Okay--Time to Confess My Puzzlement/Confusion/Hey--That's Great--But Why?

As a woman in my 40's, I am well aware that while we can start our life and go through the first 20 some years as thin as a rail, at some point the body stops working with us, and begins to work against us.  As in Me:   "I am getting comfortable with myself and my place in the world.  Amen."   Body:  "Okay--that means we get to make you gain weight in all the wrong places, and never get it off!"  


So this has been my dilemma for the past 12 years, and it's been horrifying.  Now I haven't gained 40, 50, or even 100 pounds, but what I have gained has made me feel like I have no control over my body and what it should do.  I blame it on a lack of sleep at night, changing hormones, and a work schedule that has me working either early mornings, or a second shift that lasts until 10:30 at night.  It all has combined to make me eat for comfort and eat at times when I never ever ate before.  Like after 7PM.  I come from a family where we ate at 6PM at the latest.  I liked that.  It didn't give me a chance to snack before supper, since supper was only an hour away.  If I am home alone, I will eat earlier.  If Bud is coming over, it's usually 7:30-8PM before we can eat.


I have become puzzled over the last 6 months about the body I inhabit.  At first I thought it was just that beginning of the beginning of the end.  The female body shifting gear and preparing me for that wonderful thing--menopause.  I'd like to think I'm a few years away from full blown menopause, but we all know stuff starts happening waaaay before that.  Like mysteriously feeling warmer all the time; not hot flashes, just warmer.  Breaking out in a sweat when everyone else is chilly.  Feeling a bit like a freak when you go out to run in shorts and a tank top and pass people wearing hats, gloves, and jackets.  This is why I bitched all summer at the horrible heat.  I don't like it anyway, and never have--but this summer it just felt intolerable.  


Along with this gift of extra body heat, I have strangely enough had a shift in my eating.  As in not eating as much.  After Googling this strange phenomena--thinking it was maybe part of something that happens that we aren't told about by our mothers and older sisters--I discovered that the opposite is true.  As the hormones go down, we begin to eat like a horse with a feedbag attached to it's face.  Not one thing said appetite decreases.


I have lost a bit of weight--very very very very very very slowly.  I was surprised at this, but happy.  It hasn't been from running, cause I'm not running nearly as much as I should be.  I can only wonder at this bizarre occurrence in my life.  I keep thinking I will wake up one morning and feel the urge to consume a whole box of cereal, followed by an dozen eggs and a pound of bacon.  But nothing yet.  Instead, I continue to suddenly feel full, leave food on my plate, and not have seconds or thirds.  


I have been passed by my medical scene, and I feel good except for this weird thing.  It makes me think I won't be able to chow down in Savannah on all the stuff I so want to eat.  That will really piss me off.  How can I possibly cram weeks of Southern food into a long weekend?  Can I take a cooler home?


So I guess what I am saying is "What the hell is going on?  Can it continue so I can lose 15 pounds more?"   


Bizarre--strange--a Ripley's Believe It or Not:  "Sue G is actually  not hungry all the time!"