Plateau update: down one pound over past 2 weeks - I think Easter nomming may have fired up my metabolism a bit? Anyway, I'm feeling okay. Total loss is 13 pounds since Feb 1.
What a feelin...
So I was at the gym on Friday for my torture session with Derek. It wasn't my best outing. I gotta admit, I was a little whiny. Derek wasn't in the mood for it (imagine if your job entailed listening to fat people whine about push ups - shudder). I was feeling kinda bad about it. Not like, slit my wrists bad or anything, but just... "you can do better than this".
Anyway, the last 7 mins of our workout, we were doing some cardio on the bike. The last minute is always a set of two 20 second sprints, and I go as hard as I can. I'm thinking it probably looks impressive, especially because I sweat so much that I look like the Flashdance water scene.
So in the locker room, I'm blow-drying my hair and this tall, gorgeous, fit woman with a fantastic afro walks up to me on her way out and says, "You were really inspiring me during my workout today". For reals! I said, "Right on!" and bumped fists with her. She inspired me right back, or helped me to reframe my negative thoughts and feelings about myself. Cool.
Hail Ana full of grace...
The Miaouw and I have been talking about the online pro-ana movement, or sub-culture, or cult, not sure which is the best term to describe it. It is freaky and alarming and fascinating. If you don't know what I'm talking about, the link above gives some info, but it's better to visit some pro-ana sites in themselves, where young girls defend anorexia nervosa as a "lifestyle choice", not a mental illness, and post images of skeletal models as "thinspiration". Yeeeikes.
The Miaouw pointed out that for some girls, this value set has morphed into a quasi-religion, in which they pray to the personification, "Ana" to give them strength to resist temptation, to forgive them when they slip, to make them "free and light". Whenever I land on one of these sites, I always wonder if it's real or satire. I mean, dude, it is So! Fucked! Up! Check this out, from Cassandra's site, ~Save Me Ana~:
I think I speak for all of us when I say holy fucking jesus h KEY-RIST on a popsicle stick. How can this not be read as satire? I srsly don't get it. Wow.Dear Ana,
I offer you my soul, my heart and my bodily functions. I give you
all my earthly possessions. I seek your wisdom, your faith and your feather
weight.I pledge to obtain the ability to float, to lower my weight to the single digits, I pledge to stare into space, to fear food, and to see obese images in the mirror. I will worship you and pledge to be a faithful servant until death does us part.
If I cheat on you and procreate with Ronald McDonald, Dave Thomas, the colonel or that cute little dog. I will kneel over my toilet and thrust my fingers deep in my throat and pray for your forgiveness.
If you stay with me, I will worship you daily, I will run miles a day, come rain, snow, bitter cold or searing heat I will run from the pain and in fright. I will do 1,000 sit ups a day and lie to my family about what I eat and how I feel. I will stop weeping when I feel your warm arms embrace my shivering body. I will numb the hunger pains with razor blades and your strength.
If you give me the strength to fade away I will love you and worship you forever. When i'm finally faded to nothing, when you've given me the gift of ending this torturous life. I will float on to the next world and be thin and beautiful payment for my undying love for you in this world. I ask only one more thing you, please ana, take away this hatred for my pain and allow me to be free and light.
Forever, Cassandra
As is typical of us, we miaouws have irreverently started throwing out prayers to Ana. The Miaouw asked me to print this image (by Ruth Gwily) off for him at work, for his "thinspiration". I did, and when I got home and saw half a stick of butter he'd left out on the counter, I tacked it to the fatty demon, right in its heart! We're gonna start work on a treatment for a new TV show: Ana the Butter Slayer.Well anyway, that's a two-sided look at inspiration; one sane and healthy and slightly ironic; the other totally off the charts crazy for cocoa puffs that I shall stab myself in the eye with if I attempt to ingest one. Whatever works for y'all!
Posts
the pro-ana girls have been gaining in popularity over the last few years and it's absolutely terrifying to me how any parent doesn't see what their girls (and increasingly boys) are doing.
ReplyDeletei think lazy parenting is starting to hit new heights.
Congrats on the props from your new locker buddy as well as the progress you've been making. You rock!
ReplyDeleteHoly shirt! Some people's kids will do ANYTHING to justify. Imagine that. (Hehhehehehe.)
ReplyDeleteSeriously, high fives on your -13 and fist bumps with the super fly chickie. Trés cool.
Smooches.
Patti
wratha, yeah, I haven't been following the movement in terms of its gains in popularity, but I've been aware of it for several years. There's a whole big picture gestalt of crazitude going on here, to do with absentee parents working long hours in order to buy stuff they don't need, kids left to parent themselves, parents too exhausted by the demands of this lifestyle, or by the bleakness of the existential landscape, to intervene when their kids so desperately need them too.
ReplyDeleteHelp us, Ana!
Sgt Mazzz, you are the man for handing out props for the props! Thanks so much for being so awesome and for rocking that 'stache like only you can. Happy Housewarming!
Patti, thank you, thank you! It's funny how such a small moment can have such a momentous impact. I need to make a mental note to pay that one forward. Cheers for coming out to the D-Blog time and again. Lots of smoochie x's for you too.