- Hey you, welcome back to my channel, my name's Anna, aka Glitterandlazers, and today I'm giving
you guys a little update on my health journey, my controversial health journey. I don't know why I became
British when talking about it, but maybe that feels a
little bit accurate right now because everything feels pretty foreign, so maybe that's why my health journey is now an uptight British person. So here's the deal, a lot of flimflam went on, a lot of people came out
and said their opinions, and I kinda moved on from it. And I decided I'm not gonna
respond to anyone's opinions about my body, my lifestyle or my choices pretty much ever again. Now, I say that with a caveat because there are times
when you have to respond, but the majority of the time you don't, so I'm not going to. But I do need to talk a little bit about how this has affected
me over the past month. So I don't even know where to begin, well, I guess I'll just begin
with my progress, right? I still don't know exactly
how much weight I've lost, but I have dropped a size in pants and my waist has also
disproportionately gotten smaller. This is kind of important to talk about because I think when people
talk about weight loss, it's always in the context
of being more attractive, and the weirdest thing for me right now is I feel less attractive, which is something I didn't
really prepare myself for because I mean I guess I was naive and thought I wouldn't have
to prepare myself for it. But my body is more unproportionate now than it was prior to me
starting a health journey. And it has made finding
clothes even harder, which is funny because size wise, I am now smaller, but things just don't fit
the same way they used to fit or they fit but not as comfortably
as they would fit before. So things like buying pants and knowing that I'm gonna have to deal with either tight thighs or
a waist that won't stay up. And again, these are
small problems to have, but they've changed the way I feel about my body a little bit because I feel like a
little bit of a stranger. And I noticed for two weeks, I was wearing a lot of
clothes that were baggier, they were baggy when I was heavier and they're really baggy now, and I was wearing them because it was really
clear I wasn't trying so I didn't have to feel bad
that it didn't look great because I already knew putting them on that I wasn't going to look good. So I had to literally have a little bit of an
intervention with myself where I was like, this isn't you, you look a little hot messed, and though you are generally
at times hot messed, you've gone down a little bit of a hill. And luckily I caught myself
kind of going down this hill and I was like okay, you've gotta start finding
clothes that fit you now. So that was also fun and heartbreaking because I got really good
at knowing what fit me, and all of that knowledge, all of that beautiful knowledge
is no longer accurate. So that is irritating and frustrating, and going through the shopping
process in a stranger's body is not fun, it's not, and it makes you feel crappy
the whole way through. And on top of it, it's this weird phenomenon when you lose weight where people, I don't know how else to explain this other than to say it makes complete sense why people don't wanna lose weight. It makes complete sense, you start losing weight and
your body feels super foreign and nothing fits you right. Everybody's got an opinion
on how you could be doing what you're already doing
pretty dang well better, and they seem like they
can butt in and tell you just because their body type is a little bit more
aesthetically pleasing. There will be people in your life who once felt very comfortable with you in your previous body who will now all of a sudden
be angry and mad at you and even act differently towards you because your body is changing. And it'll make some people mad, which we already saw, and at the center of all of this, your emotions and your
feelings and your choices don't even matter because they're gonna do
these things no matter what. It's really hard, it's a lot harder than
I thought it would be, and especially doing it publicly. Yeah, it's not great, and also trying to do it in a way where I don't negate or
hate my previous body, because I didn't hate my previous body, is really hard because a lot
of the conversation happens around health journeys and
more specifically weight loss is this concept of hating
and loathing yourself where you were as kind of a badge of honor
to where you've gotten to. And that feels super icky, and I guess I've just kinda
felt really alone and yeah, I felt really alone, I felt really alone, and I have come to the
point where I'm okay if people don't like what
I have to say anymore, which I think, let's not even talk about weight loss, let's just talk about self-development. Being okay, having an opinion that might be different than
someone else's on the internet is a brave ass thing, it is brave. And for a long time, I really did try to be that person that said all of the right things, but then I realized
how impossible that was and how crippling that was, and how much it basically in a lot of ways destroyed my life. Not destroyed it, my life was never destroyed, but it made my life very un-me and un-fun, and so this whole sitch, the number one thing it's done is made me okay with speaking my mind, with having a little bit of a tude, which is a new thing for me. And it's still scary every time I do it, but I'm thankful for that. So even though I feel sad and lonely, my body's unfamiliar and things are hard, at least I got my voice back (laughs), at least there's that. Excuse me while I sad cry in the corner. Fast forward now to the past week where life got really busy, I had some projects come in and all of them needed turn
around in like two days, I am a one woman show. I was very stressed out, I was doing an interior
redesign at the same time so I had to finish that to then be able to get
this other work done because I didn't have
anywhere to shoot it, it was a very, very overwhelming time and I saw my focus go to the back burner. It's not like I went back
to all of my old habits and became super indulgent
and ignored my health, it's just that health wasn't
a priority for that week. And it's crazy that it only took one week before my legs started to hurt, and they didn't hurt like
they previously hurt, at least I don't think they did, but they just started to give me signs that maybe I wasn't
making the best choices. And I started to really think about that, and I think one of the things that happens when we go off track is
you kinda have two choices. There's signals, right? That was a signal, my legs started to hurt. And you either can course
correct and get back on because you're not that far off the road, you're just a little bit off, or you just ignore it and
you become accustomed to it. And I think I'm proud of myself that I paid attention to the fact that my body started to not
like the choices I was making and got back on the road. And I feel like it's so
easy to get off the road because in life sometimes you just can't spend the
hours measuring your food or figuring everything out. Sometimes other things
are gonna take priority, and that is one thing I'm
starting to think about now, okay, we're heading into holiday season, which is a very stressful
time for an influencer, and I'm gonna have to figure out how to stay in this mode at a time when my life is
literally topsy-turvy as hell. And I kinda had a little
bit of a wake up call that I have to start figuring that out now because work is starting
to get a little harder, and it's gonna get five times as hard by the time holiday season hits. And if I don't have it figured out, I'm not gonna make it through. I'm gonna go back to where I was, and I think that is the hardest thing about this entire journey, is realizing how easy it is to just stop paying attention to my own needs. And that's literally
what it boils down to, is that I stop paying attention
to what my body needs, I stop paying attention to what I need to be healthy
and happy throughout the day and just focus on work. And I feel like I'm in a confessional, you all are my priest, and I'm admitting to you
that I am a workaholic. And that has effects on my life that I have not acknowledged until actually this video, right now. Remember when we talk about
sometimes when I talk on vlogs, it feels like therapy, well, yeah, I'm a workaholic. And I put my work above
myself almost all the time, and I have to figure out
how to break that habit. And it's gonna suck because I have to do it during
the hardest time of the year, but I'm confident that if I can do it now during the craziest
year of anybody's lives, the most challenging
situation to create in, the busiest season of
the year all by myself, if I can make it through
then I really can do this whenever, wherever, Shakira style. ♪ Whenever, whenever ♪ ♪ We're meant to be together ♪ Sorry, it's where my brain goes, but it is overwhelming and scary, and wow, there's a lot of
weird thoughts and balance going on in my head and I am not an expert in this, and I do not have the answers. And I think that's the scariest
part about all of this. Ask me how to style a tunic
25 ways and I got you girl, but this, this I don't know. And it is scary to be
somewhere I don't know, and it's scary to feel out of control. And it's weird because I am
making steps to control myself, but this whole process
feels very out of control. I don't understand why some
days I want to eat junk and other days I don't. And people talk about
journaling your feelings and all of that stuff, I have journaled my feelings girl, it ain't related to feelings. I don't know, or maybe I'm not acknowledging why those feelings are different, and that's what's so
hard about this journey, is that it's not crystal clear. And I'm literally just a person, hi, me, trying to figure out
how to live their life in a way that A, extends it, and B, is super enjoyable. It's hard, this whole situation
is hard and uncomfortable. And all I'm gonna say, and I think this is what I need to get to with the root of this
long, blithering video about I don't know at this point, is that listening to your
heart and listening to your gut and trusting your intentions
is really hard in this world. And if you are out there struggling, know that I am struggling too. Know that while my life
is generally happier, I feel better and I'm beginning to see
some significant changes in my body, I am still stressed out, I am still overwhelmed and I am still confused
by how my body operates. And it's not like there's
been some magical ray of light where all of a sudden
everything makes sense. No, everything is super confusing, emotionally, physically,
all of those things, and if anything, it's made me more compassionate on why some people just
choose not to prioritize this. I get it, it's a nightmare, it is terrible, but I also look at the positives, which I value, right? I value mobility, I value the hopeful eventual ability to do a lot of things
that I've wanted to do that I haven't been able
to because of my body. And I mean, that's where it's at, right? For me, that's where it's at, but I understand now, I get it, this is emotionally exhausting. And I wish more people would talk about it because all we ever hear about from the weight loss
perspective is oh my gosh, I feel so great, I have all this energy, I'm eating all of these
foods, it's amazing. But nobody's talking about, hey, a bunch of people who
I thought were my friends are no longer my friends just because I lost some weight. I eat differently now and
everybody has an opinion on it, either it's like why
are you eating a salad? Eat something more fun. Or you really shouldn't have
that dressing on that salad, you should just eat the leaves. You can't just eat your damn salad, there's just too many opinions. So I get it, I get it, and I just wanna say if you're struggling, we're all struggling, this is hard, and I think that, at the end of the day, if you're doing your best, that's all that really matters. Because I'm not gonna
hate myself through this, I'm going to question myself, be confused by myself, sometimes be sad, but I'm not gonna hate myself
because that's pointless and it doesn't actually
move anything forward. So with that guys, that is, I don't know, there was really no point to this video other than for me to just catch you up, and I'll probably do these once a month just so you know where I'm at, what I'm doing, how I'm vibing (laughs). Vibing, who am I? I'm 35, I can't say that, how I'm doing. But there's really no
golden rainbow to glean other than hopefully to
commiserate (laughs). I hope you guys have an
amazing rest of your day, I'll check you later and peace.
