3 yrs to FI: ertyu's journal

[7Wannabe5]

you'll be handing over 5 dollars a day for sweets and baked goods

The true sugar fiend will have taught herself how to bake by age 10, and reduced this cost significantly. I know a half dozen different recipes for 3 Ingredient Cookies, not to mention the infamous Jelly Toastee, which consists of jam slathered between two slices of bread (maybe even something like a hotdog bun if desperate), buttered on the outside and grilled. I would also note for the record that sugar fiends aren't necessarily over-weight. My youngest sister is a complete fiend, but has never been overweight, likely due to lifelong hyper-activity. My second sister, also fiend, never over-weight due to extreme devotion to aesthetics, running and yoga. My third sister, also fiend, almost always overweight, even as a child, even though very much into sports, now becoming quite slender on Ozempic. I am also a fiend, and was never overweight until I was pregnant, and since then I have yo-yo-ed significantly. For better or worse, I am firmly of the belief that once you have put on the weight, caloric/dietary restriction is required to take it off, but a shit-ton* of physical movement every day is the only thing that will keep it off.


*At least 2 hours of moderate exercise 6 days per week. I have never been successful with subbing in less time engaged in vigorous exercise, but that might just be me. Obviously, being FI or Semi-FI really helps with finding this much time to devote to moderate exercise. You just have to accept the fact that you are not, or no longer, a naturally slender person, and this is the price you have to pay if you want to "have" slender.

[Henry]

I know a half dozen different recipes for 3 Ingredient Cookies, not to mention the infamous Jelly Toastee, which consists of jam slathered between two slices of bread (maybe even something like a hotdog bun if desperate), buttered on the outside and grilled.

You are the person everyone in narcotics anonymous meetings avoids because all they do is talk about the last time they snorted an eight ball of Columbian pure grade.

[delay]

For better or worse, I am firmly of the belief that once you have put on the weight, caloric/dietary restriction is required to take it off, but a shit-ton* of physical movement every day is the only thing that will keep it off.

Not sure that's the only way. I'm also a weight yo-yo, going up and down between 25 and 30 BMI. This year I'm doing fasting: a few days a week with only water from 20:00 until 18:00 the next day. The strange thing about this method is that I'm never hungry. I can go shopping on a fasting day and I feel no temptation to snack. I can even sit and talk with lunching colleagues. It's the easiest way of losing weight so far.

[7Wannabe5]

@delay:

I agree that fasting is a relatively painless method towards caloric restriction. However, the committment that you have to make in terms of using fasting to maintain your weight is a tight, irregular, check-back loop. For instance, your rule might be something like - Weigh myself once week. If my weight has exceeded BMI 25, immediately resume fasting regimen. OTOH, a moderate exercise regime, such as the one I practiced for many years during which I successfully kept the weight off, is more like brain-dead-to-whatever-else-is-going-on-in-my-life daily habit loop. So, personality type may come into play. I am generally pretty good at establishing and maintaining daily habits, but fairly terrible at irregular commitments or even weekly habits.

[delay]

For instance, your rule might be something like - Weigh myself once week. If my weight has exceeded BMI 25, immediately resume fasting regimen.

Weight loss is chaotic for me. For example, weeks with no loss, and then a single week with 10 pounds. The chaos doesn't play well with rules. For example, I had a rule to lose a pound a week. In the weeks my body was preparing to lose weight, the rule would tell me to double down and force my body into panic mode. In the week my body shed 10 pounds, I'd be ahead of my schedule, and the rule would tell me to eat extra! I can't image how confusing that was for my body.

So I've learned that BMI based rules do not work for me at all. The rule for fasting 3 days a week does seem to work. So do rules against categories of food, like cookies, sugar drinks, and chips.

[Crusader]

From my experience, quitting drinking, smoking and/or losing weight was something that I had to try many times before I was successful, but eventually you change your identity.

For smoking, I indeed had to go the extreme route. I made myself believe that if I smoke even one cigarette, I am basically going to keep smoking after that until I get lung cancer and die in terrible pain (credit: Allen Carr). So maybe you can do something similar with sugar and diabetes and/or alcohol and liver cirrhosis.

[7Wannabe5]

@Crusader: Since I am almost 60 with no symptoms of metabolic disorder whatsoever (and the same holds true for my overweight mother at 84), my only "scared straight" motivator would be hip replacement. Also, I tend towards being much more motivated by "carrots." For instance, I watched the first episode of "The Golden Bachelor" and realized (again) that I could still maybe be having fun dating when I am 80, IFF I get back in shape.

[guitarplayer]

[...] that I could still maybe be having fun dating when I am 80, IFF I get back in shape.

Though I can imagine you get in shape but for another reason don't have fun dating.

@Ertyu the journal got focused on IT, and rightly so! I do wonder however how the teaching's going

[7Wannabe5]

@guitarplayer:

It was a weak bi-conditional, because I have also had fun dating when I've not been in great shape, but not having fun dating if I get back in shape is pretty much akin to not having fun checking out the new book rack if I get a library card renewal and an upgrade on my reading glasses. And, I think ertyu would agree that actively dating is to getting in shape as inviting people over is to renewing abode.

[ertyu]

I do wonder however how the teaching's going

Had to give it some time to answer. Here are the highlights so far:

I work 2.5 days a week, so disregarding times of the year when grading is intense (I am solely responsible for all grading in all my classes), this is essentially a part-time job. Some observations related to that:

- the alteration between work days and nonwork days still sets the rhythm of my life even though I have 3 working days (M, Tue, F) to 4 non-working pays per week

- On non-working days, I still fall into "leisure" -- or "recreation"** -- partly by habit and partly because 2 weekends a week are nice but they're still a weird chunk of time to really sink into the mindset of an activity or pursuit. I still feel "interrupted" even though I am not exhausted on a daily basis as I used to be.

** where by leisure/recreation I mean the way of spending free time of which 1. nothing is demanded, as it is not the "important" part of life, namely your job/labor: so time-wasting activities are often the norm, 2. which exists for the sole purpose to recuperate and prepare for once again working - to re-create labor power, and 3. being spaced out if often the norm vs. purposeful agentic activity. One-time activities that lack overarching context and don't fit a larger life purpose, such as a nature walk/hike (recreational, in the sense of restorative of labor power while limited in time, no mental demands in terms of overall life direction or design or agency) predominate. Projects aren't directed towards a life design because life has been designed by one's commitments to corporate.

- That said, I am noticing these things more. I have started asking myself questions I was too exhausted to ask in the past. I'm having, "oh, yeah, -that- is something i used to be excited about that i never actually did anything to pursue, wasn't it?" types of thoughts more often. I'm noticing the many ways in which I'm assuming my own incompetence and I'm telling myself X activity can't possibly be for me because I'd certainly be bad at it. And so forth. So, the process of psychological manure excavation many report upon quitting is churning along, albeit in a muted manner.

- Slowly, I am taking steps to improve my life, but as of now these steps are small and isolated either in time or from each other, rather than being part of a well designed system.

- My psychological wellbeing is still influenced by how I do on the job. A dumb mistake leaves me feeling bad about myself, whereas on a day where I felt I did my job well I feel masterful, confident, and deserving of respect

- Profin' is fine, but I am very much a narrative-oriented, big picture INFP teaching a bunch of detail-oriented wanna-be accountants. My brain sees as irrelevant and struggles to retain the fine details that give my students a sense of mastery and being challenged. I need to learn what I'm teaching the day before the students and I often don't find it very engaging. I'm doing my best. I will probably feel better and more confident next year when I'd have taught each of my courses once.

- I don't feel particularly bright, chipper, focused, or energetic. Possibly a health/eating/exercise/supplementation thing. Or I'm just old and getting stupid. i wish I had more mental bandwidth for learning things that aren't what i'm meant to be teaching.

- might be heading breakupwards w IT. IT has been moving us away from what i'd hope to have, which id define as an intimate friendship, and more towards surface talk, parallel play, and asynchronous/interrupted communication vs. actual conversations which are given a chance to deepen and which contain meaningful authentic self-disclosure, intimacy-building, and mutual growth. It's IT's right, but it doesn't meet my emotional needs. Whatever occasioned the move was not really brought up or discussed either, this is a unilateral decision on IT's part. In an attempt to give space for a discussion of what occasioned it, I did ask what are some things IT isn't getting that they wished they were, and got a dismissive non-answer (uh let me think about it uh can't think of anything really)**. Either this is deliberate, in which case it might be time for me to take the hint and pack my virtual things, or i'm dissatisfied with the degree of openness and authenticity of the communication IT is willing to engage in - and it's been two years, by now I feel if they'd have opened up, they'd have opened up. Undecided. Might bring it up one final time, though knowing IT's style I'd get "uh what? distancing? who me, no such thing" and then we'd be back to the distancing -- in other words, even if it was deliberate and the desired end result was me distancing, IT wouldn't say while still proceeding with drip-drip-drip reducing any meaningful conversations that might occur. So I might have to pack it up regardless. Being on the receiving side of that is rough when one likes a person.

** I can tell you for sure it's not me not giving back enough of what I'm asking for; I am your resident navel-gazer and I will attentively listen to you until you turn blue in the face talking.

Edit: I mostly wrote the part about IT to mope and lick my own asshole; now that I've slept on it, it seems to me IT and I will sort ourselves out one way or the other. I'm more interested in discussing the job/personal development part of this. Thanks!

[7Wannabe5]

I'm sorry to hear about your break-up with IT. Perhaps I can offer some insight based on my recent "break-up" with my ENFP partner. In my situation, the primary factor causing our relationship to be mostly long-distance, less often in person, was that he is married to another poly woman who is specifically not happy with his involvement with me (because romantic as well as sexual.) I find that I am incapable of maintaining an emotionally intimate relationship with somebody who isn't also fairly regularly engaged in the meat and potatoes space of my life. The communication eventually begins to degrade to something like Update Letter Enclosed with Christmas Card. So, I clearly told him that what I would prefer would be something akin to the relationship in "Same Time Next Year." Actually meeting in person for an entire 3 day weekend together once a year during which level of emotional intimacy/revelation could be rekindled, and if he wasn't able to make that work, occasionally meeting for coffee and conversation as friends woud also be fine, but the ratio of in-person to long-distance would have to be modified towards my preferences if he desired authentic engagement with me. He indicated that he clearly understood and empathized with my preferences, but he continues to (IMO, self-indulgently) long-distance communicate with me. So, I sometimes reply and often don't, in alignment with my druthers.

[ertyu]

I'm sorry to hear about your break-up with IT.

heh. my dumb ass is still hoping not in spite of at least 2 paragraphs of things i could write up. but oh well. it's how it goes. i'd still mope and be sad tho

[7Wannabe5]

((ertyu))

I'm not sure if this will help with your relationship with IT, but one thing I've come to notice in my experiences as a T female who finds herself at least 50% of the time in relationship with F males, is that although they tend to communicate more like a female (or the associated stereotype), they still "park their boots" like any other man, and the wise woman will sometimes benefit by doing a little less listening and a little more "boot-tracking."

[Henry]

I think the kids call it "friend zoned."

[fiby41]

You could start looking into a Plan B (seeing someone else on the side) assuming you've not commited to exclusivity with IT. If you have commited, I think you are getting the short end of the stick. But like a shrewd HR department, don't fire until you've a replacement in place.

Try physical escalation with IT, if there are not into you/there is resistence/no enthusiasm, bid adeu.

IMO if there is no spontaneous reciprocation, tying to 'negotiate by communicating' or reasoning your way arount won't help.

Disclaimer: I am a virgin and might stay so until married so feel free to disregard.

[Henry]

But like a shrewd HR department, don't fire until you've a replacement in place.

IMHO there are three categories in HR: Good wood, dead wood, bad wood.

Bad wood you fire on the spot.

[ertyu]

sigh ok, enough discussion about IT now IT and I will sort it out.

[Henry]

It''s not IT, it's you.

[mountainFrugal]

How did your teaching go this term @ertyu?

[ertyu]

How did your teaching go this term @ertyu?

150 exams to grade just dropped. wish me luck
other than that, i appear to have happy customers: student feedback survey ranked me at 2.39 out of 3 on the -3 to 3 scale, so I guess I'm doing at least something right.