Hobbit House Tour

November 22, 2019 by Kristin Purcell in Minimalism, Mental Illness

I thought I’d give a thorough tour of our little rented apartment here in Würzburg, Germany, which we refer to as the “Hobbit House.” The place is rather quirky and aesthetically challenging, but we manage to make it work.

On our last trip here, I desperately fought against the ugly decor, hiding things away and buying organizational supplies at the Euro Shop. I tend to rearrange all of our temporary accommodations in whatever city we travel to for Matt’s work, sometimes rearranging furniture, often just focusing on putting away our supplies and suitcases and keeping the clutter under control. But this always seems to make things worse for Matt, who is an “out of sight, out of mind” type of person. He prefers to let his necessities scatter across the apartment, finding things more quickly this way than if they were tucked away. So this trip, rather than fight against his instincts, I’ve tried to embrace the situation and allow for some organized chaos. Matt’s working so hard here and is so pressed for time that he needs to keep things where he can see them.

I’ve also decided to surrender to the hideous decor. Despite my best efforts last time, I was never satisfied with the way things looked anyway. It’s hard to see such a potentially gorgeous apartment filled with offensive decorations, but apart from disassembling the whole shebang and throwing it out the window, I just don’t see any way around it. So this time, I didn’t buy any little baskets at the Euro Shop, I left the homemade paintings on the walls, and aside from hiding the ugliest things, just let it be.

Heading up to the apartment is a steep staircase; the apartment sits in the eaves of the building’s roof so it’s a four flight trek up to the top every time you come home. Once inside, there’s a very practical coat rack to your left which holds a myriad of coats and shopping bags which are so necessary here (we stash our bottles from drinking water here, too, since you have to turn them in at the supermarket). Next to that is a closet, also very practical as it fits all of our clothes and even hides away our suitcases. The right side has a little bench where dirty laundry lives.

Moving on to a grand sweep of the place, you’ll see two grubby, slightly futuristic and suspiciously IKEA-esque couches, coffee table in between. The coffee table has been the location of a lot of sprawling clutter, so I’ve attempted to contain it into the little cardboard boxes that our apples come in. I’ve also repurposed a tissue box to hold my pill bag and my headphones. There was an area rug here, but I dropped a drinking glass on it and the glass shattered. With no vacuum cleaner to tidy up, I just rolled the rug up and shoved it under one of the couches. Needless to say, I don’t miss it. Oh, and there was also a pillow in the shape of a rabbit (see photo); I threw it straight onto the top of the wardrobe upon our arrival.

To your right is a beautiful spiral staircase with a hideous TV cart under it. The bathroom just beyond it has a rather shocking choice of tile going on, but also has sufficient storage between the counter over the sink and the shelves behind the door. I don’t bother tidying up in there since entropy always wins out anyway. I figure if I need something, I’ll go looking for it, so I haven’t even emptied my travel bag- it just sits on the shelf above the towel rack where we hang the bath mat to dry.

Next to the bathroom is the little spare room where we keep most of our food and other supplies. I stashed some dried flowers in there along with a gross kettle, an ancient hairdryer, and a toaster that smells like burning plastic when you try to use it. Note the only curtains we didn’t manage to remove, as well as one of our TK Maxx towels drying on the chair (it’s really just the only place for it). There’s a clothing rack which is great for airing out clothes that aren’t quite ready for the wash. And then there’s the infamous little bed where I hide from the world almost every day at some point. This is where I cry and nap and where Matt rubs my feet when things get particularly bad.

The real coup de grace is the “kitchen” where you really can’t do much cooking. It’s equipped with a microwave, toaster oven (that seems to slowly dehydrate food as opposed to toasting it), the kettle we bought on Amazon, a small sink, and a mini-fridge. With so little fridge space, groceries must be bought every day, a task Matt usually takes on first thing every morning. I did manage to clear out a single drawer for some of our food when I went on a tear and sterilized everything in the kitchen.

There’s a nice-sized dining table with very dirty cushions on the chairs where we eat our meals, and where our second towel dries. From here there’s a view of one of the offending pieces of art- I hid it last time, but this time I just got over it. There are always bits and bobs on the table along with our fruit and my food scale (Amazon again) for weighing out exact portions. You might notice that there are no curtains on the kitchen and living room windows. They were so dusty and depressing that we elected to take them down and stuff them in the back of the closet. The views out the windows are actually not bad if you can see past all the dirt, and due to the angled walls, you don’t have to worry about anyone seeing you in your underwear.

The last stop on this little tour is the loft bedroom. The bed is composed of two twin beds with separate twin comforters, plus a blanket from Amazon that we try to share. I usually end up squished up against the wall and Matt ends up between the two mattresses. I find this little nook in the eaves comforting, but Matt gets a bit claustrophobic despite the lovely view of a nearby cathedral. This room got the biggest makeover: I removed a sharp-cornered shelf from the bed area and then stashed a bunch of crap at the other end of the loft. There are some gold and glass end tables, a wicker chair, a fake ficus, and a very, very dirty rug.

And that about sums it up. I’d say I can’t complain, but I guess I already did. I’m really trying to practice acceptance of this imperfect reality. Because what else is there?

Wearing Sweaters and Loose Skin

November 20, 2019 by Kristin Purcell in Food, Mental Illness, Clothes

I’m finally wearing sweaters. Würzburg has cooled down quite a bit this week and I’ve worn 3 of my 4 sweaters already. The thicker pink cashmere one has come in really handy around the apartment with my pajamas, the grey one is making regular appearances at cafes, and the black non-cashmere one survived the trip here and just recently went over to our friend’s apartment. In terms of pants, I’ve worn each pair at least twice, so have yet to feel the need to put any in the wash. Right now I’m wearing my blue skinny jeans with my belt and it’s causing me some serious muffin-topping, so I may put them on the back burner again. I do tend to gravitate towards them though, especially for the walk home from the gym after a shower.

Before leaving for this trip, I switched to my smaller wedding ring which is a much more delicate band than the original (the original is actually a thicker men’s ring, since apparently plus size wedding rings have yet to hit the mainstream jewelry shops). But this thinner band is digging into my finger a bit, which keeps it from falling off, but makes me feel kind of chunky.

Speaking of muffin-topping and feeling chunky, I’ve been obsessing over the view of my inner thighs in the bright natural sunlight in our apartment. It’s got me worrying a lot about loose skin. If you’ve never lost a bunch of weight, you may be fully unaware of this concept, so let me enlighten you. When your skin has been stretched by weight gain, pregnancy, etc., it doesn’t always snap right back when you lose the weight. Magazines and weight-loss enthusiasts always fail to mention this potential side effect, but most people who lose significant amounts of weight in their adult years will suffer from this issue. I’ve been lucky in the past and only suffered from a jiggly belly when thin, but my weight had never reached its most recent heights. Now I’m afraid my legs are joining in the jiggle. But since the only solution is cosmetic surgery (which I have no interest in), I’m going to have to learn to accept it. Maybe all this waltzing around the ladies’ locker room completely nude will help me find that acceptance.

Now I am rather self-conscious waltzing my way to the gym in leggings. I rarely see people wearing leggings here, and I feel like people are staring when I do. Maybe it’s something about how skinny my legs are in comparison to my top half, or maybe not, but I do feel weird. It has dawned on me that people might think I’m pregnant, and if they see me lifting heavy weights at the gym, might be concerned for my health. But I feel like I get the most stares on the street. It doesn’t keep me from wearing them though, since I really have no choice- they’re all I brought to work out in.

I’m also self-conscious about my hair. My hair has been a bit of a disaster here due to the extremely calcium-rich water (we have to de-scale the kettle every couple of days). It just doesn’t curl like it’s supposed to, and I have to use a ton of conditioner. But aside from hair products, my toiletries have been holding up just fine. I’m pleased to report that micellar water is brilliant for removing sunblock, although now that I think of it, I haven’t been wearing my sunblock enough. The issue with it is that I try to use it like a moisturizer in the morning and it tingles and burns when I do. I’ve got a lead on an actual moisturizer with SPF so I’ll be sure to report back with my findings. The other issue with sunblock is that I get confused with walking to and from the gym since I often shower there. Do I put sunblock back on after I shower? And do I bring the micellar water with me? The answer to both these questions is obviously yes, but that has only just occurred to me.

My major concerns have been making sure I get my routine into place, and then taking pains to ensure that I don’t binge. It’s been just about a week since the dinkel-puff binge and my exercise is now truly consistent (our first week here I only walked around town for exercise on my cardio days and that didn’t feel quite right). So while there have been days where I could feel my routine slipping right through my fingers, I’ve managed to get back on track and power through. Today I overcame a great hurdle when I walked all the way to the gym and saw that both treadmills were occupied. Not satisfied with the walk there and back, I hiked it to the park and ran for ten minutes there.

In terms of getting out of the house, my nemesis seems to be the little bed in the spare room that calls to me after breakfast. It seems that if I heed that call, I tend to stay home all day and despair over how I’m not getting anything done. And while some days I’ve managed to rally and do something in the evening anyway, I still feel that that little bed is dangerous territory for me. So today I made sure to get dressed and ready right after breakfast even though it was almost time for Matt to get home. I think for now I have to ignore his schedule and just focus on my own, even if it means he spends his break out with me having coffee. I always want to spend as much time with Matt as possible, but I’m often conflicted about imposing my cafe time on his afternoon break. He always insists that the better I’m doing with my own stuff, the better he feels about everything. So in order to keep him happy, I have to make sure I put on my own oxygen mask first, so to speak. It definitely helps that he’s being really clear about his expectations (or lack thereof) for me. Sometimes I imagine he wants me to attend an event or do some shopping or dishes or whatever, when he’s really fine with whether I do it or not. So he lets me know regularly that I’m “off the hook,” but that I’m always invited. And the less pressure for me, the better.

Reverse Diet

November 18, 2019 by Kristin Purcell in Mental Illness, Food

Well, I’m officially starting a reverse diet. It’s all the rage with the body-builders and fitness gurus online, and I’ve finally decided to take part. I’ve alluded to the idea before, but it’s basically a method of slowly increasing your calories over a period of weeks or months so that your body adapts to a new level of caloric maintenance. So by increasing how much you eat slowly enough, you don’t gain weight and you get to eat more. The reason I’ve decided to do this is that I seem to be at the end of the road with my current diet of 1,800 calories. My weight barely changed over the 5-week period before my last weigh-in, and my clothes are still not getting any looser.

Apparently this is what happens to everybody when you’ve been on a diet for long enough: your metabolism slows down. Your body adjusts to taking in fewer calories and you stop losing weight. So in order to get things going again, you need to teach your body to burn more calories. (This means I won’t see any weight loss any time soon, but that seems to be the case anyway.) Theoretically, if I can get my maintenance calories high enough, I can eventually start dieting again and lose more weight. At that point I’ll try a more strategic approach to dieting- taking “diet breaks” every few weeks- so that my metabolism doesn’t slow down again.

But the first step is to add 50 calories to my daily intake every week or two. It’s such a small amount that it’s hard to even measure accurately, but since I have my handy little food scale with me here in the land of grams and milliliters, I should be able to do it.

Complicating all of this is the fact that I’ve changed my weight-lifting workouts a bit. Instead of having “back and biceps day” and “chest and triceps day,” I’m just doing a full body workout 3 times a week. I do 5 machines: Lat pulldowns, chest press, leg press, triceps, and biceps. Since I have rest days in between weight-lifting workouts anyway, it makes sense to take advantage and potentially get stronger by doing a little more. On alternate days, I’m still doing my 20 minutes of uphill walking and slow jogging on the treadmill. In addition to the new workouts though, I’m walking more here in Germany than at home. The gym here is a ten-minute walk away, so there’s an extra 20 minutes of walking 6 days a week, in addition to walking down to the shops here and there.

All of this change in exercise seems to be making me very hungry. I’ve been trying to distract myself with coffee and getting out of the apartment, but I really don’t think I should feel this hungry all the time. Especially since there have been two incidents with some minor bingeing lately, I think that increasing my calories in a controlled manner seems like a good approach all around.

The really weird thing I wanted to mention was that while I was jet-lagging and traveling, I kind of lost my appetite because I was so tired all the time. I couldn’t even get in my full 1,800 calories on several days. That was happening when I first got sick with my recent cold, too. So maybe my body is extra hungry now to try and make up for those times I was eating less. I don’t know.

I just know I need more food. Hopefully if I’m proactive about doing this properly, I won’t end up bingeing and gaining a bunch of weight back. That would be disastrous after all this hard work (I’ve been on a diet for over a year now and have lost 48 pounds) and especially bad for my mental health. As much as I try not to base my self-worth on my size, being heavier in general has led me to some really negative thinking and even suicidal thoughts.

And that is what’s utmost in my mind as I make these food-related decisions. When I was losing weight consistently, I imagined having the luxury of going out to eat once in a while and just estimating my calories. But at this phase of the game, I’m really frustrated with not losing weight and that frustration could blow this whole thing up. And so I always have to eat at home, weighing and measuring every little bite, now getting even more precise so I can inch my calories up over time. It’s really hard. If there were another way to do it that worked for me and my particular situation, I might have a choice. But at this point, I don’t think I do.

And I’m used to having a lot of limitations in my life. I’m used to having to go to the gym, eat the right food, take all my pills, take my Latuda with 350 calories right at bedtime so as to avoid akathisia, never drink alcohol or eat takeout, and get out of the house enough but not push myself too hard. It’s exhausting. But it’s working. So I do it.

Milchreis and Hyper-Palatable Foods

November 15, 2019 by Kristin Purcell in Food, Mental Illness

I didn’t tell you the whole story about the dinkel-puff binge. I’d already had a scare week ago, also on laundry day. Matt had gone to do the laundry himself, since he was taking a cab and wouldn’t need help carrying everything. Alone in the apartment, I had my usual chicken sandwich on “graham brot”- a really dense, healthy bread- with spicy mustard. When I was done, I craved something sweet. I had recently bought some yogurts in “dessert flavors”- chocolate, vanilla, etc.- as well as some individual rice puddings called “milchreis.” These also had flavors, some with a layer of chocolate pudding on the bottom. I ate one of the little yogurts- tiramisu flavored, I believe it was. But then something clicked and I couldn’t stop. I ate both rice puddings without checking the calories beforehand. I was sitting there with this pre-determined decision to eat all the rice pudding. Once it was decided, there was no going back. I ate both pudding cups and then made a frantic dash for the calculator app on my phone.

I had enough calories left for dinner and my nighttime pill snack, so I was safe. But I felt the need to confess to Matt when he came home and I told him I couldn’t buy those little dessert yogurts or puddings anymore. It would have to be plain from now on, maybe with a little honey mixed in. I thought it was the food that was the problem- something too sweet for me to handle, so just not worth eating. I thought I was in the clear. But the whole dinkel-puff incident proved me wrong. It wasn’t the type of food that time. It was an emotional trigger, not a food one.

I do feel there are certain foods that are “hyper-palatable” for me, foods designed to make you keep eating beyond satiety. There’s something about particular concoctions of sugar and fat that make me want to keep eating all of them until they are gone. Donuts, for one. Kinder-schokolade here in Germany, Hanuta as well (chocolate hazelnut wafer sandwiches that led to my demise on our last trip here). I’m learning to accept that these foods are engineered for bingeing and I just can’t handle them. But dinkel-puffs? Puffed spelt? These seem relatively harmless- no fat really, only lightly sweetened. But there’s something about the volume of them per portion that makes me drawn to them when I’m in binge-mode.

Because in this case, the binge-mode precipitated the dinkel-puffs. So one incident with some hyper-palatable puddings is one thing, but going on a mission for binge food tells me something else is going on. I recognize that the laundromat incident triggered me somehow, but I still wonder why this is happening now. Is it something about all the supermarkets being closed on Sundays that leads to a sense of deprivation and scarcity, and sends me into a binge? Or is it just that the food here is so bad in general that I feel desperate for anything that tastes good and has the number of calories on the label?

Because aside from excellent coffee and fresh bread, the food here is practically intolerable. I’ve settled on plain yogurt and fresh fruit for breakfast, though finding good fruit can be hard. Lunch is my pre-packaged deli chicken on whole-grain bread. And for dinner, we’ve finally found a good regular meal by taking fresh rotisserie chicken (from the takeout window of a nearby restaurant) and combining it with broth, sesame oil, soy sauce, scallions, broccoli, and kimchi, all from the Asian market, to make chicken soup. It’s very tricky to get everything hot enough at the same time, but we’ve managed to get it right by using 7 bowls, the kettle, and the microwave. Snacks have been muesli, toast with butter, yogurt with honey, or oat cookies (which for some unknown reason don’t trigger a binge for me).

Aside from these regular meals, I honestly shudder at the typical offerings of schnitzel and leberkäse (liver cheese?) that everyone here seems to enjoy. The day-old, flat rolls with cheese melted on them (maybe meant to represent a pizza?) are inedible, as are the prepared sandwiches at bakeries that feature only a thin slice of salami and one sharp piece of lettuce for garnish. And the worst of it has to be “curry-wurst”- chopped up hotdogs with ketchup squirted all over them, served with fries. We can’t afford the Italian restaurants that have decent food (pizza and pasta) and I can’t be bothered to guess the number of calories involved. So maybe feeling so limited in terms of choice is part of the problem and could account for why I’m having binge-scares all of a sudden.

My real concern, though, is whether it’s just the restriction of dieting that has me wound tight like a spring, just waiting to be set off into a binge. I worry that now that I’m not losing weight on my diet, I’m rebelling against it and having these mini-binges. There are so many reasons that could explain why this is happening now, but I don’t know how to address any of them. I’m trying to get on track with my routines and not push myself too much, but I’m also feeling better sometimes when I do push myself. I’ve actually socialized a little bit with and without Matt there, and I’ve been really proud of how well it went. But then on laundry day, I pushed myself again and things went awry. So finding the right balance between pushing and not pushing- that seems important. Keeping myself from feeling deprived also seems key. (Maybe adding some bulk to my lunch would help curb the snack cravings- some cole slaw or something?) But the really crucial issue seems to be coping with my anger in some way other than eating. How, I have yet to figure out.

The Dinkel-Puff Binge

November 13, 2019 by Kristin Purcell in Food, Mental Illness

I binged yesterday. I just scraped by, keeping my daily tally to 2000 calories, but it was a close one. I was tired, worn out. I was at the laundromat with Matt and a friend of ours and I started stirring myself into a rage. There was a large family with noisy children, a lot of shouting, a lot of banging around and taking over the whole laundromat, smoking cigarettes at the edge of the door so it filled the place with smoke, and finally, men taking their shirts off in public. While Matt and our friend were working, I was trying to listen to a book that required some concentration, and while I hung in there for some time, I finally cracked. I started doing this thing where I complain about people loudly (and of course, in English) in hopes that they will overhear and get their shit together. This never works, so I finally decided to walk home.

On my way home, I was furious. I was furious at everyone on the street, especially the people in my way, and I’m sure I wasn’t hiding my anger very well. I was on a tear, and I wanted to eat. I became fixated on some puffed spelt cereal I had seen at the DM (the “pharmacy” without a pharmacy where you buy your shampoo and stuff). It was in this little health food section in the back and I made a beeline for it. I was disappointed to see that the “dinkel gepufft” had more calories than I expected. I knew I wanted to eat the whole bag. I was looking for volume. I was looking for transgression. I bought the dinkel puffs and stormed my way out of there, back to our hotel and up the 5 flights of stairs to the safety and privacy of our apartment.

When I checked the calories again, 373 per 100 grams, I decided to just have muesli instead for 351 calories per 100 grams. I weighed out the muesli on my little food scale I had ordered on Amazon and ate it with some almond milk. Unsatisfied, I opened up the spelt puffs and weighed out 50g of those. It filled a cereal bowl, so not bad, I figured. I wolfed them down while watching a Youtube video about makeup. And then I weighed out serving after serving until I’d eaten the rest of the bag, the momentum of the binge a force all its own. I had set this trajectory, and it would not be stopped until I had done something “wrong.” I ran out of almond milk on the last bowl so I added a splash of whole milk that I use in my coffee. Once the bag was empty, I stopped eating. I nervously took out my phone and opened the calculator app to survey the damage.

Breakfast 350 calories
Coffee creamer 80 calories
Dinkel puffs 746 calories
Almond milk 50 calories
Whole milk 64 calories
Muesli 351 calories

Total: 1,641 calories

This left me 159 calories for my 350 calorie nighttime snack that I need to take with my Latuda in order for it to work. Extending my daily allowance to 2,000 calories instead of 1,800 brought me to just 9 calories under my limit. I had squeaked by, provided I didn’t eat anything else until bedtime.

Matt came home and I confessed. He suggested I focus on just getting back on track tomorrow and trying to take care of myself for the rest of the day. He gave me a foot rub and I fell asleep for a few hours. When I woke up, I didn’t know what to do, so I watched some Youtube and got ready for bed. I ate my 350 calories of oat cookies and took my pills.

I felt defeated and scared. Is there something about Germany that makes me binge? This little episode was dangerously similar to what happened on our last stay in this little apartment, the time when I started gaining weight and couldn’t stop. The time Matt had to rub my feet every day to distract me from the mental and emotional agony I was in. The time I had to go home early and get my medication changed by my doctor.

I don’t want to go home this time. I don’t want to be alone in Rhode Island. But I also can’t start bingeing again. And today, the morning after, I feel scared. I feel like I’m starting over. I feel like I “blew it” and I’m no longer going to have any control over my eating.

This morning, I somehow managed to put my gym clothes on, to pack my bag, and since Matt had some rare time off, he came with me to the gym. We came home and I had my usual breakfast- fruit and plain yogurt. I got dressed to go to the cafe, and Matt came with me again.

But this feeling of failure still lingers. This feeling like I don’t know how it happened. If I trace it back, the trigger was feeling like people were being assholes, I was in the right, and there was nothing I could do to rectify the situation. This is exactly what happened many months ago when I had a screaming match with my Trump-supporting neighbors and I binged on candied nuts. It’s the same feeling I have when I think about current U.S. politics, when I think about how there’s no point in getting upset about it when the bad guys always win.

Maybe I can learn from this. Maybe I can recognize the danger of these types of situations for me and find some way to disengage the momentum of the binge. But I’m scared. I felt out of control. I felt full of rage and indignance. I felt like the binge was happening and I had no say in it whatsoever. So how do I keep this from happening again?

Germany Trip Updates

November 11, 2019 by Kristin Purcell in Mental Illness

With so much going on on this trip to Würzburg, Germany, I feel like I have a few things to catch you up on. There’s not a great deal of culture shock, especially having visited Germany many times before for Matt’s work, but there are always certain adjustments to deal with. Here are some of the highlights (or lowlights):

1. Jet Lag and Church Bells. Jet lag lasted a full week once we arrived in Germany, and no amount of sleeping or napping could cure it. In addition to the trouble of my internal body-clock, there were the church bells. Our apartment is right across the street from a church which rings its bells every 15 minutes, with long, elaborate songs played several times a day and a giant cuckoo-clock type wooden-figure parade sometime in the middle of the afternoon. In addition to these disturbances, 7am is apparently “Bells O’Clock” where every church in Würzburg rings its bells wildly, shaming anyone who feels the need to sleep past 7. Not helpful.

2. The Hobbit House. This is our nickname for our little apartment at the top floor of a medieval-feeling hotel which caters to guests of the nearby theater. Here I should mention the bizarre decor lining the walls of the stairways: there are innumerable portraits of bedraggled teddy-bears dressed in little outfits and posed outside various castles and monuments. I have no words.

But back to the apartment. It’s situated in the eaves of the rooftop and the walls are lined in real hardwood planks. There’s a stunning spiral staircase (also wood) up to a second floor loft where the beds are. As is typical in Germany, there are two single beds which we push together and constantly fall between during the night. This apartment could be really beautiful if you removed all of the decor and gave it a deep clean. Instead it is very dirty with home-made paintings on the walls and no stove to cook with. We were pleasantly surprised to see that the toaster oven had been replaced, but as expected, the kettle had not. Thankfully, we had already ordered one on Amazon and stashed the disgusting one away in a cupboard. One day, in the midst of my jet lag, I drank some strong coffee and scoured the entire kitchen. I poured boiling water on all the silverware and scrubbed every useful plate, glass, and mug, laying paper towel down on the shelves of the cabinets. I sanitized the drawers and their contents and even the mini dustpan and brush that I use to “de-crumb” the table. This means we no longer have to guess which forks are clean every time we reach for one, and don’t have to wash out every mug before using it.

3. Towels and Pillows. I can’t explain the extreme issue with towels and pillows here. Towels are always thin, rough, disintegrating rags, seemingly starched when washed. I bought us our own plush bath towels from TK Maxx and we just use those. Why no one else seems to do the same is a complete mystery. Pillows are also a mystery. Fluffy, large squares that your head goes right through, we have yet to find a German pillow you can actually sleep on. We joke that it’s like having a bag of soup cans under your head at night, except that those might actually keep your head off the mattress, and so would be an improvement. TK Maxx had identical useless bags of fluff, so we’ve been sleeping on the couch pillows (which are completely normal) with pillow cases on them.

4. Grocery Store Checkout. For reasons unbeknownst to me, when the cashiers at the supermarkets here scan your stuff through, they throw your fruit and yogurt onto a tiny shelf from which you must rescue your food before it falls on the floor. There are no bag boys, and there are no bags. If you remember to bring your own bag, you can sometimes catch it all and quickly stash it away before fishing for exact change, which all cashiers here seem to demand. If you have a whole cartful, however, you must simply dump everything back into the cart after scanning and then go over to a little shelf at the front of the store to bag everything on your own time. I will never understand.

5. Finally, I have yet to tell you about the gym. We were lucky enough to find a gym that would give us 2-month memberships and let us pay for them in cash. The gym is very nice, quiet and clean, and has appropriate equipment for us to complete our thrice-weekly, full-body workout. There are only two treadmills in the place, but no one ever seems to be on them when we’re there, so I’ve taken the 10-minute walk there just to do my 20-minute uphill walking and slow jogging. The real mind-boggler here for me was the group showers. I was excited by the prospect of washing my hair at the gym where the water pressure is excellent (our water pressure at the apartment is non-existent). But I was quite surprised by the group showers in the ladies’ locker room. In the U.S. in my experience, the standard is to have private stalls, each with a tiny ante-room in which to dry off and get dressed. Apparently in Germany, it’s not. So I had my first public naked experience on my first day at the gym. I was obliviously washing my hair, soaping up, when another woman walked in to shower. She barely got wet and was on her way out when she started telling me something in German. After multiple hand gestures and confusion, I realized I was supposed to use this giant squeegee on a pole to push the water down the drain since the shower floor is flat. I frantically did so, completely nude and apologizing in German. The ultimate mind-boggler at the gym, however, is the co-ed sauna and relaxation area. Men are just walking around, penises swinging, showering and squeegeeing, lying in the sauna, drinking tea on the recliners. So far I have yet to see another woman in the sauna, and I can see why. But I’m also determined to get my money’s worth and take full advantage of the sauna, so I do go in there when Matt’s with me. Usually we both get weirded out in 5-10 minutes and retreat to the locker rooms.

Well, this pretty much sums up the culture shock so far on our trip to Würzburg. A good friend of Matt’s is here working with him for the first time and it’s alternately hilarious and terrifying to hear about her own experience of the culture here. I have to say, it’s great fun having a witness to some of the oddities and unexpected twists. But I also feel embarrassed for Germany sometimes when she encounters baffling, creepy, and even offensive behavior by her co-workers and the public at large. That said, I’m enjoying my coffee at a lovely cafe and no one is bothering me despite my sitting here for hours writing. I had a peaceful workout (and shower) at the gym today. And people are generally very understanding when you tell them your German is terrible and could they possibly speak in English? I feel especially lucky that Matt has so many more work opportunities here than in the States. And the more often I come here, the more I understand.

Just Keep Going

November 09, 2019 by Kristin Purcell in Mental Illness

So I’m in Germany. Again. This time we’re back in a small city called Würzburg in the south of Germany. We’ve stayed here before- I’ve mentioned how two years ago I had medication problems and had to go home early. This is where we were when that all happened. And I’m really afraid that it’s happening again. The first week was tough, but I was often surprised at how well I was coping with the hectic travel schedule, the airports, the buses, the trains, the rain. Matt’s still been sick this whole time so it was especially hard for him traveling, and I think on some level, I was able to keep it together to spare him the burden of my mood swings.

He started work as soon as we got here and we hit the gym on our second full day- pretty impressive, I think. We did miss out on one weightlifting day with all the travel, but with all the running through airports and lugging suitcases on trains, I’ve managed to let it go. I also let myself off the hook on some of my run/walk days since I was walking at a good clip around the city, finding provisions for our stay. But yesterday I actually put my gym clothes on and ran in the park for 10 minutes and I felt like it made a big difference to get the running in, so I’m going to get back to it. The gym is a 10-minute walk from the apartment, so I figure I’ll walk there, do a 10-minute run on the treadmill, and walk home, and that should cover it for my cardio days. On those days I’ll be able to go in the morning, which is what I’m used to at home. Lifting days have to be in the afternoon, though, because of Matt’s work schedule, so that’s put a little kink in the works.

After our workout today, I thought Matt just wanted to rest, but after a few minutes of not feeling sleepy, he suggested we go to a cafe so I could write. I had a sandwich and started to get dressed before determining that I just wasn’t up to it. For some reason, this resulted in a deluge of tears and questioning of my life choices. Matt, already beyond stressed from work and being sick, came to my aid and tried to reason with me. I felt so ashamed and frustrated at not being able to go out- I’m just so sick of being mentally ill and being so limited in what I’m able to do. I wanted so much more for myself than what I have, and it makes my head explode that all I was able to do today was run to the drugstore and go to the gym. I used to be able to push myself, to power through and work and perform. And now I’m struggling to just get my food on track and my workouts in place.

Matt pointed out that I really did power through our whole travel debacle and days of jet lag and not sleeping through the night. I guess he’s right. But at the same time that I’m sobbing and he’s consoling me, I feel horribly guilty that he’s having to do this when he has a rehearsal in less than an hour. And that guilt just makes me want to disappear- to erase myself from the equation and not be one more problem for him. I eventually took some Klonopin and mellowed out a bit, but I knew I’d kept him home longer than he wanted and I feel horrible for that. Now the last couple days weren’t like this. I actually managed to get to the cafe twice in the past 2 days and do some writing. I even had a brief social interaction with Matt’s good friend and colleague who I know from years ago.

I don’t know, maybe I overdid it. Maybe I’m taking on too much too quickly, but I really like it here and I really want to enjoy this time away from our suburban life in Rhode Island. It’s so nice when Matt gets to do his actual job, the thing he’s really good at, and I want to support him as best I can. But crying and ranting about how my life is over and nothing I do matters and how I fucked everything up and there’s no getting it back- that’s not exactly helping him. So I’ve just got to get back to my schedule: exercise, shower, breakfast, get dressed, go to a cafe, and write something- anything. I have so much to say about this trip so far, so much I’m dying to write about. But I guess I’m still finding my feet- it’s only been 8 days after all- and there’s nothing to do but keep going. That’s how I got through all the travel and getting situated- just keep moving. It’s stopping to think that keeps tripping me up. Dwelling on the past, comparing myself to others, thinking of what could have been, if only…. That stuff might kill me. I just need to keep going.

Dublin Debacle

November 07, 2019 by Kristin Purcell in Mental Illness, Food

We decided that this time around, we would stop over in Dublin for a night before continuing on to our stay in Germany. Due to several cancellations by the airlines, we couldn’t take a direct flight, so stopping in Dublin was our best option. And since the only flights to Europe from Boston are red-eyes, we’re always exhausted halfway through. That feeling that you’d pay a million dollars for a bed and a pillow is brutal, since neither Matt nor I can sleep on planes. So we thought we’d try checking into an airport hotel when we arrived in Dublin in the morning. The catch, of course, was having to lug our checked bags on and off the hotel shuttle and around the airport parking areas. In the rain.

Since I didn’t know what our food options would be at the hotel, I went looking for a shop to buy some prepackaged snacks to get me through the day. I found a little convenience store inside the airport and got a couple yogurts, some crackers, some soft cheese wedges, some rice cakes with chocolate on them, and a Coke Zero. I hoped I’d be able to get a salad or something at the hotel cafe, but this stuff combined with our stash of Larabars could easily cover me if I couldn’t.

After a 20 minute (not 5 minute, like the website said) ride to the hotel, we checked into our room. Relieved that they checked us in early, we opened the door to the room that time forgot. The carpet was matted down to a burgundy piece of felt, cigarette burns dotting it every few feet. The beds were squeaky and you could feel the springs right through them, and the furniture was nothing short of amazing in that it was straight from the 70s. Literally.

Matt politely called the front desk to complain about the cigarette smoke smell, and they were kind enough to switch us to a renovated room on the next floor. Meanwhile, I was so desperate to wash the airplane smell off of me that I actually ran a bath in hopes that at least there was hot water. Matt returned with the new keys to find me sitting in a pool of filth, dirt actually floating on the surface of the water. He applauded my good-natured attempt to pretend that the room was OK, but suggested I get out of the tub before I got some kind of infection.

The new room was a vast improvement. I no longer felt the threat of ringworm or bedbugs and after a long, hot shower, Matt and I descended into the plush white bedding to catch up on sleep. We awoke around dinner time and went downstairs in search of food. There was a casual pub area in the lobby where the prices didn’t seem outrageous, so we went in there and looked at the menu. I saw a green salad with broccolini, quinoa, and cranberries that looked promising. I ordered it without the cranberries, and with oil and vinegar on the side. You could add chicken for a Euro fifty, so I decided to get a double portion of chicken (I assumed that at that price, there probably wouldn’t be much). But when my food arrived, there were two massive chicken breasts on top of some sad looking lettuce and some questionable broccolini. The broccolini didn’t taste exactly rotten, but it was close. For some unknown reason, I ate it all, save some of the chicken which Matt took off my hands. Well, I paid for it dearly with awful stomach cramps all night. Neither of us was able to sleep through the night anyway since jet lag was throwing us off so badly, so we started our return to the airport just as exhausted as if we had skipped the hotel altogether.

Included with our room was a free breakfast, and Matt wanted to take advantage. We thought maybe they’d have oatmeal or fruit or something less volatile than the double chicken salad. We also thought that it would be a quick buffet since all the guests would be rushing off to the airport, but no. With true Irish hospitality, we were met at the front of a dining room by a host who asked for our room number. Matt told him, and we started to follow him to a table where we would have to order from a menu. Before we could get there, another employee confronted me and asked for my room number. We explained that we were already being shown to our seats when she insisted on taking our luggage from us. Already tight on time, this was the last straw for me, and I cursed and stormed out of the place, heading straight for the shuttle. While on the 25 minute ride back to the airport, I complained loudly about the length of the ride, the process involved with breakfast, and the horror of the first room they had given us. While no one seemed to notice, much less care, Matt suggested we simply leave an honest review on Trip Advisor, including the pictures of the first room that he took. This got me to calm down and stop being so embarrassingly rude. I turned my attention to getting through the next leg of our trip without throwing a fit.

I've Already Packed Wrong

November 04, 2019 by Kristin Purcell in Clothes, Minimalism

This is really no great surprise. I knew I was packing for a wide range of temperatures, having no idea what havoc climate change might wreak upon Germany during my visit. I packed based on the knowledge that it had already dropped to freezing temperatures this fall in the town we’re staying in. But I also packed based on the shocking, record-setting highs we experienced in Berlin in June earlier this year. Yet another factor in my planning was the knowledge that there would be no surprise washing machine in our apartment the way there was in Berlin (we’ve stayed in this place before and I could pretty much guarantee that there haven’t been any “improvements” since then). So I was sure I’d have to get through at least a week between washings. I packed knowing that I’d be exercising 6 days a week, as is strictly regimented for the sake of my mental health. And I packed knowing it had rained in this little town every day for the two weeks prior to our departure. This all resulted in a 50 pound suitcase plus backpack, and an unhappy time for all.

I first realized I had packed wrong during our journey to Germany. Wheeling my unwieldy suitcase through the Dublin airport on our stopover, outside in the rain for what seemed like a half-mile to the hotel shuttle bus stop, hauling it on and off said shuttle bus on the way to the hotel, hauling it on and off the shuttle bus yet again on our return to the airport, then up and down various stairs and escalators just to check the bag in again, I decided I had made some bad packing decisions. Upon arriving in Frankfurt, I realized again how wrongly I had packed, hauling my suitcase off the baggage claim, sweating and cursing my way to the adjacent train station, waiting with the bags by a garbage can while Matt sprinted to the grocery store to buy us some snacks for the train. We hauled our bags onto the train, praying that we had followed the map of the train cars correctly so we’d board near our seats and not have to make the walk of shame through car after car with our massive luggage. Upon our surprising success, we found room in the designated space for larger luggage and crammed ourselves and our backpacks into our seats. We enjoyed a sweaty yogurt and a Larabar before arriving at our destination where we dragged our bags down and then up the stairs of the train station and pushed them through more rain to the taxi stand. Once we reached the apartment, Matt carried the suitcases, one at a time, up the five flights of stairs to our apartment while I dealt with the backpacks and duffel bag.

Throughout this whole debacle, we kept questioning where we had gone wrong. Why was no one around us suffering the way we were? Why was nobody else sweating or struggling or even running for the train? Beyond that, why were my favorite bloggers recommending using a facial mist on the plane when I couldn’t even reach down to get a pen from my backpack without injuring several other passengers? Why are other bloggers harping on about the importance of drinking lots of water on planes in order to “stay hydrated”? I was trying not to drink anything because I avoid the airplane bathrooms like the plague, especially considering I might actually catch one from using them.

What is it that we’re not getting here? Do we pack too much? Do we stay away for too long? I kept thinking of those old movies where a woman goes on vacation to the Bahamas for 6 weeks and has porters loading trunks and hat boxes onto carts and wheeling them around while she is impeccably dressed in a skirt and heels, not a hair out of place. Is that the problem? Does traveling with more than a carry-on require servants? We couldn’t possibly be the only people with heavy bags, but we were certainly the only people schlepping them up and down escalators in search of food with the caloric content printed on it.

And now, having endured all that, the mild weather here has been an absolute affront. It’s alternately sunny and cool, then muggy and raining, leaving you somehow both sweating through your clothes yet always a little too chilly. I cannot figure out what to wear. Sweaters seem like too much, but my parka sounds like a good idea. I don’t want to drench the hems of my trousers in the rain, so I keep throwing on skinny jeans to run down to the shops. I’m spending most of my time in gym clothes or pajamas, but since I’m managing to wear them multiple times without washing them, the quantities seem wholly excessive. I keep reaching for the same lightweight socks, so as one would expect, my 18 pairs seem completely over the top.

It just goes to show that with climate change, you really can’t predict the weather these days. It also goes to show that despite my meticulous tracking and analysis of my wardrobe during my last trip, I still have no sense of what I wear and how much I wear it. In this case, I put it down to season. What I wore in June doesn’t really help me in October. And what was plenty of stuff when we had a washer may be too little without one. Matt did our laundry for the first time on Sunday, and between our dirtying of all the towels and going through so many workout T-shirts, it was no small feat. (It just dawned on me that if I’d really packed “correctly,” I’d be hauling my entire suitcase to the laundromat every week. Phew.)

Maybe it’s OK to just recognize how wrong I’ve been, and hope that I learn from this trip. Then again, we still have 7 weeks left, so who knows what I’ll need during that time? I know I’m more than prepared, but I do wish I didn’t have to carry all this luggage here and back. Since I don’t see a butler entering my life anytime in the near future, I guess I just have to put up with it this time.

Even More Packing

November 01, 2019 by Kristin Purcell in Clothes, Minimalism

Well, I’ve met my limit. My weight limit. For my suitcase. Let me start at the beginning.

I easily fit all my clothes for Germany into one half of my new suitcase, and only had to fit shoes and vitamins and a few bits and bobs into the other side. There was so much room left that Matt even piled in some of his clothes. But when we weighed it all with our little luggage scale, it was over 60 pounds. The limit for checked bags is 23 kilos (or 50 pounds), so this would not fly (get it?). And this is what kills me: Why do they make suitcases this big if you can’t fill them without going over weight?

Matt’s smaller suitcase was a measly 35 pounds, so we started the endless game of redistributing the heavy items to get them both under the limit. But there were still lots of things we hadn’t packed yet- two pounds of Larabars, for example. We always stock up on these for travel since we save so much money on airport/airplane/train station food. And then my modest amount of toiletries contributed to the heft, too- I guess two months worth of eczema cream and medicated shampoo really add up. Once all the last-minute things went in- our electric toothbrush and charger, Matt’s electric clippers, etc.- both bags were pushing 50 pounds.

And then Matt decided to bring our DSLR camera onto the plane instead of checking it, and he thought it would be wise to wrap it up in a big sweatshirt and put it in a duffel bag. So then, somehow, things started being added to the duffel bag- my purse, some sandwiches, my scarf, etc.- and we ended up with a whole carry on bag in addition to our suitcases and backpacks (our backpacks count as “personal items” that hold our laptops, my pills, important notebooks, some liquids).

It’s moments like these that make me rethink this whole idea that I’m a minimalist at all. I always say to myself that packing for two months should be no different than packing for a week- we’ll be doing laundry, after all. But somehow it never works out that way for me. I dream of fitting everything I need into a carry-on roller bag and a purse like I see the bloggers doing, but give me an inch and I apparently take 23 kilos.

Matt tried to start pulling out some of his clothes: “I don’t need two sweatshirts,” he said. But he wears one every day to rehearsal, so I insisted he bring them both. His clothes were clearly not the problem. I mean, how much could a sweatshirt really weigh? My vitamins weigh 3 pounds. Now there’s something I wish I could leave behind. But I’ve never seen vitamins for sale in Germany, and I couldn’t be sure that I could buy them there. Well, what about our shoes? Were they the problem? I don’t think so. Between the two of us there were just 3 pairs of sneakers and Matt’s dress shoes. I racked my brain, trying to come up with some way to cut back, but I just couldn’t. We legitimately needed everything we packed.

And it all makes me wonder why they never show this part of packing in all those “Pack With Me” Youtube videos and blogs. The rearranging of items, the consideration of weight limits. They always show you how to roll up your clothes and put them in little packing cubes, not a luggage scale in sight. But I’ve never had an issue with fitting things in- that seems pretty basic to me. I don’t require any instruction on how to cram things into my suitcase. It’s a strategic approach to the weight limit that I want to know about. With most European airlines weighing your carry-on as well as your checked bag, I really want to know exactly what people are doing. The only weight-related tip I can find is to wear your heaviest items on the plane to keep your suitcase a little lighter. I already do this- I’d never dream of trying to pack my boots or my belt when I can just wear them free of charge.

Are they just not showing the reality in those packing videos? Are they paying overweight fees at check-in? Are they squatting on the floor, pulling items out of their checked bag and wearing them instead? No one’s ever mentioned it. Every time I check my bag, I’m holding my breath that our scale was accurate enough and that we won’t end up on the airport floor, frantically rearranging our personal effects while trying not to get stepped on.

So what am I doing wrong? Do I just have maximalist tendencies when it comes to travel? I don’t know. I think one glaring difference between me and those minimalist packers is that I have to pack my pills. My backpack is full of them, leaving little room for anything else. And those 3 pounds of vitamins certainly don’t help anything. Then with Matt still battling a sinus infection, he has his own medicine cabinet’s worth of drugs to take with him (you can’t buy things like Sudafed or melatonin in Germany, so you have to plan ahead with the over-the-counter stuff, too).

After all was said and done, I still ended up with (including my plane outfit) 4 pairs of pants, 4 sweaters, 3 pairs of shoes, 2 coats, 3 pairs of leggings, a fleece, a button-down, a scarf, and all the requisite T-shirts, socks, bras, and underwear. Sure, I could have cut back, but with the weather being so drastically unpredictable, I couldn’t figure out how. And so I have a giant suitcase and a backpack to lug around, plus Matt has the duffel bag, too.

No matter how many times we take these two-month trips, I never seem to get the hang of packing. I can’t get it into my head that I always need less than I bring, that it’s no great tragedy if I run out of socks and have to buy a pair. I insist on being over-prepared and over-burdened. Maybe next time will be better- simpler, I think. But I think I’m just an over-packer. There, I said it. Renounce my minimalist membership right now.

Pill Packing

October 30, 2019 by Kristin Purcell in Mental Illness

Okay, so clothes are settled. Now for the most anxiety-inducing part of packing: pill packing. It’s a rather elaborate process for me when I’m going to be out of the country for two months or more, but I think I’ve finally got the hang of it. That said, the stakes are high and there are a lot of moving parts, so it always stresses me out.

Step One: Figure out how much medication you need. I like to start from whatever day it is, and just count how many days until I’m home from the trip. This way I account for all the meds I need leading up to the trip, plus whatever I’ll need to bring with me. Since I started the counting process on October 5th, I counted up 63 days from October 5th until I get home on December 6th. Then I like to add on a buffer period in case a volcano erupts and I’m stranded in Europe for a couple of weeks longer. So I added 14 days to my tally, bringing the total up to 77 days. Now, some pills I take twice a day, so those ones went up to 154. And fish oil I take 4 of per day, so I need 308 of those. Now that I’ve got the numbers worked out, I can move on to step two.

Step Two: Get your refills in order. Once I have my numbers squared away on how much of each drug I need, I get in touch with my doctor and have him call in enough refills to cover me.

Step Three: Get your hands on the meds. There are several ways to go about this. First, I try to time my prescription pick-up date so I get a 3-month supply soon before I leave (this happened to work out for me for the majority of my prescriptions). If the timing’s not quite right, I switch to 30 day supplies until the pick-up right before the trip when I get a 90-day supply. Another way I go about it is I get a “vacation override” from my insurance company so they let me pick up more than 30 days’ worth (I had to do this for one of my meds that wasn’t timed right for a 90-day pick-up). My final approach is to have my doctor over-prescribe. This was necessary for me for my anti-anxiety medication. You just can’t get more than 30 days’ worth of a controlled substance in my state, so even a vacation override wasn’t going to help. In this case, my doctor agreed to prescribe double the dose which, in combination with the extra I had socked away, worked out just fine to get me through the trip.

Step Four: Count ‘em up. I like to spread out my stash on a large, flat surface (the dining room table is best for me). I rip open all the little pharmacy bags and arrange the bottles according to medication, including with them whatever current bottles I have going. Then I make a written list of each drug and jot down my count as I go. For example, if I have an open bottle of 17 pills for the first drug, I write that down next to the name of the drug. Then I dump out the next bottle of the same drug and count that (call me crazy for recounting what the pharmacist already counted, but I just like to be sure there’s no mistake). If I have sealed factory bottles of pills, I trust the number on the label. I write down how many are in every bottle, so let’s say it’s 17+60+180 which adds up to 257. Next, I separate the number of pills I need for the trip and the time leading up to it, plus the buffer, so 154 in this case (2 pills a day). I set aside the rest to leave at home, usually in one of the bottles, but sometimes I have to use little ziplock bags with sticky labels saying what drug and dose it is. I repeat this process for every single drug and vitamin that I need, setting aside all the extra for safe keeping at home. That way, if something disastrous happens to my travel supply, I can always fly home and have meds to return to. This may all seem excessive, but I’m just extremely aware of the gravity of my illness and the importance of taking my meds. And I realize how complicated it is to get psychiatric medication when you’re in a foreign country. It’s not like traveling domestically, where you can just have a prescription called in to a pharmacy wherever you are. There are often entirely different medications and certainly different laws on prescribing them depending on the country.

Step Five: Leave all the pills and vitamins in their original bottles, never combining them to save space. This is in case anyone in airport security questions my possession of so many prescriptions. I make sure they all have my name on them and contain no more than the pill count on the label. Having my meds confiscated would force me to return home to my backup supply, so I like to be overly cautious in carrying them. I always, always carry them in my “personal item”- the bag that goes under the seat in front of you- so I never lose sight of them. I don’t even want to risk putting them in the overhead bin, should someone steal them or take my bag my mistake. I’m less protective of my vitamins, and since they’re so bulky, I’ll even put them in my checked baggage. I don’t know if I’d be able to replace them on my trip if they got lost, but I’m not dependent on them for my mood stability- they’re just supplemental.

Step Six: Dole out a week’s worth of pills into daily pill cases. I like to do this the night before I leave, so I don’t have to delve into my larger stash until I’ve reached my destination, even if there are travel delays. I actually have 3 pill cases- morning, afternoon, and night- plus a little pouch for emergencies (anxiety medication, ibuprofen, etc.). I keep these in my personal item, too, for easy access during travel.

So there you have it: my self-devised, step-by-step guide to traveling abroad with a bucketload of psychiatric medication. I really think it’s worth being meticulous and methodical in preparing my prescriptions. Jet lag and red-eye flights are difficult enough to cope with without going through withdrawal or developing symptoms. This whole pill-packing process can be daunting, but it’s so worth doing in order to avoid any major medical issues on the trip.

Packing Panic

October 29, 2019 by Kristin Purcell in Clothes, Mental Illness, Minimalism

I’ve been laying low lately. Matt’s still sick and I haven’t been up to going out by myself. We’re still exercising daily, but I’ve lost several days otherwise to just staying in bed, panicking. Our departure for our next Germany trip is imminent, and I’m focused, of course, on packing.

My anxiety is probably more related to the upheaval of my routine, the stress of traveling, and the memory of my despair the last time we lived in this little town called Würzburg. That was almost exactly two years ago, and I’d had to return home almost a month early because of problems with my medication- specifically, that it had stopped working. I was taking Adderall and had had great improvement overall, but at that time it had been several months on the stuff. And as one would experience with any amphetamine, I developed a tolerance to it and was getting diminishing returns. I started bingeing and couldn’t stop, and Matt had to come home from long days at work to me sobbing and feeling suicidal.

But now, as is so common for me, my anxiety is manifesting as concern about clothes. I’m often lying in bed with Matt, going over and over various packing plans. We’ve managed to hem all our pants that needed hemming- well, Matt really did it all- but I did manage to make a decision about just how long my new black dress pants should be. It had me seized up for some time: Do I hem them to the right length to wear with boots? With sneakers? Heels? We eventually settled on a length that worked for both boots and sneakers, and I’m actually surprised at how great they look with my white Adidas sneakers. I feel very Scandi-chic. So my men’s pants are all set- I’ll pack these black ones and my grey ones.

But I want to bring a pair of jeans, too, and that’s become an issue. After wearing my newly-doctored jeans with the “button extender,” I decided it was just ridiculous to walk around with my top button unbuttoned and stashed them away in my storage bin. Then I went back to the most-recently-purchased-on-Ebay jeans: the ones marked 40 but that have a 38 inch waist. I’ve decided they look like clown pants, so they’re not coming to Europe either. So much for my Ebay denim finds. This leaves me with only two more options: my black skinny jeans, which are pretty baggy and therefore not necessarily offensive to my sensibilities, and my blue skinny jeans which I had resolutely decided against wearing in the recent past. I felt rather strongly that they were somehow objectifying and ruled them out of my wardrobe. But I left them in my closet, and they’ve started to look more and more like a decent option. I hemmed and hawed over it for days, and finally decided that I was in a desperate-enough situation to wear them. So I’ll wear the black ones on the plane, and pack the blue pair as my fourth option for pants. I rationalized this by saying how it would probably rain a lot and I wouldn’t want my men’s pants’ hems to get wet, so skinny jeans would be a practical choice. This also spared me from any panicky shopping and spending $60 on jeans that might only fit for a couple of months. So pants are finally settled.

T-shirts are pretty easy- I’ll bring all 9, knowing we won’t have a washer and I’ll have to get through at least a week between laundry days. Also, they’re small and light, so no great burden to my suitcase. Underwear are the same case- bring all 12 since they’re small and light, plus we’ll be going to the gym so I’ll need some spares. For some reason I still find it necessary to travel with 18 pairs of socks: 6 for working out, 6 for boots, and 6 for sneakers (my new thinner crew socks are designated for sneakers in colder weather). Again, they’re small and light, so I can justify it. I know I’ll bring both my coats- the parka and the raincoat, wearing the parka on the plane so I can squish it into its little bag and use it as a pillow when I inevitably get too hot. I’ve already decided not to bring any heels for opening night- I’ll just wear my boots, figuring no one will notice anyway. My black silky blouse with my black pants should dress them up enough.

But now the real dilemma: layers. Since I’ll have both coats, I feel pretty covered (get it?) weather-wise. But if it gets really cold, I’ll need to think about sweaters and whatnot. I think I’ll bring my green shirt- it can go over sweaters or be worn as a light jacket on its own. But I’ve been in a fit of anxiety trying to decide on sweaters. I only own 7, and one is strictly for summer, so you think it’d be easy. But it’s hard to not just pack your whole capsule wardrobe- when you have so little, every item seems essential. But I have to narrow it down.

My super-thick grey zip-up cardigan is really bulky, but seems absolutely necessary. My grey and black cashmere pullovers are a no-brainer; they’re both lightweight and super warm. Part of me wants to just bring those two. But I keep thinking it’ll get freezing cold and I’ll be left with not enough warm clothes. I also worry about my two favorite sweaters getting worn out, since I’ll most likely need a sweater every day. So I’m thinking maybe my thicker pink cashmere pullover would be good too, even if just to wear around the apartment, or to add a little color to my wardrobe. I also own a thinner, black, non-cashmere sweater and a really light grey cardigan with pointelle holes in the sleeves. I’ve been over and over it in my mind, thinking of what could be worn on the plane and what might be necessary in unpredictable weather. We were really thrown on our last trip to Berlin by scorching temperatures and high humidity when the summers are supposed to be mild there. This time around, Matt heard from a colleague that it’s already hit zero degrees Celsius (freezing), so I need to be prepared for winter temperatures.

After a ridiculous amount of contemplation and discussion with Matt, going through every possible combination, I hit upon a novel idea: I wouldn’t bring the warmest or the lightest options. I’d bring all 3 cashmere options, the pink one being quite thick, and then wear the thinner black non-cashmere sweater on the plane. I usually get really hot when traveling, so it seems like a good lightweight layer for both airports and mild weather.

All of these clothes fit into one half of my suitcase except for shoes- my Adidas and my running shoes. I’ll wear my belt and scarf on the plane with one of my T-shirts, the black jeans, and my boots. Now I just have to figure out everything else.

Bra Do-Over, Jeans, and Everlane Order

October 28, 2019 by Kristin Purcell in Clothes

Okay, I realize this is pretty ridiculous, but I went back to Kohl’s and exchanged the bra I bought. Luckily I had snapped a photo of it with tags on, so I retagged it with my little tagging gun and it was as good as new. I exchanged it for a 40C in instead of the too-tight 38D, so up a band size and down a cup size. This does support (get it?) my theory that the two sizes are virtually identical, but in this case the right size became abundantly clear.

According to the experts, you’re supposed to start out wearing bras on the loosest hook, and then as they get stretched out over time, you progress to the middle hook and then the tightest. But I was wearing the 38D on the loosest hook yesterday and it still felt too tight, so rather than wait for it to loosen up over time, I decided to trade it in for the bigger band. In going up to a 40 band, the cup of the D became too big, so I went down to a C instead. Now, if anyone was paying attention to the last blog (and I honestly don’t blame you if you weren’t), you’ll remember that this is the exact size I was wearing to begin with. Like, the bras that were way too big. So, despite this being the same brand (Vanity Fair) and a very similar “Beauty Back” style, the soft-cup style fits where the foam-cup was huge. On my first round at Kohl’s, it never occurred to me to try on the same size I was already wearing. Call me crazy, but I assumed I had changed sizes. I apparently had not.

Rather similarly, I’ve been going through some rethinking when it comes to jeans. My latest pair, bought on Ebay, measure 38 inches in the waist even though the tag says they’re a 40 waist. The inseam was 30 on the tag but measures 27 inches, so I figured this discrepancy wasn’t a problem and they would fit great. But I’ve worn them a couple of times now and they just don’t look right. For some reason, despite fitting in the waist, they look huge. Even my old 38s (which measured 40 inches in the waist) looked better. Frustrated with the numbers, I pulled out the 36s that also measure 36 inches in the waist. They fit me perfectly- until I try to button the very top button. So I can either walk around with a significant muffin top (and trouble breathing), or I can just not button the top button. I decided to go with that: just don’t button the top button.

My husband and I designed and engineered a “button extender” composed of some flat elastic and a button. The button goes in the button hole, and the elastic goes around the jeans’ button. It looks a bit weird if you see it, but if I wear a belt or leave my shirt untucked, no one would ever be the wiser. I fantasize that one day I will wake up and the button will, well, button. But my weight loss has stalled and I don’t see it happening anytime soon. So I guess it’s good enough for now.

In other “news,” and I use the term lightly, I got my Everlane order in the mail. I got the Air Oversized Crew Tee in faded pink in an XL and the Japanese Oxford Square Shirt in white in an 8, a 10, and a 12. The 10 was the best fit (even though I’m more like a 14), but then I got really confused when I imagined wearing it with the rest of my wardrobe. Layering it with sweaters seemed impossible, and even jackets seemed tricky. The cut is just so wide that it’s hard to fit it under anything- even though that cut is exactly why I love the shirt so much. I soon realized that while it could be worn over a T-shirt or on its own, even putting on a coat would prove difficult. Sadly, I decided this was just too impractical for my current minimal wardrobe and I returned all 3 sizes. It’s really a shame, since the fabric was thick and substantial, plus the details were great- it had really cool long cuffs and was cropped just right.

The T-shirt, on the other hand, looked just fine. Oversized, as it was meant to be, and a color that’s not black or navy- thank goodness for that. I washed it before wearing it, but then after I wore it for a day, I decided the material just felt cheap. It brought me back to the last time I tried an Everlane T-shirt: I’d purchased the Cotton Box Cut Pocket Tee and rejected it because it just felt shitty. As in, my Old Navy and LOFT cotton tees felt way nicer, and my J. Crew T-shirts were light years better. I decided to keep this Air Tee since it was basically free (it was $25 and I had a $28 credit, so after the $6 restocking fee for the other shirts, it only set me back $3), but now I’m regretting it still. The color sort of gives it some points, but honestly, the fabric is so sleazy and artificial-feeling (despite its 100% cotton tag), I don’t know if I’ll even reach for it. Now, I understand the Air Tees are supposed to be thin, the way J. Crew’s Tissue Tees are. But Tissue Tees are incredibly soft, and the Air Tee is not. It feels like something you might find in a bin at a fast fashion store for $3, so I guess I got what I paid for. The quality of the Japanese Oxford Square Shirt was so good that I really can’t resolve this in my mind. But damn it, this T-shirt. I really, really don’t recommend it. If you’re as excited about Everlane as everyone else on the internet is, by all means spare yourself the agony and skip the T-shirts.

Fugue State Bra Shopping

October 24, 2019 by Kristin Purcell in Clothes

Preparations for our upcoming trip to Germany are progressing slowly as we’re still coping with the worst cold in recent history. I did overcome one major hurdle the other night: bra shopping. Notorious for being the least desirable form of shopping (perhaps trumped only by sports-bra shopping), I was somewhat wary. I do have a brand and style of bra to which I am faithful at a higher weight, so I made a beeline through the Kohl’s underwear department straight to the Vanity Fair “Beauty Back” racks. This is the style of bra I’ve been wearing that is getting way too big. I like the wide straps, set closer together than in smaller bras, and the wide band that covers your armpit fat. The size range is strictly for “full figured” women, so when I was at a lower weight I switched over to Maidenform. But these Vanity Fair ones have been my go-to for years now, and often wished they came in smaller sizes. There’s just nothing like a 3-hook band to make you feel secure. Luckily I still fit into the full-figured range right now, so I had exact sizes in mind to try in this favorite style. My current bras are size 40C, but the foam cups are half-empty. So I went in looking for a 38C or- in the rare case they had one- a 40B. It’s a little-understood fact that these two sizes are almost identical. This is due to the fact that cup sizes increase as the band sizes increase, regardless of how they’re labeled. So I fully expected one of these two sizes to be just the right fit. I was wrong. Neither one felt quite right: the 38C was too tight in the band and the 40B too small in the cup. So much for my little-understood facts.

I decided to branch out and try some other styles: the foam-cup, wireless Beauty Backs; the soft-cup, underwire Beauty Backs; and then some non-Beauty Backs also from Vanity Fair. I should have known that wireless is not an option for me- they always look worse on me than not wearing a bra at all. The other styles were less than thrilling. But the soft-cup Beauty Back showed promise. Labeled as a “minimizer,” the 38C gave me “double boob” so that was a no-go. But then I did something kind of counter-intuitive for me, having never been more than a C cup in my life: I tried the 38D. It worked. It felt just great in comparison to everything else. I love that I don’t have to mess around with packing foam-cup bras for the trip, and I love that it’s less bulky to wear- and indeed easier to wash. I chose a soft pink color as opposed to black or “nude” since my skin is rather pink anyway.

At this point I was relieved, though rather sweaty, so I headed to the underwear. I needed 3 pairs of underwear to bring me up to a total of 12 pairs in all, since for some reason, 9 is just not enough lately. My chosen brand is Warner’s, and the style is called the “No Muffin-Top” hipster. The ones I already own are cotton with a lace band, but those were nowhere to be found among the masses of No Muffin-Top options. I found my size (2XL or 9) in the hipster style, some silky with a lace band and some in microfiber with no lace. I searched about 20 racks’ worth (randomly arranged) before realizing there were a bunch of them on one of those tiered tables for display. I found the colors and patterns abhorrent, so I finally went with one black silky pair, one black microfiber, and one grey microfiber. I always buy these in threes, since they’re always on sale “3 for $30,” or in a 3-pack at TJ’s if you’re lucky. Sweating even more profusely, I tracked Matt down and checked out. Success. Next stop: TJ Maxx for some socks.

I found some nice Cuddle Duds socks right off the bat, but couldn’t find any more. I eventually settled on a 3-pack from Tahari that was pretty similar, so I went with those. I had decided I needed some thin crew socks to wear with my Adidas sneakers in the cold, since my boot socks are too bulky and my ankle socks too chilly. I went with my usual black, white, and grey in various forms, some solid, some striped, and some textured. So I’m up six pairs in socks.

The next day, Matt put on his winter hat and I commented on how nice it looked. He pointed out that he had been wearing it the night before, but I hadn’t noticed since I was in some sort of “fugue state” in the bra department. I explained that looking for bras on a timeline takes great focus and persistence, that it requires both rational logic and wild experimentation. The calculus of figuring out what will fit is something I can’t even begin to explain to him, so we left it at that. I’d already tried to explain why I only needed one bra- that it was like a pair of jeans that can be worn multiple times before needing to be washed. I finally just concluded that I’m kind of disgusting and so I wear the same bra every day.

I’m wearing the new bra as I write this, and am suddenly racked with second thoughts. The band feels way too tight. I may need to make a return trip to Kohl’s.

Weigh-In Woes

October 21, 2019 by Kristin Purcell in Clothes, Food, Mental Illness

We have Ebay success. I know you were waiting with bated breath. The men’s 501 Levi’s fit in the waist, although they do look a bit weird from the back. In any case, they fit. And the black dress pants from GEORGE are also a winner. I love how they look, and the fabric is exactly what I’d hoped for- definitely a suiting material but not too thin. I just have to hem them, and I’m good to go for Germany, pants-wise anyway.

Another major task in preparation for Germany is placing our Amazon.de order. The last time we stayed in this apartment, we planned ahead and ordered a blanket, pillows, an electric kettle, and a set of metal bowls with lids and a bonus metal colander, all to be delivered to the opera house and picked up when we got there. This time we’re ordering a bigger blanket, the same kettle and set of bowls, and some packaged foods that I think will help me stay on track. I found my “zero noodles” on the German site, along with those pouches of Indian food that don’t need to be refrigerated- you just nuke them for 2 minutes. Because the thing is, in addition to German supermarkets not carrying some of my staple foods, this apartment has no stove. There’s a microwave, a disgusting kettle, and a disgusting toaster oven. Hence the purchase of our own kettle, with which we can make veggies, pasta, couscous, etc. I don’t know if we need a toaster since the bread is so fresh there- last time we didn’t. Our Amazon pillows, however, were disappointing and the ones in the apartment are ridiculous. There’s no other way to describe how useless they are. We call them “joke pillows” - no matter where you put your head, the filling moves around and your head is flat on the mattress. There are so many great things about Germany- the superior windows and construction in general, the cobblestone walking villages, the coffee, the bread. But for some reason, they just can’t do pillows right. I have yet to find a German pillow I like. So we’re going to hit TK Maxx (yup, just like TJ Maxx) and see what they have in person.

But I digress. I’m especially glad my Ebay pants have worked out because I went to the doctor the other day and got weighed in. I found out that I’ve lost a total of .8 pounds. Not 8 pounds- no, no- point 8 pounds. In 5 weeks. Last time I was 176.8 pounds and this time I was 176 pounds. This is after a week of eating 1,400-1,500 calories a day because I was sick and had less of an appetite. I can’t tell you how disappointed I am. But I really am grateful that I took the bull by the horns and got some pants that fit me well now. Because fitting into my smaller clothes seems further away than ever.

I keep going over that weigh-in in my head. My doctor changed offices, so the scale was in a different spot on the floor. I drank my iced coffee later than usual and so I didn’t get to pee it all out. I didn’t exercise last week- could it be that? Has my metabolism slowed down from eating less? Please, dear lord, let there be some reason for this outrageous result. Because if it wasn’t a fluke, it throws everything into question.

If I keep doing what I’m doing, will I suddenly start losing weight again? Or do I need to change what I’m doing in order to lose more weight? I know my main focus for my diet and exercise regime is to keep my mental health in check. But let’s be real; if I’m working this hard, I want to lose more weight. Is this as far as my current regime will get me? Or do I have to work out more? Do I have to try “reverse dieting” so I can eat more and rev up my metabolism? Or is this just the place where my body wants to be? The most burning question of all is, can I keep doing what I’m doing without the incentive of weight loss?

All of these questions in combination with the not exercising/eating less during my cold has me in a tailspin. First of all, while I was sick, I didn’t try to eat less, at least not at first. I just wasn’t hungry. But then, I reasoned that since I wasn’t exercising, it made sense to eat a little less. Then I started restricting myself to 1400-1500 calories a day, to account for the calories I wasn’t burning at the gym. I imagined that I might lose a little muscle, but that that would quickly be remedied when I started exercising again. Looking back, I now see this self-imposed restriction as disordered eating. I enjoyed the fact that I didn’t need as much food, and I pushed it beyond what felt natural. That’s not a healthy thing for me to do, especially with my history of dieting and binge eating. So now I’m making sure I get my full 1,800 calories, and even allowing myself to go up to 2,000 if I need to in order to feel comfortable. And I need to make sure I don’t get trapped in the idea that I’ve “saved up” this calorie deficit and am allowed to add it all up and binge on those calories. Because that’s just more disordered thinking.

But I really, really want to binge right now. Much like the trying-on-too-small-clothes incident, this weigh-in has me fantasizing about donuts and various baked goods. Between the weigh-in, the restricting last week, and the stress about the limited food options during our Germany trip, I’m an absolute mess.

So last night, I sat down with Matt (I needed a witness), and planned out my food for today. I thought it would be a relief to just know what I was going to eat and not have to think about it. Instead, I feel more restricted than ever. I mean, there’s no cinnamon-raisin toast in my diet today. What if I want cinnamon-raisin toast? Do I ignore that and stick to the plan? Or do I get to make substitutions?

And what about my workouts? Should I switch over to just weightlifting every day instead of every other day? Apparently that makes you lose more fat over time than doing cardio. And what about getting a gym membership in Germany? We still haven’t heard back about getting a short-term membership. I don’t know what I’ll do if I can’t lift weights, now that I know that cardio is a dead end. Or maybe cardio will be enough for the 8 weeks that we’re there. Or maybe I could do HIIT- high intensity interval training.

This thinking is madness. I need to get myself sorted before this trip. I’m just so worried that I’ll come home and weigh in at the same weight or, god forbid, even more. I don’t know if I can continue to be this restricted if I don’t get to lose weight. I just don’t know. And I need to stay on my plan. My mental health depends on it.

More Ebay Finds, Less Leaving the House

October 13, 2019 by Kristin Purcell in Clothes, Mental Illness

Well, I’ve done it again. I placed another Ebay order. This time, I checked the measurements carefully and found a pair of jeans that not only measure 38 inches in the waist, they also have a ridiculously short inseam of 27 inches which is perfect for me. They should give me that quintessential “break” over the top of my boots when worn low on my hips the way I like. They should also work well with my sneakers and not cause any treading on the backs of the hems. The tag on them says they’re a 40 waist, but good Ebay sellers always give the true measurements of jeans to make it easier to find the right fit. In addition to these latest Levi’s 501 men’s jeans, I ordered a pair of pants. I went for the same brand as my grey men’s pants, GEORGE, but in a slightly different style. They’re still a 38 waist, but have a slightly longer inseam of 32 inches (I’ll have to hem them a bit). I even checked the leg opening measurement to make sure they were a similar fit. They’re black and look more like true suit pants than my grey ones. They have that inner clasp and inside button instead of a simple outer button closure. And the material looks shinier and more slippery than a basic chino fabric. Oh, and they’re new with tags! Gotta love Ebay. If all goes well, I’ll be back up to 3 pairs of pants: my grey GEORGE ones, these black ones, and these new 38-waist jeans. This means I don’t have to rely on my black skinny jeans as my third pair of pants on our upcoming trip to Germany, or as my “formal wear” pants. I can wear the black dress pants with my silky black blouse and heels to Matt’s opening night.

In my last blog, I was toying with the idea of adding some lighter color to my wardrobe, and had my eye on some Everlane items. I ended up taking the plunge and placing an order, making sure I can return it all for free if I need to (shipping was free, too). I ordered the Air Oversized Crew Tee in XL in faded pink, hoping it works out better than the Cotton Box-Cut Pocket Tee I rejected in the past. And then I really went rogue: I ordered the Japanese Oxford Square Shirt in 3 sizes so I can try to figure out what fits. I ended up going with the white one since they had more sizes in stock. I got an 8, a 10, and a 12, taking the advice from the reviews and sizing down. It could be a total wash, but those darned promotional credits ($25) really draw you in.

In other news, I didn’t leave the house for 7 days. But not for any mental health reasons; this time I just got an awful cold and was in bed all day. The first 5 days weren’t bad- I was so sick that I could barely stand up so it never even occurred to me to go anywhere or do anything. I’d been having a hard time sleeping, too, so I was too tired to even make it out to the couch. And then, of course, Matt got sick and joined me in my misery. We both went to the doctor today and finally got some antibiotics, so we should be on the mend now. But the hardest thing about it for me was not exercising. I know, who am I? I hate exercise. I dread it every morning when I wake up. I live for that one rest day on Saturday when I don’t have to drag myself through it. But taking a full 7 days off was really difficult psychologically. We’ve been exercising 6 days a week religiously ever since January 2nd of this year. Sometimes it takes me all day to make my way onto the treadmill, but I consider it a non-negotiable requirement. I allow myself no excuses, unless it’s a simple shifting around of our rest day. But even that feels risky. We exercised throughout our Berlin trip, through medication changes, through dental surgery and menstrual cramps. So when I realized exercise was simply not an option being so sick, I decided that I was allowed exactly one week off. It sounded precise and reasonable. One week off a year sounds like something even the healthiest people do. But today, day 8 of my illness, we returned to our schedule as though we’d never left it. We went to the gym, cranked out back day, and went to our respective doctor’s appointments. And it wasn’t terrible. If anything, it was a relief to be back to normal. It’s good to get out of the house.

Why Are My Clothes So Boring?

October 08, 2019 by Kristin Purcell in Clothes, Capsule Wardrobe, Minimalism

It’s not lost on me that my clothes are pretty boring. For a blog called Mood and Clothes, you’d think I’d have more OOTDs or fashion spreads. But if you hadn’t guessed by now, my real passion lies in the simplifying of my wardrobe and the refinement of my personal style.

My favorite blog ever has to be the now-defunct Dead Fleurette. She sought the “perfect” wardrobe, owned a shockingly small collection of pieces, and wrote of her deep consideration over what to buy and what to get rid of. I pored over her every word, every list of clothing items, every collage of possible purchases. I can only find a few archived blogs of hers online now, but Dead Fleurette is truly the inspiration for my own writing about clothes. So in that spirit, I’ve come up with a whole list of reasons for exactly why my clothes are what they are.

1. Minimalism. The fact of the matter is that I love having less. Fewer options mean fewer choices, which means less decision fatigue and less waste. I’d rather have a small, curated collection of items that I actually use than a vast array of things that get little use or attention. I love the efficiency of minimalism, the process of deliberating over choices, and the clarity and beauty of simple things.

2. I’m very picky. I have extremely specific preferences when it comes to clothes. I know what works for me and what doesn’t. I know that I don’t like dresses, blazers, ruffles, or V-necks. I know that I like neutral or muted, subdued colors. I know how I like a T-shirt to fit: wide and open at the neckline, slightly fitted through the bust, and boxy and relaxed through the body. I know these things from years of trial and error. I know I don’t like dresses because I’ve owned probably a hundred in my life and not one has made me feel good. I know I don’t like blazers the way I know I don’t like fuchsia. For whatever reason, on my body, it just never feels right. And after many years of trying, I’ve finally given myself permission to admit it.

3. Uniform Dressing. I don’t like spending a lot of time getting dressed. While I may love shopping and deliberating over cuts and colors, when I wake up and put clothes on, I want it to be simple. I want all my options to be good ones so I don’t have to think too much in the moment about what to wear. This means I tend to gravitate toward uniform dressing, I.e. wearing basically the same thing every day. The formula right now is: men’s pants+boots+T-shirt+sweater or else men’s jeans+sneakers+T-shirt+sweater.

4. No impulse shopping. I no longer buy things on a whim. I used to shop randomly, picking up anything that I simply “liked,” regardless of how it would fit (or not fit) into my wardrobe. I always ended up with a bunch of cocktail dresses, a wool cape, a headband, and a frilly top that made me look like a giant baby. And oh, yeah. Those 2 T-shirts that I actually wear. So now I know what I’m looking for and I stay focused. I’m realistic about what I’ll actually wear and only buy those things. This does mean, however, that I don’t have a colorful closet full of all those fun things I never wear.

5. They don’t have good colors. I always value fit over color. Choosing an item of clothing based on what color it is seems arbitrary and bizarre in my mind. So when I find the perfect fit, the right drape, the best material and construction and style, that’s always what I go for. But the color options are not always great. I like black, navy, and grey (that is apparent from a glance at my wardrobe). But I’m often limited to those colors not by my own choosing, but by the utter lack of acceptable alternatives. I love white, light blue, blush, camel, deep green, and even eggplant. Yet somehow the options are usually yellow, orange, neon pink, or tomato red. There might be a garish teal or chartreuse in the mix, but I just can’t stomach it. (And did you ever notice that those colors are always the ones on sale because they know the good colors are the neutrals? Why don’t they just make more neutrals?)

Conclusion: I don’t mean to be so boring. I really don’t. Just because I’m a minimalist doesn’t mean I don’t like color- I do. The good ones are just hard to find. I’d love to have a wardrobe more like that of A Small Wardrobe. She’s created a 34-item wardrobe that is full of lovely subdued colors: muted gold, mauve, pale pink, oatmeal, white, light blue, stone, deep red, eggplant, jade green, and yes, black, grey, and navy. Why can’t I do the same? Am I not investing enough time? Enough money? Probably both.

Here are a few items I’m obsessing over at the moment, in subtle colors, but colors all the same:

These two T-shirts are from Everlane, and I thought the pale pink hue might add some color I can get on board with. (FYI Everlane, a brand known for its ethical and sustainable practices, now has some slightly larger sizes.) The first one is the Air Oversized Crew Tee and the second one’s the Cotton Box-Cut Pocket Tee. The funny thing is, I apparently once ordered the Pocket Tee (right) in grey and hated it so I sold it on Ebay. So I guess that one’s out. I can’t remember what was so bad about it, but I know the purchase was the result of receiving a $25 promotional credit. I’ve been notified that I have another $25 credit there for “referring a friend” so I could potentially try the Air Tee for free.

This shirt is also from Everlane and is called the Japanese Oxford Square Shirt. They have a blue and white stripe, a light blue, and a bright white. I’m obsessed with the cut of this but am afraid it will be too long and look like a maternity top. The sizing is also a nightmare to try and figure out- some of the reviews say to size down by 2 sizes and some say it’s true to size. I also have no idea what size I am in general, and then I don’t know for how long it would still fit me if I lose weight. It’s also a little pricey at $68, so I’m finding it hard to commit.

And then there’s this white Short Sleeve Swing Tee from Vince that’s on sale for $30. I know the quality would be good- I’ve always had good luck reselling Vince T-shirts on Ebay, so they definitely have longevity. I also love my Vince sweaters. Tempting.

I'm Afraid I've Made a Terrible Mistake

October 05, 2019 by Kristin Purcell in Food, Clothes

Here’s a tip: Don’t try on clothes that you know full well are too small for you. It makes you feel bad about yourself and it makes you want to eat. I made this mistake yesterday, supposedly in preparation for our upcoming trip to Germany. I pulled out the infamous bin of storage clothes that has been whittled down to only clothes that fit me when I am 160 lbs. or less. Right now, I am 176.8 lbs (as of my last weigh-in). Somehow I ignored this not-so-little discrepancy and just hoped for the best. I was looking specifically for two things: some black joggers (2 pairs) and a bunch of sweaters.

The first things I pulled out were the joggers, fully expecting them to fit (they have an elastic waist, after all). But they were too tight to breathe in, never mind sit down in. This was a bit of a blow: I was kind of counting on them as fall/winter pants since my linen ones will not be warm enough as it gets colder. Then, randomly, I tried on a bra. I’ve started wearing real bras lately, but the ones I have are pretty big on me. They’re comfortable and everything, but there’s some pretty significant empty space happening. So I tried on one of the smaller bras, and it resulted in the double-boob effect we all know and loathe, so those went back into the box.

I tried to stay focused: I’m looking at sweaters. I started with a light-grey, pointelle-sleeve, open cardigan and it actually worked well. I knew there were things in there that I could pull off. Then there was a camel J. Crew cardigan. This gave me sort of a hunchback look, so that was a no-go. I shook it off. There was a black, boxy, supersoft pullover that fit really well, and a blush, boxy, cotton pullover that looked pretty good and could inject some much-needed lighter color into my wardrobe. So I brought those two out with the grey cardigan, but was put off by the smell. Somehow they’d started smelling like thrift store in a subtle way. So I’m currently washing them one-by-one and flat-drying them so I can add them to my capsule.

Then things got a little weird: I put on my beloved asymmetric blouson-style Vince cashmere sweater, but it looked funny with my baggy jeans. So I put on my black skinny jeans, and we were right back to the negative self-talk that inevitably starts every time I wear skinny jeans. Like how I look like a tomato on a stick and whatnot. But since I’m kind of desperate for pants right now, I blamed it on the sweater and put it away. I revisited the pink cashmere sweater from the other day and rejected it again. It’s not really too small, I think I just don’t like the neckline, so it may be destined for the discard pile. And lastly, I revisited the grey structured zip-up that fits but doesn’t work with the silhouette of my baggy men’s pants and belt. That one’s on the back-burner for future consideration as my pants situation solidifies.

And speaking of pants, I also happened to get both of my Ebay purchases in the mail yesterday. The jeans were not a success. They were tight. Like, really tight. Like when I buttoned them all the way up, my flesh spilled over the top, threatening to burst the seams. Now the jeans I’ve been wearing are a size 38 and are way too big, so how could these size 36s be so small? I measured the waist: 36 inches. Blerg. This means my current size 38s are much bigger than the tag says. I measured them: 40 inches. Apparently I should have done some measuring before I placed my order. I thought men were exempt from these random sizing discrepancies since they go by actual measurements instead of arbitrary numbers. I guess I was naive to think so. I tried on the grey, size 38, GEORGE pants and they’re perfect. They are literally identical to the size 40 ones I’ve been wearing; they just fit better. And when I measured them, they came up true to size: 38 inches. I guess I’m truly a 38.

I threw both new purchases into a warm wash and a low tumble-dry, taking them out before the jeans got too dried out. They were actually a little damp, so I put them on and thought maybe I would be able to stretch them out a bit. I squatted, I bent over, I curled into a ball on the bed. I lay like that for a while, watching YouTube, wiggling around. Then I ate lunch and really couldn’t take it anymore, so I took them off. I folded them and put them into the storage bin.

I suddenly felt ravenous. I ate a single-serving packet of Lorna Doones. I had two Coke Zeroes. I took a Klonopin. I lied down and said some affirmations: I am a worthy human being. The clothes may not fit, but that doesn’t mean there’s anything wrong with my body. My body is perfect as it is. I am a worthy human being. I put the storage bin back in the closet and called it a day.

And this is why this was a bad idea: I spent half my day making myself feel bad and then trying to recover from it. And all I have to show for it is a couple of sweaters and some pants. Now I know I needed that stuff, but why is it so hard to be honest with myself about my body? What’s so bad about where I am? Was this project purely about practicality and thrift? I don’t think so. I think I’m looking for validation, for reward for how far I’ve come. And the obvious source of that reward is fitting into my old clothes. Because it’s not just about the clothes; it’s about what they represent. I imagine that by wearing them, I’ll have the qualities I had when I wore them before- I’ll be energetic, enthusiastic, and profiting financially. But that’s not how it works. That’s a fantasy. I am where I am with my life. I’m making real progress, however slow and steady it may be. I just have to be patient and keep doing what I’m doing.

Gym and Pajama Capsule Updates, Accessories, and Packing Plans

September 30, 2019 by Kristin Purcell in Clothes, Capsule Wardrobe, Minimalism

It’s been a while since I laid out what I have for gym clothes, pajamas, and accessories, and since I’m starting to plan my packing for Germany again, I thought I’d take a look. Here’s my 19-item gym capsule:

Okay. So, the top row is my cold weather running outfit: Under Armour base layer top and leggings, water-resistant hoodie, and RBX top layer joggers. Everything’s lined in fleece and works in really cold conditions. I don’t know if I’ll really need this full outfit for Germany since it tends to be milder there, and we’re back home by the beginning of December. But the hoodie and top are good layering pieces and the leggings and joggers are good on their own. Next are my sports bras and T-shirts: I’ll bring 3 bras for alternate running days, and all the T-shirts since I plan on working out 6 days a week. I’ll be doing the pajama top/gym top mash-up where I wear one shirt to bed and then work out in it the next day- there are 4 of each, so 8 total. Then we have my other leggings and pants: The first pair are definitely good for fall weather since they are really long and cover my ankles. The next pair are too cropped, the Under Armour ones are too thin, and the sweatpants are really only for layering in winter. I don’t think I’ll need anything more than 3 pairs: the cold-weather leggings and joggers and the long navy leggings (I tend to re-wear leggings 2 days in a row since I don’t sweat much on alternate weight-lifting days). And then there’s my fleece which is too bulky to pack, so I’ll just stick with the hoodie instead. The 3/4 sleeve sweatshirt is pretty useless and I’m not sure why I own it. And then, the absolute necessity, my running shoes.

Next up, gym accessories: I don’t think I’ll need the top-layer mittens, but I’ll probably need the rest.

And now onto pajamas- 20 pieces in all:

First off, there are my 4 pajama tops- those will be added to the 4 gym tees and worn for both sleep and working out. The tank tops and shorts can stay home, as well as the slippers. I have 2 sleep hoodies; I might bring the black one since it can be chilly in the apartment in Germany. And I think the grey striped pants and the two navy joggers will be sufficient for bottoms, so I’ll leave the pink pants and the taupe wide-leg pants behind.

And the last category I want to address is accessories. I don’t think anything has changed since I last posted about these, but here’s a recap and my thoughts on what to pack.

First we have scarves and winter accessories:

I think the blush Calvin Klein logo scarf (top left) will be the only one I bring on the trip, although I am toying with the idea of bringing a fancy one for opening night. For hats, I think I’ll just go with the pupley-grey wool one (bottom right).

I’ll be bringing the one men’s black belt (top left) and I’m kind of wondering if I will ever wear the other two. Maybe I’d better wait to see what pants I’m wearing before I remove those options. For handbags, the standard navy purse and my backpack will both be packed (and probably brought as carry-ons).

I think that covers it. Packing really makes it clear what my most-worn pieces are, and it makes me think about downsizing and going a little more minimal. But I feel like I have to wait until my weight settles before I get rid of anything- it’s kind of hard to predict what categories will suddenly start dwindling as things stop fitting. Like my pajama tank tops that are way too big in the arm holes, or my belts that only work with certain kinds of pants, at a certain weight, and have smaller counterparts in storage.

It’s much easier to be a minimalist when you stay the same size all the time. No one really talks about this. The other minimalists usually say to get rid of everything that doesn’t fit right now, but that just doesn’t make sense for me. I mean, I’m getting rid of the bigger clothes as my weight goes down and they no longer fit, but I still have all this perfectly good stuff that I know will work in the future.

Or am I just kidding myself? That stuff is from 2 years ago and I might not even like wearing it anymore. My recent try-on sessions have certainly made me start thinking about this. Can you ever really go back to what you wore before?

Capsule Wardrobe Update, Shoes, and Germany Preparations

September 29, 2019 by Kristin Purcell in Clothes, Capsule Wardrobe, Minimalism

I’ve just been taking stock of what I have in my current wardrobe so I can figure out what I need for our next trip to Germany. We’ll be there from October 10th until December 6th, so it should be pretty straightforward fall weather. It doesn’t snow there that much, so I can forgo the snow boots and heavy parkas, but I will need some layers for colder days. I recently added some sweaters from storage for that very purpose. Here’s my 26-item capsule wardrobe:

And that is what my year-round closet is looking like. Yes, I have 4 navy blue T-shirts. Yes, I have 3 black T-shirts. I never said it was pretty; it’s just what I’ve got. But I think I have a good solid base to start with. The oatmeal cotton sweater, linen pants, and white skirt aren’t great for fall, and the jeans are just way too big, so that puts me down to 22 pieces to work with. The black silky square-shaped blouse and skinny black jeans at the bottom are my “dressy” outfit for special occasions. The grey men’s pants were replaced by their smaller (identical) counterparts found on Ebay. But the jeans I ordered didn’t work out, and the joggers in storage were too small, so I’m still looking to round out my pants section, hopefully with a pair of men’s jeans that actually fit.

The “new” sweaters I’m thinking about packing are:

Lightweight, open, light grey cardigan with the brand label cut out
Black, super-soft, boxy pullover with the brand label cut out
Blush, cotton, boxy, H&M pullover
Full-zip, cable-knit, dark grey cardigan with a mock neck from Hinge

That gives me four sweaters to work with, plus the two cashmere sweaters I already had in my capsule. I certainly don’t need 6 sweaters for the trip- I’ll probably go with 4, but which ones I don’t know yet. We’ll see what’s practical as the weather starts to cool off. I just thought I’d take out everything that fit well and could give me more options for layering. For mild or chilly weather, I tend to wear a T-shirt and sweater every day, with a top layer if I need it. I’m thinking of wearing the long raincoat on the plane and bringing the “packable” parka that I can squish into its little bag. I don’t know if I need the tan jacket, green shirt, and hoodie, so I may narrow it down a bit. The thing is, we’re each checking a bag for this trip, so I do have the luxury of a little more room than on our last trip to Berlin.

For shoes, I think I’ll stick with what worked last time and wear the boots on the plane, although getting through security with the boots can be an issue. On our way home from Berlin, we weren’t required to take our shoes off, so the steel shank in my boots set off the metal detector. After an extensive conversation involving 3 security officers and a pat-down, they ran my boots through the scanner and discovered it was in fact the steel shank. I think I garnered a little respect from the officers; Germans do love a well-made shoe.

Anyway, I’ll be packing my Adidas sneakers and my running shoes. That way, if I have 3 pairs of pants- hopefully a new pair of men’s jeans, grey pants, and maybe my black skinny jeans? - that gives me equal wear of both the boots and the sneakers. The boots go with Levi’s or pants; the sneakers go with Levi’s or black skinny jeans.

The tricky part is Matt’s opening night: I can easily pack my silky blouse to dress up a pair of black skinny jeans, but heels would really be the only way to make it look right. I don’t know if I can spare the space for that, so I have thought about other options. One possibility would be to bring these cream wide-leg pants and wear the silky top and my boots:

The pants don’t fit just yet, but by opening night at the end of the trip they might… then again I don’t know if I can handle that kind of pressure. In any case, the pants might take up the same amount of space as the heels anyway, so maybe it’d be easier to just bring the shoes.

There’s always all this fuss for one night where I might not even have to socialize after the show. And then there have been times where I couldn’t even attend opening night, when I wasn’t feeling up to being in public. I really regret not getting to see Matt’s work, but when I can’t, I just can’t. It sucks.

So that’s where I’m at with my capsule and my packing plans. The only major shopping that needs to be done is finding some pants. Ideally, I’d like a new pair of men’s Levi’s and some kind of black men’s dress pants in a suiting material. I’d rather not rely on the black skinny jeans since they tend to make me feel bad about myself. For some reason, the black skinny jeans aren’t as bad as the blue ones, but still, I’d rather have something that makes me feel great. I feel like I keep trying to shortchange myself, saying, “Well, I’m in the home stretch. I almost fit into my old stuff, so why bother getting anything now?” But the reality is, weight loss is slow. Agonizingly slow. I’m at least 3 months away from fitting into my storage clothes, and I need to wear pants. Why torture myself over it?