An old friend of mine has gradually been gaining weight over the last 10 years. We used to walk every night after dinner until she couldn’t anymore due to her job.
Gradually the health concerns arrived…sleep apnea, pre-diabetes, acid reflux, high blood pressure and then she started having trouble walking…knee and hip. I was with her when she picked up a new medication…I read the side effects first. “Have you read the side effects of this?” “No, I never read them…they scare me.” ! ! !
I’d been telling my husband for quite awhile now that if she doesn’t start being serious and losing weight, she will develop even more issues. (Her doctor has been after her to lose weight for years now…she finally said to him, “if you don’t stop harassing me about my weight, I’ll have to go somewhere else.”)
Two weeks ago we went to our yard sales. She’d bought a few items for her sister and we dropped by her sister’s house to give them to her. Her sister had gained weight over the past two years and different issues have developed with her knees and hips.
We needed to go down to her basement for something…she was first…limping and hobbling, my friend was next…limping and hobbling, and I was last…did I mention that I was limping and hobbling as well?
As I am looking at the three of us hanging on to the bannister and walking carefully down the stairs, it hit me. It really hit me.
Definitely a case of the pot calling the kettle black.
Last summer, my husband had a health crisis. At that point in time, I was just 8 lbs away from my goal weight…the closest I had been in over 20 years…closer to 30.
When I am anxious, I pace and I eat. Since it was summer, I ate ice cream…mint chocolate chip…1/2 gallon in 2 days.
Not paying attention/caring, my eating habits reverted back to my former habits of eating at night, wheat products(the peanut butter cookies from Dollar General…a pack disappeared in one day) plus the ice cream.
It got to the point that after my husband would go to bed at 9 pm, I’d be at my computer and the thought “hmmm, what can I eat?” would pop into my head and I just didn’t think/care.
During the winter, I realized that my clothes were tighter and my winter coat didn’t fit like it had the year before…but it didn’t hit me.
In the New Year, I began having trouble with my Achilles in my left foot again and my multi times daily heartburn was back…and it still didn’t hit me.
March..my Achilles(I thought it was my shoes), my veins in my legs were hurting, heartburn and I was getting foot/leg cramps often. Nope…didn’t hit me.
Until that afternoon walking down the basement steps…limping and hobbling after two others who I have been saying they needed to lose weight…it finally hit me.
I’d been avoiding the scale pretty much all winter and spring…so it was not a happy sight. Instead of being within 8 lbs of my goal weight, I was 30. No wonder the Achilles, the knee, veins, leg cramps, heartburn and headaches.
I went cold turkey. No gluten whatsoever, no eating after meals, back to my protein/vitamin shake daily, up the water intake, no ice cream…
Within 2 weeks, the heartburn is gone, 10 lbs disappeared quite quickly(am quite aware that is majority of water weight and also from the gluten). So now, it will be slower going…but that wake up call really hit me this time and I seriously don’t believe I’ll ever return to that point.
I really wonder why it took that long…and why that was the point…to finally realize I was just as guilty as I’d said my friend was and I couldn’t see it.
Now I am extra observant of other things that I am not presently seeing…is what we criticize in others what we are guilty of ourselves?
til next time…Eva
My Paper Rose Garden 