Chicana on the Edge

Mentioning the unmentionable since 2004

Ask For What You Want, Part Two: People Pleasing

Are you good at asking for what you want? Some insight into those who struggle with it.

How Chicago Failed Its Most Vulnerable: The Heat Wave of July 1995

31 years ago, a three-day disaster revealed an ongoing one.

On Fat Tuesday I Will Fear No Food

I'm excited about Fat Tuesday (Mardi Gras on 12 Feb) this year because now that I've embraced the Health At Every Size approach to health, I no longer torment myself with food as I used to. If I want the food, I eat the food; if I don't want the...

read more
Good Weekend

Good Weekend

  Settling in for movie night I just had a great weekend. On Saturday morning the snow was coming down and I enjoyed being out under the cloudy skies. The EFT group was excellent as usual, and on the way to the meeting I visited Bulldog Bakery at Belmont and...

read more

Doctors, please Don’t Tell Fat People to Lose Weight

Previous post on fat and health: Exercise that feels GOOD (and I don't mean morally) I seem to have taken a slide into weight and body issues on this blog. Oh, well. That's where my focus is these days. Food issues are a huge part of my self esteem building and...

read more

Exercise That Feels GOOD (and I Don’t Mean Morally)

Previous post on this topic: I want to bend easily again After years of being a gym rat (and between size 6 and 10), I stopped all exercise last March, except for dog walking and yoga classes at my workplace. Since there haven’t been any workplace yoga classes since...

read more

Write Club: Great for Writers and Listeners

http://writeclubrules.com The first rule of Write Club is to tell five to seven other people about Write Club, so here I go. Write Club takes two writers and gives them opposing themes to write an essay about. They prepare this essay ahead of time and it must take no...

read more
I Want to Bend Easily Again

I Want to Bend Easily Again

(Can you find the dog in this photo?) Previous post on this topic: Gaining 25 pounds in 3 months I want to be part of the fat acceptance movement, but I'm having doubts. The 25 pounds I put on since October have added to and subtracted from my happiness. I love...

read more
Hotel Metro, Milwaukee, Wisconsin USA

Hotel Metro, Milwaukee, Wisconsin USA

Fancy hotel room with dog   Beautiful bathroom with oversized tub and Ozzie's dog dishes in the back. Monday, January 21, besides being Martin Luther King Jr. Day and Inauguration Day, was one of the coldest days of the year. In Chicago temperatures stayed in the...

read more

Die, Inner Critic, Die!

Sitting in my weekly EFT tapping circle, I tapped as I listened to topics like family dynamics, self-nurture and the feeling of not being good enough. As I tapped, my feelings of not being good enough and being too fat, grew. "I really hate myself," I thought, as I...

read more

Gaining 25 pounds in 3 months

Previous post on this topic: How to be overweight When one suddenly becomes chubby after being not-chubby all one's life, one might do the following: 1. One might hate how tight everything fits. 2. One might hate buying new clothes, which is not fun if the reason is...

read more

Blasting Through Zombie-Like Depression

A one-on-one session with Lili Betancourt has melted the frozen suppressed anger that’s had me down (see yesterday's blog photo). Locked into emotions I couldn’t release on my own, unable to focus or function, I made an emergency appointment for her powerful blend of...

read more
Not Quite Alone

Not Quite Alone

The Black Dog by Regina Rodríguez-Martin I took this photo with my Macbook Pro. It's me with a black dog and another black dog ("black dog" is a metphor for depression). I felt very alone when I took this even though I wasn't quite alone.

read more
One Dog’s Reaction to Extreme Emotion

One Dog’s Reaction to Extreme Emotion

The owner of the dog lay in bed until after 10:00 a.m. with the dog's body curled up next to hers in the blankets. After a brief phone call, she began to weep loudly. The dog, still in his relaxed position, pricked up his ears. At the first shriek, the dog's head...

read more

Subscribe


Archive

My blog focuses on