And then I ate it all

You know what the only thing better than finishing up your strictly acetic cleanse-y type dealio and being able to eat chocolate again is?

Finishing it up just in time for the monthly hormone poisoning.  Holy gods.  The stomachache and sugar coma are SO worth it.

So I finished Bonesetter Stew's cleanse thing!  Yay me! I don't have new pictures yet but here are the numeric stats:

Weight: Stew ran the numbers with 155. This was higher than what I actually weighed in at (159).  He's running the numbers again because I'm anal like that, but here are the ones gleaned with 155.

BMI: 24.28, a drop of about 3/4% to put me just under the cut-off for "overweight."  Did I mention that I upped my max deadlift to 220? Damn skippy :)

Body Fat Percentage: 24.9%, a drop of 1.4%.  Not too shabby!  With the weight of 155, this means I've got 38.6 lbs of fat and 116.4 lbs of lean mass.  Boo on the slight loss of muscle but yay on the greater loss of fat!  Now, more lifting!

Stew & I postulated that a decent overall goal might be 20-21% body fat, so this is a really good first step.  Note that I'm definitely not tying myself to that number.  If I keep cutting it down and start to really lose my boobs, you can bet your ass I'm reevaluating my goals.  Having really nicely-cut abs would be cool, but not at the expense of Ralphie and Louie.

Total Body Water:  A solid 45L/64%, up from 43L/59.7% last time.  Yay hydration!

Basal Metabolic Rate:  1518 kCal, down from 1540 before.  Merh.  I wqs hoping for a move in the opposite direction, but I guess that goes along with the slight drop in muscle.  Bring on the steaks and heavy weights!

Daily Energy Expenditure: 2278 kCal, up from 2002.  Joanne, you told me what this meant before.  Does the increase just mean that I'm doing more during the day?  If so, how can they tell that?  It seems an awfully complicated and variable thing to measure so precisely.

I forgot to measure my waist and hips.  And now my waist is like ba-FWOOOM! from the aforementioned hormone poisoning so I'm not really inclined to want to whip out the ol' tape measure.

So, overall, decentish results, at least from my perspective.  Honestly, though, I kind of hated it while it was going on.  My self-esteem and mood dropped pretty low, and my trichotillomania started acting up again...a lot.  As in, I had a dream about shaving my head two nights ago and now I really want to act on it.  I also had these batshit insane cravings for stuff like skim milk (I can't stand the taste anymore, but wanted it like crazy) and butter (not on anything, just by itself).  And when I roasted my weekly chicken, I saved the fat as normal for use in future cooking.  But I got this incredibly strong urge to get a spoon and just drink the liquid fat right there.  I was simultaneously nauseated and absolutely drooling for it.  Mindfuck.

All said and done, I don't know if I would do this again.  Like I said, the results are decent, and I don't know how much of the weird thought processes were because of other things and just coincided, but the coincidence is enough to give me pause.  I don't like cringing when I look in the mirror.  I don't like ripping at my hair and skin enough so that I'm sore and bleeding.  And I really don't have any desire to drink straight fat.  Just ew.

Has anyone else done this dealio?  Ashley, I'm looking at you.  Are my experiences just a fluke?  I'd really like to hear that they are.

-Nelly

Eleven Things About Me You Probably Don't Know

Hi guys! Yes, I'm still alive. Life got crazy and I got into kind of a funk...and not the good kind with a lot of bass and horns.  I got all sad and grouchy and nothing I wrote, not even the simplest little post on dinner, seemed to be enough to pass my good-enough-for-the-internet test. What do you guys do when you really want to write but everything just seems blah?

Anyways, I've got an ulterior motive for writing random little tidbits about myself at this particular time.  You see, I've  decided to take that one step every health blogger takes eventually and start posting stats and progress photos of myself.  Meaning, if you check this blog on Monday, you will be seeing pictures.  Of me.  Mostly nude.  Hide the kiddies.

But, since I'm gonna be putting my external self out there (so very, very out there) for all the internet to see, I thought it would be a good idea to talk about the internal stuff as well; a few of the things, bad and good, that make me me. 

1.  I'm named after a character in Lord of the Rings.  No, really.  Sam's daughter Elanor the Fair, although my parents used the more normal spelling of "Eleanor" and then just  called me "Nelly" all the time.  I kind of love how nerdy that is.  And if you haven't read far enough to know where she comes into the story, get cracking or we can't be friends.*

2.  I'm pagan.  Solitary (my friends and I had a circle when I lived in Ohio, but I haven't joined one down here) and ecclectic (although I favor the Celtic pantheon, Brigid in particular).  I don't pretend to know everything (or even anything) about the way the universe works, but I do feel like there are more things in heaven and on earth that are dreamt of in any philosophy.  And this particular method helps me feel closer to the earth, my fellow man and that un-nameable force that ties everything together.  Also, yes I plan on jumping over a bonfire tomorrow night (probably not naked though) and no I don't do love spells.

3.  I have trichotillomania.  Generally speaking, it's the compulsion to pull your hair out.  Some people bite their nails down to the quick; I've pulled bare patches on my scalp before.  For me, it also manifests as picking at any imperfection on my skin - if I have a scab or a zit or an ingrown hair, I will literally tear the skin from my face and body to get it out.  It really sucks.  If I didn't have it, I'd have about a tenth of the scars that I do and my hair would actually be long (about a year ago, things got so bad that I just buzzed it and started over).  So if you ever see me in the gym with my hand up to my head, I give you free rein to come up and body check me.  Totally serious.  Or just a hug.  Whatever.

4.  I have an amazing ability to memorize and retain songs.  At my current job, taking care of an adorbz little monster who loves to be sung to, I've found that I can sing most if not all of the songs my parents used to play and sing for me when I was a wee one, even the ones I haven't heard in years.  I used to be able to do the same thing with playing the piano, just because I could never really read music so I just memorized everything right off the bat.

5.  I save all my bacon grease and chicken fat and use it later to cook with.  It's AMAZING.  Do it.

6.  If I could have any superpower, it would be the ability to insert myself into people's dreams.  Mostly just to talk.  Sometimes to mess with them.  Now I'm giggling to myself.

7.  I own very little furniture, but I have 7 bookshelves, all full.  I think people without books in their house, or even without books in view as soon as you walk in the door, are kind of weird.

8.  There was a brief period the summer after I left college that I was homeless.  The friend I was staying with at the time had personal dramas unrelated to me that got her really, really depressed and she went all hermit for a while, which involved closing her door to me.  I had a job, but no place to stay in that town, so I ended up sleeping under a bridge for a couple nights until I bought a cheap tent, camping just outside of town during the week and then hiking the 20 or so miles to another friend's house on the weekends to shower and eat.  The main thing I noticed?  You really do become invisible.  People don't want to see you, so their eyes just skip you.  You know that bit in Harry Potter (think it's the first book) when Hagrid explains why the Muggles can't see that one building because they don't expect or want it to be there, and Harry sees their eyes just sliding past it without actual recognition?  That's what it's like.

9.  As part of the progress stats, I'll be weighing myself for the first time in 4 months, and I'm a little scared.  I've never been really seriously tied to the scale, but like pretty much every other non-third-world adult woman, I've definitely had some level of a disordered relationship with it in the past, and I really don't want to go back to that.  I'm also getting stats like body fat and other more medically sound ones taken, though, and I'm hoping I can focus on those more.

10.  I still sleep with my two favorite toys from childhood.  One is a teddy bear named "Teddy."  She wears a blue-and-green tartan nightgown; I used to have a matching one that I wore until it started choking me when I tried to button it.  The other is "Baby Eleanor," a baby doll with only one foot, because when I was about 7 I left her in the yard and the neighbor's dog got ahold of her and chewed the other foot off.  She's also a black baby doll.  Yes, she's named after me.  Is this why it seemed perfectly natural to date a black man? Perhaps :D

11.  If I could live off only 5 food for the rest of my life, they would be 1. steak, 2. bacon, 3. cherries, 4. brussel sprouts and 5. decaf coffee. 

-Nelly

*Ha ha!  Just kidding!**

**Not really kidding.