Out of Control

Despite my fears, thing went well last night at my friend's get together. I didn't drink much, as usual, but I still felt as if I were part of the conversation at dinner and we had fun hanging out at the piano bar. My friend Lani stayed over and I taught her how to make jewelry today; all in all, it was a nice weekend.

Unfortunately, my leg and back were really bothering me and my eating was less than stellar. Last night, I could barely walk a block without experiencing excruciating back pain. It hurt like hell when I walked and it even hurt when I was sitting. I hate to say it, but I found myself missing the wheelchair. When I was in the chair, I didn't have to deal with my back hurting; I could relax and enjoy the world around me, and I was pain free.

Of course, I want to be mobile, but I'm not really there yet as my world is still very small. That said, I did not walk the half mile from the restaurant to the bar last night and ended up taking a cab. Honestly, I didn't have a choice. At one point, I considered just going home so I wouldn't have to deal with moving, but I'm glad I stuck it out.

I know that I can't really use my leg as an excuse for my back pain anymore, and that my weight is the culprit. It's what caused the pain before I broke my leg and now I'm hurting again. And my eating's been crap lately. I've been having more and more carbs and I really overindulged today. Jon made a homemade dinner from a Spanish cookbook and served us chicken with safron sauce, almond soup and Spanish potatoes. Everything was delicious, but I kept having potatoes. I also ate almost the whole cake and had three glasses of orange juice.

I don't know what's wrong with me and why I keep sabotaging myself. I mean, it's just food. All I have to do is eat less of it and I'll lose weight, and my back pain will go away. But I can't seem to be able to stay on a plan; as soon as I start doing well, I fall apart. Even worse, I find it's like a vicious circle; when I start gaining weight, I want to move less, then I'm like, "Who cares?", feel depressed and eat more. I know it makes no sense, but that's sort of how I feel right now. I honestly wish I don't have to move again and that I can just stay in bed -- or that I can take pills that put me to sleep until I lose enough weight so that my back pain goes away. It's easy for people who are not in my situation to say I'm lazy, but it's not laziness that's stopping me; it's the fact that when I walk more than a few feet or stand for more than about five minutes, I feel as if someone is sticking a knife in my back. It's hard to find the motivation to walk or exercise when your whole body hurts. I've done hard workouts before where my muscles ached, but it was a "good" pain -- it let me know that I'd done a good job. This is different, where it's keeping me from functioning.

I'm going to try to eat better tomorrow and see if I can knock some more pounds off. I wish that just 20 or so would magically disappear, just so that I can walk comfortably and find the energy to do other things. Unfortunately, that's not going to happen, so I'm going to have to deal with another week of commuting and walking and standing while waiting for the bus ... and yet more back pain. I can't stand this.