So I work in the nonprofit sector... specifically for a Hassidic Jewish organization in Chicago (ok, so my anonymity is starting to fly out the window... if someone is so inclined, they could probably figure out who I am just from that). I am not Jewish, though, especially not Hassidic. I bet you can tell. Anyway, does anyone know their Jewish holidays? Purim starts at sundown on Monday evening, and besides being a Jewish version of Halloween, Purim, like many Jewish holidays, has a big emphasis on food, but more specifically, gifts of food. This is where my week turned into a nightmare.
Our organization sends out over a hundred little food gifts, but we didn't just go to a Kosher grocery and pick out little kits. No. We got the little round plastic tubs with four compartments, the lids, and had special stickers made to stick to the top. Then, we ordered huge amounts of peanuts, dried fruit, candy corn, and hamentashen (these little cookies that are traditional for Purim). Then, we had to individually fill maybe two hundred of those plastic tubs - two hamentashen each, a scoop of candy corn, a scoop of fruit, a scoop of nuts, put the lids on them, and then put the stickers on the lids. They ended up looking nice. Being around the food wasn't the problem. I wasn't tempted to eat, even though everyone else was chowing down. I was just really focused on trying to get everything done.
But then, we had to put them in boxes, slide letters and promo materials in there, tape up the boxes, label them correctly (because each letter, of course, was personalized), stamp them with our return address... and then what? They all got dumped in the back of my car, because of course, I had to be the one to take them to the post office and ensure they got mailed out.
That's a lot of stress. Over two hundred boxes? And I got only one thank you from the rabbis. One. They went to the post office yesterday. I had to enlist my boyfriend to come and help, because the rabbis wanted nothing to do with it. Then I had to convince my direct boss to let me bring a check for it - his usual response is to just have me pay for it, and then he'll reimburse me, but when I got suckered in to shelling out almost $500 in one day, including $300 for his kid's birthday invitations, I decided that it kind of has to stop. I mean, I trip to Office Max or the grocery store now and then is no big deal, but I knew that this thing would end up costing at least $500, and I first of all don't have the liquidity at the moment to support it.
So, we went to the post office. And I stood at the counter while Jon brought stuff in from my car. Added to that, it was unseasonably warm yesterday, and my poor boy was getting hot and sweaty and I felt bad about it... and the people who work at the post office are seven kinds of retarded. I mean, this lady was perfectly nice about it, and I was afraid someone would flip out on us over all of the packages we were sending. But she was so SLOW. By the time we separated out the ones that needed to be sent from the ones that should be hand delivered, we ended up with about 150 boxes at the post office. And this lady, no joke, took TWO HOURS to weigh and meter each one, and load it into her cart. TWO HOURS.
Now, I had called beforehand about paying with a check. I told them that I am not the signer on the account, so they said I just needed a letter from the business giving me authorization to pay with a check. So I typed one up, had my boss sign the letter and sign a blank check for me to use...
And when it was all said and done (I checked to make sure it was ok before we got started, too, just because I didn't want to have to end up paying for it out of pocket), I went to write out the check, and there was a huge problem because my name is not on the check, and because I didn't sign it.
WHAT?????
I had the letter, I had the check, and they were like, "you have to sign it." Well, I'm not a SIGNER on the account. The bank won't release the funds unless the signer on the account signs the check! The lady said that the letter authorizes me to use the check... whatever. I just signed my name under boss's and left utterly pissed off about wasting two hours of my life with some of the stupidest people on the planet.
And then... the craving came. I wanted a milkshake. Oh god, I wanted a milkshake! And, damnit, why did I tell Jon about the diet? He's FORCING me to be accountable. I can't have a slipup without him staring down his nose at me. It's AWFUL. So I went up to my apartment, told him to go home, and cried for an hour. Then I binged (which wasn't as bad as it could have been, because I have no junk food in my home). Then I slept. And he just wouldn't leave me alone.
Maybe my problem with the weight for the past week and some has been because I'm so stressed. I have read that stress and weight loss are not conducive, that stress tells your body to store fat because it raises your adrenaline, fight or flight response, and your body turns on survival mode. What the fuck? I would think that stress would make it just fall off. But my fat cells are like, "Hold, hold brothers!" and I'm constipated and pissed off that the rabbis I work for are lazy, unorganized, and expect me to all but wipe their asses for them.
Fuck it.
My mom is coming to visit this week. She flies in Wednesday evening, and I'm taking Thursday and Friday off of work. Tuesday and Wednesday are Purim, so while I will be working, it will be weird hours (evening on Tuesday, morning on Wednesday), and Monday will probably be a leave early day. Being at work pisses me off these days. It's a shitty job, I don't get paid enough, and these people just rely way too heavily upon me.
Le sigh. Thank god the weekend is here. If I just lose one pound before tomorrow, I will be sitting happily below 240, and that's the best I can hope for considering what this week has put me through. This weight loss thing has got to put into perspective for me. I'm not looking for a get-hot-quick scheme. I'm looking to keep it off. So if it takes a long time, well.... it takes a long time. Them's the breaks. I needn't be so concerned with what the scale reads every day (or every week), but with what I'm doing, how I'm feeling, etc. etc. I just need to keep it in perspective. I WILL lose it... it just might take a couple of years.
The way my body is, I don't think I look too bad at 200. Most of it lives in my tits, anyway, and I'm proportioned ok. My face is slim at 200. 200 is a good short-term goal. It'll happen. I'll get there. I just need to cut myself some slack and focus on the shit that's REALLY important... like Jon, like getting through the busy shit at work, like my cat...
3 comments:
Oh my god. How did you survive? Just reading the words "candy corn" is almost enough to send me into a binge.
Thank god for the weekend :)
2 hours! Oy vey!
" I needn't be so concerned with what the scale reads every day (or every week), but with what I'm doing, how I'm feeling, etc. etc " EXACTLY!
Luckily, I hate candy corn. But I do like hamantashen and peanuts and dried fruit... At work, it's very easy for me to not eat. That's part of the problem with how I got to the way I am. I just get focused and that's the only thing that matters. My problem is when I leave work... before, I was always starving because I hadn't put anything in my stomach all day except for a coffee and a muffin in the morning, so I'd binge... until after a while, it didn't feel like binging and it just became normal eating behavior.
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