Fiddledeedee

After spending nearly 6 days at Disney World, and walking 794 miles, you would think that I’d have lost a little weight.

BUT YOU WOULD BE WRONG!

Because Disney World serves Churros, my friends. Little carts line Main Street, and kindly vendors will hand you one of these long fried morsels of deliciousness covered in cinnamon and sugar.

AND GET THIS! All you have to do is hand over money to receive one. Or 27.

So now my stretchypants are feeling a little snug. And my willpower has not only left the building, but the country as well.

And you know what that means.

It’s time to go back on South Beach. Phase 1. Since Phase 16 doesn’t seem to be working for me.

I’ve written about the South Beach diet before. In between child #2 and #3 I lost quite a bit of weight. But after packing on 50 plus pounds with Junior, and still carrying around a bit of baby weight (the baby is almost 4), it’s time to do it again.

I started Phase 1 last summer with great success, at about the time Jensen was diagnosed with severe food allergies. And after the diagnosis, I started eating everything rice and potato based right along with him.

But look! It seems that Rice and Potatoes are a carb! And carbs in massive quantities are not my friend.

Because I like to garner sympathy be transparent, I will document my weight struggles on this blog. But I wanted to get a consensus.

Who wants to do it with me?

C’mon, it’ll be fun!

If enough of you are game, I’ll do a little Mr. Linky thing on Fridays so you can share your failures, success, recipes, tips, or extreme displeasure that I even suggested this in the first place.

Of course we should weight wait until after the first of the year because that’s what everyone does. Resolutions. Whatever.

Let me know if you’re in. And if you’ve ever lost weight on The South Beach Diet.

And if you’re worried, it was written by a REAL doctor, it is a healthy lifestyle of eating, AND the recipes are wonderful. (You can check the cookbooks out at your local library.)

AND it does allow chocolate in Phase 2, which follows Phase 1 (2 weeks). Caffeine is allowed in all Phases. Otherwise, I would have chucked the whole thing out of the window.

Have I sold you on this yet?

Trish and I braved the muscle building class again. It has been two weeks since we last subjected ourselves to that type of torture. Frankly, because it has taken two weeks for our biceps, triceps, and all the rest of their friends to heal.

And just like one is likely to forget the pain of childbirth, and foolishly give it another go, we traipsed back to the scene of the crime. No pain. No gain. Blah, blah, blahhhhh.

One reason we endure this type of torture, is that we can leave our children in the care of really wonderful childcare providers. Right there at the gym. And the large play area is monitored so that we can check on them, without them seeing us.

Because children should be seen and not heard.

Oh, I could not keep from snickering as I typed that last sentence. If I had a nickel for every time I heard that growing up. Well. Okay, my parents never said it. But, probably should have. I’m quite sure that Ma Ingalls said it liberally.

That saying is the main reason I would like to invent a Plexiglas soundproof partition for my van. Between the drivers row and the cheap seats in the rear of the van.

Police cars have them. Mommy vans should as well.

Where was I?

Oh yes. Hell The gym.

After class, we drug our sweaty disheveled selves back to collect the children. Who were all having a marvelous time, frolicking with their cousins.

When we walked in, my young 4 year old nephew proudly announced to me, in a rather loud 4 year old voice, “AUNT DEEDEE, MY BWOTHER SHOWED JENSEN HOW TO DO A ARM FART!”

Because we all know that the best lessons are learned from our peers.

It was a proud parenting moment for Aunt Trish.

It made my day. Usually it’s my children saying something highly inappropriate. In public. Like Monday, when Jensen announced to Aunt Trish and everyone within earshot that his daddy taught him how to pee in a McDonalds cup.

Anyhoo, tonight I will sleep with the ice packs. And tomorrow, I’ll whine about how sore I am. As I type with my nose. Then, as the soreness subsides, I’ll go back. For more torture.

Because I never learn.

Posting light today. Took Weight class today. Worked every muscle group in my body. Can no longer lift my arms. Typing with my nose.

Be back tomorrow.

What doesn’t kill you only makes you stronger.

Whatever.

Exercise.

It’s good for you.

You’ll feel better.

I hate exercise.

Pfffftttthhhht.

Sadly, however, I’ve reached that magical age that I will not lose another single pound unless exercise accompanies eating healthy.

Bite me.

I started going to the gym with 3 of my SIL’s a couple of years ago. My BIL is a personal trainer and has a studio, and we can use the space before hours. So, we met there at 5:15 am and worked out for about an hour, three times a week. And I use the term “work out” loosely, because our regiment involved mostly sitting on the exercise bike and laughing until we either peed, or fell off.

But then, about a year and a half ago, Jensen stopped sleeping through the night. On the bright side, the nightly rendezvous were a good source of blog fodder. But sadly, I stopped meeting up with my SIL’s at the gym, vowing I would instead get on my treadmill. Which I did.

Once.

Fast forward to last week. Dare I say it, but Jensen is sleeping through most nights, and I surprised my SIL, also known as Aunt Trish, by showing my weary face at the gym at 5:15. But the girls had a little surprise for me. It seems that they’ve gotten all serious about their workouts. And Trish purchased a DVD series from Beachbody.com which will transform a different area of your body with each workout. Killing you in the process.

Now, she had two options for workout series. A) the one for decrepit, older, out of shape types, or B) one for intrepid athletes.

She opted for B.

Oh happy day.

Not to be outdone, I jumped in with both feet. So last Friday, after a cardio warm up on the bikes and stairclimber, we tackled lunges, squats and other such methods of torture.

When I dragged my weary middle aged body through the front door at 6:30 am last Friday, taking great care to avoid the plague of frogs at our entry way, Fiddledaddy was waiting for me.

“So, how did you do?”

“I hope you don’t mind serving me while I recline on the couch all day,” I mumbled as I found my way to the hot shower.

Trish called me later in the morning, “How are you feeling?”

“Well, I find that I have to keep moving, because if I slow, rigor mortus sets in. I’m eating all of my meals in transit. Can’t wait for next week.”

Friday night I slept with not one, but two ice packs. One for my lower abs. And one that rested on the top of my head to soothe my headache. Because the children spent the day working out my last nerve.

And now, after pilfering through the children’s halloween booty, I have no choice but to continue. So, I’ve concluded that I’m going to have to invest in a full length body ice pack, a case of Ben Gay, and an industrial size bottle of extra strength Tylenol.

Oh yes, and a rifle to take care of the creepy frogs that are waiting to pounce on me at dark thirty on workout days.

I’ve sunk to an all new low, ya’ll. First of all, if you’re here from Tales From The Scales wondering how I’m doing on my weight loss plan, avert your eyes. Then just turn and walk away slowly, shaking your head in mock sympathy.

I’ve not only fallen off the wagon, but I let it run me over. And then back up and run me over again.

I’ll be going along just fine, eating all my fruits, vegetables, whole grains, and all that cr stuff. When all of a sudden, I’m hit with an irresistible urge to consume cookies. Usually once a month. Odd, that timing.

I found myself in Publix over the weekend, innocently shopping for vegetables. This was after a quick stop at McDonald’s where we ordered grilled chicken snack wraps. Only they accidentally gave us fried chicken. I knew we’d hit pay dirt when Emme exclaimed, “OH.  My.  Goodness.  My favorite kind of chicken!”

Waste no, want not. So we scarfed it down in record time.

Okay, back to Publix. Quite by accident, I meandered down the cookie aisle. I spied a coupon thingy. You know the ones. They blink at you, thusly taunting you with “take me, take me.” This particular coupon was for $1.25 off of two bags of Sugar-Free Cookies. Okay. Sold. So I threw two bags into the cart. One was an Oreo type knockoff (which you know I can’t say “no” to) and the other was chocolate chip. My family was waiting in the van for me, so I magnanimously offered to share my cookies. I counted out 3 cookies per kid, and that left a good bag and a half for me and Fiddledaddy.

And then for dinner, I had the audacity to FRY the yellow squash I had just purchased. FRY people. With OIL. In my defense, I did use whole wheat flour. BUT STILL.

Then, after dinner I ate more cookies. Until there were only 3 left. Which I placed in a sealed baggy. And then I went in search of the Pepto Bismol, complaining bitterly about how bad I felt. Fiddledaddy wasn’t doing too well either, and I noticed that we all had a bit of gas.

Some more than others.

Fiddledaddy fished the cookie wrappers out of the trash and read the label on the back. Since they are sweetened with Maltitol, the warning read, “Excessive consumption may lead to a laxative effect.” The serving size was 3 cookies.

I ate 32.

The “laxative effect” that they spoke of was all wrong, by the way. I should be so lucky.  A laxative effect would have been a welcome relief.  The words really ought to be replaced with “painful gaseous explosiveness.”

So, it was an uncomfortable night for everyone concerned. I vowed NEVER to eat those again, or anything of a fried nature, amen. Last night, Fiddledaddy informed me that he had thrown the last 3 remaining baggied cookies in the kitchen trash the night before. And he waited for my reaction. He knows that I’m not above rummaging through the trash to retrieve something that I deem delicious, in my desperation.

I didn’t even blink. “Good riddance,” I said, and went about my business.

Then after lunch today (a very healthy lunch, btw) I started thinking about those cookies. In the bottom of the kitchen trash. Cookies that had now been in the bottom of the kitchen trash for a good day and a half. And what a waste it was just to throw perfectly good cookies away.

When Fiddledaddy was otherwise occupied, I dug through the trash. Oh yes I did. At least this time I didn’t have to go out to the curb. And I was fully prepared for an explanation, should I be caught. “Um, I was just taking out the trash.” Which was the truth. As I had to take out the majority of the contents and set them on the kitchen floor, which needed to be mopped anyway, to find the baggy of cookies. And there they were. At the very bottom of the kitchen trash. I pulled out the baggy, dusted it off, and carefully put the old trash back into the receptacle. In the right order. No one would be the wiser.

The baggy smelled a little, well, trashy, but it was sealed after all. The cookies were still crunchy. A good sign. I detected a slightly odd taste, but by the third cookie it no longer mattered.

Waste not, want not. And besides, a serving size is three cookies, right? That’s not excessive consumption at all.

Now, if I can just remember where I put that bottle of Pepto, everything will be all right.

Until next month.