Skin
	One of the most frequent questions I'm asked is if I have excess skin. I know this is a legitimate concern for folks who have a lot of weight to lose, but skin worries should not deter anyone from losing weight. Excess skin won't kill you. Obesity can. This is a blog I wrote back in April 2007. Because so many people have responded to my People Magazine, Today Show and Entertainment Tonight appearances and have asked about the skin issue, I thought I should publish my skin blog here.  "If You Can't Be With the One You Love..." (April 2007)   Since reaching my weight goal back in March, I’ve struggled to develop a relationship with this new and …cough… “improved” body of mine. It’s like working with someone you don’t like much, someone who talks too much and wears cheap perfume – not a bad person, just a constant irritation. You have to work next to her and so you go to work every day and try to stay positive. Most days you can ignore her incessant talking or tolerate that extra spritz of that Chanel knockoff, but some days you just can’t and you want to scream, “Shut up!!” or “Go take a freaking shower!” And even though you don’t, you create the scene in your head of you screaming and her staring at you dumfounded. She’d probably cry. Then you’d feel really bad and apologize, saying you didn’t mean it, that you’re just having a bad day, but you really did mean it, but you can’t be honest, and then her talking gets even more tedious because she thinks you’re now best friends and she brings you a bottle of the cheap perfume because in your assuaging apology you asked her where you could get some, and now you find yourself not back at square one, but somewhere in the negative digits. That’s sort of what it’s like most days when I change clothes, take a shower, get naked. I usually keep my gaze forward or skim over the parts I have to look at with a buff puff in one hand and shower gel in the other. There are days I actually admire parts of my naked body and take a moment to tell myself “good job.” But mostly I see the sagging and bagging that cover the muscles underneath, the ones I work so hard every day to tone. When I was five months pregnant with my oldest daughter, I got my first stretch mark. I saw it in the mirror as I got out of the shower, a small thin line just to the right of my belly button. ‘So much for the aloe lotion and olive oil theory,’ I thought. My skinny mother, who birthed five of us, had nary a one, but I don’t take after my mother in any physical way and I so my belly, four months later, was littered with thick pink stretch marks. When daughter number two came along, I was blessed with a few more reminders of stretched skin along my hips and breasts. Just as she did all the time growing up, daughter number two had to one-up her sister. Over the years, I learned to live with my little “flap” of belly and the stretch marks faded to white. I had two awesome kids and in a weird way the skin and marks made me feel even more like a woman. But a non-functioning thyroid and the obesity that ensued is hardly like birthing a child. Skin, once stretched, doesn’t just go away when the fat underneath disappears. Skin merely deflates. And now, after losing 159 pounds, I have excess skin in my inner thighs, upper arms and armpits, and on my belly. This excess skin is not a “war wound.” It is a constant reminder of the years I spent fat and anxious and self-conscious. Of course that is the negative view, the irritating co-worker metaphor. I could look at the skin as just another marker of my life journey, in the same way that my scars mark the surgeries I’ve had. I tell myself I’m just being vain, that my health is what matters, the fact that I now wear a size 8 and not a 32 is what matters, that no one else besides me cares if I have excess skin or not. It isn’t important like global warming or the deficit. It’s just some skin, Lynn. Get over yourself. But here’s the deal: I’ve worked so hard to be the weight that I am and I’ve overcome a lot of physical and emotional obstacles to be where I am today. These issues might not be as big as the war in Iraq, but they are mine and they matter to me. I color my hair because I refuse to be gray at 43. I wear makeup and jewelry to enhance my appearance. Why then shouldn’t I get rid of this excess skin if it will make me feel better about myself? Herein lies the problem. I don’t have $20-$30K lying around to pay a plastic surgeon. That’s the bottom line. And so I will work with the irritating co-worker. We’ll never be best friends, but maybe I can get her to talk about something interesting and perhaps buy her some better perfume. As Stephen Stills sang, “If you can’t be with the one you love, honey, love the one you’re with.”

Novemember 27, 2007
	On the eating front, I got through Thanksgiving, but it bothered me that I wanted to keep picking at the sweet potatoes and caramel apple salad*. Yes, both are low-fat, but I was satisfied and not hungry. What I realized was that I love the taste so much that it was very difficult to stay away from them. I had to be mindful of my actions. Wanting food and needing food are two very different things. You'd think after almost three years into this new lifestyle I'd know that. It just proves there's always something to learn about ourselves and our relationships to food. I also noticed last week that my jeans felt a little tight. The scale was up a little and this bothered me. I knew it wasn't water weight. It was a "real" gain. I looked at my food journals and realized I'd been eating more chocolate and almonds than usual. I was well within my alloted WW points, but I was feeding myself too much of the wrong things. Not that almonds are bad, or even chocolate for that matter, but I must take amount into consideration. I cut out the chocolate and nuts for a few days, substituted fruit and more vegetables and protein, and the weight came off. I will eat a few almonds and a piece of chocolate once in awhile, but as I said before, it's so important to stay ultra conscious of what we put in our mouths. Mindfulness eating, mindfulness living. I thought you  might like the Caramel Apple Salad recipe. It generally makes 8 servings, but I could easily make it two. LOL Caramel Apple Salad 1 box of Jello Instant Butterscotch Pudding 8 oz fat-free Cool Whip 20 ounces crushed pineapple, undrained 4 medium apples, peeled and chopped Mix pudding and Cool Whip. Add fruit. Refrigerate at least 3 hours.

October 21, 2007
	Some Thoughts On Maintenance I belong to a small online support group made up of women who have lost a significant amount of weight and are now in maintenance. Our private online forum is a lifeline to me in maintenance because often I feel like I’m the only one in the world who feels like I do as it involves weight and self-image.   A few days ago I posed this question and comment: “Do you ever look back over your weigh-ins? I do that every once in awhile, like what did I weigh a year ago? Two years ago? It helps me put things in perspective. It also is a wake up call, at least it was this morning. I realize I'm obsessing, truly obsessing, about the numbers on the scale and ignoring my body. I was hungry last night but by golly I wasn't going to feed myself because I wanted to see 130.something on that scale this morning. So I woke up hungry, weighed in at 131, and am now feeling yuck, like I *gasp* didn't feed myself right yesterday.”   For me, the thing about maintaining a significant weight is I constantly fear I will gain something back. Every ounce stares back at me on the scale and I spend a lot of time during the day agonizing over every food choice, like I’m new to weight loss or something.   I wanted to share some of my groups’ answers and my response because I think this is a crucial topic for anyone losing weight.   One woman said: “… if it's far too difficult to maintain 131 and you find yourself hungry all the time, you should try eating more and be happy with only a slightly higher weight. Life is too freaking short to be starving all the time and not to mention, keeping yourself hungry like that may eventually lead to you tossing it all out the window eventually.”   That was like a brick between the eyes: “Life is too freaking short to be starving…”   Another woman wrote: “Lynn - Remember when you were going on (vacation) to see your family and you were stressing out and still loosing weight and you started to question your goal weight because you liked seeing that 130 on the scale? Remember what I told you once your body started to level out? Don’t starve yourself just to see a l lb or 2 difference on a metal box, it’s not worth it. Other than a nice low number what difference is it making? Are you going to be a smaller size? Are your pants going to button without sucking in? Are your collarbones more prominent?”   When she said reminded me about my pre-vacation stress, I realized I get so “in the moment” that I forget that there are times in my past when I’ve behaved similarly and I need to visit that time and remember how I dealt (or didn’t deal) with it.   Also, the part about what difference will a pound make, I’d never thought about that before. I really get my head geared toward the number on the scale, and since reading what she wrote I’ve done some deep thinking about that and I realize I’ve done that all along. It’s like I’m not ready to be done with the weight-LOSS journey. I enjoyed going down the scale. It was challenging and fun. Maintenance has its own challenges, but I haven’t been willing to embrace them until now. I am (and am soon to be WAS) in that weight-LOSS way of thinking. “Just another ounce or two…” is what I kept saying to myself and then when I’d see a maintain or a “gain” of a few ounces I’d be pissed.   Well, I’m putting my brain on another path. After 9 months I’m actually ready to “do” maintenance and not just talk about it.   The women in my support group are phenomenal and I owe them so many thanks for their help with this and all the other issues we’ve discussed the last five months.