This is completely random, but have I mentioned before my fear of buying food (especially unhealthy food) in public? It's true and sometimes its to my advantage and sometimes not, mostly when it comes to buying groceries.

I've been going grocery shopping on Wednesdays lately because I'm already in town and I figure its a good time to do it, but I'm already fearing going to the same grocery store I go to every week because I don't like being recognized. Have I also mentioned that I will almost (almost) never go through a drive through alone. I fear being seen as a cliche. I also do not like to eat alone in public, so I've eaten many meals in my car.

I developed this small fear, back when I still lived in Huntington WV (now known as the countries fattest city), when I would fast food hop. I would go from drive-through to drive-through ordering my favorite items. I didn't want to order that much food at one place so I would go to various places. Right down 5th ave you could get steak escape, Wendy's, McDonald's, dairy queen, burger king, captain d's and taco bell all within on one mile of each other. My favorite was captain d's a meal made up entirely of fried food: chicken strips, fries, hush puppies, fried fish with honey mustard and sweet and sour sauce with a large sweet tea. Its true.

Logically, I know no one is bothered with thinking about me ordering/buying food, its totally in my head, but it still lingers. I am happy though, that I don't drive-through hop anymore and have no desire to ever do that again, but I'd like to get over myself when it comes to my weekly grocery shopping.

Does anyone else feel self-conscious when shopping? I don't want to create paranoia where it doesn't already exist, just curious if other people out there have the same feelings.

***************

Thank you for the encouraging comments (and phone calls) regarding yesterdays post. I got on the scale again today (I know, I'm a junky) and its still. the. same. And I felt like I was doing a lot of whining and self-pity yesterday because I realize I can't eat so much food.

Sometimes I'm waiting for someone to give me permission to do this or that to lose weight. If a professional person said "you can eat what you want, and lose weight, but you have to exercise three hours a day" and I would do it. I don't know for how long-haha-, but I doubt with three hours of exercise I would even want to eat a lot. Why am I always waiting for someone else's advice to tell me how to lose weight?

It goes like this: I count calories, and get tired and lazy and half-assed with it. And then I think I should be more strict and eating less and losing more. And then I think I should do a lower carb diet where I don't have to count anything but carbs, but I hate the idea of that too. And then I think that I shouldn't count anything and be more intuitive with my eating and wonder how thin people keep track of stuff like that?

I often think: thin people eat less, and don't count calories, but they instinctively (it seems) know when to stop eating. (i should say, health-conscious thin people) Why don't I have that? And then I always go back to snapping out of it and just telling myself that this is my thing that I have to deal with and I have to work towards it and at it. Thin people have their things too.

And then today, I go right back to keeping a food journal and exercising, even if it sucks, but it doesn't have to. Its all about perspective, right?

Also, this post from Poppi Kramer (from the biggest loser) haunts me and has entered my consciousness since I read it many months ago. I know that this is very extreme (the exercise), and I can only imagine the comments I would get from posting this. Being honest, it has challenged me to think I should be eating better and less and exercising a lot more.