How I Got Here, or Fitness for All the Wrong Reasons

Before we get started with today's (sob) story, I'd like to share some goals with you, the internet world. Why? Because if I write them down & make them public, you're going to hold me accountable to achieving them. (You are going to hold me accountable, right?):

1. Improve squat to full range of motion below parallel by August 1.
2. Clean up my diet & fit back into my work pants by September 1.
3. Bring my body fat back to the 15% range by September 1.

Okay then. Story time: (*Ahem*) "How I Got Here, or Fitness for All the Wrong Reasons."

(Oh, and before I get started, I should let you know that I'm actually telling you Part Three of the story. You'll get Parts One and Two another time. When I feel like writing about them. Which I don't. So. Without further ado...)

(And I apologize for all of the parenthetical asides. All of my professors gave me shit for my inability to complete a thought before interrupting myself. And for being unable to finish a sentence. I'm a fan of commas, and I'm not too fond of periods. Right. Story time. Sorry.)

Parts One and Two of our story cover my descent and relapse into the fun and exciting world of eating disorders. Suffice it to say that  EDNOS and I are well acquainted, and that he's my closest frenemy. So let's start at the summer of 2009, where Kitchen Jouissance left off.

The top photo (Part One) is from 2001. I'm the skinny chick in red. The bottom photo (Part Two) is from 2007. 

I had the perfect boyfriend, I had a fellowship to the perfect grad school, and I had found the perfect apartment in the perfect city.

After a perfect run of A Midsummer Night's Dream at the Palm Beach Shakespeare Festival, the boyfriend and I spent the rest of the summer just hanging around his house in Jupiter, baking cookies, and making plans for the future. He and I would also get up at the crack of dawn to alternately go to the gym or run six days a week. At the gym, he would spend the hour lifting by himself. I would spend the hour climbing stairs to nowhere or elliptical-ly training. He did deadlifts; I did cardio. He ate nothing (well, nothing but oatmeal, black beans, chicken, and spinach); I ate everything (including lots of peanut butter and cereal). He lost weight; I ballooned up to 131 lbs.

At 128

The boyfriend and I had to do the long distance thing, since he was going to business school in North Carolina, and I was headed to grad school in NYC. The problem was, NYC wasn't all I had built it (back) up to be in my head after my hellacious year of teaching. I had a month until my program started, and I was stuck in Washington Heights without furniture or a source of income. The worst part was, I was feeling horrible about my body, and my boyfriend was far, far away (and making me feel bad about it.)

So I decided to sign up for a temporary gym membership at Jay's Big Gym on 181st & St. Nick's. I remembered that the boyfriend had brought up (on several occasions) the name of a fitness model who he would have dumped me for in a heartbeat: Jamie Eason. Hell, I would dump me for her. I decided to give up my long hours of cardio-ing myself crazy and look up what Jamie did that made her body so incredible.

After a few hours on Google, I found a sample workout of hers. I took it to the gym & dared to enter the weight room for the first time. I had no idea what I was doing, and I'm lucky that I got away with nothing worse than plantar fasciitis.

The school year commenced, and I began a horrible semester of waking up at 4 am, eating breakfast, commuting to school on the 1 train, working out (& showering in the gym--ew.), going to class (where we would spend three hours debating whether or not theatre was a legitimate career anymore), and then coming home, writing papers/reading plays, and crashing. I had no life, and I missed out on several opportunities to get closer to the fabulous people in my class because I was too worried about not having time to talk to the boyfriend on the phone or staying up late and missing the gym in the morning.

Blah, blah, blah, the semester progressed, my weight started dropping (but not fast enough) and things got worse. Boyfriend and I started fighting all of the time. I started cutting and counting calories and weighing myself every day. I began having anxiety attacks when I had to stay out after dark or go downtown to see a play. I started talking to my advisors about dropping out.

You see, I was trying to look like Jamie Eason by Thanksgiving, and I wasn't losing weight fast enough. I was still 126 lbs, and I wanted to be 120 by the time I went to visit the boyfriend. He had bought me a plane ticket & I was set to spend the holiday (and my birthday) in NC with him, but I knew somehow that he would be disappointed in me for not looking like a fitness model. So I called him up to cancel. And during that same phone call, I cancelled our relationship. The morning after, I woke up, and he had removed our "In a Relationship" status on Facebook. Shit was serious. (<--sad, no?)

Not thin or fit enough. 

I took an incomplete for the semester, and went home for Christmas break. All I cared about was getting thinner and stronger and fuck grad school and a future and my first real long-term relationship. I was obsessed, and not for the better.

Okay. Don't want to overwhelm you AND you need a reason to return again tomorrow SO: stay tuned for Part Two of Part Three of the story I haven't told you yet!

Kaila