In Vain, or Insane?

So the best part of day 2 on a liquid diet is that day 1 is over.

Although I grazed through the day with

• 7 8oz cups of water
• 3 protein drinks, 
• 2 cups of cream of broccoli soup (eww!), 
• 1/2 cup of Malt-o-Meal (yeah, they still make it and it still tastes the same...), 
• one 4oz container of applesauce (no sugar added), 
• one 4oz container of non-fat pudding, 
• and one truly bitter container of yogurt, 

somehow I was hungry pretty much every minute of the day.

Okay, in the interest of total disclosure, there were about 10-15 minutes following the protein shakes where I wasn't actively hungry, but it roared back within the hour.

However, I'm one day closer to my goal, and THAT is pretty cool.

So day 2 started off with me wondering if I should take some photos of myself at the beginning of the journey. After I stopped quivering, I tried once more to talk myself into it. Same visceral reaction.

I learned a long time ago that you can't be in the photos if you're the one taking the picture. So I became the family photographer. There are still enough photos of me to make sure I get my face on at least 10 out of 12 months of the Christmas calendar (Mixbook.com), but I make sure they're head shots. I shudder whenever someone takes a photo of my whole body, and usually crop it out of the photo as soon as possible.

I also avoid seeing my whole reflection in mirrors, focusing on whatever body part I'm dealing with (usually face, teeth, hair...). When I'm walking by large store windows I focus on the models within, rather than my image reflected from the glass. I never try new clothes on in dressing rooms before buying - I just return them after I've tried them on at home. In that way I have happily maintained my own ignorance of the true size of my body.

Except that's not true. When asked to estimate my own weight I'm usually within 10 pounds, startling the hell out of health professionals who uniformly believe overweight people have no true understanding of their situation. Although I routinely refused to be weighed when being seen by doctors (that public humiliation thing I covered yesterday), I have lived with this body my whole life and am aware of what wearing various sizes mean in terms of total weight.

In other words, I know how big I am but avoid like the plague seeing the proof of the pudding, as it were, with my own two eyes. Kind of the way I want the world to deal with me too. You can know I'm a plump (fat), middle-aged (old), charmer (woman), just don't see me that way. I'd rather you 'saw' me as my young, beautiful, healthy self in my eighteen year old body.

Of course, doesn't everybody?

I don't know if I'm going to talk myself into a 'before' photo or not. I'll let you know tomorrow.