Crashing Down to Earth

Today marks the end of an adventure -- one that was started the day I decided to sign up for the Optifast Weight loss program. It is now early Monday morning, April the 13th. An auspicious date? Not really, just the first day of rebuilding some new sense of normalcy in my life.

Losing weight, or the decision to, started a chain reaction. That, along with the brain chemistry change from the anti-depressant, kicked something into high gear. I escaped from myself. I cut the tethers that were keeping me down for so long and like Icarus, floated a little too close to the sun. I lost 25 pounds in about a month, I got Botox, then more Botox, and then even more Botox and Juvederm injected into my cheeks. I hired a contractor to renovate my house; I went to Argentina for 3 weeks. I booked myself to have plastic surgery on my eyes, nose and chin in August in New York; I basically went on a spree of excess and escape.

Yes, I thought I felt better, and at times I did break through to some pure sense of joy in myself. A feeling that I am loveable, funny, generous and kind. Someone who is genuinely happy to be on this piece of rock we call Earth. Most of the time, however, I was running as fast as I could from any and all negative thoughts and feelings. If I buy enough art, if I make my house look like a photo spread in House & Home, if I have Tom Cruise's dermatologically enhanced cheekbones, if I have sex with as many hot men as want me -- then I won't have to think of how much I actually still hate myself. There is still work to be done, obviously.

It is time to give Dr. Oliver a call and begin the next phase in rebuilding Adrian. Not really rebuilding, but demolishing and starting fresh from the old foundation. The bones are good, in designer speak, all that is needed is to fix the structural damage. My poor ego has been buffeted by Psychic hurricanes, earthquakes, fires and floods. However, like Argentina, I am proud, strong, damaged yet resilient.

First day of Optifast and the rest of my life

I got home about an hour ago, after watching Mickey Roark's ("fuck-you I can act") The Wrestler, full of sound and fury over a life that has thus far signified nothing. I am forty-and-a-half years old and have yet to have lived a day without fully living as my "authentic" self—well, I guess I was a self-realized little person 'till I was about four years old, but since the evil Sister Agnes got her talons into me I've been pretty much a shadow of my former self.

Tonight signified my second prong of attack on my journey towards my becomingness. The first was quitting smoking three weeks ago—well I also gave up coffee last week so maybe tonight was my third prong. Tonight was the first night of the Cadillac of weight-loss-programs—Optifast. For those of you who don't know what it Optifast is, it's reported to be the most successful, long term, weight loss program in the world. It has a 50% success rate after 5 years of completing the one-year program. To put that number into perspective, every other diet has a 5% success rate in terms of people maintaining their weight loss long-term.

What brought me to Optifast—other than a referral from my family doctor—was a desire to discover whether I actually do have Tom Cruise's cheekbones (that, and the fact that if I don't change my lifestyle soon I have a 25% chance of having a non-fatal or fatal heart attack within the next 10 years!). I am tired of being a mildly obese, pleasantly plump guy. Yes, it was flattering when one of the 300 plus pound members told me tonight that I didn't belong there, but that's the very attitude that has held me back. Other, apparently well-meaning people telling me that I was good enough as I was—but the message I hear is that I have no right to be as attractive and healthy as I deserve to be. Yes, being 50 pounds overweight might not seem much when you have over a hundred pounds to shed, but believe me, it is just as much a hurdle to my happiness as is their extra girth.

Someone told me once, after I earnestly unburdened upon them my belief that I was doomed to an eternal pattern of self-destruction, that I was only self-destructive enough to make my life less than optimal. I might not have been strung out on crack, selling my ass on the street and sleeping in a card board box, but I knew how to screw things up for myself just enough to keep me where Sister Agnes' ubiquitous voice told me I needed to be. I never let myself shine at anything. If, by some fluke, I did excel at something I would immediately quit or somehow slip just a little sugar into my gas tank. Just enough to screw up the carburetor, but never so much it was beyond repair.

I've always thought, in my secret inner place, that if I'd had another teacher at the old convent I'd discover that I have a great singing voice, that I can act as well as Olivier, that I can cook circles around Rachael Ray, can paint a better Mona Lisa, could design a more user-friendly Guggenheim, take a better photo than Mapplethorpe and be more handsome than Tom Cruise on a good day. I fully realize, however, that this little voice might be a tad optimistic and more than a little narcissistic; however, I think it's the psychological equivalent of tiny David shooting peas at the goliath of Sister Agnes.

I usually hate the smug assertions that most self-help experts spew forth like the beautiful but toxic gasoline rainbow left in the parking lot after a rainstorm, but the oft-used platitude that I should live my life as if failure was not an option does ring true at this moment. I am going to use the next 40 years of my life to find out to the fullest extent what I can do with the gifts I've inherited.

Tomorrow, I will be four again. Sister Agnes never existed, and I will start a renovation of self that will put Madonna to shame.