Day Ninety-nine - Y control

And there was a lot of good. I can safely say that for about two thirds of my stay there, it was amazing. Probably the job I had I enjoyed the most, certainly up to that point. And what was not to like? The pay wasn't bad, the job wasn't hard, and I got along famously with pretty much everyone there. Well, maybe not really that much with the folks that worked at the book department, those mainly lived in their own bubbles. So, bearing that in mind, those first few months were really great - this while I was still in the customer care department. We worked really well as a team, and a bunch of us - plus a bunch of people from other teams as well - used to hang out after work a lot, generally just for a few drinks or maybe depending on the occasion, even a proper night out. I had fun, I really did, and I never did not like what I was doing. Because work was increasingly the solace I could find due to my family life being not all that good, really. Whatever communications problems me and Dora had faced were only getting worse, and the only pretense we kept that we were a couple was us still sleeping in the same bed. And also this should be noted, mentally and physically I was at my lowest ever. I'd put on massive amounts of weight, and though I never felt too bad about it, I can also see why that would make me not all that appealing to Dora. It was, in fact, during a routine medical check-up at work that I finally realized how badly I'd fallen. See, I did feel good about myself. But that was because I didn't see myself as an overweight person, and certainly not as a fat one. But that doctor who was doing my check-up weighted me, and made some calculations, then hit me with a ton of bricks. She used a word nobody had ever used to describe myself, and by jove, I didn't see myself as it either. But she said I was obese, not merely someone overweight or with a few extra pounds, but obese. And that hit me hard. Hard as hell. So much so that on that very day I started down the path that would see me getting much fitter in due time. All the crap I'd been eating and drinking, I quit cold turkey. On top of that, I started exercising daily. Every single night after work - I used to leave at 10 p.m. and get home around 11 or so - I would wait a couple of hours and around 2 a.m. or so I'd go for a run around the neighbourhood, and - jesus, thinking aabout this now is cringy - I did like 500 sit ups, little kowing that I was ruining my back in the process. And I kept at it, every single day, week after long week, for months on end. I was on my way.