Battlegrounds

The battle of the bulge starts right here...

I spent some time yesterday with a friend who is suffering terribly. Suffering is a strong word, but it's appropriate here. It wouldn't be accurate to say she's going through a "rough patch" or having a "tough time" because the truth is, she is battling cancer and has been for many years. If that doesn't constitute suffering, I don't know what does. She recently had back to back surgeries to first remove tumors, and then complete a painful skin graft. Radiation has left the skin on her chest as thin as tissue paper, inhibiting its ability heal on its own after making the necessary incision for the first operation. She is in deep pain -  both physically and mentally.

One thing about this friend that I do know is that she is one tough cookie. This woman has been through hell and back and despite all that she has been though, she has always maintained a sense of humor and relative optimism. That's not to say she's all rainbows and butterflies all the time. Not at all. But for the most part, looking at her, you would not believe just how sick she is. However, yesterday I saw the tremendous toll this is all taking on her. I saw just how exhausted she is of fighting for her life. 

As we talked yesterday, we spoke about the unknowns in her life right now. I asked her what she was most afraid of. She confided to me that she is petrified of not ever getting her life back. To see the fear in her eyes and sadness on her face was heart-breaking. Her statement was enough to nearly knock me to my knees. It made me go home, kiss my husband, think about my own life in the present, and ask myself why the hell am I not more concerned about my own health? Why, after years of being fat, am I still losing my own personal battle with weight? When, pray tell, am I going to get my own life back and be the person I feel that I am on the inside?

Good question.

Let me preface the next part of this post by saying I'd never in a million years compare having cancer to being fat. Those two conditions aren't even on the same plane. However, seeing someone I care about fight a disease they have no control over made me realize that life is the biggest, most fabulous gift I'm ever going to get and I'm stupid as hell if I choose not to live it to the fullest. Obesity, while classified as a disease by the American Medical Association, is a condition which can be controlled. It doesn't require drugs or medical intervention (most of the time). What it does require is a sincere willingness to change unhealthy habits and the balls to take a good hard look at one's self to determine what isn't working and be committed to fixing it. 

I feel like I constantly go round and round with this train of thought. It's not as though I had some type of epiphany yesterday or anything. But sometimes, something jolts you back to reality and forces you to refocus. I guess that's what happened to me after seeing my friend. 

Sure, I'm sick and tired of fighting the fat war. But here's the ridiculous thing - I have the ability to end the war anytime I want. I've just chosen not to. So far I've only chosen to stock up on an ammo of good intentions only to trade it for some fatty diet-illegal contraband. A donut here. Some chips there. Throw in a piece of pie for good measure. And (not so) suddenly, I'm (once again) trapped behind scale-crushing enemy lines. I've been here a while and frankly, I'm not digging the accommodations. I need a good strategy so I can start tunneling my way the hell out.

I know I talked about starting over in my last post and I suppose, in a way, I am doing that. Before my surgery I was tunneling out, little by little. I felt like finally, I had created a solid path of healthy eating, albeit forced upon me by my revolting gallbladder. Post-surgery, without the medical condition to keep me on the straight and narrow, I plummeted back to the days of yore, choosing to forget the assured consequences of those actions. In other words, I chose to go back to war with myself, trudging through the battlegrounds created by my idiotic decisions regarding enemy number one - food.

I hate viewing food as the enemy, especially because it SHOULD be my ally. And it would be my ally, if I would only allow it to be. After all, I need it to survive. At some point, making peace with it sounds like a good idea. I'm continuing on working on how to do that. How to say no to the wrong stuff and yes to the right stuff. How to stop gratifying myself with quick fixes and impulsive choices. I have to keep reminding myself - over and over and over again - that I DO have control of this. I'm fortunate and I need to remember that. This is NOT a situation where I am helpless... I just need to figure out how to help myself. Consistently. Correctly. Confidently.

Back to the drawing board, as they say...