do it, life seemed a lot simpler. There was a single enemy, and it required a single battle plan. The reasons for my life-long weight problems were legion; I had to wade through a lot just to even get started, and many of those causes persist today. But it was still a single issue, about which I could safely become single-minded. Now that I have the power to change my body, something I never thought I could really do, what else can I do? And now that I have committed to my health, am I now inextricably bound to the responsibility of fixing everything about myself? Where do I draw the line between self-improvement and hypercritical self-destruction? Knowing that change requires destroying the old habits and traits, how much of myself should I attempt to replace with what I believe to be the upgraded version?
This is all getting very deep and dramatic and serious. But it's Thursday afternoon and I have tomorrow off and PAX East is this weekend and tomorrow I'ma do a final weigh-in at my gym for a weight loss contest that I'm probably going to win. So a lot of good things are happening and I need to just be. To facilitate being, here is a puppy:
However, as I descend firmly into the 150s of weight, a territory unknown to me for at least the last decade, I find that I don't know what my ring size is. And I certainly don't know what it will be when I lose another 10 or 15 or 20 pounds. I don't even know what weight I'm shooting for, much less whether my sausage fingers will still be little sausages at such a weight. But I do know that I keep my ring on its designated holder on the bathroom sink more and more often these days, so paranoid am I that I'm going to calorie deficit this ring right off my finger. And an engagement ring that you can't wear is kind of lame.
So, knowing that a re-size was in the near future, I casually dropped this information into a conversation with Dan the other day. Here is a reenactment:
Amber: I think I've finally lost enough weight that my ring is kind of loose. I might have to get it sized down.
Dan: Oh, shit, really? Ugh.
Amber: Yeah, well, that's what happens when you lose a bunch of weight.
Dan: Is it like, a little loose, or falling off?
Amber: Right now it's a little loose, but it's only going to get looser. Do know how much it'll cost to get it re-sized? I know the company you got it from had a free re-size period, but I know it's expired by now. I figure it'll be more expensive because it's platinum, but it shouldn't be that bad.
Dan: I mean, I don't know the exact numbers, but it's going to be crazy expensive. With it being platinum, it's going to cost a shitload of money.
Amber: Well, if it's more than three figures, then I'm not going to worry about it, that's too much. I'll wear it on a different finger if I have to.
Dan: Oh, it's going to be at least three figures. I'll be lucky if I get away with paying less than $500.
Knowing that Dan didn't know what the fuck he was talking about, but also knowing that I wasn't sure of the price hike for platinum, I went online and searched around. Information was pretty all over the place, but every forum and website I saw suggested that it would either be under $100 or free, depending on the jeweler. I went on the website of the company that made my ring and did their little customer service chat thing. Cost of resizing this ring? $50.
There are several things that really bother me about this whole thing, and it's certainly not about paying no goddamned fifty bucks to re-size a ring. First, Dan's reaction was so overwhelmingly negative that I was pretty taken aback. I did expect him to frown upon an additional cost associated with our engagement/impending marriage, but I didn't expect him to shit bricks. And at least a brick or two did, indeed, get shat. I know that he doesn't understand what I'm about to say, but...seriously, you're mad about something that is a result of me losing weight? SERIOUSLY?
[Tangent: He certainly wasn't upset when I gave away trash bag after trash bag of clothes, totaling now three separate trips to Good Will. Does he give a shit that I just lost probably $2000 worth of my accumulated wardrobe? Nah, honey badger don't give a fuck. When I express any disdain for having to get rid of so many clothes, some of which were not cheap, Dan is Captain Silver Lining, saying that it's for a good reason and now I won't have such a crowded closet, yadda yadda. He's allllll about positivity then. And I will tell you why. Dan believes that the amount of stuff I own is significantly greater than the amount the I need and/or the amount that any person should own. He owns like 5 pairs of pants, so therefore everyone should own 5 pairs of pants. He has 25 t-shirts, so therefore everyone should have 25 t-shirts. If I have 30 t-shirts (and I assure you, the number is far greater, even with the repeated wardrobe cullings), then that is too many, regardless of the sources of the shirts, my use or need of them, or my storage of them. Moreover, it seems to irk him, slightly but constantly, that I have "too much stuff". I will be the first to admit that I have lots of things. I follow George Carlin's philosophy/critique of using a house to keep all your stuff while you're out getting more stuff. My personal policy is that as long as everyone can be "put away" whether it be a closet or a drawer or what have you, then you're fine. If stuff is just out and that's where it lives (hoarders-style), then that's too much stuff. Dan and I do not have the same benchmarks/standards for this, and while I don't really care if Dan is a bit spartan in his possessions, he certainly gives a shit when I'm sybaritic in mine. /Tangent]
So the fact that Dan was so up in arms about my ring getting to be too big for me bothered me. I'm not saying he has to celebrate every inconvenience that comes with dropping 3 stone, but maybe don't treat my weight loss as a burden, you know? He already laments how he doesn't get to order takeout as much anymore because I won't order with him (what, are his fingers/legs broken that he can't get his own dinner?), which he's not saying to make me feel bad but is just saying what's on his mind, but holy shit, Supportive Jones he is not. Another, weight-unrelated issue I had with our conversation about ring resizing is that he assumed that the financial burden was his. He never thought about the possibility of me paying for this process, despite the fact that I'm the one who took action that directly resulted in the ring no longer fitting. Maybe he assumed responsibility because he bought me the ring, or maybe it was because I bothered to say something to him about it so he figured that meant I expected him to pay for it. I don't know. But dude, I got this. All fifty dollars of it.
A few weeks ago, Dan and I were talking with some mutual friend of ours whom I can't presently recall, and that person mentioned my blog. Dan regretfully said he still hadn't read it, which I find funny because I told him about it once five years ago and have nary mentioned it again. He later asked me if he should be afraid to read it and if I spend the whole time bad-mouthing him, and we had a good chuckle over that. I told him that I would never be offended if he didn't read it, but that he was welcome to do so. As I look back at past entries, I find a surprising number of them either are directly inspired by conflict with Dan or at least offer passing critiques of him. I guess it makes sense that the person I love, live with, and plan to marry would end up being a frequent subject in my blog, but it bothers me to look at my own entries and see this sea of negativity, much of it directed at him. It certainly was never my intent with this blog (nor could it have been, since it's been around longer than he has), but it seems that it has become a slightly different animal over time. Even as I go back and obsessively reread this very entry for typos and spelling errors (which still seem to sneak through no matter how much I proof it), I'm a little surprised at how angry I sound/am.
I think I use this blog primarily the way I would use a therapist. And rereading this shit, I think I might have a need for a real one of those. This blog does a great job at accepting me for who I am and not judging me for the numerous mistakes I've made, but it doesn't offer much in the way of probing questions and insightful advice. Yesterday I spent a half an hour looking up information on Selective Eating Disorder (what they're now calling us grown-ass picky eaters), and found that there's an eating disorders specialist at Tufts Medical Center downtown who works with selective eaters. Should I get a referral from my PCP and just go? Am I ready to start treatment for a disorder? It sounds so grave when I say it like that. Would this specialist be able to then refer me to a boring ol' psychiatrist? Do I really want to have two shrinks when before I had none? Oye. It's all getting very complicated. When I wanted to lose weight but couldn't seem to do it, life seemed a lot simpler. There was a single enemy, and it required a single battle plan. The reasons for my life-long weight problems were legion; I had to wade through a lot just to even get started, and many of those causes persist today. But it was still a single issue, about which I could safely become single-minded. Now that I have the power to change my body, something I never thought I could really do, what else can I do? And now that I have committed to my health, am I now inextricably bound to the responsibility of fixing everything about myself? Where do I draw the line between self-improvement and hypercritical self-destruction? Knowing that change requires destroying the old habits and traits, how much of myself should I attempt to replace with what I believe to be the upgraded version?
This is all getting very deep and dramatic and serious. But it's Thursday afternoon and I have tomorrow off and PAX East is this weekend and tomorrow I'ma do a final weigh-in at my gym for a weight loss contest that I'm probably going to win. So a lot of good things are happening and I need to just be. To facilitate being, here is a puppy:
Friday, March 30, 2012
Diary of a Fat Girl - Episode 15: Please Select Your Avatar
Ever since succeeding in running my first 5k (just me versus a treadmill, not an actual race), I have been spending a lot of time ruminating on my fitness goals and long-term plans. I am stuffed to the gills with short-term goals, and can't seem to stop making them. The Zombie 5k looms - it is a mere five weeks away. A month afterward, I run a far more traditional 5k to benefit Pug Rescue of New England. I don't have any races/runs scheduled for after that, but I hope to get more comfortable with the 5k distance and actually get a decent time. In 2013, I will hope to be somewhat competitive for the next Zombie 5k, plus there's that whole wedding thing that's going to happen, and I hear tell that some brides try to get in better shape beforehand. Additionally, I have a few fitness goals like doing 20 kneeling push-ups in a set or completing an unassisted chin-up. While it may take me a while to get to the point of doing those, the training is pretty straightforward and is not particularly time-consuming.
I guess what I'm really struggling with is the creation of a Fit identity. I think spending a great deal of time on Fitocracy (or rather, with the people on Fitocracy) has made this issue more pressing, whether that's a good or bad thing. I don't know which person I want to be: the distance runner, the sprinter, the always-heavier lifter, the vainglorious-peacock lifter, the always-in-weight-loss-mode cardio bunny, the Fitocracy-dictates-my-fitness-goals gamer, the try-something-new-every-week rudderless boat, or just the person who finds a routine they like and then just does it every single day. Some of these hats I would not particularly care to wear; some others I worry about even being realistic. But so far, nothing has struck me with the feeling of yes, this is my thing now. This is what I do.
To me, the Fit identity is the thing that dictates my goals, plans, and actions. But I don't have one yet. I know that I like a lot of what I've been doing (hence why I keep doing it). I like lifting. A lot. But if I really wanted to get strong and jacked, I would have to be even more psychotic about food (macros, timing of meals and workouts, protein protein protein), if I wanted to see any real gains. I'm looking forward to the time when I hit a healthy weight and I can start eating maintenance calories rather than cutting all the time. Yesterday I ate 1177 calories: Corn Flakes for breakfast, Chef Boyardee Dinosaurs with Meatballs for lunch (Spaghettios are for suckers), and then Corn Flakes again for dinner. I was supposed to have pasta with sauce for dinner, but it was hard enough to motivate myself to get off the couch after the gym, much less cook a meal with no meat in it. If I hit a weight between 135 and 140, which is my rough estimate of what "healthy" will look like for me, I get to eat 2000 a day. I don't even know what I would do with all those calories! Actually, yes I do: drink a fuckton a milk. God, I miss milk. The point is, I want to get less obsessed with my food intake than I am now, not MORE obsessed. So any fitness goals that require food OCD in order to get anywhere...well, they're not for me.
I also like running, although the act itself is nothing something I crave. The accomplishment that comes with longer/faster runs, or even just runs that are less devastating to my body, is pretty addicting though. It is a very reliable and healthy mood regulator, and I would not mind incorporating it as an activity I continue to do throughout my life. That being said, I don't know if I want to care more about distance or speed, and if I want to do races or just care about my own progress relative to my past runs. Since the 5k, I have even been struggling with deciding how long/how far/how fast to run at the gym, despite the fact that none of those metrics matter more than the other right now, with me being such a n00b.
I could see myself aiming for some sort of aesthetics goal, but I also see a big problem with that. Anyone who has ever played Plants vs. Zombies will probably recall a gameplay mode called Endless Survival. The point is to see how many rounds of zombie assault you can endure. The game always ends, however, with your brains getting eaten. There's no such thing as winning. You can break your own record, get a really impressive number, make your friends look like amateurs...but you don't win, you just lose later. I think any body/appearance goals I had would be like that, no matter how small/fit/awesome I got. "Sure, my back boobs are basically gone, but when I wear this bra you can see them kind of pooch out." "Yeah, being a size 8 is great, but you know what would be better? A 6, a 4, a 2, or a zero." "I don't know why the hell my thighs still rub together when I walk even though I'm like 130 lbs. I want to wear a skirt without shorts underneath and this is fucking it all up." Even if I weren't a negative nancy, I would still have to deal with the reality of hitting a natural limit. There are only so many pants sizes I will drop, or how little body fat I can have on me. Setting a goal that is "the lowest number I can reach" is setting me up for Pyrrhic victories: sure, I achieved something, but only because I realized I am unable to do any better.
Another issue I need to address is figuring out my long-term balance between fitness and everything else. There are many people in this world (and yes, even in this fat country) who do not spend much time focusing on diet and exercise, but who are a healthy weight and have good enough habits in general to be physically fit. These people may occasionally act with fitness in mind ("No, no more cake for me thanks. I like my size the way it is."), but in general they're just going about their business, not worrying about their food/exercise more than they worry about defragmenting their hard drives or finding a good parking space at the supermarket. Could I ever be one of those people? Do I even want to be one of those people? I like the way that exercise makes me feel, so I don't see myself reverting to a primarily sedentary lifestyle. I also know that, if given total freedom of choice, I will pick calorie-dense, nutrient-poor foods more often than is healthy for me, so I will always at least need to give a shit about what I'm eating, even if someday I am able to forgo calorie counting.
I think the source of this confusion and uncertainty is that my big goal is, and has always ALWAYS been, to get to a healthy weight. Never before has that goal been so tangible, so possible. By next week or so, I will have lost 40 lbs. That's like a whole 5-year-old. Basically, for the last decade, I have been carrying a child around with me, and I finally dropped his ass off at elementary school. I have somewhere between 15 and 20 more pounds to go, depending on what feels like a healthy weight when I get there. I know I have at least like 15 lbs in fat to lose to get to a healthy body fat percentage, so I'm going with those numbers and seeing what happens. I've lost that much since January and it's now the end of March, so I could theoretically hit my weight loss goal in May or June (happily enough, that is when I originally had hoped to hit such a weight, so I'm on track). After that, then what? Even with all the races or the times or the lifts or the reps in the world, I still won't have one big long-term goal. Now I understand why lifters go through these cycles of bulking and cutting. You have a goal, it's a clear number or data point, and then when you hit it, you go to another ready-made goal. Each time you try to make progress towards the ultimate goal (perfect body, I guess? If there is such a thing) without undoing too much of the work you did previously. I don't know if that cycle would be particularly satisfying for me, especially with the aforementioned food obsession that would be required.
Maybe the real problem is that, if we can get morbid and dark for a second, I'm really just trying to fix up a machine that is destined to break down at some point in the future. I have some control over how long it's likely to last and how well it performs while it's running, but the machine will break. So in a sense, trying to achieve anything "permanent" is rather foolish. To avoid getting suicidal, I think I need to focus on quality of life. What is going to make the other parts of my life better? What is going to make me happy, right now and for the foreseeable future? There are many possible answers to those questions. I guess it's great to have so many options for being awesome. Even so, I feel a change in the wind. We'll see what's coming.
I guess what I'm really struggling with is the creation of a Fit identity. I think spending a great deal of time on Fitocracy (or rather, with the people on Fitocracy) has made this issue more pressing, whether that's a good or bad thing. I don't know which person I want to be: the distance runner, the sprinter, the always-heavier lifter, the vainglorious-peacock lifter, the always-in-weight-loss-mode cardio bunny, the Fitocracy-dictates-my-fitness-goals gamer, the try-something-new-every-week rudderless boat, or just the person who finds a routine they like and then just does it every single day. Some of these hats I would not particularly care to wear; some others I worry about even being realistic. But so far, nothing has struck me with the feeling of yes, this is my thing now. This is what I do.
To me, the Fit identity is the thing that dictates my goals, plans, and actions. But I don't have one yet. I know that I like a lot of what I've been doing (hence why I keep doing it). I like lifting. A lot. But if I really wanted to get strong and jacked, I would have to be even more psychotic about food (macros, timing of meals and workouts, protein protein protein), if I wanted to see any real gains. I'm looking forward to the time when I hit a healthy weight and I can start eating maintenance calories rather than cutting all the time. Yesterday I ate 1177 calories: Corn Flakes for breakfast, Chef Boyardee Dinosaurs with Meatballs for lunch (Spaghettios are for suckers), and then Corn Flakes again for dinner. I was supposed to have pasta with sauce for dinner, but it was hard enough to motivate myself to get off the couch after the gym, much less cook a meal with no meat in it. If I hit a weight between 135 and 140, which is my rough estimate of what "healthy" will look like for me, I get to eat 2000 a day. I don't even know what I would do with all those calories! Actually, yes I do: drink a fuckton a milk. God, I miss milk. The point is, I want to get less obsessed with my food intake than I am now, not MORE obsessed. So any fitness goals that require food OCD in order to get anywhere...well, they're not for me.
I also like running, although the act itself is nothing something I crave. The accomplishment that comes with longer/faster runs, or even just runs that are less devastating to my body, is pretty addicting though. It is a very reliable and healthy mood regulator, and I would not mind incorporating it as an activity I continue to do throughout my life. That being said, I don't know if I want to care more about distance or speed, and if I want to do races or just care about my own progress relative to my past runs. Since the 5k, I have even been struggling with deciding how long/how far/how fast to run at the gym, despite the fact that none of those metrics matter more than the other right now, with me being such a n00b.
I could see myself aiming for some sort of aesthetics goal, but I also see a big problem with that. Anyone who has ever played Plants vs. Zombies will probably recall a gameplay mode called Endless Survival. The point is to see how many rounds of zombie assault you can endure. The game always ends, however, with your brains getting eaten. There's no such thing as winning. You can break your own record, get a really impressive number, make your friends look like amateurs...but you don't win, you just lose later. I think any body/appearance goals I had would be like that, no matter how small/fit/awesome I got. "Sure, my back boobs are basically gone, but when I wear this bra you can see them kind of pooch out." "Yeah, being a size 8 is great, but you know what would be better? A 6, a 4, a 2, or a zero." "I don't know why the hell my thighs still rub together when I walk even though I'm like 130 lbs. I want to wear a skirt without shorts underneath and this is fucking it all up." Even if I weren't a negative nancy, I would still have to deal with the reality of hitting a natural limit. There are only so many pants sizes I will drop, or how little body fat I can have on me. Setting a goal that is "the lowest number I can reach" is setting me up for Pyrrhic victories: sure, I achieved something, but only because I realized I am unable to do any better.
Another issue I need to address is figuring out my long-term balance between fitness and everything else. There are many people in this world (and yes, even in this fat country) who do not spend much time focusing on diet and exercise, but who are a healthy weight and have good enough habits in general to be physically fit. These people may occasionally act with fitness in mind ("No, no more cake for me thanks. I like my size the way it is."), but in general they're just going about their business, not worrying about their food/exercise more than they worry about defragmenting their hard drives or finding a good parking space at the supermarket. Could I ever be one of those people? Do I even want to be one of those people? I like the way that exercise makes me feel, so I don't see myself reverting to a primarily sedentary lifestyle. I also know that, if given total freedom of choice, I will pick calorie-dense, nutrient-poor foods more often than is healthy for me, so I will always at least need to give a shit about what I'm eating, even if someday I am able to forgo calorie counting.
I think the source of this confusion and uncertainty is that my big goal is, and has always ALWAYS been, to get to a healthy weight. Never before has that goal been so tangible, so possible. By next week or so, I will have lost 40 lbs. That's like a whole 5-year-old. Basically, for the last decade, I have been carrying a child around with me, and I finally dropped his ass off at elementary school. I have somewhere between 15 and 20 more pounds to go, depending on what feels like a healthy weight when I get there. I know I have at least like 15 lbs in fat to lose to get to a healthy body fat percentage, so I'm going with those numbers and seeing what happens. I've lost that much since January and it's now the end of March, so I could theoretically hit my weight loss goal in May or June (happily enough, that is when I originally had hoped to hit such a weight, so I'm on track). After that, then what? Even with all the races or the times or the lifts or the reps in the world, I still won't have one big long-term goal. Now I understand why lifters go through these cycles of bulking and cutting. You have a goal, it's a clear number or data point, and then when you hit it, you go to another ready-made goal. Each time you try to make progress towards the ultimate goal (perfect body, I guess? If there is such a thing) without undoing too much of the work you did previously. I don't know if that cycle would be particularly satisfying for me, especially with the aforementioned food obsession that would be required.
Maybe the real problem is that, if we can get morbid and dark for a second, I'm really just trying to fix up a machine that is destined to break down at some point in the future. I have some control over how long it's likely to last and how well it performs while it's running, but the machine will break. So in a sense, trying to achieve anything "permanent" is rather foolish. To avoid getting suicidal, I think I need to focus on quality of life. What is going to make the other parts of my life better? What is going to make me happy, right now and for the foreseeable future? There are many possible answers to those questions. I guess it's great to have so many options for being awesome. Even so, I feel a change in the wind. We'll see what's coming.
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