Ah, the Products of Angst!

I've been in one of my super anxiety ridden states lately, which is always fun. One of the many fun things about being a hyped up, angst driven person is the truly crappy poems and free form writings the state inspires me to create.

I also get lots of bizarre ideas about things I want to do. My angst has a traveling companion oftentimes. Its name is mania. My manic thoughts want me to deal with my insecurity and anxiety by doing things I wouldn't normally do. Some of my latest winning ideas include:

• going on a ride-along with a patrol cop
• signing up with the county coroner's office to watch an autopsy as research for a writing project
• going to an open mic night for poetry and (fingers crossed!) flash fiction reading (I'd much rather read some of my flash fiction than my poetry)

My angsty poem is so bad I will spare any blog readers the horror of reading it. I will tell you what it's about though, so you can see why I decided not to post it. It's about an anxious and insecure person continually checking his/her email hoping to hear from a special someone; that special someone doesn't respond, so the anxious person speculates about what could possibly keep this other person from sending an email back. I may have been my own inspiration for this poem. I did take some license to exaggerate a bit though.

Writing seems to be helping my anxiety, so I suppose I'm off to create more poorly written poetry.

Dieting

I don't know why, but this time around dieting has been much easier for me. Not that I enjoy it, because there are certainly times that I'd rather be eating pizza than steamed broccoli. Still, I don't have the urges and compulsions to cheat like I used to.

When I was training for a figure competition I really had a hard time resisting sweets. I'd also get really angry if anyone insinuated that I wasn't allowed to eat "forbidden" foods. I knew I wasn't supposed to eat chocolate (and lots of other things), but having people say it to me just really p*ssed me off. Then occasionally I'd sneak and eat things I wasn't supposed to when I was alone.

This is what I refer to as "closet eating", since I didn't tell anyone and I didn't let anyone see me. Sad, I know. How pathetic is it to hide and eat snack foods? Very.

Anyway, I know that I only wind up cheating myself when I do these sorts of things. This time around I haven't had the urge to "closet eat" on this diet, which makes me happy. I think having been through this process before makes it much easier for me this time. I've lost a little over six pounds so far. Now only about 20 more to go! :)

Weight Loss, Revisited

I am getting back into the habit of eating sensibly (which is a big struggle for me). I'm hoping to be able to do another figure competition this year, but I don't know if I'll be ready to or not. Possibly by the fall. I'll have to see how I do on my current workout schedule and diet.

I've somehow managed to drop 5 lbs. in the last three days. I'm thinking most of it is probably water weight, so I'll likely see some of that reappear the next time I get on the scales.

I've had a rough year and a quarter as far as my fitness goals go. Since I had my car accident, which gave me whiplash and a bulging disc in my lower back, I was unable to do many kinds of exercise and I was only able to exercise at a lighter intensity. Then I began taking Abilify a few months ago and I promptly went from about 155-160 lbs. to 175 lbs. I haven't weighed this much since I was nine months pregnant with twins (I topped out at 179 when I was pregnant, which was a total gain of 44 lbs.).

Anyway, I'm hoping that I stick with things this time and don't allow stress and depression to distract me from eating right and kicking a** in the gym. :)

Tosca Reno

I went to the Arnold Classic yesterday for a little while and was able to watch the bikini competition. I wanted to see a friend compete in the figure competition, but my back hurt from standing and watching.

Anyway, I was also able to meet with the people from Oxygen. I saw Monica Brant, Robert Kennedy (the publisher/owner), and some other buff people at their booth as well.

Anyway, I also got to have my picture taken with Tosca Reno. She also signed her book for me. She was really nice and just as buff in person as she is in her pics in the magazine. : )

I look like a frumpy couch potato in this pic! Still, I figured that I'd share it. (Besides, I started working out again and doing Crossfit classes, so I don't think I'll be looking like a frumpy couch potato for long!)