Tuesday, May 31, 2005
We moved!
Yes indeed! We moved on Saturday at 7 am on the pouring rain! The movers were punctual at 7am, and everything was in the new house by 10.30!

When the first pieces of furniture got into the house, I almost had a heart attack. Most of our wooden furniture is a dark-ish brown, and that against the ivory wall was too much for me! Angelos did not say anything, but I could see he was just holding back not to upset me. So as soon as the movers left, I took the keys of the car, handed them to Angelos, and told him: Let's go!!! Where to? he asked. To the flower shop, I said. Right, let's go! he replied. We went and bought so many flowers! Sunflowers, red and yellow roses, some exotic flowers in orange and purple called paradise birds in greek, some fuschia and white lillies, and then returned home and arranged them in vases and then we begun to move furnioture around and by 3pm we had a home!

A gorgeous living/dinning area and a kitchen drenched in sunlight. The flowers did an amazing job and the ivory of the walls with the accent of the colourful flowers softened immensely the bold contrast of the darki-sh furniture. The result was incredible!

We just LOVE our new appartment!!!!

Of course, we have two rooms full of boxes with shut doors. I think it will be at least a couple of more weeks till this is totally ready, but now the fun begins.

I do not remember being that tired in my entire life before. My whole body aches and all I want to do now is sleep! But it's my first day at work since thursday and I need to do a pile of things here.

I just wanted to let you know how things went, and tell you I have missed you!!!!

Unfortunaly, the phone company will take at least a week till it connects our phone, and that means no internet at home! Which is sort of good, cos one of the rooms with the locked door and the thousand boxes happens to be the study...hehehe

I will soon catch up on you all and I will be back soon with details and stuff!

Posted by Argy at 1:00 pm | 12 comments

Wednesday, May 25, 2005
New
I am delighted that ms ralph offered to redesign my blog and make it more personal. She did a wonderful job and she made me feel like I am having two new homes now, one in Athens and the other on the web :) Timing could not have been better! I still have to add all the links to the blogs I read, but this will take some time and will be done right after the move!
Oh the move...lol
I will not go into it now, or else I will scare my precious Kimba more!
My mom came over this morning, and she weighted herself on my scales, freaked out because she seemed to have gained 2 kilos and went back to her house. She called me right away and told me she did not gain two kilos and that my scales are wrong.
So I weighed myself on my scales (88.2) and then went and weighed myself on the pharmacy scales. They showed me 1.6 less (86.6) and I had clothes on.
So I called Angelos and asked him to weigh himself in the gym today, they have these very accurate huge scales with the balance thingy and then I will make him weigh at our scales too.
If this is right and my scales are showing more, it does not mean I have lost more weight lately, because I always weigh myself on those scales. It just means I have a little less to go, and much more importantly, that I will only have 2.1 to loose to be just gorgeously overweight, instead of threateningly obese.
I am eating a lot less lately, simply because I am too busy with the move, thus food is not in my mind all the time. I like it this way!

Posted by Argy at 2:07 pm | 10 comments

Monday, May 23, 2005
It's all about the move!!!!
I have been so busy with the move! This morning when I woke up I could not really get up. Every muscle in this body (even long forgotten ones) is sore and complaining! Since Thursday I have:

Spent two days cleaning the new appartment. And it still needs work to be done. I think for the next month or more I will have to clean this place up every day. It happens with new buildings. The dust comes out of everywhere!

I have packed and took there all the winter clothes, put them in storage in the new place too

I have packed all the linens - sheets, tableclothes, towels, etc - and took them home and arranged them too!

I have packed and moved and arranged all the winter shoes too! And yes, I will never admit how many pairs of shoes I have, but I will tell you that I am definately related to either Imelda Marcos or to centipedes!

Besides two forks, two glasses, two plates, the espresso maker, the wok and a couple of containers, everything else from my kitchen is in the new kitchen! Plus all the pyrex's, and pots and good serving stuff, like trays etc.

Also, during the weekend we went and bought a sink to replace the one we broke here, and we also got our new stove. We cannot take the old one with us, because in the new appartment the kitchen appliances are fitments. Luckily, our dishwasher works both ways, and the fridge can be fitted, if the carpenter who made the kitchen can remove one of the two wooden panels that form the box where the fridge goes in. It is a pity really, because the width of our fridge is 73 cms, and the width of the box is 71.5. But I love our fridge and do not want to have to buy a new one! So if he takes one panel off it will be perfect. Of course, if he does this I will loose the closet that is on top of the fridge but I can live with it. Tuesday afternoon I am meeting the carpenter and see what happens.

I still have so much to do. So much that I try not to think of all of them at the same time or else I will panic!

I will not be a good blogger till we move, but I will prolly post some more from work later today. Cos although all this work, I have been pondering the first of my nine questions and I have found some answers!

Posted by Argy at 8:57 am | 10 comments

Wednesday, May 18, 2005
Nine Questions
I got home at 9 last night. Did I tell you that during the weekend Vangelis and Sofia moved to their new home? I was in their house from Friday afternoon packing and carrying and it was such a hard work that almost ended Sunday night, that almost made me reconsider moving myself...lol. So yesterday after work I went by their house to help with some stuff and get some more boxes to use for our move.

Angelos came to pick me up and I asked him if he minded me spending some time alone in my study while he watched some TV. Luckily, he was feeling like watching TV and he said if I cook him something nice he would not mind being alone.

Pork chops with basil pesto rice afterwards, I was sitting in my study. Now, you got to understand that our appartment is full of empty boxes. Our clothes are scattered everywhere. We clean the bathroom and the kitchen, we sort of tidy our bedroom, and this is it, the rest is chaos. We both feel as if this is a large hotel room and not our home anymore. Strange. So I had the light off, in an attempt to not see the mess surrounding me, and the pc on.
I tried really hard to think of my goals. My rewards. Things I want to achieve. I tried really hard to find ways to motivate me. I could not. I got up to go to the kitchen to get some more ice for my drink. Now that is summer I am again addicted to scented water. Try it if you want to increase your water intake. Take a big jar, fill it with water and ice, and add any of the following: slices of orange, fresh basil leaves, fresh mint leaves.
Anyway, as I was walking past my open closet, I got a glimpse of myself in my underwear. I stopped and looked more closely. I half closed my eyes and could see my figure only.It was darkish with just the light of the pc screen. I was pleased. Well proportioned. This has always saved me, even in my highest weight, I had a well defined waist.
Then I turned the light on. Now this was not as good a feeling as before. The flaws were brightly enlightened. I felt what I fight for so long. A deep disappointment. The truth is that it really aches to see the damage in my body. I used to be so fit. You have heard me before complaining about the stretch marks and the cellulite and the looseness and and and. This is what I do lately, complain, feel the disappointment, and then pack these feelings and hide them somewhere, pretending I forget them.
Yesterday, I took them to extremes. I begun to grab, squeeze, pinch, you name it my flesh. My thighs. My arms. My belly. My breasts. I made my cellulite more visible. I smoothened my skin with my fingers to see each and every stretchmark. I pressed my skin around my belly closer to see the loose skin more freakinshly.
I did not do all this with detest or disgust. I was getting really aquainted with them all. Deeply aknowledging them. And then I had a brilliant idea.
I looked for my red sating fat pants. Elastic waist of course. And the red coat most of you have seen in my before pic. And put them on. And then, took some lengths or rope (cos our house besides being full of boxes is full of all moving accesories: ropes, duck tapes, packing papers, etc) and I took tshirts and socks and undies and you name it and I wrapped them around my body so that I could fit into these clothes. I became my old 130 kilos me again. I looked funny. You could see a small head and a small neck getting out of these clothes. And then I went to the living room where Angelos was watching a film, and stood there.
He was shocked. He was looking at me and was speechless. All he managed to whisper was: You were never that big in my eyes, but honey, do you see what I see? You look enormous with these clothes!
Pictures never have this effect you know. Pictures never give you the feeling back. Pictures cannot make it hard for you to bend. I could not bend easily yesterday because of my stuffed stomach and belly. I could not reach my toes.
I returned to my study with a feeling of extreme pride. I felt so proud of my accomplishment. As I stood in front of the mirror, untying the layers of clothing from my thighs, I felt tears falling from my eyes. For each cut rope and each tshirt falling off me, I felt my past dropping on the floor. It was like I was watching scenes from childhood, from teenagehood. But when I was done and was again left in my underwear, I felt as if I was more naked than my bare flesh. Strange feeling really, but I felt really very vulnerable.
I sat down and closed my eyes and breathed deep, like I do in my therapy sessions, and tried to exagerate the feeling I was having. It is a technique we use a lot with my therapist. I was feeling more and more vulnerable, till I felt fear. And I begun to ask questions to myself. These are the questions I wrote down on a piece of paper last night:
  • Why are you afraid?
  • What are you afraid of?
  • Why you feel this now, after "re-producing" your lost fat?
  • What else do you feel you have lost along with this fat that you have not yet admitted to yourself?
  • What is the fat protecting you from?
  • Are you ready to trust life so that you need no more of this kind of protection?
  • What is that you need to feel safe about so that you let the remainin fat go?
  • What do you gain by staying in this weight?
  • What do you think you will loose if you loose the rest of this fat?
Last night I did not get my motivation back. Nor I replied to these questions. Being able to admit I have them was enough. And very strong too.
This morning I still have not attempted to answer them. This morning I will just enjoy the return of the feeling of pride for my accomplishment so far and the renewed appreciation for my body.
I am absolutely certain that when I answer these questions I will have made the first step to the final countdown.
*******************
This is a more summery look for this blog. I wish I could make something myself that would be closer to who I am really. But since I know nothing about templates, this will have to do for now!

Posted by Argy at 9:18 am | 12 comments

Tuesday, May 17, 2005
A year ago...
I wrote:

I have been struggling with weight for many years. Now that I am almost clean of all other issues and weight is just weight to be lost for me I can say with sincerity that I have felt the same disgust with my body when I had just 5 kilos more and the same disgust when I had 61 kilos to loose. For me, the important thing was first to lift the weight of my shoulders. By doing so I waved goodbye and farewell to 36 kilos of fat. Tricky thing that was. The taste of accomplishment resembles that of tequila you know. And it is equally intoxicating. It drives you to cloud nine, and makes you feel on top of the world. And then you slip... And then I slipped. Fitting comfortably to a size 18, sometimes a 16, enabled me to go shopping and have a blast, feel beautiful inside my clothes, and good about myself. But it did disoriented me from my initial purpose. To reach a healthy weight range.I got 25 more kilos to loose.And I am going to loose them.By eating right and moving as much as I can.

On May 17, 2004 I weighed 94 kilos. On May 17, 2005 I weigh 88 kilos. I could be nice to myself here and list again all the rough stuff I went through this year. I could be really supportive to my efforts and explicitly describe how a loss is a loss and write a couple of paragraphs about how in the past I used to give up after a couple of loose weeks and never return on the weightloss wagon, while look at me now, although I have managed a small loss in all these months, I am so good a girl that I am still trying. I could even invent a new theory that after a loss of a vast amount of weight it is the healthy thing to loose so slowly because this way your body learns to maintain. I could also list all the good things that happen to me too cos of this loss and the little exercise I do. I could tell you all excited how I take the stairs to the 3rd floor where our new appartment is, since they have not yet connected the elevator, and how smooth my breath is at the end (and hey I am a smoker), and imply that my physical condition is so much better than it used to be. I could begin to number clothing items that now fit, or are loose. I could tell you how many compliments I get a day. I really could do all these things.

I won't.

I will tell you that I have spent the last days visiting Renee's place and reading her entry about the willpower and motivation pill and reading and rereading all the comments and still, after the 128th time reading them, I still could not decide which pill I'd rather have. Cos I want them both!

I have eally spent the last nights staying awake till 2 am, here, in my study, after Angelos goes to bed, with the PC open, playing frantically solitaire and thinking over and over the same question:

Why can't I concentrate for a few months and get over with these last kilos?

And the answer finally came last night. Because I am not motivated anymore.Because when I got on the scales after months and months and saw 130 kilos, yep, rounded like that, 130.00, I never thought I would make it to the 80's. I never really believed I could be slim and fit again. My dream then was to be able and wear jeans again. You know, not the fat section size 22 jeans. The normal nice cut labels you can find in any store. Last summer I bought my first pair of jeans after 5 years. Now I swim on them. They were a classic pair of Levis 501 size 38. Men's. I bought a size 36 women's a month ago, and it is very loose now. And I have a size 34 pair too, witch fits, but is embarassingly tight, so I am not wearing it yet.

Also, my weight loss is a big issue among family and close friends. Every time I see someone, they will all tell me what a huge accomplishment I have achieved, how good I am looking, etcetera, etcetera. Which is nice indeed, but bad too. Because without much change really, without much effort either, my vanity stays reassured and pleased.

I really need to sit down, now that I have admitted all this, and see why I want to loose the remaining 18 kilos. Perhaps I need to take a good walk downtown, get in shops, try clothes on, see what I want to wear that now does not fit, or is not nice on me. There is really no need to count my steps and exercise if I am to eat badly afterwards. Because although we all know that exercising even if not followed by a diet plan is good for us, it really pisses me off to walk around the block just to make sure that I have completed my 10.000 steps, and then return home and cook pasta. Not that I have eaten pasta lately. But with my lack of motivation for further weightloss, noone can guarantee I am not having pasta tomorrow!

I think I would so much like to read this entry on May 17, 2006, and smile, wearing my size 30 Diesel jeans, and remember that May 17, 2005, was the day that I got my motivation back, and changed my weight from 88 kilos to sexy 69!

Posted by Argy at 9:14 am | 8 comments

Friday, May 13, 2005
Friday the 13th, a "yes day"
Because we Greeks are weird people, we consider Tuesday the 13th the "bad luck" day. Because I am even more weird, I consider Tuesday the 13th my lucky day. Because the 13th letter of our alphabet is N and because Nai in Greek means yes, I consider every 13th of the month a "Yes" day.
The concept of a yes day started when I was little, and it was a reward for me. If I would clean my room and be nice to my brother (cos I was a heartless cruel bitch to him till I was about 7) I would have a "yes" day.
A "yes day" would simply be a day where I would have a yes to as many questions or favours asked as my years were. Because I think the previous sentense is very bad english, what I mean is that when this started and I was 4, I had 4 questions/favours to ask. When I was 5, the favours were 5. Now I am 36, we don't play this game anymore ;o(
Usually it would be like: "mom, can you make me a tomato - feta sandwich?" Mom would say yes, and as soon as she would give me the sandwich, I would say, "Mom, can I not eat it now?" and she would smile and say "yes". I was such a bastardious brat!
Although I adored my "yes days", I really did not have many of them. It was just too difficult for me to clean my room or not harass my little brother. The funny thing is that I loved my room when it was all tidy and clean. I felt like a little princess in her glossy pink kingdom, where everything looked prettier and harmonious, in order and in place. And the truth is that I didn't really enjoy being mean to my brother. Cos I loved him as much as I do now; more than I can really express.
I started writting this down to give you a funny story, because I did not like that yesterday's post made you sad. I did not mean it. For the record, I was not sad myself. I was just cleaaring up my head.
But as I wrote the "yes day" story, I really felt like I was 4 years old again. My "yes days" passed through my head like a movie, and I could see the pattern. I would ask for things or would do things that I did not really want or enjoy, just for the naughtiness of asking them or doing them.
Or I would do things that would give me a momentarily pleasure, like pinching hard my brothers buttock when he least expected it, and then make me feel horrible, like seeing the "why did you do this to little me" look in his face after the pinch.
It is the very same thing with eating something I am not supposed to eat. It has nothing to do with who I want to really be. The slim and fit woman. It does not give me but momentarily pleasure, because the moment the last bite is swallen I begin to feel the teeth of guilt biting my heart.
Like when I was little, I really wanted to be a tidy girl and caring sister. I loved me and my surroundings so much more when I was like that. But there there was this little angry child inside me that lived for mischief and naughtiness and wanted to do the forbitten, the bad thing. Oh rebellious years...lol
So now I am thinking that perhaps there is the middle ground after all.
What if when I was five I would tidy my room but put everything in the order or space I felt like, and not in the way my mom had decorated and arranged my room?
What if instead of pinching my brothers buttock and instead of surprising him and hurt him too, just lick his nose, surprise him, and then have both of us laughing?
What if instead of eating a pitta gyros from the shop, with all the grease in the pitta and all the fat in the gyros and the 198% fat tzatziki, I make my own at home, by grilling my pitta, make my own gyros by slicing lean beef in stripes and adding all the right spices and then make my own tzatziki with 0% fat yoghurt?
Ah, the five year old inside me is smilling right now you know. She is content and happy. She can have her "yes days" back, and trust me, she will learn to enjoy them much much more now!
Now, can I have this tomato-feta sandwich? ummm...well...on wholewheat bread of course ;o)

Posted by Argy at 12:26 pm | 8 comments

Wednesday, May 11, 2005
A woman
It is 3 in the afternoon and I just got to work! I was at the new appartment from 10 am, measuring, fantacising, day dreaming, calculating. Such a pleasure - besides the calculating part which involved all the expenses!
I weighed in at 88.2 this morning. I was at 89.4 last Wednesday, so I will delete from my mind the nice 87.7 I saw on Saturday, and will gladly accept the 1.2 loss.
For the last few days, since I realised it is almost the first year's anniversary for this blog, I have been trying to think and feel and remember what was different last year and made me so focused on the weight loss, something
I do not seem to have lately. Surely, I am putting effort on loosing weight, but not with the consistency and the soul I put last year.
I have come up with some thoughts, facts and conclusions.
I will not bore you with them. But the truth is for me to get back with my soul to my weight loss, I still need to fully trust life again. To really get over the fear of the bad unexpected thing that happens right when you think you are at your peak. Like last year. After the glorious weightloss, there were the glorious holidays, the glorious closing ceremony of the olympic games, and mom's cancer followed 5 days after.
I am not looking for a contract that says I will have no troubled times in my life, nor that everyone I love will live to complete 147 years of life and then we will all go together so noone will suffer from each other's loss.
I just need to not be so afraid anymore of something similarly awful happening again. You know, I still have the hospital smell in my nostrils sometimes. When I am having a great time and feel happy, I suddenly freeze inside me with this fear.
Now I think of it, there were quite a few things on my plate since last summer. My partner left to have her baby and I was dealing with a 6 days, 12 - 14 hrs per day working week for four months. For two of them I was dealing with this plus my mother's chemo. Then for a month I almost lived in the hospital with her. And then there was the rehab period for her at home, which was not nice for the first three weeks. February started off nice with the trip to Amsterdam, but then, work became chaotic again, Angelos and I got a bit distant with all the work stress we both had, and then there was the babymaking business. Which really at that time was both a dream and a nightmare. Because I want it so badly, I am afraid it never will happen. And then, there was the festival with the enormous workload, and then my mom had to go to the hospital again, thank god for no reason at the end, but it really freaked me out again and brought me back where I was on December.
(I didn't finish this yesterday, so here I am completing it today :)
I have always been a person with really little patience.
Therapy has also become tough lately. Not only because of the digging into the too deep and unfamiliar territories. Also because of this fear. That when everything finally goes wonderfully something evil happens. So this is really what has kept my soul apart from my weightloss. This is really what has made my weightloss pause in a way. It is really complicated in the most silly way. I am eating so well and exercising too, and then on a day I will ruin everything with eating stuff I should not, and then some more of them. This way I am keeping myself sort of tricked that I am not giving up, and then I give my efforts a slap on the face and ruin them in three servings of chocolate icecream. Combine this with re-discovered feelings of looking good and being complimented by others often, and you are where I am now: Comfortable and afraid to move on to the next level.
The pedometer has given me some of my motivation back. Because it involves walking. And walking for me is liberating. It gives me hope. I associate it with life. If I can take another step for me it means I have a body that really functions. If I can break another kilometer it means that my lungs, besides the smoking - which is still under control and a lot less than 4 months ago, but still is part of my life - have the ability to fill in deep with oxygen.
I am really investing too much hope and too many dreams on the new appartment. First, because this place suits us better. Second, because I am a tad paranoid and have felt weird living in this current one that had other tenants before us. In a weird sense I had always felt that I live with the left over energy of others here. I love the fact that there is a gym five minutes walking distance away. I am dreaming about dinners in the balcony, grilled veggies and fish in our new bbq. I see myself waking up in the morning and going to the kitchen to make my coffee in extreme daylight. I measured the window over my kitchen sink yesterday. It is 2.47 cm long! I could see all the small pots with the fresh herbs nesting there. I could smell them really! The initial sadness of leaving this neighbourhood has almost disappeared.
I am saying this because really, for me this will mark a new era. When I got married with Angelos, although inside me I loved him to death, I refused to accept it and told myself that I did it for the party really. I married him thinking that perhaps by actually accepting his proposal I would break free from him. We have been together forever you know. We first got togehter in 1989. I used to break up with him every couple of months, go out with others, then return, then break up and so on and so forth. Then I left him for a year. Then I got back. Then I left him for another year. Then we got back together again in 1993, and then we got married in 1997. Then in 2000 I left him again for a few motnhs. Such amazing fear of intimacy. Such amazing fear of acceptance of my own feelings.
Also, when I got married I never wanted to have children. And then I got pregnant in 1998, and cried for 2 weeks, and then felt miserable for another 4, and then one night Angelos team in football was playing against mine. And he was cheering cos mine missed a goal, and I remember telling him...yeah yeah cheer now you are just you and me. But soon there will be two of us here cos noway my son is following your team! And the next day I found out that the foetus was dead inside me. Since 2002 I wanted a baby and then we started the company, my partner asked me to give her priority because she was trying and she is 10 years older than me, so her time was sort of limited. And then we were going to start on September, after she gave birth, and then my mother's illness happened.
I am saying all these to myself really. I am reminding myself what has been and what I want it to be from now on. This is why I am putting this down. Because really, my gaining all this weight is really part of what has been in my past. And loosing all those fortysomething kilos is really a part of a healing process. And plateauing for so many months now is nothing but a self defense - resistance mechanism to total change.
But my husband and I are making a new start in a new home and with dreams and plans for us. And if making this body a better place for our baby to start their sweet life is not a good motivator, I do not know what else could be!
Oh...right...a pair of size 30 Diesel Jeans!

Posted by Argy at 3:17 pm | 5 comments

Tuesday, May 10, 2005
Hi Argy - come on let's just finish what we started out to do!
I was thinking yesterday that I need a couple of days to think about things and decide how to proceed. Then come back and post.

And then I get this comment from Leigh! "Hi Argy - come on let's just finish what we started out to do!"

My jaw dropped when I read it you know! Because it really is that simple. Taking steps backwards is only delaying it a bit. But there is no other option but the finish line really.

So what do you think?

Let's all just finish what we started out to do!!!

(thanks so much Leigh :)

Posted by Argy at 9:59 am | 8 comments

Monday, May 09, 2005
Anniversary Alert
When you are a person with lots of weight to loose, which usually results in some fatigue with all this watching of what you eat and how you move, you tend to stop, eat bad for a little while, gain some weight, resume, and hit the target again.

This has been the case with me for all these years I have been trying to loose weight. Sometimes I got tired of all the trying, and just slipped. Sometimes I got too comfortable with how I look, and just slipped.

On February, I managed to weigh 20 kilos less than last February 2004. My reward was my trip to Amsterdam. Actually this was my burning flame. A shopping spree can be a huge inspiration for my vanity you know.

But it just occured to me today, that in May 17 2004 I started this blog with the challenging, for me, title "25 to go". I thought then that putting this down would make me fight hard for these last 25 kilos. And now? Almost a year after, and I am not far from where I started last May. Surely, one could say that I have lost a bit and have not gained. But if you count how many times I have lost and gained and lost and gained the same 3 kilos since December, you will see that if I only lost and slightly gained, I would have lost at least 15 kilos by now. And would have had 10 to go.

But the truth is that I still have 19 kilos to go. In almost a year I have lost so far just 6 kilos. I could have gained 10 really, but still...

And I always seem to come up with plans I cannot follow well during the weekends. Monday to Friday I am perfect, Saturday I am good, and Sunday I eat Valhrona Sorbet. Like I did last night. And I got on the scales this morning to see 88.1, while on Saturday I saw 87.7. Plus I really miscalculated on Saturday. Because I thought my weight on Tuesday was 88.5. Ha! I erased from my mind the 89.4 I saw right after I was back from teh Easter holidays! So actually I had lost 1.8 kg and I gained 400 gr with the icecream overnight!

I know this will go off fast, because I eat the way I do, mainly fruits and veggies and a few carbs and protein. But I need more than this you know. I need the old flame back.

Sofia is leaving for Chicago to visit friends and family at the end of July. I am not sure I can afford the trip with the move and all the new stuff we need to buy, but we will stay at her cousin's home and it will be sales there too, so perhaps I could go for a week with her. Angelos is not too thrilled for me to go alone, but if we both went then it would be impossible for us to afford 2-3 weeks of holidays in the islands this summer.

But a shopping spree can be such a motivator...lol

I will have to think more about this...and other stuff...

I will be back on Wednesday with weigh in results and a good reward plan.

Posted by Argy at 8:52 am | 5 comments

Saturday, May 07, 2005
The New Appartment
In an attempt to cheer me up (yes, still in some kind of blues, with bits of laughs and happy dreams inbetween), today, I will tell you that I am taking the day off the treadmill, and soon Angelos and I will go shopping for things we need to pack, like boxes etc, we will go buy the sink we broke and replace it, will go do the grocery shopping, and I will go buy a pair of high heel sandals, to wear them with my new jeans, because hey, a girl needs the extra cm's to make her thighs look a tad smaller ;o). I will go weigh in now...hang on...haven't weighed in since Tuesday, let's see what the 10.000 steps and food have done so far, although it won't be official till Wednesday! Ha! (sorry I took so long, but I had to strip you know) 800 gr already!!!! 87.7!!!! I weighted on 88.5 on Tuesday!!! I am so glad to see the 87.7 again :)

Right, and now its all about the new appartment!

Which really, is about 20 minutes walking distance from here. And now I feel even more sillier for how I feel, because Cat was right in her comment, I make it sound as if it is in another city. But this is me, over emotional, and still my dad's little girl in a way. Last night I did a big post in my head about why I feel like this. It includes foetal trauma, baby trauma, fat and attention. But I think I need some more time to decide if it should be right to post about my therapy in such depth in here. Part of me wants to do it because it is my journal and I like to go back and see the change, both physically and psychologically, but then, I am not sure this would be proper reading material.

Anyway, back to the appartment (of which you will get to see pictures dg ;o)

First, it is a big appartment. It is on the third floor of a four- floor brand new building. Each floor is a single appartment. 125 square meters interior, and the front balcony is 10 meters long and 3.2 meters wide (biiiiiiiiiig yeeehaa!) and on the back of the house, where the two bedrooms are, each bedroom has a 3*2 meters balcony.

You enter the house, and you see the livingroom - dinning room. 2 big windows lead you to the balcony. On the left corner of the room, same side withthe windows, is the fireplace. Across it is the BIG kitchen, which has a 1.5 m long window above the sink (I fell in love with this window the moment I saw it. I so pictured new small pots of all herbs nesting there :)

Then, there is a door, which leads you to a corridor. On the left there is one bedroom, looking in the front balcony, and this is where my study will be. Then there is a very small WC, with just a sink, toilette and a shower. Because it is bluish, it will be Angelos' bath. WE will have our own baths darlings! My make up and hair stuff and slimming creams and body butters will soooo love their independance!!! Mine has a bath tub, and is pinkish. The best thing is that in the outer wall of both baths, they have put 4 big glass bricks, so the daylight is plenty! And then, there are the other two bedrooms. The bedrooms are smallish, compared to our bedroom now. I have a big chestdrawer that I am not sure it will fit in the new bedroom.

The closets are plenty in the kitchen, ok in the bedrooms.

It has tiles in the floor of the kitchen - livingroom - dinning room in a nice creamy beige. And wooden floors in the bedrooms. The basement is devided in 5 spaces, so we will have our own storage space there.

Every wall is painted white, but the exterior of the building is a very sunny yellow, one of my favourite colours!

Our sofa and armchairs are cream, and we are thinking of a warm soft brown on the walls of the livingroom-dinningroom, and something shocking in the kitchen, like ummm....orange or red! And when I told Angelos that I am thinking of a fushcia bedroom he told me he ain't sleeping on Barbie's room...hehe

Now he is calling me to get ready to go shopping. So I will :) Have a super Saturday!!!!

Posted by Argy at 9:59 am | 8 comments

Friday, May 06, 2005
Small
I thought there was no way I could reach 10.000 steps yesterday. I was back home at 9 pm and the devilish device had 8.978 steps. My mom was not home so I could not go take the dog out for a walk, and I was really tired to just go out by myself. Angelos returned home and wanted to go rent a dvd so asked me to go with him. You know what he did? He got on the car after we took the dvd, and then started the engine and left!!!! Bastardious creature made me walk home laughing all the way. Still, I got home and it was less than 10.000 steps. 9.753! So for my little revenge, I was walking around the living room singing out loud (and not letting him start his dvd) till I saw 10.000 steps!!!

I told our landloard we are leaving at the end of the month yesterday. He was shocked and sad. He asked me how I can leave the neighbourhood. "You live here for 25 years, isn't it hard?" he asked me.

I feel like I am two people recently. There is this grown up woman who wants better quality in her life, a better place to live, a bigger place to expand her family. Angelos and I are day dreaming about the new house all excited. He tells me he is going to buy a big bbq and grill me veggies and meats and fish every night for dinner. I am getting all excited about the big balcony and tell him what new plants I will get and how I will arrange them. We are looking for balcony furniture. I even went and bought colours to paint my teracotta pots in red and green and orange and turquise and make the balcony happy. He tells me how gorgeous our christmas tree will look next to the fireplace. He is so exciting we will have a fireplace. I spend hours daily on the benjamin moore site playing with their thingy that colours the room in your colours of choice and try to decide the colours for the livingroom and kitchen and bedroom.

Then, I know my Sundays will never be the same again. On Sunday mornings, I usually wake up before him, and make my coffee, and still on my pj's, without having washed my face or brushed my teeth, I go down the stairs, get out in the street, walk for 40 seconds, go two buildings down, ring the bell, take the elevator, and I see my dad waiting for me in the door, saying always the same: "Morning dirty eyes" with a mischief in his own eyes. He teases me cos I have left over mascara in my eyes. Then I see my parents for a little while, then I go home and wake up Angelos, or he wakes up and comes and joins me in my parents' house.

Every day, when I come back from work, I pass by my mom to see her for 5 minutes. This is all the time I spent there, 5 minutes, and this makes the whole difference in my day.

I think of things like this and I feel my eyes watering. I broke down in tears late last night when Angelos said something along these lines. I was crying and crying and could not stop.

This must sound so silly and childish to you. It does sound childish and silly to me too. And it takes so much of me to try and hide it so that I won't spoil Angelos' happiness or won't upset my parents. But the truth is I feel as if my umbilical cord is about to be cut again. I know I have to go through a very emotional three weeks and I also know that the moment I will be in our new appartment I will feel fresh and new and ready to start our family.

When we moved in this appartment, five and a half years ago, my mom and Angelos used to call the second bedroom "the nursery". At that time I did not want children, ever! So one day they were saying this and I told them that this bedroom will never be a nursery and will always be my study. Because I am greek thus superstitious, I feel I need to move out from here to start a family. This is not the only reason, nor the basic one. The basic reasons for mooving actually are three: in this building there is central heating. We were paying too much for heating all winter, and yet, the heaters turned off at 9 pm. We are never home before 9 - 930. We froze last winter. The second reason is the small balconies. It might sound weird to you, but in Greece, people actually live in their balconies from late May to early Ocotber. We eat dinner there, watch tv, have parties, bbq's. Our house is full of friends and family during the winter months, but with our tiny balcony, where only a small table and two chairs fit, we had no visitors during the summer months. And the third reason is that since we are trying to have a baby, we do need the extra bedroom, and Angelos thought bettr to move now I am not pregnant yet, so we won't have to do it during the pregnancy.

I could very well erase this post and stop it while I was still counting my 10.000 steps. My girlfriend who's a psychotherapist calls my state the ultimate accession to adulthood. One would have guessed that at my 36th year of age I would be ready for this. And my therapist is on holidays!!!!!

Posted by Argy at 8:57 am | 8 comments

Thursday, May 05, 2005
Ten thousand steps
I always thought that 10.000 steps are not hard to make. That was before I actually owned a pedometer and the ability to count my steps. After 40 minutes on the treadmill, walking 3 bustops to work, going out for an appointment, and walking back to the office, and I was only at 7.456 steps!!! Angelos was teasing me on the phone and was telling me that I have a big stride and should make smaller steps, or else I'll end up walking in the middle of the night counting steps like a sleepwalker...lol

But seriously, it is not easy peasy to make 10.000 steps. And I really thought it was easy! I was certain that I was taking more steps than that a day. I was thinking that by the end of the day there would be more than 12000 steps on the pedometer.

But I managed to end the day on 10.035 steps. I went to my mom, and took the dog out walking. I have not taken the dog out walking in years!!!

Food was great too. After a few days of eating whatever my heart desired, going back to my salads was actually a treat. I stocked on veggies and herbs, and my partner, who spent Easter in Santorini island, brought me a real treat. Caper leaves. In Santorini they take the leaves of the caper plant in the spring, and boil them for 5 minutes, and then cool them, and put them in a jar with a little of spring water and vinegar. They are so yummy in tomato salads!

So for lunch I had a salad with rocket, baby spinach, pumpkin seeds, tomatoes, strawberries and balsamic vinegar. And for dinner I had a salad with tomatoes, caper leaves, olives, onions, fresh oreganon, and rye rusks. And I had fresh organic strawberries for dessert, marinated in balsamic vinegar, stolen from Jamie Oliver too.

I really feel back to it. When my body is good to me, like it was after eating all this stuff for 5 days and showing a small, relatively, gain, I always feel I need to take super extra care of my body to reward it for playing nicely. I took a longer shower yesterday, applied body butter in the evening, and now, after the treadmill and the shower, I will start the operation firming creams.

I used to think that these creams are for size 10 women who want to get to size 8. I thought that in cases like mine, with lotsa lard and cellulite they would do nothing. But the truth is that I used some last summer and I could see a difference after 4 weeks. So I am going for them again!

Sitting here for more is not going to help my steps quota! I am going to hit the treadmill now, and I will post more later from work if it is slow.

Have a gorgeous day!

Posted by Argy at 9:11 am | 10 comments

Wednesday, May 04, 2005
Back to business
I really had a magnificent Easter. We left on Friday afternoon for the summer house and came back Monday around midnight. It was really full of family and friends, sunshine and laughter, walks to the beach and the hill, cuddles with my man, day dreams and descriptions to friends about the new appartment, warmth inside me every time I played with my niece and nephew, happiness to see my mom glowing with energy, and lots and lots of food.

My brother invaded the summer house with his friends and their kids, so Angelos and I stayed over our friends' house, the friends we went to Amsterdam with. There were 8 of us there, which was really very much fun. It was particularly fun because we did everything ourselves, the mageiritsa, the lamb, the kokoretsi, everything. I have taken lots of pics of all the things I told you about and I am soon going to develop the film and show you most of what I talked about during last week.

You know how it is with old friends. I know this girl since we were 13. Well, I was 13 and she was 11. And her sister was 16. Thre different worlds when you are a teenager. So I know many of their friends, whom I see perhaps once a year or so, alwys in their house, and either during Christmas or Easter or some birthday. My firend's sister needs to loose weight, and her best friend needs to loose almost the same amount I had to loose when I begun. There were the familiar "how did you do it" questions. The familiar "I will never do it" sad looks. We had some really deep conversations. Then we all ate icecream!

Yesterday I stayed home and slaved over clothes. I put away all winter clothes, in special cases ready for storage in the new appartment, and took out all summer clothes. I got to say that last year it was much more of a pleasure. Because when I was trying my summer clothes last year, they were really falling off.This year, they were a bit roomier, but nothing too dramatic. Also, remember the red linen shirt I bought last summer and was never able to wear because the sleeves did not fit? Well, they sort of fit now, I mean they go all the way up, and I can button the two first buttons, while I couldn't last year, but I still need to loose a couple of cm's in my arms to wear this shirt without the fear of the sleeves opening up like paper!

And I have to tell you that I ate tooooo much. Food and beers and icecream and tsourekis and cookies and baklava and chocolate. I will tell you my latest discovery: Valhrona Sorbet. Sex in each teaspoonful ladies. Good moaning sex too! So naturally, I stayed away from the scales all day yesterday, telling myself I will eat very well, and get on the scales today. Then my mom came and she brought her cookies, which I attacked. I had an apple and a banana for breakfast, a tomato salad with a rye rusk for lunch, and then 7 cookies for snack. Dinner was grilled pork fillet with tomato salad and a pita bread.

I got on the scales this morning. Do you know how much I gained? I was guessing between 2 to 3 kilos. Well, I gained 900 gr! 89.4 this morning, while before leaving I was 88.5! I can tell you I am happy! I almost feel like a normal person, who eats a lot for 5 days and does not gain a kilo a day!

So that makes me even more determined to start with my challenge.

I need to get serious again with exercise. The food I can keep under control. It is the exercise I should master again. So, from today, the program is as follows:

Food:

Breakfast will be fruits. Lunch and dinner salads with either rye rusks, or seeds (legumes are included in the seeds category). Once a week I will have a dinner of grilled protein, lean meats only.

Exercise:

I got a pedometer. They were a gift in Angelos Spacial K. I am aiming for 10.000 steps a day, in the treadmill and in the street.

This will be my May. By the end of the month I expect to get to 85 kilos.

I am still trying to decide if I should sell the treadmill. There is a very good gym 5 mins walking distance from the new appartment. We could use the extra cash for the moove. I can sell it for 1.300 euros, I bought it 1.800 and its almost a year old. I could buy a yearly subscription for 250 euros (they have it on special for May) and use the rest of the money to buy my furniture for the HUGE balcony we will soon have. And more pots and plants too!!! Also, this is the same gym chain Angelos is going to. And Angelos has a gold membership which means that he can work out in any gym of the chain in any neighbouhood. This means we can workout together in the weekends. This is something we have never done together and could be fun (if the competitive monster inside me stays put...heheh). What do you think...to sell or not to sell?

I got to get ready for work now. And get another load of clothes in the machine too. I am hysterical like this, and when I get the summer clothes out, although they are clean, I wash them all again because I feel they have gotten dirty during all these months they are closed in the closets.Lots of work, more steps ;o)

See you soon, I can't wait to update on your blogs!!!

Posted by Argy at 8:42 am | 7 comments

About Me
I have spent all 36 years of my life loving life itself and this will never change. I am a great lover of the smallest things. I am addicted to smells and I attach them to people and events. It is impossible for me to wake up without ice in my coffee.

Stats
Age: 37
Height: 1.68 cm
SW: 130kg/286lbs
CW: 86 kg/189.2lbs
GW: 69 kg/151.8lbs
Lost: 44 kg/96.8lbs
Left: 17kg/37.4lbs

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