I'm 168.8 lbs. And no, that's not a dodgy reading, I got the same number 10 times weighing myself in multiple places in the bathroom. I don't even know how the fuck I managed to gain on 1179 calories, or how my weight actually went up overnight (I weighed 167.8 before sleeping) but probably it had something to do with the fact that I had 4 cold and miserable hours' sleep on the shitty air mattress I've been using this week because all the beds are in my new apartment. I get a better night's sleep on the couch. I'm literally so pissed off. I told my mum I wanted half an hour alone or I'll be pissed off all day. She can't stop interrupting me for things, helping her with this or that. I feel bad for complaining and any other day I'd be happy to help her but not today. Today I want to punch a brick wall. And it just so happens to be the day I have to go out and meet people, and have coffee, and go clothes shopping. I mean kill me now. My past self would have been horrified at the idea of me going shopping at 168.8 lbs. What the fuck, why do I even bother rounding down? I'm 170 pounds. 170 giant fucking pounds and I'm never going to change.  

If it's possible to drop 4 pounds of water weight overnight I'm sure as hell going to try. I had a Diet Coke, a fat free yogurt and a bagel and then swallowed 20mg of Ritalin. That's 340 calories. If I only have coffee when I'm out, and a 250-calorie ready meal when I'm home, the day shouldn't technically come to more than 1000 calories. Well, I say 1000, more like 700, but I'd rather tell myself it's 1000 than underestimate and wind up bingeing out of panic and frustration.

* EDIT: 20 mins into taking Ritalin -

I actually had a lovely day with my mother yesterday. We did some rounds of the home and furniture shops and looked at bric-a-brac, pointing at this and that. Sometimes, when I can behave like an adult, and appear as if I have my shit pulled together, my mum is my best friend in the whole world. Then I fall apart and turn into an angry adolescent again, and we end up arguing. We ate carrot sticks together in the evening and the thought crossed my head that perhaps she would be far more cooperative with me if I were the perfect 22 year-old woman: thin, refined, anorexic and organised, with a touch of OCD and a penchant for dipping raw vegetables in mustard when hungry. It's my full intention to become that person; I just don't know how/when it will happen. Sometimes I think that I'm very anorexic in my mind, and then I remember that once upon a time I was borderline anorexic, weighing a little under 124 lbs at 15. I didn't appreciate my BMI of 18.3 back then, but nor was I sophisticated enough to work it at the time. I was scrawny rather than svelte, flabby rather than muscular, and deranged and derailed rather than fussy and neurotic. I don't want to be 124 lbs again, because I don't want to look ill (and I would). 140 lbs would work, if I had the matching persona to go with it. 140 would be fine, maybe 135, but one doesn't need to be truly underweight to appear as such. There are other factors than can come into play such as muscle mass and bone density and dress sense. I'm bigger than I was then, not just height wise (almost an inch taller) but also I'm a lot stronger. A lot of this weight is muscle, which is fine, but it's not what I want - at least, not with the fat I've gained along with it. My arms and legs seem so huge to me. Some of that might be muscle, a lot of it might be, and I'm sure it is but that's not what I want. I don't want my thighs to be bulging out of jeans. The ideal is to zap the fat without ruining the muscle, because being toned never hurt anyone. But I don't want guns.

I admit I was a little (read: very) derailed by the reading on the scales. I stepped on again after going to the bathroom and it said 166.8. So I don't know if it was a false reading or whether it was just water weight I had to "lose" in the morning. Either way, 166.8 isn't good enough and still constitutes a gain. Hideous, but maybe I can drop 2 additional ones today. That would make me 164 at the beginning of a new week, which is the lowest I've been in a while. And I'm sleeping on the couch. I have to get a train at 1pm and I refuse to be in a bad mood for the two-hour journey.

I don't know why I'm complaining so much. My life is pretty nice at the moment. I'm not working, I don't have to start reading course materials until next week, and I just got a new phone to replace the old one that kept breaking. So I should just plug in some bloody headphones and get on with it.

My sister called my mum on the phone yesterday and then passed over her manager-slash-Earth-Momma Dawn. Dawn's a total bitch at best but I try to put up with her. This is the same charming woman who consistently tells my sister I'm a jealous and toxic presence, and who, during an expedition to a New York flea market this Christmas, told me that if I wanted to hide I should. That is not the sort of advice one gives to someone with crushingly low self-esteem; it's the sort of advice that perpetuates the whole thing, and she of all people, at 5'6 and approximately 105 pounds, should know that. But whatever. I may be biased because shoot me, I don't much like the idea of my eighteen-year-old sister being pimped out by a 40 year old LA producer with peroxide hair and a missing finger. Oh, and I might mention that while I lie in my cold freezing air mattress cave all night, my sister is parading around Melrose Avenue buying wicker peacock furniture for her apartment and drinking iced matcha lattes in a pair of Lolita sunglasses. And yes, I'm bitter - can you tell?

Speaking frankly, I hate the America thing.