Balancing My Weight and My Life

Back

noreply@blogger.com (Jessica) — Mon, 23 Mar 2009 03:08:00 +0000

I've been gone for a while--somehow it seems like more than three months.

Anyway, in that time we've moved and gotten more or less settled in, and I've realized that I need to get back on the wagon. As much as I would like to think that I can do this without being "on a diet," I can't. I would like to, but I know that I can't. So I'm not going to. I'm setting a goal for myself this time that I will stick with it for at least six months before I even consider quitting. I won't allow myself cheat days/meals until I've lost twenty pounds and the results are tangible.

So I'm back. And I hope to stay back.

So...lazy...

noreply@blogger.com (Jessica) — Sun, 14 Dec 2008 03:08:00 +0000

My time for making Christmas gifts is supposed to be after the boys go to bed. Ideally, with them going to bed at eight and me going to bed sometime after midnight, that's a good four hours of work getting done. It very rarely—OK, never—works out that way.

It's so much easier to stay in my nice warm bedroom hiding under blankets watching reruns of various crime/forensic dramas than to get up and go into the cold (so cold) sewing room and work. It's above the garage, it's easily ten degrees colder in there than it is in the rest of the house. And the rest of the house is also cold. I need to invest in some adult-sized footie pajamas. (There is a space heater in there, but I'd have to go turn it on at seven and then huddle by it the entire time I'm in there.)

I'm going to have to get over this, though. I have nine gifts in various states of completion. Most of them are in the “not started yet” state. If I want to get anything done on time, I'm going to have to wear my bunny slippers and a giant sweater and suck it up. Just...not tonight.

I have a terrible secret

noreply@blogger.com (Jessica) — Thu, 11 Dec 2008 02:27:00 +0000

Shameful, too. In fact, I might as well just come out with it.

I like tween TV shows.

It doesn't hurt that my four-year-old likes them, too. (He's my beard.) Drake and Josh, iCarly, Hannah Montana, Wizards of Waverly Place. I LOVE them. I have seen Merry Christmas, Drake and Josh about four times now, and it's so cute. And festive--I'm also a sucker for Christmas episodes/made-for-TV movies. And Lifetime TV movies. But I'm getting sidetracked.

I don't know what it is about these shows. If I'm honest, the writing is...not great. Most of the time, anyway. Whoever wrote Merry Christmas, Drake and Josh either has no idea what a parole officer does and the powers they legally have or they don't care. The acting is OK but usually over the top. If there are special effects they're terrible. Maybe all that's part of the appeal.

I know that someday I'll have to hide my love and consumption of these shows. I don't have any daughters to justify watching them with, and I would imagine the boys will only watch them for so long before they decide it's more fun to watch sports...or play sports...or do other things that boys do. My husband may suspect something, but I would probably deny it if pressed. Of course he likes Walker, Texas Ranger; what does he know?

Here's a cute title about fat people and clothes

noreply@blogger.com (Jessica) — Wed, 10 Dec 2008 04:11:00 +0000

So, somewhat inspired by this post over at Joy Nash's blog, I have been thinking about me as a teenager and my attitude about clothes. See, I had this thing about being perceived as fat. I consider this thing gotten over because I really don't care anymore. Whether or not other people see me as being fat is something I can't control, and I have better things to do with my time.

However, when I was younger I thought about it. A lot. I never ever wore horizontal stripes or bright colors or did any of the other clothing-related things fat people aren't supposed to do. When I would go shopping, if I was in the dressing room and the saleswoman asked me if I needed a different size I would always say no, even if I really did. My thought was that if I didn't tell her my size she wouldn't know I was fat. Which is stupid because a) she could probably tell I was a big girl whether or not she knew my size, and b) she was probably more concerned with me buying something and giving her a commission than what my size was and if that made me fat or not.

Usually in those situations I left empty-handed. Actually, most of the time when I shopped I left empty-handed. The clothes making me look fat was usually my reason why. It took me years to come to terms with the fact that while, yes, I do have long monkey arms and a long torso and long legs that are certainly not conducive to finding clothes that fit easily and hit me at a flattering point, it wasn't the clothes making me look fat. I was heavy--fat, if you prefer--and probably always would be to some extent. My whole family is large, and even when we're thin we still look...thick, if that makes sense. We're German. What can I say?

I'm trying to get better at ignoring sizes and buying clothes that I like and that look good on me instead of wearing my old T-shirts and track pants to rags. (I just threw away a shirt my dad bought me a decade ago. It was almost transparent. I'm still sad about it.) I'm glad I've finally realized that “looks good on me” is not synonymous with “make me look like a size six.” And I just might buy a trapeze jacket or a spaghetti-strap tank top or an empire-waisted dress one of these days.

Better late than never, I suppose

noreply@blogger.com (Jessica) — Tue, 25 Nov 2008 03:43:00 +0000

Anyway, as I promised you in September, here are some remodeling pictures and stories.

Story the First: when we got this place, the previous owner's daughter very proudly told us that they had been planning to remodel it but had never really gotten around to it, so they would leave the remodeling supplies they had bought behind. These supplies, according to the woman, were a new front door, some laminate for the hallway (three boxes worth, about 55 square feet), quite a few mini blinds still in boxes, and a toilet. The toilet was still in its boxes when we saw the trailer, and the woman pointed to them and said, “Here's a new toilet. We were planning on redoing the bathroom in a pink theme, so we got a new toilet.” From that I extrapolated that the boxes contained a pink toilet. We moved on.

Now it's after we've bought the trailer and we're clearing the garbage out, aka gutting it. No one has looked in the toilet boxes yet, but one had been moved into the living room to use as a little table. I realized we hadn't opened it yet, so I peeked inside and saw...the basin to a pedestal sink.

I called my husband over and said, “Please look in this box. Am I correct in thinking that this is a sink basin, not a very shallow toilet?” He looked and agreed that it was, indeed a sink and not a toilet. It was white, too—bonus!

I went to look at the other box, thinking maybe they got one wrong box and the other one is part of a toilet. A pink toilet, too. I wouldn't be surprised. But no, I opened the box and saw the pedestal to a pedestal sink.

A pedestal! A new pedestal sink. Woohoo! Best part of the deal so far if you ask me. Now, granted, these people aren't big on measuring things (you'll know how I know in the next story) so I'm not totally sure it will fit in the bathroom. The vanity has to come out anyway, though, so at least we don't have to buy a sink. (Probably not--my dad is strongly against the pedestal sink, and we've had a few fights about the pedestal sink. Mostly because I insist that the plumbing for the sink go under the floor or inside the wall, not across like you would be able to get away with if you had a vanity.) I will point out that getting a pedestal sink to replace a double vanity in a trailer that's less than 1000 square feet was probably not the smartest choice, but whatever. We'll put the pedestal sink in and put a tall cupboard next to it for storage. There was one at Home Depot that had cupboards on the top and drawers on the bottom that would be pretty nice, I think. I'd even stain it instead of painting it.

Story the Second: Remember the new front door I mentioned up above? This is it:

Now, first things first: I love a French door as much as the next person. However, this trailer is located in Nebraska. NEBRASKA! Anyone who lives in Nebraska—or anywhere in the Midwest or any other state that gets cold winters—please raise your hand if you think a French door is a good idea for an entry door. Not to mention how easy it would be if someone were ever to break in.

The second thing about the door...I don't know if you've noticed, but it's a storm door. It's not an exterior door at all. There is a handle with a lock on it, but it's certainly not a lock I would ever consider acceptable for keeping things out of my house. Plus there's no key, so the lock would have to be replaced anyway.

On to the third point. The point that makes the first two points moot. I shall tell this part in my typical long-winded fashion. As I was moving this stupid stupid door around inside, I kept thinking, “This door is really big. Really, really big. But surely they measured before they went and purchased a storm-door-that-is-supposed-to-be-an-entry-door. Surely.” Hahaha! Oh, you fool! Measuring is for suckers, all the cool people eyeball it.

Here is a picture of the existing front door. (It's textured almost-paper-thin sheets of metal sandwiching a slab of styrofoam, so it's probably not keeping much cold air out, either, but still.)

I have helpfully added the measurements for you. This door—the existing door—is 32 inches across and 76 inches tall. Now for the storm door...wait for it...

That's right. 36 inches by 80 inches. Really? Really? It's a metal door and this is a trailer, I'm not really sure if they just thought it looked like it fit or if there was some plan to make it fit. It could not have been a very good plan, I don't think.

Story the Third: I was going to separate this out into another blog entry, but I'm typing this in Open Office Writer (screw Word, I don't have that kind of money) at midnight, so it would really be pointless to separate it, wouldn't it? I'd just post both entries at the same time anyway.

This is the Best Story of All. This is the Story of How I Fell Through the Floor. Gather round, children.

Okay, enough of the caps and librarian crap. We knew when we bought the trailer that some of the floors would need to be replaced, even though there were supposedly no active leaks (HA! And HA! Again!). I am amazed that anyone managed to put a bed in the master bedroom, considering that the floor was completely rotten and was fixed with a sheet of 1/4” plywood and gigantic railroad spike-type nails driven through it (but not actually holding it in place, they were apparently just there to increase the odds of someone getting tetanus or something).

We knew that the master bedroom, bathroom and boys' room needed at least some subfloor repair. We did figure out that the kitchen also needed some repairs, presumably where the refrigerator used to be. We did not, however, realize how bad it was.

I was standing in the kitchen, having just triumphed over some crappy cupboards. I was now taking out carpeting—the original 1975 carpeting, I think; none of the cabinets had bottoms, but they all had lovely blue floral carpeting in the bottom of them, which is gross beyond words—that had been glued down with that black tar-type glue. I was basically just having to cut it at the wall with a utility knife because it wasn't ripping up. I think they installed the carpet and then put the walls in, because the carpet was under the wall.

I was trying to avoid the exact spongy spot because I was worried about exactly what happened next. I fell through the floor. Not just a little, but left leg up to the hip. I think I'm lucky that the insulation under that part of the kitchen had been taken out, because Lord knows what would have been in that.

There's the hole. That's the bare ground you see down there. I'm going to look on the positive side, though. Now it's going to be easy for us to put insulation in there, and no one will have to crawl through the nasty dirt under the trailer. Makes it easier for me to do stuff on my own, because Brandon is not really much of a DIYer unless he wants to be, and that's not very often.

Stranger Things Have Happened

noreply@blogger.com (Jessica) — Tue, 18 Nov 2008 17:50:00 +0000

I have somehow lost six pounds. I hope they stay lost.

Fun at Home

noreply@blogger.com (Jessica) — Sat, 08 Nov 2008 03:40:00 +0000

A little bit of news since I last posted. First, I had my first ever trip to the emergency room. We were over at the trailer cleaning up and I stepped on a nail. Ho-ly monkeys did that hurt. A little info about our deck to set the scene: on one side there is a gaping hole. This gaping hole is there so that people may walk down the stairs on that side, but because no one has maintained this place in years, the stairs rotted off. The previous owners started pulling them off but basically left a giant pile of wood to rot in the yard.

So Brandon was loading the last of the trash from inside (yay!) into the back of the truck and I decided I would hop down into the yard and toss the pieces of wood up onto the deck so he could put them in the truck, too. I sat down on the deck and scooted off, and as soon as I did a piece of wood with a good inch and a half or so of nail went through the sole of my shoe and into my foot. (Sidenote: I am a big fan of House and CSI. As a result, whenever I think about the nail going into my foot I get a mental image of that inside-the-body imagery they use, and I see the nail going into my foot from the inside, plus I hear a “puncture wound” noise. It's hard to describe, but I bet if you've seen any of those shows you can imagine it, too.) I screamed and pulled it out and took off my shoe and sock. Hoo boy was my foot bleeding. I staunched the blood with my sock (mmm, sanitary) and waited for Brandon to find me. I say I screamed, but it wasn't bloodcurdling. It was pretty breathless, actually.

It stopped bleeding within a few minutes, but it was easily the worst pain I've ever experienced outside of childbirth. In fact, as I was sitting there I had to do some deep breathing and remind myself that it hurt a lot less than giving birth. After that I debated on going to the emergency room. When I pulled the board off I had tossed it back to the ground, so we couldn't be sure which one it was, but none of the ones we could see that it could have been had rust on the nails. I went inside and looked up tetanus on WebMD. The quote that did it for me was something along the lines of “tetanus can very often be fatal even if expertly treated.” I was decided after that.

We were in and out in about an hour. By the time the doctor saw us—about an hour and a half after it happened—the wound was nearly invisible. Deep but not wide. That was Sunday, and my foot is pretty much back to normal. The doctor said it would bruise and be painful to walk on, but it never bruised. It was pretty painful to walk on for the first day, uncomfortable the second, and only bad Wednesday if I stepped down on it a certain day. Hopefully all the things that can kill me from the trailer are gone now. I can't image what else it would be. Tree branch falling on my head? Electrocution? I suppose I could fall through the floor again and, I don't know, knock myself out on a beam and die of a subdural hemotoma. Let's hope not, shall we?

Tomorrow Comes So Quickly

noreply@blogger.com (Jessica) — Tue, 21 Oct 2008 15:36:00 +0000

Oops. The "tomorrow" that I promised to post pictures on has come and gone quite a few times. Can I just say, though, that Blogger does not work on dial up? At least not my dial up. So this is being posted from my mom's computer, which has broadband. Slow broadband, but nevertheless.

So basic update: we're still working. I was hoping to be in by the end of October, but now it's looking like mid-December. We will be in before the end of the year, because since we're moving from one state to another it will have tax ramifications if we don't. And I hate filling out tax returns for two states.

Um...yeah. I don't have any pictures on this computer, and I've forgotten where I left off with my story last time, so I'll have to do all that later. I will try and do that by the weekend, but no promises.

As for weight loss...well, I'm at the same weight I have been for a while. No more, no less. Any effort at changing my eating habits has been put on hold until we move. Basically, while my mom has an awesome kitchen, it's 65 degrees in here right now. We tend to huddle in one bedroom with one or two space heaters so we don't all freeze to death. In fact, I think that's where we'll go now. I can't feel my toes.

Diet is...

noreply@blogger.com (Jessica) — Tue, 23 Sep 2008 21:21:00 +0000

My grandma has this magnet that looks like it was made in the '60s or '70s, and it's been on her refrigerator for as long as I can remember. It's a small rectangle of wood with a black background and a measuring tape painted across the middle. One side says “Diet is On,” and when you turn it upside down, the other half says “Diet is Off.” My magnet has flipped to the “Diet is Off” side. Low carb...well, it sucks, but the reasons it sucks are mostly due to me. For one, I like to cook, but I don't like to wait, and I don't like to do dishes. You get to do both in low-carb cooking. Also, it annoys me to eat something different than the rest of my family, because of the aforementioned dish-hating. So my patience with it was wearing thin, but the biggest reason I went off it (okay, maybe not the biggest, but one of the bigger) was that we spent all our money on a mobile home. Moving out means having to pay actual bills again, and since I was already getting tired of low-carb, now seemed as good a time to quit as any.

We've been looking for an apartment closer to Brandon's work and having little luck finding anything we could afford. I mean, seriously, we live in Nebraska. Prices near $1000 for a 900-square-foot two bedroom with washer/dryer hookups? Come on. But then we saw someone advertising a mobile home for free on a garage sale group, so we went and looked at it, then took it. Free was by no means really free, though, as you probably suspected. Free included a ridiculously high price for credit checks for Brandon and I ($70! I can buy a credit report WITH A SCORE for $6!), two months back rent plus one month's rent as a deposit, and, since we're in a trailer park and officially trash in the eyes of the world, ridiculously high deposits for all our utilities. Plus the fixing up that needs to be done on the trailer itself, which we will need a small loan for.

So anyway, there it is. And this is your notice that I'm going to start blogging about things other than weight or size acceptance or dieting or whatever. I think we all know, from the spacing of the entries, that I am at a bit of a loss when it comes to blogging about size acceptance. Tomorrow I shall have an entry or two with hi-larious stories, including one about how the previous owners of our trailer think that all doors fit into any doorway and how I fell through a rotten floor. I bet you can't wait, can you?

Yet Another Change of Plan

noreply@blogger.com (Jessica) — Mon, 08 Sep 2008 17:30:00 +0000

In the interest of full disclosure, I feel I should post this here: I am on a diet. Low-carb, to be specific, but not Atkins. (Screw induction, I'll eat as many vegetables and low-sugar fruits as I want to eat.) I feel a few ways about this: first of all, I feel a little bit like I've failed. Like I've become a person that just has to be on a diet because they don't know any other way, which, to be honest, is true. I've been on diets since I was twelve—I'm almost twenty-six now, so I've been dieting over half my life. I don't know how to relate to food normally; that's why I am where I am.

I also feel a bit defensive about this choice, and I feel like I shouldn't have to be defensive about it. I probably don't have to be, but since this is a blog, here I go.

I wholly support size acceptance. I do. It feels a bit hypocritical to add “for everyone else,” but there it is. SA should also allow me to not accept my size if it's not what I want for me. I am 80-100 pounds overweight, depending on which numbers you use, and I don't think that's anything to sneeze at. And since it took me twenty-some years to get to this point, logic dictates that it's going to take a fair amount of time to get to the point where I can relate to my body in a semi-normal way again. It's time I don't have. I have a family history of diabetes and heart disease, and I feel like I'm courting disaster, not only with my weight but with my eating habits. In a perfect world I would be able to see this and have some sort of epiphany which allowed me to immediately start eating tons of fruits and vegetables and very little processed food. It's not a perfect world, as we all know, so this is going to take some work. Obviously doing it on my own isn't working. Also, I feel terrible most of the time. I constantly have sinus problems, joint pain in my ankles and fingers, and stomach problems even when I haven't eaten for several hours. I can stand on principal all day long, but if I feel like shit when the sun goes down, I'm going to take some honest-to-God for-reals action.

So this is the action I'm taking. I'm going on a diet. I'm going to try to make it a learning experience and to break bad habits, like eating when I'm full or bored or eating nutritionally deficient foods. And yes, I still think dieting sucks, and I still hate being on one, but you do what you have to do. I want to be around to see my grandkids, and I don't want to be so out of shape I can't enjoy it.

Where has the time gone? Where have I gone?

noreply@blogger.com (Jessica) — Fri, 11 Jul 2008 22:01:00 +0000

I thought I had just posted here for some reason. I didn't realize that bridal post was all the way back in May. The end of May, but still. I was being crappy about posting before that, though, so that's really no excuse. I shall hang my head in shame.

Anyhoo, it appears as if we are moving. To make a thousand-page novel short, we were going to buy a house. It appeared as if everything was going great, so we notified our landlord, who congratulated us and sent us a letter being official about the whole breaking our lease thing. (It's month-to-month, so no big deal.) Then the house deal fell apart. We had an inkling that was coming, and had been tossing around the idea of moving to a different apartment if we didn't get that house, one that would hopefully have most of the features that our current place did not. Namely, a dishwasher and a washer/dryer. A playground or some sort of yard would be nice, too, as would being on the first floor so that I wouldn't have that excuse for not taking the boys on walks. We started looking, but the idea of moving when it wasn't to a house was overwhelming and annoying. So we changed our minds and DH called the landlord to inform him that we were not moving. Then, a few days later, a woman came to our door with a paper for us to sign telling us we didn't have to be out at the end of July, we had to be out at the end of August, maybe September. After some (rather embarrassing on my part) conversation, we found out that we didn't have a choice in the matter: the building had been sold. That letter wasn't just for us; everyone got one.

So now we're looking for a new apartment. We may have found one in a nearby town, but we're waiting to hear if we've passed muster. And that's all I'll be able to type today because the children are up now and I'm being ordered to hold E. Duty calls.

Fat Bride, Pregnant Bride

noreply@blogger.com (Jessica) — Fri, 30 May 2008 16:34:00 +0000

So thanks to Kate Harding's great post I am now hooked on InfoMania. (Seriously, I think I've watched all the segments twice now.) Last night was a new episode with a new Target: Women section about bridal shows. Go watch now, then come back and I'll finish. Go on, scoot.

http://current.com/items/88988193_target_women_wedding_shows

OK, back? I would like to discuss the part about the show Bulging Brides. First of all, the name is beyond ridiculous. Nothing like a little shame to get a fat girl motivated to fit into her wedding gown, am I right? Second of all, the woman they refer to as a "chubster"? I'm not the best at guessing dress sizes, but I seriously doubt that woman is more than a size 8. That's fat? (And why is her wedding dress a size too small? Generally speaking you order your dress or have it custom made, why not just get it in the right size?)

I'm not really comfortable with bridal shows--partially because there seems to be a large percentage of the population that think it's OK to act like a total bitch if there's a camera on them--but also because there is this whole message that you, as a woman, are Not Good Enough to get married. You must be skinnier, more tanned, with better hair and the perfect dress or your prospective husband will realize the error of his ways and call it off. It makes me appreciate my husband more, who still loves me as much as or more than the day we met even though I'm easily fifty pounds heavier than I was when we got married. And even though our wedding was something of a disaster.

For my second item, I would have you refer to the June 2008 issue of Redbook. (Don't worry, I'll type it out.) On page 28, in the "What's on our Radar" section, there is a story titled "No Way!: The Bridal Bump," which reads "We're not suggesting that you need to be a virgin to wear white at your wedding, but a white maternity gown takes the chastity speculation out of the equation altogether. Sister stores Motherhood Maternity, A Pea in the Pod, and Mimi Maternity are now offering wedding dresses for their shoppers who are 'marrying and carrying.' Shotgun sold separately."

Yes, Pregnant Brides, for shame! How dare you marry after getting pregnant! Don't you know you are supposed to hide your shame and not show your face in public once that little bastard starts to grow inside you? Then you pass the baby off as a younger sibling or a niece or nephew.

Set aside for a moment the mistaken assumption this article has that white wedding dress=chastity,* why on earth shouldn't a pregnant bride wear whatever the hell dress she wants to wear? Because she's pregnant she's not allowed to wear white? She should wear red instead since she's obviously a big whore? And what is the deal with the shotgun line? Not all women who are pregnant when they get married are getting married because they're pregnant. Maybe this is what I get for reading Redbook. Heads up, editors: some women DO THINGS OUT OF YOUR DECREED ORDER. Some women have children and THEN get married. Some women have children and NEVER get married. Some women get married and never have children. Get off your high horses.

*The white wedding dress trend was started by Queen Victoria. The way I've always heard it is that white wedding dresses are a symbol of wealth. Up to that point most women simply wore their best dress, so buying a white dress that you would wear for one day and could never wear again showed that you were rolling in the dough a la Scrooge McDuck. Wiki has it a little differently, saying Queen Victoria chose white to use some lace she had and that other women honored their queen's choice by also marrying in white.

Shopping While Fat and Other Delightful Tales

noreply@blogger.com (Jessica) — Sun, 09 Mar 2008 05:31:00 +0000

Wow, it has been an excessively long time since I’ve been on here. My only excuse is that I am boring and many times I have nothing to say. It’s a character flaw that needs to be addressed. Also, I think the Internet wants to know that at this moment I am eating popcorn with white cheddar seasoning and M&Ms. (Well, between typing.) Also, my husband bought three pizzas for movie night at a friend’s house and 1 ½ came home with them. Therefore I have eaten pizza for I think every meal for the last twenty-four hours. Tomorrow I am going to roast some vegetables and eat them because roasted vegetables are freaking delicious. (Fun fact: I will only eat cabbage that has been roasted. Otherwise, eeeew.)

So, yeah, the shopping thing. The mall was having a sale a weekend or two ago, so DH requested that I go and procure the family some clothing. I did. It sucked. I hate shopping as a fat girl. Especially the specific fat girl that I am, because I have long monkey arms and long legs and a long torso, with a big butt for good measure. Finding jeans that fit ever since low rise jeans became popular is IMPOSSIBLE. And who is the genius that decided that elastic waistbands were a better idea than trying to make women’s jeans according to some sort of sizing standard? (Newsflash: they're not. Maternity pants have elastic waists. Jeans of any size above 3T should not.

As I was walking around the store, trying to figure out which of the 40 women’s clothing vignettes I’d visited and which of them had clothes that would fit me, I got this sudden urge to throw things on the floor and kick and scream. I hate shopping. Even when I was thin I hated shopping (because of the aforementioned monkey limbs) and obviously being fat does not make it better. I also wanted to put everything I’d picked out down and run away from the mall. But I sucked it up and purchased a hoodie and a few shirts. No pants—nothing that looked good was on sale.

As for the other tales I promised you up there in the title: I saw this the other day. (And yes, I know it's old, but it's my blog and I'm going to talk about it, damnit.) Basically, a sex columnist for the New York Press used some old Dan Savage questions in her debut sex column, as she had no reader questions of her own. (BTW, Dan Savage doesn't think it's plagiarism.) It’s not totally clear from the way these articles are written if she just took the questions or if she used both the questions and the answers. The first one, bad but kind of understandable. Second one, very bad and not at all understandable. I am going to guess that she took only the questions and made up her own answers, because I would hope that she planned to do some writing on this column. I have no legal training or anything, but I would say that was misguided more than it was plagiarism, although still a fireable offense. Here’s my thing, though: when I was a relationship columnist in college (ooh, kinky) and I didn’t have any questions*, I MADE THEM UP. Seriously, how hard is it to hypothesize a sex column question. My girlfriend wants to tie me up and I’m not comfortable with it, how do I talk to her about it? My boyfriend wants me to use a dildo on him and I’m not comfortable with it, how do I talk to him about it? See, there you go. Done and done. Open communication in a relationship is a must, kids.

As a final parting gift, I will tell you that potty training sucks. And pretty much as soon as I’m done with Kid One I have to move on to Kid Two. I don’t know what my son’s deal with the potty is but apparently he has decided it is a Very Bad Thing and is acting accordingly. I want one of those kids that just decides—preferably as close to the age of 2 as possible—that they’re not going to wear diapers anymore and never has an accident again. I think they’re a myth, though.

*I never had any questions. Well, I got one the whole time I did it, which was from another columnist. We either had apathetic readers, readers with very healthy relationships, or I sucked. I shall leave the deciding up to you.

Obligatory Whining

noreply@blogger.com (Jessica) — Mon, 14 Jan 2008 18:56:00 +0000

I love not dieting. I do. And I am a bit shocked that it's not taking any effort to eat vegetables or salads, because--shocker--I like them. There is a but, though.

I never imagined letting myself have full reign over what I eat, without consulting anyone else about it, would be so hard. On the surface this seemed great--the aforementioned freedom from consulting books on what I should eat, no running on a treadmill unless I wanted to (that's not going to happen). Just freedom.

Have you ever seen "The Shawshank Redemption?" Where the prisoners talk about getting out and committing another crime to get back in because they're lost without the structure of prison? That's the closest example I can think of for this feeling. I want the freedom but I'm scared of it, too. I have no idea what I want to eat 90% of the time, good or bad. Some days after I've been staring hungrily into the refrigerator for half an hour, trying to decide between one thing and another but not really wanting any of it, I feel like collapsing to the floor in a gibbering mess, rocking back and forth until a nice orderly comes and puts me back in my room.

One thing that I always used to do was make lists of weight-related goals. Eat eight servings of fruits and vegetables each day--and the good ones, too, not potatoes and corn. Exercise six days a week at least an hour a day. Weights three times a week. Don't eat more than X calories. And so on and so forth. At first I didn't miss that; now I do. I have goals for other parts of my life, but I have had to follow a plan for eating for so long that I feel like something's missing now. And it sucks, not because I really want the lists back (I don't) but because it's making me feel like any decision I make is the wrong one.

There's also this guilt I have because I still want to lose weight. I still read diet articles and watch diet shows. I still weigh myself, although the number on the scale no longer makes me want to delve headfirst back into disordered eating. I accept that dieting is unnecessary and almost certainly harmful to my body, but I can't accept the weight I'm at now. (For the record, I am about 65 pounds overweight, and that number is based on what I consider to be my set point.) So does that make me a SA fraud? I don't know. I wish I did.

Cheeeeeeese

noreply@blogger.com (Jessica) — Thu, 13 Dec 2007 18:04:00 +0000

Yes, it's picture time. Tomorrow my boys go to my best friend's mother's house to see the Santa Claus that she hires every year for the four boys her daughter and I have between us, plus her brother's girlfriend's daughter. (Get all that?) There will be pictures there; Santa makes the adults sit on his lap. Which weirds me out for a whole different non-fat-related reason.

The day after that I get to go to my mom's house and have a family portrait taken for a bound book my sister is making for my mom's Christmas present. I have four siblings; why is it only me that needs a family portrait, you ask? Because there was a group portrait session months ago and the photographer took no pictures of me and the boys (together, that is). My husband was at work, so I don't know if the assumption was that I wouldn't want any pictures of me and my kids together without him or if it just honestly did not occur to her to make sure she got pictures of everyone. I'm so glad I'm grown up now--in high school, exclusion was free. Now I get to pay for it. And yes, I'm a tad bitter.

Anyway, the point of this post, once you get past all my bitching and moaning, is this: I am not afraid of pictures this year. In years past I have managed to be in the background or on the fringes of any picture including me, of which there were few. I am not photogenic, and that plus being fat made me want to skip all events where a camera could theoretically be present. I have decided that this year is not going to be the same. I'm not going to seek out the camera, but nor will I avoid it. I am what I am; I'll be the same whether or not there's photographic proof. And I like having photographic proof--we have thousands of pictures of our children, but there are approximately three total pictures of me while pregnant. That makes me sad; that's an opportunity missed that can never be gotten back. There are even fewer pictures of me--intentional pictures, that is--when I'm not pregnant.

I am of the personal opinion that our portrait Saturday will look ridiculous in context. Everyone else's portraits were taken outdoors in August. Ours will be taken indoors in December. It will be quite obvious that we were not included in the original portrait session. But whatever; it's done. Now I just have to make sure that I don't make a weird face in this picture.

Shopping While Fat

noreply@blogger.com (Jessica) — Mon, 10 Dec 2007 14:55:00 +0000

Normally I don't, but as I posted here I decided that owning a pair of jeans that fits again would be nice. A new Steve and Barry's just opened here, so I went out. I am hugely attracted to the idea of Steve & Barry's--it's like Old Navy, but cheaper, and with cuter stuff. I first heard about when I saw a piece from Sarah Jessica Parker's line Bitten, which goes up to size 22. (I discovered when I got there that SJP's line was the only thing that went up to size 22. The rest of the store did not even have XL. I'm not kidding; everything else only went up to a size L and the biggest I saw in pants was a 14.)

So I got my fat ass over there and picked out four pairs of Bitten jeans in three different sizes. As expected, one was too small, one fit, one was too big. I didn't buy any of them. In fact, shopping made me reaffirm my belief that homemade clothes are best because of one thing: tailoring.

I am, in addition to having a big belly and a big butt, gifted with freakishly long monkey arms and legs and a long torso. Try fitting that commercially. I dare you.

Every pair of jeans I tried on, low waisted or not, exposed at least two inches of underwear and, one would assume, buttcrack. Definitely not the look I am going for. So I purchased nothing. And for once I'm not blaming myself for being too fat to fit into the clothes.

A Decision a Decade in the Making

noreply@blogger.com (Jessica) — Wed, 28 Nov 2007 08:47:00 +0000

I know that I am not unique in this, but I am schlumpy. Slobbish. I do not take the time to do my hair and makeup before I leave the house. I do not wear pretty clothes. I do not put my best foot forward. Because I am Fat.

For as long as I can remember, I’ve made plans to buy a whole new wardrobe (or make one, since I love to sew and can rock it) when I was Not Fat Anymore. The last time I was Not Fat was in 2001. Before I was married or had children. It was a pretty short period of time, and even then I was not Not Fat enough for myself. I did buy a few smaller items that were necessary, like jeans (slow down, don’t get crazy!), but I didn’t go balls out like I planned on doing when I got to that elusive goal weight. (Back then it was 135 for 5’10” me. I chose that number because I read in an issue of People that that was what Tyra Banks weighed, and that was enough for me.)

And now I have decided that this is pretty ridiculous behavior. The whole thing, not just the Tyra Banks goal weight. I never understood why, on What Not to Wear, they would tell people who said they were going to lose weight that they should look good whatever weight they were at. Not that those fat people didn’t deserve to look good, but what was the point of buying a whole new wardrobe since you knew, for reals, that in mere weeks or months or whatever you were going to be hott with two Ts?

Even if I were still dieting religiously, I would be changing my tune. I’m not sure exactly what precipitated this, but I think it might have something to do with a certain habit of mine.

You see, I am a prodigious collector of tear sheets. Pages torn out of magazines for parenting, web sites, clothes, home décor, whatever I think looks cool. These are all filed in a white file box, which I get out every month when I receive a new magazine. I take the old magazine and go through it, tearing out whatever I’ve marked or whatever looks good to me. And I file it. Sometimes I go through the things I’ve filed and throw stuff away, but not very often.

My clothing folder was bulging, as it always is. So I went through it and picked out some pages that I liked. Then I separated those pages into what I would make now, what I would make when I was halfway to goal, and what I would make when I was at goal. Guess how many things were in the “now” pile. Five. And two of those were shoes. One of them was a pair of pants, and the other two were fairly innocuous shirts—with sleeves, of course.

I am in possession of literally hundreds of pictures of clothes that I like, and yet I can only give my fat self permission to wear three of the pieces? Why? People don’t point and laugh at me now; do I think that if I stop wearing giant T-shirts and track pants that they’re going to start?

Some time ago, when my favorite jeans were dirty, and maybe starting to get a little tight, I don’t really remember, I went out in public in pajama pants. I didn’t care what anyone thought of me! I was going to wear my damn pajama pants if I wanted to and everyone else could suck up their mortification! And no one pointed and laughed. In fact, I’m pretty sure I wore fluffy gorilla slippers out once or twice and if there was no pointing and laughing about that I am hard pressed to believe it’s coming due to anything else. So why is me wearing the clothes I want to wear—even dresses!—any different than my rebellious pajama wearing? It’s not, that’s how.

I don’t guarantee that I will be brave enough to post pictures of me wearing said clothes. But I can guarantee that I will be brave enough to wear them in public. And for me, that’s a huge step.

More bloggy goodness

noreply@blogger.com (Jessica) — Sat, 24 Nov 2007 06:08:00 +0000

I discovered Kate Harding's blog yesterday and I am shocked that I have lasted this long without it. This post is exactly what I want to say about my food issues, except a gajillion times more eloquent. You can definitely put me in the group of people afraid of what they will do if they have no restraints on their eating. It's like there's a gene that people who eat when they're hungry and stop when they're full got, and I'm missing it. Definitely read the comments on that post if you click on it.

Dealing with food is starting to get easier. I think my biggest issue right now is time/laziness. I really really love roasted broccoli and cauliflower, for example, but I usually make the stupid mistake of not starting dinner until it's time to eat. Roasting vegetables takes time that I don't want to take, so I skip it. And microwaved broccoli is just not the same thing. I don't like most prepared foods (see below for more on that) but they tend to be a go-to food here, because if the kids expect food at 6 and I get busy with other things until 5:50, they're not going to wait an extra hour so I can make something healthy. Frankly, I don't want to wait either.

There are some quote unquote "bad foods" that I used to love that now I'm not that into. I'm like a little kid--I eat something until I burn myself out on it and then it disgusts me. One example would be hot dogs and cheddarwurst, which are like bratwurst, but cheese-flavored. A year ago, when those were things we didn't eat very often because they were salty and full of junk, I could eat two cheddarwurst in a sitting, or three hot dogs. And half an hour later I wanted more because, you know, those aren't the most nutritionally dense foods. Then something happened and we started eating them a lot more, and now they gross me out. All I can taste when I eat them is salt and fat. That actually happened before, when I had my first son. I actually made a concerted effort to cook healthy foods and stuff that had previously been the norm--like Hamburger Helper or macaroni and cheese--was inedible. I hope to get to that point again. I just have to stop being lazy about cooking, I guess.

One problem that I'm still having is that my brain is still remembering that I like these foods. I will see a package of hot dogs and go, "Ooh! Hot dogs! Those sound good!" Then I stop and remember that I don't even like hot dogs. How weird is that that I don't even know what foods I like and don't like? Perhaps I should start carrying a list with me.

E and I went for a walk today. He's at the point now where he prefers to walk rather than ride, which is great because I can get by with one stroller. The obvious drawback is that he's three and tires easily. Our walk today was four blocks each way. In winter that's fine, but in the summer it's nothing. I'd really like one of these but I don't want to spend more than $200 on something that we won't need in a year or two. I hope to make the walks a regular thing. It's November, maybe by spring or summer we'll have worked up to a longer distance.

Happy Thanksgiving

noreply@blogger.com (Jessica) — Fri, 23 Nov 2007 04:38:00 +0000

I was kind of shocked when I saw that I haven't posted for over a month. I'm going to try and be less negligent in the future, because I do feel like writing here is helpful to me.

So Thanksgiving was not bad as far as eating. Too many crackers and spinach dip, but I also ate raw broccoli. I was shocked because normally raw vegetables almost make me gag. Still can't stand raw carrots, but I'm getting closer. I only had one plate at dinner and I didn't finish the whole thing, and I had no dessert. In the interest of full disclosure, that was only because the apple crisp that was to be dessert was still cooking when E decided he was scared and wanted to go home. (That's his new thing. He's scared of everything. I think he uses the word scared to describe emotions that are not scared--like nervous, for example.)

I really don't expect that holidays are going to be that hard, besides the cookies. I love cookies, and my grandma always gives me a cookie platter. I should take that damn thing down to the homeless people that hang out around the library. My problem is usually night eating. I don't know if this is legit or not, but I always feel hungrier at night, and when there aren't kids to chase or things to be done that need immediate attention, I eat to keep busy or...whatever. If I could take care of that bad habit, I think I would be a heck of a lot further along in my loss.

I was cruising through some of the blogs that I've come across lately, courtesy of Delightful Blogs. Through one of those, Big Fat Deal, I stumbled across the blog First, Do No Harm. I wholly recommend all of these sites, especially if you are a person like me who likes black and white proof that other people are going through the same thing I am. The stories on First, Do No Harm were literally jaw-dropping. I knew that fat was the last acceptable prejudice, but I guess I've lived in a little bubble where I didn't realize how bad it was.

I am lucky in that I have never had a doctor tell me that I was fat, or that my problem was due to being fat. The closest I've ever come is, when taking a sports physical when I was younger I checked that I had irregular periods. When the doctor asked me about it, I said that yes, that was correct. He hemmed and hawed for a minute, then said "That might be due to your being slightly overweight." I'm pretty sure that I weigh more now than I did then, and I now have regular periods. My guess is that it was more due to age than weight.

On the one hand, my mouth was hanging open in horror at a lot of the women's stories in First, Do No Harm. I almost believe that if they had gone to the doctor with a compound fracture they would have been told to lose weight and it would go away. On the other hand, what if I had had a serious illness like PCOS or thyroid imbalance, where weight gain or inability to lose is a symptom? The doctor seemed almost scared to say anything about my weight, and said nothing about it besides that one sentence, but what if it was important? Is there really no middle ground here? Either don't bring up weight at all, or bring it up and rub the patient's face in it until the skin is gone off their nose?

I have had other weight-related testing. I had my thyroid tested once and I told the doctor I wanted it done because of my inability to lose weight despite dieting and exercising. All he said was OK and did the tests. Again, I really appreciate that he didn't lecture me about it, but when the tests came back normal there was no follow-up. Have things like this happened to anyone else? Are some doctors so afraid of offending fat women that things could be going undiagnosed?

Also, I can't remember if I've mentioned this book before, but I'm going to do it now, redundancy be damned! I absolutely love it. It's by Paul Campos, and it's called The Obesity Myth: Why America's Obsession With Weight is Hazardous to Your Health. It's awesome; I loved this book. Highly recommend it, it's relevant even if you're dieting to lose weight. I'm finding more and more that a key part of my success has to be acceptance of my body and what it can do, so that I can take seriously the task of getting healthy. This is helping me with that.

A good week, so far

noreply@blogger.com (Jessica) — Fri, 19 Oct 2007 00:15:00 +0000

I've been doing really well on food and exercise since Sunday. Weekends are hardest for me, so I know I can get through the rest of today and Friday, but Saturday and Sunday will be my real challenges.

Exercise is going pretty well, although I would like to get to the point where I can do a lot more with a lot less resting. I've done something every day, though. Monday I jogged, Tuesday I did a few toning videos off the cable OnDemand that added up to about twenty minutes. Wednesday I should have jogged again, but the shoes I bought on the weekend had made my toes go numb on Monday, so I had no shoes. Instead I did more OnDemand videos for about 30 minutes total, including a Tae Bo one that made me feel about as graceful as an elephant. Tonight I will probably be doing a couch potato-esque workout: toning exercises while watching TV. Not ideal, but it's what fits in right now and it's better than nothing. Tomorrow will be a cardio day again, but it'll undoubtedly be another video day.

I found this site today that I love, although I think it's been around for a while. I wish I had known about it before! I found Hungry Girl while I was looking for these Tofu Shirataki noodles, and I love it. I haven't seen it all yet, but so far I've seen recipes that look really good and a section called Chew the Right Thing. They list a "bad" food, like a patty melt or a sausage breakfast sandwich, and then show a healthy food that can be a commercial product or a recipe. I'm looking forward to seeing it all, I think it'll be a really big help for me since I love food so much.

Not-so-startling revelation

noreply@blogger.com (Jessica) — Mon, 15 Oct 2007 14:41:00 +0000

Yesterday DH and I were in the car riding home. I was eating a rice cake, and after a few bites I realized I didn't like it--normally I do, but this one tasted funny. So I threw it out the window. When DH asked what I was doing, I said "I didn't like it, so I stopped eating it. I should do that more often." Then, like a lightbulb that should have come on a long time ago, I thought, "Hey. I really should do that more often." I stuck with it all day yesterday, even through a birthday party with cake. (I had no cake--I had decided that before it was even cut. It was a store bought cake and I don't ever really like them. I always have a piece, but the frosting always leaves a residue and the cake usually tastes fake.)

This brings me to another thing I saw online the other day while I was messing around. Paraphrased, it said "No one ever wakes up in the morning wishing they'd eaten more the night before, but most of us have woken up wishing we'd eaten less." It was another "so-obvious-why-didn't-I-think-it" moment. How many times have I eaten something at night just because I was bored and woke up in the morning wondering why I ate all of it when it wasn't even that great and I wasn't hungry?

I went jogging this morning--well, I jogged some and walked some. It was much nicer than walking on a treadmill or riding the exercise bike. I may try and see if I can get in one last round of golf before it gets too cold. I once saw something on Oprah that said that it was great if you played tennis, golfed, swam, whatever, but those were "activities," and "activities" were not to be confused with or used in lieu of "exercise," which is apparently to be done in a gym and preferably with a trainer. I say that's crap. It may work for some people, but in the past when all my exercise has been in a gym or on a machine I've just found excuses not to do it. I'd much rather look forward to playing a round of golf or taking a swim than dreading my hour on the treadmill. It may be different for others, but this is what I have to do to make it work for me.

Excuses, excuses, excuses

noreply@blogger.com (Jessica) — Thu, 11 Oct 2007 18:30:00 +0000

Today and yesterday were bad days as far as diet is concerned--and exercise, too, but I've got an injury to explain that. Anyway, I spent most of the day(s) frustrated and feeling defeated and thinking that I just wanted to quit, when it occurred to me that what I was thinking was nothing but a bunch of excuses that would allow me to eat what I want, when I want. Which means all the time.

Here are some of the defeatist attitudes that I need to get rid of if I'm ever going to succeed.

1. I'll start tomorrow/I screwed up so I can eat what I want for the rest of the day. Any good dieting article or book should include the advice that when you screw up, you get back on the horse right away. Not tomorrow, not the next day, not next Monday. This very minute. I cannot tell you how many days I've eaten something "forbidden" (a term I really don't like, because that just means you want it all the more) and decided that meant that I had messed up, so I could eat want I wanted for the rest of the day and start again tomorrow. For me, and I suspect many other people with similar problems with food, this translates to "eat, drink, and be merry, for tomorrow we die."

2. I don't really care if I'm fat/This is how I'm meant to be. Some days I really wish I could make myself believe this one. Life would be so much easier if I could accept myself the way that I am: fat and addicted to food. I would be happy. But I would also be happy to be "normal," with food having no control over me.

I once had a professor mention in a lecture that if he could he would rather not have to eat, that food for him was an annoyance, something he had to stop working to do. He didn't like to eat, he didn't care what his food tasted like. To me, this was a shocking thing to say for many reason. First of all, how could you not like food or not care what it tasted like? Second of all, how could you have something more important than food that you would be annoyed to have stopped so that you could eat? Didn't everyone look forward to each mealtime from the moment they woke up, planning what they would eat, how they would prepare it, what order they would eat it in?

I want to be like that. That is my fantasy of normal. I don't think it will ever happen for me so completely--I was raised to love food and eat beyond full, and I don't know if I'll ever be able to fully overcome that--but I would like to get to the point where every day, every meal, every bite, is a struggle. I would like to be able to eat and stop when I'm full without having to sit and stare down the remaining food for twenty minutes. But maybe I'll never get to that point. I think if I got to the point where I at least won the staring contest I'd be happy. Or happier.

I actually tried to convince myself the other day that my dad's history of diabetes wasn't that big of a deal. It may be, it may not be. I have never had a problem with blood sugar, including during my two pregnancies, so it may be that I am not going to have a problem with diabetes. None of the women on my dad's side do, after all.

It may be, though, that it just hasn't happened yet. My dad's diabetes came on when he was in his late forties, and I'm pretty sure that's when my uncle's came on, too. I'm in my mid-twenties, so it may be twenty years before I have to face the diabetes monster. I'd rather have things under control long before that time comes around. And, to be frank, I have been struggling with food and weight for over half my life now--my first diet was when I was twelve. When I think of doing the same thing for the next twenty years or more, I want to cry or hit something. (Or have some pasta.)

3. I can eat a TV dinner if it's under X calories. While this may be true for some people, it's not for me. In fact, processed food should be removed from my diet as much as humanly possible. I am way too sensitive to sodium to be eating most of it. I'm tired of having fingers swollen up twice their normal size in the morning and not being able to wear my engagement ring for fear I won't be able to get it off.

Also, even if I didn't have a problem with sodium, there is a lot more satisfaction available in 500 calories of homemade food and 500 calories of TV dinner food. Usually you can get a lot more bang for your buck by making it yourself, and in more ways than one. Homemade food is cheaper and you'll get more food for your 500 calories. And the absence of a plasticky or chemical-y flavor is nice, too.

4. I'm hungry, so I should eat. If I've just eaten a big meal and I'm still hungry, I should not eat. If I just ate an hour ago and I'm hungry I shouldn't eat. If I'm getting ready to go to bed I shouldn't eat. This is a hard one for me, because everyone keeps saying things along the line of "if you only eat when you're hungry, you'll be fine." Well, my body is used to running on a lot more calories than it needs. If I cut it off, it's going to protest and think that it needs that extra food. It doesn't. The thing is, I have to convince myself not to eat when my stomach's growling and I feel hollow. I have, to some degree or another, been able to do all the other things on my list at some point in the past, when I had been doing really well with my eating and exercise. I don't know that I've ever done this one. It's so contrary to what I've been taught and what I myself believe. I think this is going to be one of the most difficult attitudes/habits for me to break.

That's it for now, although I'm sure I have a bunch more that are so ingrained that I don't even recognize them for what they are.

Mmm, food

noreply@blogger.com (Jessica) — Tue, 09 Oct 2007 13:44:00 +0000

That is my attitude this morning. I got up at 5:30 but have accomplished just about nothing. Well, the kids are both bathed. And I'm dressed. That's it.

I've been feeling very food-oriented today. My meal plan is off for the week since DH couldn't find (or forgot) a few very important things on the grocery list. When I went in to eat breakfast this morning, I found that we had no oatmeal. For a second, I was seriously tempted to eat a piece or two of leftover pizza. Then I realized how ridiculous that sounded. "We didn't have any oatmeal, so I had pizza instead." I settled for cereal, but I did eat some pieces of krab meat a few hours after that. And they were good. I could go for some more.

Sometimes I think that I would rather be fat than moderate my eating. If it weren't for my family history of diabetes, I think that might very well end up being the case. As it is, I'm apparently becoming hypersensitive to sodium since my fingers are swollen every morning when I wake up. (30 or 40 ounces of water usually makes it go down, but it's annoying.)

I'm going to try very hard not to eat until lunch. I have no idea what we'll be eating, but I do know that I have plenty to do to keep me occupied until then. It's just a matter of doing it.

We're free!

noreply@blogger.com (Jessica) — Mon, 01 Oct 2007 11:05:00 +0000

We are finally in our own apartment! Sunday night was the first night here, and it's so nice. Of course, when I asked my mother what she thought of it she said "I'm happy if you're happy." And I am happy. So I guess everyone is delirious.

I actually have tried to post in the last month, but apparently Blogger and dial-up don't get along very well. Now, though, it's back to cable internet. I also need to get back to dieting. I've been trying to just kind of self-regulate without a food diary or any journaling and I think we all know how well I do with that sort of thing. I did get an excellent toning workout yesterday, though--our apartment is on the second floor and I must have taken those stairs fifty times. I shall have buns of steel yet.

Updates, updates, updates

noreply@blogger.com (Jessica) — Tue, 04 Sep 2007 05:14:00 +0000

The first update is actually relevant to the blog--DH and I have started exercising together. Our workouts are hardly anything to write home about, but it's better than nothing. I'm not doing so well on the food angle. Food is so much cheaper and easier to procure than narcotics, and I have a feeling it's going to be a bit of a problem until we move again.

On the family front, there was a big blowup this weekend. It was inevitable--when, not if. Suffice it to say that my mom was rude to my husband, my husband was rude to her, and I was rude for not taking her side and telling her that she made us feel unwelcome. Imagine! How impertinent! So the plans for now have changed. We are looking for a cheap car to get us around and we'll be waiting and fixing our regular car with the tax return. We're hoping to move out by the beginning of October at the very latest. I'm going to go look at the newspaper online and see if I can find anything that's anywhere near our price range.