Brain Waves

Please ignore the following. I have to get it out of my head. Usually when I see it in print and work through writing it, it helps me put things in perspective. People have called me brave for the things I write about here. I figure it is more along the lines of foolish or crazy, blogging stupid things like this.

I have to be the only person on earth that freaks out when she loses weight. I noticed last week that I was about 5 pounds lighter than I thought I was. I had been planning to buy a new digital scale to get more accurate readings which I did on Friday. And of course that made things worse because each time I got on it it told me something different. The idea is that I'm only supposed to be weighing myself once a week, but instead I spent the weekend hopping on and off and the number would change each time by a pound or a few tenths, usually going down.

Now the more rational of you may say, hey doesn't sound like your scale is very accurate. Instead in my head it goes like this. Whoa, that's a pound less than yesterday. Fast forward a few hours. Oh my god, I've just lost a pound in four hours. Couple this with not eating as much and the anxiety section of my brain goes into a tizzy.

Never mind that I'm not nearly as active as I was during the school year. Never mind that I am a big time stress eater and stress has considerably lightened in the last two weeks. I can't tell you the number of times I would eat candy bars and ice cream and other stuff I shouldn't be eating just from stress or as some kind of relief. Never mind that my appetite ALWAYS changes during the summer. Oh and I finally set a date for my first walking event (Checklist item #6), I drew up a new walking schedule and stuck to it all last week. Last week was a very good week (re: I'm actually happy). But apparently none of those things matter to my brain. Instead it says, CANCER!

Sigh. I hope it is true that half the battle is admitting you have a problem. I hope this post will quiet those brain waves.

Comments

[Sarah]

I'm sure you know this, but your weight fluctuates over the course of a day. It's not unusual for me to see my weight fluctuate by as much as 4-5 pounds depending on what time of day I weigh myself.

[Randy]

A walking schedule suddenly seems so funny to me! Although I haven't moved much in the past 18 hours or so. Slept for nearly 12 hours last night. Randy is tired and allergic and a bit surprised that it's hitting as hard as it is. I blame the chain-smoking protesters on Sunday. Or maybe it's CANCER! :)

[laanba]

Sarah, I actually didn't know if fluctuated by that much! I know people say to weigh yourself at the same time each day, but I couldn't imagine the numbers changing that much.

Randy, well look at where you are now. Walking is part of the culture!

[Network Geek]

Let me set your mind at ease about at least one aspect of your fear.
You don't start losing weight with cancer until they start treating you. Honest. My appetite was just as healthy when I was coughing blood as it ever was and I lost no weight at all until the chemotherapy started.
Oh, yeah, that's another thing. There are, you know, other symptoms to that cancer stuff than sudden weight change, like, uh, coughing blood. I have been told that unexplained fluids in places they don't belong are a general indicator of "bad things".

But, hey, adjusting your life to be a different weight is no easy thing, so allow yourself a little craziness, okay? It probably makes you a much more fun person to be around than being the other way.

[laanba]

Oh geez, Jim now I'm embarrassed about my whining. Actually I'll use this for the better. In the future when my mind is running away with me with silly things and I *know* my mind is running away with me yet I can't stop it, I'll just remind myself I can always ask you. That will put a stop to it because I'm not going to go and complain to a cancer survivor about my silly paranoia. :-)