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Wednesday, February 21, 2018

Clarifications

There are a few things I want to clarify.


During the past festivities which involved meeting family members whom I usually only see once a year, I was asked several questions regarding my weight loss. Which was understandable, since I looked like a pregnant whale the last time they saw me.


BUT.


It was a bit frustrating for me to explain things, since they already have their own conceptions on weight loss methods.


Sure, I could have gone into a whole tirade about counting calories, macro-nutrients, and the immense benefits of weightlifting, but I knew for a fact that I'd lose my cool and get more and more pissed as several other people tried to refute my tried and proven methods with old wives' tales they've heard and believed for years.


So, item number 1 that I want to clarify - it's much easier for me to quote eating less as one of the main factors of losing the weight, because technically speaking it is an accurate way to convey this type of calorie deficit - less food = less calories consumed. But this generally leads to constant hunger, and more accurately, I count my calories and macros and make sure that I'm in a calorie deficit (this obviously flew out the window during aforementioned festivities).


I legit have a whole spreadsheet to count my daily calorie and macro intake. But it's soooo much easier to say "just eat less", than to have to explain the whole shebang and get cut off because one has lost interest.


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And then I got asked how I exercised - I said I went to the gym, not for the treadmill, but for the weights.


If you didn't know, there's a whole plethora of people who don't know how muscle growth works, and how men's bodies are different from women's bodies. Sure, they know all about the societal expectations and child production part, but that's it.


So point number 2, muscle growth requires lots of protein, patience, and testosterone. Testosterone is present in both men's and women's bodies, and is the "opposite" of estrogen. You could call them the male hormone and female hormone.


Testosterone is produced is much larger amounts in men's bodies, and it influences body hair growth, muscle mass, and sexual libido. Women's bodies produce more estrogen vs testosterone, so women in general have less muscle and less body hair.


Having said that, it is immensely difficult for women to gain muscle, and regular weight lifting (even if women lift heavier weights than men) will only serve to tone the muscle without bulking. It will take hundreds of dollars worth of protein formulas and a much longer period of time for women to get close to a more masculine male physique.


So despite what someone else says about a woman they know who do weight lifting but got bigger, weight lifting is an effective method to lose weight for women. It's even better than pure cardio because lifting = muscles = more body weight hence more calories burned, and also muscles = higher and longer metabolism (calorie burning) vs pure cardio.


And I've been doing weight lifting for a whole year, and if you agree that I have lost weight over this past year, would you not also agree that what I'm doing is effective is weight loss?


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Having my dad away for long periods of time for work meant that we had to learn to do lots of stuff, and my dad usually taught me to do some household repair work, and tbh you can learn practically anything from the internet now.


Previously, my bedroom had no proper work space - it was either sitting on the floor with the laptop on a chair/bed, or on a tiny collapsible table. Since the boyfriend has semi-moved in and we spend quite some time on our laptops, even for leisure activities, we needed a proper space that didn't jeopardize our (my) postural issues further.


I went to where everyone gets their furniture - IKEA.


I bought two smaller tables that summed up to the size that we wanted, then assembled one of them on my own. I then contemplated whether I wanted the boyfriend to assemble his own, but I had to clean the room, and loose table legs on the floor was gonna further piss me off.


So I just put the damn thing together so I could get other shit done.


Some family members insisted that this will further "perpetuate" the boyfriends non-active role, and that I will have to do everything in the future by doing thing.


Tbh, I don't mind. I've always tried to do "manly" things on my own, especially if it's in front of guys (which did wonders for my love life #sarcasm). And I didn't do this to "spoil" anyone, but rather to save my sanity and prevent myself from unnecessarily blowing my top just because I had to handle a few extra loose table legs while cleaning the floor.


Yes, I somehow perceive an hour's work to screw on legs to a table less work than having to navigate loose shit lying around while cleaning the floor.


So assembling one table isn't gonna somehow guilt me/perpetuate him into throwing the ball to me in the future when it comes to household handiwork.


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And no. I don't want kids. Earth is overpopulated with humans, and I really, really don't want to be tied down for so long, and likely have my kids hate me and resent me for being a shitty parent.

Tuesday, February 13, 2018

Plus size ≠ attractive

The rise of models such as Tess Holliday and Ashley Graham has paved the way for more size-inclusiveness for people around the world who know who they are, especially the girls.


The thing is... I don't think they're attractive at all.


This is not to say I'm fat-hating, or that I'm discriminating against bigger girls, but I just don't find that physique attractive. They're beautiful women in their own right, but they're just... not my type, if you get what I mean.



I somehow flipped to an MTV-like channel at one point in my childhood, and was drawn in my the cool edginess of the models of a fashion runway show. I just told myself that I wanted to be them, and my young mind did not comprehend this "career" to be a size-specific one - I saw beautiful girls strutting down a runway, and that looked very attractive to me.


And I was a gluttonous child - to the point where at an annual health check, a nurse wrote in red pen in my health booklet "overweight". My dad was the first to jump in as an "intervention", though I would've appreciated his efforts more if they had been more tactful in approaching it.


I was told constantly to lose weight, annual family visits did not help, as they insisted on pointing out the obvious.


When I started getting into boys, they seemed to prefer those with more traditional feminine traits - which included being slender. At least, I assumed this as one of the most widely used nicknames for me was something along the lines of "fat pig".


There's an existing school of thought which describes the characteristics that an individual tends to criticize in others, are actually characteristics that they themselves posses but are unhappy about. For example, an individual may be easily agitated when a person does not take initiative to make a decision, because this individual may have the "issue" with themselves.


I suppose the same theory could be applied here - I've struggled with what they call a "curvy" figure now for most of my lucid life, and I perceive them as unattractive aspects.


Thus, I may have carried this perception on to other women - Ashley and Tess both have beautiful faces, but I can't perceive them as attractive to myself.


My boyfriend's liking for non-skinny girls also can be explained with this theory, as he was super skinny in the past and found that being so skinny was not attractive.


As I internally condemned myself for being rotund, I also condemned the girls I saw who had similar features to mine - stomach rolls, cellulite-heavy thighs, etc; all the while mooning over girls who had the "desirable" features I severely craved - flat stomach, skinny arms, slender thighs that could fit into cute shorts without the danger of splitting seams.


Now that I think about it, this is quite ironic, as my aspiration is to be Instagram-fitness-model skinny, while he appreciates some healthy softness in a woman. In this entire journey of getting my "dream body", he's been very, very encouraging and supportive - firmly telling me that those girls that I fawn over are bodies that I will never achieve as my body type does not fit, and showing me models who have a more similar body to mine which are equally as attractive.


I don't think I will ever "learn to love myself" until I reach a certain physical appearance that doesn't involve a bulging belly and jiggly bingo wings. I don't see that as an issue until I internalize the self-hate for not being born naturally skinny or for not having a passion for sports and fitness.


And having said that, I don't think I'd ever appreciate women who have the same physical features that I don't like on myself. By saying this, I'm not nullifying their efforts to push size-inclusiveness in the fashion and beauty industry, or their other efforts in other fields.


But for now, I can't see excess weight as anything other than something that needs to be worked off. For me, it's a physical and psychological barrier to feeling good about myself.


For women who can love themselves regardless, that's good for them. I admire women who have the confidence to carry themselves regardless of how much society "condemns" their appearance. As for myself... it's a different story altogether. :)

Sunday, February 4, 2018

#theNekoAsh

I thought I'd cry for three days and nights, like I did when we had to let go of Dukie. But surprisingly... I didn't.


Maybe it was because I didn't feel the overwhelming gap that he would leave, or perhaps I was just used to letting go by now. I thought I'd be a nervous wreck for the next few days, or at least, mopey af.


Surprisingly, I wasn't.


If those eyes don't speak to your soul, you must be soulless. #theNekoAsh During his last drive in my car, he sat in the backseat in the carrier, meowing in confusion and anxiety of being taken on another road trip. He wouldn't drink or eat his favorite treat when he got there - no doubt he needed time to recover from the roadtrip and settle into his new home. I thought I'd feel a nagging dread throughout the trip and exchange, and probably burst out bawling as I left. Instead I felt really jaded. Instinctively, I expected to see an expectant feline at the dining table. I was greeted with an unexpected silence, no persistent meows of welcome and excitement, no trace that he's ever even been in the house. It's the subtle silence and absence that makes it so loud. The urge to go back, apologize, and be able to once again cradle 5kg of fluff that doesn't claw was strong. I contemplated this choice to so suddenly "abandon" him, albeit to a place where he would likely be even happier. I forcefully moved him once, and now I did it again, and placed him in unfamiliar hands. I wondered if he was adjusting well, if he was eating, if he would try to nestle into his new environment for comfort if familiarity. I was told to just do everything within my own control to make sure this family would be one who wouldn't abuse him. And even in doing so, I was doubtful. Or the more likely so was that I didn't even want him to leave, but all things considered… this was better for both of us - he would have almost round-the-clock attention and free-roaming rights and more people to play with. Waking up this morning was strange, because the first thought every morning was to feed him. I spent those 10 minutes staring into space, feeling uncomfortable in this small but stark change of routine. They say they're just animals, but in theory, so are we. And the thing is… animals are much easier to get along with, and they don't judge you. And Ash has been there - albeit silently - during difficult times. He's a good cat: tolerant, gentle, playful, and smart - a handsome cat with personality. And having said that, he deserves better than what I can give him, which isn't much.
A post shared by Kellie Low    ◐ ⇀ 紫倩 ↽ ◑ (@yukari_ivankov) on



In case you're lost, here's the 411: I gave my cat #theNekoAsh up for adoption.


There were several reasons behind this final decision, one of the main ones being that he wasn't given free reign to be a cat. Because I had my grandmother at home who detests cats, and my boyfriend who isn't a fan of pets was now sleeping over on a regular basis, I had to leash him to my dinner table, where he enjoyed pawing at my mother when she was plucking greens into a bowl while watching K-dramas.



Also, the change in my life schedule left me with almost no time for him.


At this point, I feel like I'm making excusing for an error in judgement for when I took him away from my ex - I knew there was no place in my home for him, and the time that I would be spending at home was limited as it was.


I insisted anyway - he took to me the most among all three cats, and I had a bias toward him. He slept with me for the first few weeks until my boyfriend started to sleep over. During this short period of time, he would play with my toes and I tried to find a comfortable sleeping position, and would not shut up in the morning until I spent at least a few minutes petting him before leaving for work.


All in all, his life quality would improve a lot with a family who could truly allow him to be a cat, which meant free-roaming and ample attention - both of which I could not provide.


Ads were put in multiple places, but it took a few months before I found one who didn't back out by the 2nd message. She's a young girl with a large family, and despite needing to work shifts, her mother was at home most of the time. It was excellent - he was to have a whole house to roam in, and round the clock attention.


The drive there wasn't uneventful - boyfriend spilled most of my water, Ash kept toppling over his carrier, and it was HOT. I dropped him off, assembled his scratching post, then drove off with my car empty.


I imagined that I would bawl my eyes out the moment I left the area, but I didn't. I still managed to drive all the way from Tun Hussein Onn to PJ for omurice lunch, then to Sunway to shop for gaming chairs.


It wasn't until I got home, showered, and got the time to sit and think if I was a shitty person for suddenly taking him on such a traumatic drive then leaving him there with strangers. I had humanized him to the point where I was afraid he'd hate me for life for abandoning him the way I did.


And if emotions exist in cats, then he probably did feel anger toward me among the confusion and fear of being suddenly thrown into a new environment. It feels so shitty to have to come to this decision, but unfortunately, Ash did not have the same appeal as Dukie did to my family, although my mother did warm up to him significantly - whether voluntarily or involuntarily.


Despite my subtle urges to be able to cuddle his fluffy mass again, he's probably happier where he is now once he settles in. And the lesson would be that I should probably not get pets again in the future. The boyfriend has agreed to go to pet cafes with me should I feel the "urge" for fluff.