Thursday, May 31, 2012

WHERE IN THE WORLD IS CARMEN SANDIEGO?

Okay, so I dropped off the face of the blogosphere about nine months ago.  I started this blog back in February of 2009, which was over three years ago.  I used the blog as a place to record my personal stats, which I was very into at the time, and as a storehouse for all the great articles I was finding in my main area of interest, which was, and still is, nutrition.  Low Carb High Fat nutrition, to be precise.  And then, without an explanation, I disappeared, and no one knew where I was, just like my old friend, You-Know-Who:




(I would watch that show just to hear them sing!  I'm really dating myself now!)

Everyone has had the following experience:  Someone says something snarky (or downright mean) to you out of the blue, and you are so taken aback that you can think of nothing clever to say.  Later, when it is much too late, you think of the perfectly scalding comeback that would have put that person in their place and elevated you to “most clever person ever”.  I had one of those experiences back in August 2011 when a random stumbler stumbled across my blog and called me and my blog, well, stupid.

The comment posted by this anonymous person went something like this, as best as I can remember:  “Your blog is so lame!  Who cares about all your stuff?  Why don’t you get a life?” and more along those lines.  I posted back something like:  “Oh, yeah?”  I know.  Not the height of cleverness.  After I posted that brilliant response, I deleted both his (I don’t know why, but I always assumed it was a guy) and my comments so that no one else but me and that guy would see them. He never returned and it was a good thing, because I spent the next three days coming up with the most scathing comebacks I could think of, and I’m glad I never got the chance to use them.  I did not want to go on record tearing some stranger a new one as if I cared about what he said.  But I did care, and shortly after that, I stopped blogging.  To you, Guy that Commented:  I assume you will never read this, but you got your way.  I realized that no one cared about all my stuff and I got a life.  Not that I didn’t already have one, but you know what I mean…

I’m not sure what motivates a person to make a comment like Guy did.  I tried to imagine myself visiting someone’s blog about, say, restoring classic cars, and leaving this comment:  “Your blog is stupid!  I don’t care about cars and neither should you!  It’s a stupid hobby and a waste of money!  You need to get out of the garage and get a life!”  Nope, I don’t see me doing that.  Because, at heart and on the surface, I’m a pretty nice guy.

Anyway, the stats I posted nine months ago were the last ones I recorded here, right before I stole away into the night like Carmen Sandiego.  Not only did I stop recording them here, but I stopped in the real world, too.  No more weighing and measuring of food, no more tracking of fat grams or any other kind of grams and no more weighing and measuring of my own body.  Oh, I would hop on the scale every now and then (every few weeks, if I was looking fat), but those times were few and far between.  My tape measure stayed in the drawer and my digital kitchen scale stayed in the cabinet.


I feel pretty confident that I am only talking to myself here, because any people who were following my blog have long since given up on me, I’ll bet.  But if anyone is reading, the answer to “Where in the World is Carmen Sandiego (aka Rebecca Latham)?” is that I just hit the wall and could not stand having to micro-manage my food and activities for one more second!  Being the anal retentive, perfectionist, obsessive compulsive person that I am (that last one has never been diagnosed), it was a hard thing to give up.  My charts would be incomplete and I would not be able to look back to a certain date after August 24, 2011 and know what my thigh measured that morning or how many grams of carbs I had eaten that day and what percentage they had been of my total calories!!!  Oh, the agony! 

Long story short, I got over it, and I am much happier now.  I have been sticking, mostly, to the low carb lifestyle.  I have had times that I have gone completely off of it, like during the holidays, but it is now my default way of eating and I always come back to it.  Over the past few months, I realized that I was getting too far away from what I knew to be the best for me and my chubby body and my chubby hubby.  I was starting to do things like grabbing a bag of Peanut M&Ms when I was out and about and a little hungry, and ordering and eating a pizza (crust and all!) when I was too tired to cook.  Lately, I put on about five pounds, and decided to get really serious about low carbing it again.  Just to see where I was starting at, I dusted off the ol’ tape measure and measured neck, waist and hips, and found out that I was almost EXACTLY where I was, body-size-wise, back in August, within an eighth of an inch.

Here is what I learned (again, pretty sure I'm just talking to myself to solidify things in my mind and convictions) after my nine months off:  Whether I obsess over it or not, it looks like this is the weight my body wants to be.  All the many months and years I spent tracking everything and trying desperately to shed some more body fat were a waste of time and effort.  I mean, hey!  I did not track for the last nine months, and no harm done!

Having said that, I have made a new commitment to get really serious about low carbing and high fatting it again.  I have decided that I am not going to eat candy and chips (did I forget to mention the Doritos that I was having with more and more frequency?) and I am not going to grab cookies at the bank (yes, my bank has a cookie jar and there are bowls of candy on every flat surface accessible to customers).  For the past week or so, I am doing what I know is right and eating protein, fat and some veggies, no fruit save a few berries now and then, and drinking only water, tea and homemade lemonade sweetened with a little liquid Stevia.  I am not measuring my food.  I am eating what appears to be a reasonable amount.  After all the measuring all these years, I guess I should have a handle on what that means without having to get out the dusty digital scale!

If I never decrease my weight from here on out, I am resolving to be content with that.  In clothes, I look pretty good, and no one sees my secret love handles but me and my husband, and he’s not complaining.  I have dropped a couple of pounds in the past week or so, and that’s nice.

I have spent the last several days shoring myself up with reading great nutrition articles on the internet and catching up with all my favorite low carb bloggers that I have ignored for nine months and finding a few new ones, too.  I am rereading “The Art and Science of Low Carbohydrate Living” by Volek and Phinney (two of my faves, who chose me to be a success story in “The New Atkins For A New You”, for which I will always be grateful), which was a gift from Karen Norris, my ol’ Atkins pal.

I will post again when I feel like I want to write something down in font, or when I find a great bit of information that I don’t want to lose track of.

Onward and Downward, as I always say, but even Onward and Straight Ahead can be a good thing!

(By the way, I have gotten back into quilting as a business, so if you want to visit my other blog on that subject and see photographs of my quilts, you can click here.

10 comments:

  1. Well girl you KNOW I care!! In my opinion (?) you have chosen well! Always glad to hear from you and you have thot this thru to a good conclusion. Maybe Guy was a God send, just maybe :) you know He does that kind of thing! Hugs and love Karen

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  2. Rebecca,
    Just want you to know that your efforts and what you shared on your blog were what helped me to reach a similar conclusion for myself, that my body is where it wants to be and I do not need to stress myself with all the obsessing over how many grams of whatever I am eating from day to day.
    Your blogroll opened the door to many websites that I may not have found on my own.
    You helped me explore quality food and get the proper help for my own hormone issues.
    You did the hgc diet and reported on it with such detail so I didn't have to try it myself.
    I am glad to see you back on your blog, however infrequently and very happy that you have discovered for yourself that you are perfect as you are.

    Thank you,
    Stephanie

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  3. Wow! So many hearthwarming things to hear all at one time, Stephanie! I'm glad that my little blog had such a positive impact on your journey toward better health.

    I will be adding a few more sites to my blogroll, and I'll put up a post announcing each one as I put it up.

    It's great to hear from you!

    Rebecca

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  4. Nice post, Rebecca. There is a freedom in letting our bodies be where they want to be (I think my body is way wiser than me anyway, LOL). I am so happy that you are now happy with your weight -- you look fabulous and always have.

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  5. Thank you, kind stranger! Just to clarify, I am happier, but not totally happy. I would still love to look like I did when I was 18. tee hee

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  6. Sorry if this is a duplicate but I think my first attempt to post a comment didn't work because of the multi-layered security. I want to make sure that you read my comment whether or not you decide to post it. I may be the guy who said some impatient and frustrated and ultimately hurtful things a long time ago. I remember feeling those things so if I was particularly crabby I may have actually posted my feelings, I don't quite remember posting. With my own obsessive traits, I had to stop reading your blog. Your work was obsessive and it became frustrating to read. I liked to read about your adventures trying different strategies but it was painful to read your goals and statistics measured at such a minute level for years - you set goals for some of your already healthy, fit measurements to reduce by 1/12"! What difference would that have made in actual real life? Anyway... If it was me, I apologize for hurting your feelings, I don't want to hurt anyone's feelings. I am happy for you that you are in a better place, good for you for adjusting your perspective and celebrating your successes!

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    1. I'm glad you can see that it was your "obsessive traits" that caused you to post as you did, if it was indeed you at all. :0)

      As far as me being healthy and fit, I was not and am still not. I still carry my visceral fat, which is not healthy, and, at the time you commented, I had over 37% body fat. Because I am thinner than some people does not make me healthy.

      And just to set the record straight, I never set a goal to lose 1/12" of an inch. My goals were always set to lose multiple inches, which is not unrealistic. I would keep track of when I lost any amount of inches, down to 1/8" (not 1/12"), and I did it because I have a scientific bent and love statistics and charts and graphs. I think they are fun, but not everyone does. I find it interesting that when obsessive people see my charts, they automatically assume that I am obsessive, too, and that's why I do it. I think it is fun, and when I am in the mood, I do it, and when I am not in the mood, as I was not for the past almost year, I don't do it.

      I have always thought of myself as a researcher, even if I am the only subject of my research. And I hope that when people see the results I am having (or not having), it might help them in their own personal research.

      Anyway, thanks for writing. I always assumed that "Guy" was just some random person who stumbled across my blog and didn't get it. I am going to keep posting about the results of my latest n=1 experiment, so if my charts and stats bug you, just back away from the screen and have a great day doing something that doesn't bug you! LOL!

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  7. Update: Your blog post about your quilting business got me to pick up my quilt that had been bundled into a basket since November and finish the quilting. The thought of hand quilting a king size quilt had put me off. But I finished it on June 30th. Here are some pictures.

    http://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.257298451051641.56901.100003144648308&type=1

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  8. Good for you, Stephanie! The quilt looks great! I only hand quilted two quilts (early on) and now I do everything by machine. By BIG machine!

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