The Magic Number

My magic number is 28.

No, it’s not pounds.

No, it’s not dress sizes.

It’s the number of years I

…fought an unknown condition.

…endured unbearable pain twice a month.

…spent thinking I was addicted to sugar.

…saw countless doctors who tried to convince me that my periods were normal and I was overly dramatic.

…took to gain the weight I now need to lose.

So, why do I think I’m going to beat this condition by doing exactly what I need to and have it play fair, when playing fair was never what it intended to do right out of the gate?  I am fastly embracing the idea that, for the first time in my life, I have a goal that I do NOT have complete control over.  Mrs. Type A Gargasz is having some trouble accepting that.

When I went to my meeting this evening the topic was:  What was going to be our big change this year and how were we going to break it down into smaller, bearable parts?

Good question.

I was good all week.  I weighed myself at home, obsessively, because I’m a little…okay, a lot…OCD.  It’s what I do.  Tuesday I was on track to have lost almost 6 pounds for the week.

Then I ovulated.

My official weigh in was  a loss of .8 pounds.  I wanted to scream.  I wanted to put on boxing gloves and beat the living shit out of something, anything.  If PCOS only had a face….

I walked into my meeting fighting back tears born of frustration and anger, conjured by my complete lack of control over my body.  I wanted to walk out.  I wanted to go to the bathroom and scream and cry.  I wanted to give up.

Then Stacy asked how I was.  All I could do was growl.  I didn’t want to get into the details because I felt a rant boiling just under the surface.  I simply told her my weigh in should have been better.  That, due to nothing I did wrong, it sucked and had only lost just under a pound.

Then she said to me, “Well, you LOST that because you did SOMETHING right.”

Her “rightness” washed over me.  While it would have been socially inappropriate for me to kiss the woman in public, it’s exactly what I felt like doing.

So, as the meeting wore on and Lynn, our fearless and loving leader, challenged us to find our big goal and break it down, the number 28 popped into my head and stayed there.  My goal became very clear.

Expectations:  My big change.

I have to change the expectations I have.  It has to be enough to expect to do my tracking, to follow my points, to be as active as I can in all the moments that I can.

I’m coming up on my year anniversary with Weight Watchers this May.  I’ve married my change to my broken down goal.

28 years.

That’s how long I took to get this way.

I cannot expect to lose it faster than that.

That doesn’t mean that I can give up fighting.  It simply means that I will not let PCOS win.  I will not let my expectations wane simply because my endocrine system has other plans.  That also doesn’t mean that I have to accept that daunting 28 year goal as the be all, end all.

You see, if I lose the weight before that goal of 28 years, then I win and PCOS loses.

I’ve got to take that goal one meal at a time, one day at a time.

So, PCOS, to you I say:

And not tomorrow, either.

 

 

 

 

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