In which I weigh in for the first time

It's Saturday, 9 am. I've run by my office to grab the printed forms I left there the day before, and driven back to Coralville. I went to the meeting sponsored by my work that meets at lunchtime Thursdays, but a snafu with my payment kept me from officially joining the Plan until afterward. So no official weigh-in for me.

The Plan center is three blocks from my house, in a well-windowed storefront formerly occupied by a scrapbooking store, and is pretty much brand new. There are three stations with blue-ombréd, modern-looking curved "privacy screens" behind which you stand on the scale. It looks like people typically remove their shoes, so I do so as well. I wait for the young, trim brunette to check me in and patiently step onto and off the scale three times while she troubleshoots its connection to the computer.

Finally I stop looking at the number and stare straight ahead, and my weight registers. 213.6. About seven pounds less than I weighed a month ago, when I was halfassedly tracking food a few days a week, and working out once or twice. I'm a little annoyed that I don't get "official" credit for it, but I'd be a liar if I didn't think that was kinda cool.

In which I outline some ground rules and disclaimers, and introduce myself

Disclaimers:

• Language: I swear. I use neologisms and LOLcat and all kinds of other dubious linguistic choices. I frequently go back and edit entries for inconsequentially awkward phrasing. I also tend to be wordy as fuck. I have no plans to change this for whatever readership this blog develops, if any. 
• Language, the Caveating: I do try to avoid dehumanizing/demeaning language, so if you are offended by my word choices in that realm, please let me know. I've been known to use subtly ableist words like "lame" (and less subtle ones, like "f-tarded") without thinking it through; please consider this a sincere pre-emptive apology and call my attention to it if you see them. I do use some somewhat gendered epithets like "bitch" and "douchenozzle" and don't plan to stop.)
• Politics/Commenting: Since body size intersects with politics in many ways, my political, religious, and ideological opinions may come out in the course of blogging. My give-a-damn about your objections to them is directly correlated to your level of courtesy in stating it. The same goes for comments in general.
• Weight goals: I recognize that by joining the Plan, I'm committing to having goals quantified by weight loss. I may mention these goals here, and even congratulated myself for meeting them, although I plan to keep them in thoughtful perspective. 
• Clichés: I hereby solemnly swear to all the gods that be that I will never, ever 
• refer to certain foods as "bad" (except things like tofu shirataki noodles, which are fucking disgusting);
• use a graphical ticker to represent my goals, not even the one with the cute little turtle;
• straightfacedly refer to this as my "weight loss journey"; or
• take a picture of myself standing next to or inside my former pants.
• Ignorance: I consider myself very size positive, but I don't have an exhaustive knowledge of the fat activism movement or blogosphere, nor am I particularly interested in acquiring one. Linking me to specific articles and honest critique of my outlook is very appreciated, but berating me for not already having an exhaustive grasp of specific bloggers or sources, or pinging me for not using the latest and greatest in accepting terminology, is not.
• Laziness: I am also a very lazy linker; I can identify six or seven terms above that I really ought to be linking to in these two initial posts, but seriously, it's called Google, kids.
• Golden Rule: My body is not your body, my choices are not your choices, and I do not wish them to be. Deciding that CPAP treatment of apnea is an acceptable lifelong decision is absolutely valid. It bothered me on a deep visceral level, but my viscera are not your viscera.
• Golden Rule, Continued: I have decided to make lifestyle changes within the conceptual framework of the Plan, which inherently values weight loss. That doesn't mean I think any other individual should lose weight, or gain it; hell, it doesn't even mean I think I "should" lose weight. It just means that I think the tools and the social structure will help me have more thoughtfulness about and control of my behavior change, and at this time I'm willing to pay the Plan for them on that basis.
• Gossip/Personal Critique: I may at times be bitchy and pessimistic and critical about the Plan, the process of weight loss, or many other things, but I am making a conscious choice to not depict specific people I encounter.This is not to say that I won't be discussing interpersonal behavior or generalizations about personality types, just that I'll be doing my best to separate the behavior (like foodphobic comments) from the person. If individuals are mentioned, please rest assured that they are composites, not individual character studies. [Edit 7/10/2012: I am amending this somewhat; I do find myself drawn to analyzing particular Plan leaders' approaches and assessing them critically, and because I'm working with a limited data set, some of those portraits are a little more specific to the individual. I sort of feel this is justified, because they're not random people off the street; they're paid representatives of the Plan's parent company. Still, I'll try to avoid ad hominem and identifying details as much as possible.]
• Timeliness: I plan to post here weekly, to roughly coincide with the Plan's weekly weigh-ins, but I don't promise updates on a particular day. I have enough changes to my life that I'm "seriously" tracking already, without adding another.

In which I describe why I'm here

Over the last several years, I've become an avid but admittedly casual advocate of Health at Every Size, body acceptance, fatshion, fat activism, intuitive eating, and all those other amazing facets of the size positivity movement. Although I only just recently heard of Fat is a Feminist Issue, my initial reaction was pretty much "fuck yeah, Susie Orbach."  I won't claim to have any kind of exceptional size-positive credentials, but I'm one of its quiet, somewhat apathetic supporters. You know the type: I'm not making fat activism a central cause of my existence or part of my day job, but I call people out on fat-shaming as I can, and let it affect my TV choices. (Yay Huge! Boo, Biggest Loser!)

But like many people who embrace HAES, I'm objectively not very good at the H. I don't exercise regularly, and I've never stuck with a physical activity or an eating routine (diet or otherwise) for more than two or three months, if that. I've had recurrent binge eating problems since my early teens.

And I was just diagnosed with obstructive sleep apnea at the age of 31.


                                                                           ~~~~~


Now, the three things that your doctor will tell you when you first get diagnosed with sleep apnea are as follows:

1. You need a CPAP. (There are other approaches to treatment, like dental appliances, but this is the one that your basic family practice doc knows about and reflexively refer you to.)
2. Avoid central nervous system depressants, especially before bed. (Layman's translation: you know how booze makes you snore more? It also make you apneate more. Yes, apneate is totally a word that I didn't just make up right now. *nod*)
3. You really oughta lose some weight, fatty. (Yes, this is couched in terms of increasing physical activity and controlling diet or whatever. But let's be honest. We all know what it means.)

And of course, my initial reaction to that was "fuck you." Fuck you for automatically assuming that my weight is the problem; fuck you for casually mentioning weight loss as though it were some quick fix and not a major life change; and especially fuck you for effectively shaking your head and offering to hand me over to the weight-loss industry, as though they weren't instrumental in creating, aiding and abetting the body-image dysfunction and self-shaming that got me here.

After the anger and panic subsided, though, I did some research. And yes, obesity and apnea are associated, though I don't believe the causal relationship is particularly clear. Not everyone with one has the other. There is definitely evidence to show that reducing weight can improve apnea symptoms in ways that no other noninvasive treatment does. (There are no particularly great drugs, and surgery is an invasive, last-ditch option.) And conversely, treating apnea can act as a catalyst for weight loss, as energy levels improve and cravings for short-term fixes subside.

I looked candidly at my treatment choices, and realized that I really, really don't want to be dependent on a machine  -- or even a dental device -- to help me breathe for the rest of my life. I'm ok with doing it as part of a larger knockout-punch approach to getting this condition under control, and I will, but I am not going to choose at age 31 to use a CPAP for the rest of my life.

So, I decided, I am making the choice -- now, today -- to mindfully overhaul my eating habits and increase the level of physical activity I'm doing. I refuse to let my life revolve around food or weight forever, but I also refuse to accept that this condition is untreatable.

                                                                           ~~~~~

Here's the thing, though: I'm not the world's most self-aware human being, but my psyche and I, well, we've met. And the one thing that helps me commit to change is structure. What I need in order to capitalize on my new-found motivation is structure. Pre-existing, one-size-fits-all structure -- a strong, external framework that I can use as a scaffolding to bring my previous expectations to, and see how I can integrate one with the other.  And among all the possible structures and choices available to me, there's one that stands out as a relatively inexpensive all-in-one, pre-fab package of accountability and support from totally neutral parties. Sort of the IKEA bookcase of lifestyle change support systems.

So I made a choice. A choice that I believe to be the correct one for me right now, but that I'm nevertheless incredibly intellectually and emotionally conflicted about, for reasons that any fat activist will understand.

Therefore, yesterday, I joined a certain internationally known weight loss program, hereafter referred to as the Plan. You know, the one that turns nutritional values into... well, let's call them Dots.

And that's what this blog is about.