Breakthrough Day (P2, D20)

By breakthrough day, I don't mean in weight. I mean in self discovery, aka navel-gazing voodoo. But first to the weight, which is my custom. Down 0.8 pounds for a total of 4.4 this week and 21.8 total. Working the plan, working the plan.

Day 15	11/15/2010	212.4	0.2	-17.2
Day 16	11/16/2010	210	-2.4	-19.6
Day 17	11/17/2010	210.2	0.2	19.4
Day 18	11/18/2010	209.4	0.8	20.2
Day 19	11/19/2010	208.6	0.8	21
Day 20	11/20/2010	208	0.8	21.8

I have written before on this blog about how I have taken some shit for this diet. My friends Z and her husband B have been particularly skeptical. B is one of my favorite men in the world. He's just very kind and dear and genuine, and a wee bit affably dorky. He's also seriously left-brained and scientific, and when I ran into him yesterday at the gym, he said, "so am I allowed to make jokes about this ridiculous diet?" Gentle teasing and sarcasm is sort of the way Z&B and R and I relate to each other. I said, "Actually, NO." He made a half-hearted attempt at a joke anyway, and I froze him out. I was actually really pissed about it.

We were all invited to dinner at a third couple's house that night. I dutifully made and brought my own food. B wouldn't talk to me or make eye contact with me the whole night. Several upsetting things have been building for me over the last week, and I've been getting increasingly touchy and depressed. When I got home last night, I had a complete breakdown because I thought B didn't have any respect for me anymore, which opened up a whole can of worms about my fears that R doesn't have any respect for me anymore. It's like if you have a friend who you think is this totally normal, sane, logical, intelligent person and they convert to Mormonism or Scientology or something. Wouldn't it call your whole relationship with that person into question? It's not that you can't come back from it (and no offense to the Mormon or Scientologist HCGers who may be reading this blog), but it would throw you for a loop. I was crying and crying (for the first time in a very long time) and just feeling totally alone, like the people I know in town who are on this diet can't make room for my skepticism and the people who aren't just think I am batshit crazy.

My little breakdown led to a really sweet conversation with R, who was more than a little tipsy from all the fine Italian wine served at dinner. He conceded that the real reason he was against this diet is that he thought it was unhealthy and that I would be miserable and anxious and bitchy and depressed (what he actually said was that he thought it would be a repeat of the postpartum phase, which was a bear both times). R said that I was the same as ever. There was minimal impact on him, and that he wants me to be successful and wants to support me. It was really lovely and sweet and supportive and nice.

So there was that.

I saw B at a birthday party today where we were both dropping off our kids. Again, he wouldn't talk to me or make eye contact with me and was just very weird. So I asked him if he thought I was crazy now and if he didn't like me anymore. He stammered, he murmured, but he wouldn't come out and say, "no! What are you talking about? There's nothing wrong!" And clearly there was. I finally said, "I know you don't understand this and you don't think it's smart or logical, but just give me a chance to show you that I'm not any different, that I'm not any less smart or logical about everything else."

B hesitated, chewed his lip and then said, "the truth is, you said I can't make jokes about it, and that's how I relate to people, and I'm afraid that I'm going to screw up and say the wrong thing, and I'm afraid that you are going to lose your sense of humor." So I told him it wasn't that he couldn't EVER make jokes about it, he just couldn't right now, and that he could still make jokes about LOTS of things and that I promised I wouldn't lose my sense of humor and I promised that we would eventually make jokes about it together. I am actually quite good at self-deprecating humor.

We got distracted by kid stuff at that point, but I felt settled and calmed. A few minutes later, he was leaving the party and ran over and whispered into my ear, "I think you're smart and funny and beautiful and don't worry about it." And he kissed my cheek. And I actually got tears in my eyes about what a dear, sweet man he is.

So that was another thing.

At this same kid's birthday party, I also cleared up another problem/misunderstanding with another friend that had been weighing on me for a few days. I told her calmly and fairly that something she said upset me without making it a bigger deal than it was but also without playing down how much it bothered me. And she explained her true meaning, and we talked about it, and it was all cleared up. And I still like her, and she still likes me, and the world did not come to a screeching halt because I was honest about my feelings in a way that might hurt someone else's feelings.

It's hard to describe why, but this just feels like a MAJOR breakthrough on all my worries about what other people think.

I woke up this morning with a terrible sore throat and a stiff and achy body. R let me stay in bed all morning because we both thought I was sick. But I think I was just having some kind of psychic illness and all these events are rolling up together to finally break me out of my basically week-long funk. Fucking finally!

My friend H told me at the very beginning of this diet process that I needed to stop listening to what everyone else thought I should do and what everyone else wanted me to do. On one side I have my HCG coach and other local friends doing HCG who say "Don't listen to the skeptics. Listen to us. Do everything just like we say and don't listen to everyone else or anyone else. Have faith. Don't deviate at all and don't experiment." On the other side, I have my husband and a few skeptical friends and family members who say, "don't listen to the people who say this diet works. Listen to us. Listen to rationality and science. Listen to years of research that say that the way to lose weight is reasonable diet and exercise." And then of course there are also a few lovely people who know about this blog who are not doing either of those things, who simply support me and take interest in me and trust me to make my own decisions. And more and more people from the skeptic group are moving into the support group (R, Z) which is wonderful.

But it shouldn't really matter. I am not doing something dangerous or unhealthy. I am not giving myself shit and calling it shineola. I am doing an unconventional diet with promising but not guaranteed long-term result. I am a grown-ass woman, and you know what? I am fucking smart. And so if I think this is what I need to be doing now, I need to trust myself and, as H said, STOP LISTENING TO EVERYONE ELSE. Truthfully, it is flattering that I have so many people who care enough about me to give a shit about this. There are not many people I care enough about that I would feel compelled to get involved in their personal relationship with food and their body in any role other than a supportive one. So I tell myself that I am lucky that people give a shit how I am taking care of my body, even if it doesn't always feel welcome.

So, yeah. It feels like I have had a small and hopefully somewhat permanent breakthrough on the narrowly-defined topic of WHAT PEOPLE THINK OF KAT'S DIET. Now let's talk about the upcoming royal wedding.