Days 230 - 246

In my dream we are together at the opening of an art gallery. There is a crowd, people milling with glasses of wine in their hands. The room tilts and it is in the ocean. The weight of wood and concrete pulls us all toward the sea bed. People, furniture, detritus, slides across the floor and I am clinging to the wall on the high side of the room, afraid of how much it will hurt when I lose my grip and hurtle toward the lower end. I am searching for you in the mass of bodies. A bank of windows shows dark water rushing past outside and we are drawn deeper and deeper, closer to the bottom. Storeys and storeys. I want to be holding your hand when the walls crumble and the water rushes in. As we hit the bottom and the seams of the building open up I am next to you and then I am awake.

How it is that it took me 25 years to figure out how my body works? Less than a week without exercise and I feel terrible. Well, I don’t really feel terrible but it’s harder to get out of bed in the morning. Not being well exercised makes me feel like there is less to be gained from making better food choices. Which is patent bullshit. So I ate cereal for breakfast and went to Zumba. A hard slog, but I’ll go tomorrow and it will be easier again and the next night it will be easier again.

It was harder this last month. I spent a good two weeks wondering where the magic of the previous month had gone. That easy willingness to simply do the things that needed to be done – the counting of calories, in and out. Uncomplicated faith that the things I ate and the exercise I engaged in would lead to loss. I dug my heels in for the last two weeks and tried to do as much as I could.

Then I had a fantastic loss. I’m not going to tell you because I don’t want to be held to it. It would be foolish to expect this kind of loss every month. I have to accept 500g a week. I really do. I feel like there is a fragile truce between my body and I. I don’t want to fight. I just want us to be nice to each other.

You can ask me anything.