The Wedding Outfit

I was looking through some family photos the other day, searching for something else, and stumbled upon this photo from a wedding in June, 2019. 

I remember feeling so awful about myself that day – and everyday back then. I had nothing to wear to the celebration so I ordered lots of dresses online weeks before the wedding. Some didn’t look good on me and most just didn’t fit. 

As a last resort, I wore these awful worn out Old Navy drawstring pants and a blousy top with the only shoes that would accommodate my swollen feet. The shoes were more worn out than the pants. 

Smiling I was in the photo, but cringing inside. I dreaded photos, especially group photos. I tried hard to avoid them that day. I wanted to crawl under our table when the photographer came around and stay there until it was time to go home. 

I tried to drink enough Sauvignon Blanc to dilute my embarrassment but as usual, it didn’t work. It just made me compare myself to others more, become sweatier on that hot day and act like a pill on what should have been a day full of joy. 

When I look at myself now, I wonder what the bride and groom must have thought. Maybe that I didn’t care enough about their wedding to wear a nice dress? That makes me sad to think about but I did try. 

For me, it wasn’t just about the extra weight I carried but the idea that people who hadn’t seen me heavy before would think I let myself go, or that something was wrong with me. 

The truth was I didn’t have the tools I needed to succeed…yet. The first and more important tool for me is sobriety. Breaking up with alcohol has allowed me to achieve great things including losing 80 pounds and getting into shape. 

Thanks for letting me share. The other photo was taken in late January, 2021. In it, I was smiling on the outside AND the inside! 

Adrienne

Giving Up Alcohol

On January 16th, 2020, my husband and I took our last sips of alcohol. After returning home from a trip of a lifetime to French Polynesia, I came down with Dengue Fever.

On that day, I didn’t know that those vodka sodas would be my last or that I would wake up the next morning barely able to walk to the bathroom.

Dengue Fever is a horrible illness that can be fatal. Its nickname is ‘Break Bone Fever’ and the head-to-toe body aches and behind-the-eyes headaches live up to the name. I have never been so weak in my life. Just walking to and from the bathroom took enormous effort. My limbs felt like they belonged to a rag doll. Some of my hair fell out and I still get Dengue headaches on the regular. Other than that, I am healthy and thriving.
As awful as Dengue was, it was also a gift.

At the onset of my illness, I contacted my doctor and told her what was going on. I had no idea I could be suffering from Dengue Fever. I explained my symptoms and she told me I had the flu. I just needed to rest, drink liquids and take Advil for my crushingly painful headaches, body aches and relentless fever.

So when I started vomiting blood, having bloody noses and gums, I wasn’t sure what the hell was happening. This certainly wasn’t the flu. At some point it occurred to me that it might be Dengue. I sent her links to Dengue symptoms from CDC and WHO websites. I had at least 75% of the symptoms and had just spent 2 weeks in an area with Dengue. Yet she continued to tell me it was the flu. 

Thankfully, the Internet led me to lots of information – some of it scary. Like how taking ibuprofen with Dengue can cause internal bleeding. I immediately stopped taking Advil for the remainder of my recovery. 

At the end of January, after about 11 days in bed, I started to feel normal again. I hadn’t had any alcohol and neither had my husband, Bill. Once I started back to my usual routines, I realized Dengue had given us both a golden opportunity. With 11 days free of alcohol under our belts, we had a healthy head start on a postponed Dry January. We planned on doing Dry January but when the invite to Tahiti came, we ditched the idea. 

Now I see Dengue Fever not as the worst travel souvenir ever, but as a gift. It gave me and my husband an invaluable opportunity to make significant changes to our lives.  

A couple weeks post recovery, I asked my doctor for a Dengue test. Sure enough, I had Dengue Fever.

So here we are, over a year into our alcohol-free life and we couldn’t be happier!

Besides losing our alcohol habit this past year, we also lost: 

• 125 pounds between the two of us – Bill lost 45 and I lost 80

• Credit card debt and more money in our savings  

• Medications (neither of us take medications now)

And we gained: 

• Better sleep 

• Much better skin 

• A clearer mind and better concentration 

• Lots of energy 

• New hobbies including lots of exercise

• Self-confidence has returned

• More positive outlook on life with even temperaments  

The authors of We are the Luckiest, The Unexpected Joy of Being Sober, and This Naked Mind helped me see that not only is there life beyond the grip of alcohol, but a full, rich and free life! I highly recommend these books if you’re considering giving up alcohol or just taking a break.

Adrienne

How I Lost 80 Pounds

Last February, I decided it was time to address my growing weight problem. Since 2015, I gained 70 pounds. It happened slowly at first, then after my husband retired and we started traveling frequently, my weight began to increase more rapidly with no signs of stopping.

For reference, I’m 6’ 2” and I feel best at a size between 6 and 10 (150 – 165 pounds). In this first photo, which was taken January, 2020, I weighed between 235 and 240 pounds.

Over the next year, I would drop between 80 and 85 pounds. Here is how I went about it.

I lost weight doing 3 main things: 

• I quit drinking alcohol. That helped me lose the first 15 pounds, from 235 to 220. 

• Next I started intermittent fasting (IF). I have black coffee, a big glass of water with a little fresh lemon juice and plain green tea for breakfast. I eat my first meal of the day around 1:00 pm. That opens my eating window which goes like this: I eat lunch, snack if I want, eat dinner, have dessert if I want, then wrap all that eating business up around 6:30 or 7:00 pm. I have nothing but water until the next morning when I do it all over again. I lost another 8 to 10 pounds doing just IF, from 220 – 211. 

• When I first started doing IF, I went a little crazy. That was back in April, near the beginning of the pandemic, and I think we were all sideways back then, eating for comfort and stress relief. I was eating almost non-stop for most of my 6-hour window. And I was eating whatever I wanted – cheese puffs, ice cream, candy, huge portions of meals, lots of cheese, and so on. It’s no surprise that I stopped losing weight. When I went from plateauing to gaining, I knew I had to change what was happening between 1 and 7 pm. A friend told me she started Noom. I checked it out and from the start I knew it was for me. By following the Noom program, I went from 211 to 150 in 8 months.

The photo of me in a bikini was taken February, 2021.

I have not given up any foods or food categories. I allow myself to eat what I want, I just have to work it into my day. I weigh and measure most of my foods – especially the high calorie ones – and I count calories.

I workout 5 to 7 days a week. Yoga, Pilates, weight training, walking and running on the treadmill are my favorite ways to exercise.

If you decide to do what I did, you do not have to quit drinking alcohol, you just need to count the calories you consume. I gave up alcohol for many reasons, one being weight loss, and it’s helped me stay the course. This journey has been a lot of hard work and commitment but I’ve never felt better!

Please feel free to ask any questions you may have about my weight loss journey.

I am happy to answer them!

Adrienne

A Return to Blogging

If you’ve been reading blogs – especially over 40 fashion/lifestyle blogs – over the last several years, you may have come across my former blog, The Rich Life in Wine Country. 

I blogged for 8 years, focusing on fashion, travel, and wineries mostly. I also wrote about my life in Sonoma Valley with my firefighter husband, youngest stepdaughter, cute doggies and pet chicken. 

When Bill, my husband, retired from the fire service in 2018, we decided to buy an RV and hit the road. And that’s what we did for most of 2018 and 2019.

Blogging didn’t fit into those plans so I let it go dormant. After getting a bill for $1500 to continue hosting my blog for another year, I made the decision to delete it in 2019. I figured it was time to move on from blogging, once and for all.  

My life changed so much during the last three years. We had terrible fires here in Sonoma County and almost lost our home twice. Our stepdaughter and her now husband lost their home in the Tubbs Fire as did many, many friends, acquaintances and neighbors. 

Bill’s father passed away, my youngest stepdaughter moved out of state and both my stepson and my eldest stepdaughter married and began new lives with their families. I had a hard time keeping up with all the changes. I began to feel rudderless and no longer relevant or useful. 

All of this change resulted in persistent restlessness and anxiety, which I treated with lots of food and drink. I gained a lot of weight and drank some type of alcohol – usually wine – nearly everyday.

At some point I started checking out of my regular life – hiding in a way. It was easy to check out when we were on the road, so far from home where no one could see me. That was where I most wanted to be. I was fine never going home, but we couldn’t travel forever. We arrived home a few days before Christmas, 2019, just in time to get ready for a trip to Tahiti that would end up being the beginning of so much more change.

At 52, obese and most likely depressed, I was convinced that this was how my life would be moving forward. At this point in my life, I’d never lose weight, I’d never enjoy the feelings of self-confidence again and I’d never have purpose. I would always need alcohol for fun and enjoyment and, most importantly, to get through all the hard parts of life. 

But I was wrong about all of that. I have returned to blogging to share my stories of turning my life around in my 50s, with the hopes that it might help someone else.

Adrienne