Monday, August 2, 2010

Giveaway Winner, Hair Color Advice?

The first giveaway is officially closed! The winner is Liz as chosen by random.org. [: Expect to see a new one as soon as enough donations come in... or as soon as I get impatient and decide to do it all over again.

I haven't weighed myself in nearly 2 weeks because I've had so much going on. Secretly I was also avoiding the scale because I knew I was eating much more than I should have. I didn't carry on with reckless abandon, but there were days where I had three full meals and dessert. I probably floated around the 1500 calorie range for half a month. It really adds up. I jumped from 122lbs / 55.3kg to 132.8lbs / 60.3kg in 13 days. That's absurd. That's almost a pound / half a kilogram per day.

Several mistakes were made here and I hope I can help someone else out by letting you know what I've learned.

1. I stopped following my routines. Although I don't have specific habits that I follow religiously, I do have a combination of quirks that are generally applied to my lifestyle which encourage my eating disorder. Normally I would write down what I had eaten for the day, or prepare a small meal and chop it in half if I did decided to eat, or make sure I chew each bite a number of times, or make the choice to have nothing but a certain food group or color for the day... at least something to remind me to stay on track and have a purpose. I do not do all of these things every single day, but I do hop between them from time to time. But when I abandoned all these things and ate as I pleased for two weeks without so much as counting a calorie... well, the scale showed me what happens.

2. I stopped weighing myself. I am convinced that if I had seen those numbers sooner it would've shocked some sense into me. I swore months and months ago that I would never see 130lbs / 59kg again. If I do nothing else, I need to make sure that I weigh myself at least once a day. I need to be fully aware of what I'm doing to myself whether it's good or bad. If I had manned up and faced the music sooner I would've been able to fix it quicker.

3. I kept fat company. Although this can be applied in the literal sense for some of my peers, I mean that I was spending a lot of time with people who were accustomed to eating whatever they want whenever they want. It's hard not to join in the fun when you're going out to restaurants with friends two or three times a day. Peer pressure is such a jerk.

A ton of things have happened to me in the past two weeks. None of them are amazingly bad... in fact, most turned out to be very exciting and were for the better. I think that's also what factored into my strange eating binge. I've said it before but I'll say it again: I don't eat when I'm sad, I do eat when I'm happy. If I feel anxious, annoyed, depressed, or angry I can fast easily. If I'm happy, excited, calm, or anticipating something good then I'll eat away. It's terrible. This is a brief summary of what has come my way since the middle of July...

Three people lived in my 3 bedroom, 2 bathroom apartment: myself, E and A. A moved out and N moved in. E lost their job and it made N decide to leave. E and I decided that we needed to downgrade, so we moved into a smaller place.

I went to Ireland to visit family members that I haven't seen in more than six years. It was for a claddagh ceremony so that was quite lovely. I had to deal with the other side of my family asking me questions about the visit. (It was nothing negative. There's a ton of adoption in my family so they're very curious about each others cultures.)

One of my very good friends who lives half a day's drive away said they were moving much closer, then changed their mind because they didn't seal the deal on a job offer. They ended up applying for an even better job and will be near me come December.

My father had a heart attack, so he has decided to lose some weight and actually start taking his health seriously. He's not old (~40 years) and has a lot of life to live so I'm glad this has knocked him on his rear. He was thin and in the military when he was young, but once he retired he seriously put on the weight (320lbs / 145.2kg and 6'4'' / 193cm.)

I lost my cell phone and got a better one for free with the insurance plan. I'm really enjoying the Motorola Droid so if you're in the market for a new phone... I would definitely recommend it.

I lost $600 that I had in an envelope. I cashed a check from one of my roommates and foolishly put it in the holder along the side of my car door... many things have fallen out of there before so I'm sure some lucky fellow found it. While not devastating it was still a bummer.

Lastly, I'm torn about my hair color. I have never dyed it in my life until about four months ago. I figured that if I was going to do it I'd get a color that I had always wanted: silver. My hair was blond for a bit, but gradually turned into the color I wanted. (My stylist did it in stages so that it would stay as healthy as possible: honey blonde, platinum, light silver, then chrome silver.) Unfortunately it is a very high maintenance color and expensive to upkeep. (I don't trust myself with my own hair so I've been going to a professional since the start.) I decided that I'd post a few pictures that are on my MySpace and ask for advice...

PICTURES REMOVED~.

My natural hair color. I am considering going back to this. I never disliked it, I just wanted some change. I was at my lowest weight here... 118lbs /53kg! How I'd love to see that again. (I didn't blur the second picture since I'm looking down and it's of terrible webcam quality anyway. It's also a funny picture that I have up elsewhere.)

PICTURES REMOVED~.

The first stage of blond that I had. I got the most compliments with this color. I'm not sure why. I was also told that it looked very natural by those who knew me, and was never asked if it was dyed by those who didn't. I liked that quite a bit.

PICTURES REMOVED~.

The second stage of blond. Most people asked me why I had changed it to a lighter color and seemed to like the first one better. Everyone knew this was obviously dyed. The one thing I disliked about being blond was that I couldn't wear much red without looking red myself... and it's one of my favorite colors to wear. (People also called me "Draco" and I can't say I was a huge fan of it.)

PICTURES REMOVED~.

Silver! While I love this to death, it has had mixed reviews. It looks terrible after about two weeks. In all honesty... the color fades out horrendously and it becomes an awkward dull granny gray.

Color suggestions? Go back to something I had? Keep what I have? Change it entirely? The one color I'm not willing to do is black (only because I hear it's so hard to change.) I'm not to keen on super bright colors either (highlighter orange, super bright pink, rainbow, more than two colors, etc.) but I'd be willing to consider it if you had good reference pictures and decent reasoning. I guess any solid color that isn't neon would be fine. [:

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