#can you believe in the whole 4 months we’ve had nacho she’s never come up on the bed

[cherryhomo]

oh to be loved

(feat. @onasfreckles)

[callieshipman]

The Becho Effect

I’ve been participating in A Very Becho Valentines, run by the wonderful people over at @echo--positivity! I had the lovely Soph @echokomspacekru and I hope she enjoys this fic under the cut (I’ll upload it to AO3 tomorrow)

It is a known phenomenon in their friendship group that if there is an opportunity to incessantly flaunt your relationship in everyone else’s face and somehow still stay friends with them, Bellamy and Echo will gladly take that opportunity and turn it up to eleven.

Monty and Harper call it The Becho Effect, and Bellamy and Echo see it more as a point of pride than anything else when they’re willing to accept that they’ve taken something a little far.

“I’m just saying,” Emori tells them one day over their weekly group coffee. “You’ve been together three years, and I have sincerely never met any other couple so intense.”

“Knock it off,” Bellamy says fondly, taking Echo’s hand and running a thumb over her knuckles. “Just because your relationship is mostly egging each other on to do borderline illegal things doesn’t mean you have to come after mine.”

“I wouldn’t have it any other way,” Murphy quips, grinning at Bellamy.

“We’re not that bad,” Echo argues, though she’s smiling as she says it. “And in my defence, it’s Bellamy’s fault.”

“True,” Monty muses. “You were very cool before you started dating this nerd.”

“Hey,” Echo says, raising an eyebrow at him as she leans into Bellamy and he pulls her closer to his chest. “Name one occasion we’ve been over the top.”

Harper laughs, the sound ringing through the coffeeshop and Gina, the barista and Bellamy’s ex, turns and grins at them across the shop. Raven waves at her, then turns back to Bellamy and rolls her eyes, placing her elbows on the table as she leans towards him.

“I can name five.”

1.

When Echo first gets it into her head that Bellamy might be interested in her as more than a friend, she starts taking up increasing amounts of Harper, Emori, and Raven’s time with it.

“But how do I know?” Echo asks one day, sitting on the floor as Harper braids her hair. They’re having a girl’s night in, and she’s rather enjoying the pampering, as well as the opportunity to pick her best friends’ minds about the guy she’s hopelessly in love with.

“Um,” Raven says.”Because he looks at you all the time, stumbles over his words, and won’t stop touching you?”

“Sometimes you just gotta take chances!” Harper tells her. “Honestly, Echo.”

“I like him,” Echo says softly, because she really really does. She wants to date him, and ask about his day, and kiss him in the evening, wake up with him in the morning. But she’s not the type to make a move without being absolutely certain what the outcome will be.

Unfortunately, or perhaps fortunately, her three closest female friends are all the type to take a leap of faith and hope for the best. They’re also the type to get it, because they will accept absolutely no less.

“You’re being dramatic,” Emori says.”Kiss first. Ask questions later.”

Logically, Echo knows this. She has a tendency to dramatise the situation, make it worse, then wait it out until it’s over, but she’d really rather not mess this one up. Bellamy has been a quiet object of her affection for a long while.

“I need a plan,” she announces. “I could spy on him to find out if he likes me? Or someone could ask him and tell me.”

Harper smacks her lightly on the back of the head. “Just ask him yourself, ya fool.”

-

“I still can’t believe you were gonna spy on me,” Bellamy says fondly.

“Did you have any better ideas?” Echo teases back, nudging his foot under the table.

“He absolutely did not,” Monty says, raising an eyebrow. “He’s worse than you.”

“So much worse,” Murphy sighs. “Number two. Guys night out. The Secret Echo Meetings.”

2.

“She doesn’t like me back,” Bellamy tells Monty and Murphy as he puts their pitchers down on the slightly sticky bar table. “She hasn’t said anything.”

“She likes you back,” Murphy drones, taking a swig of his drink.

“Please just talk to each other,” Monty mutters, staring into his drink with an expression of true distress as if Bellamy and Echo potentially dancing around each other is the most troubling thing in his life. “I’m begging you.”

“How do you two just keep kissing people?” Bellamy asks. “Don’t you make plans?”

“The drama of it all,” Murphy says, rolling his eyes. Despite his frustration, he shoots Bellamy a smirk. “You don’t need a master plan.”

“I want one though,” he says. “What if I said we were all going out together but then you guys pretend to cancel so it’s just us? Or I could pretend I need help moving something, she’s pretty strong.”

“I feel like this relationship is my whole damn life now,” Monty says as Murphy drops his head onto the table and groans. “Why do you keep making us come to secret Echo meetings?”

“Why won’t you just help?” Bellamy asks, lightly smacking Murphy on the back of the head. “You guys have great relationships! I’m just asking you how to do it.”

“Talk to her,” Murphy says into the table. “Just. Talk to her.”

“I feel like that’s not enough,” he says. “I can’t just talk to her.”

The look Monty gives him makes him think that he might be being an idiot, but damnit, he does not do things by halves.

-

“Secret Echo meetings,” Echo laughs, and Bellamy kisses the top of her head. “I love that!”

“We didn’t,” Murphy says. “There were like...ten of those.”

“Four,” Monty corrects, though he’s smiling. “Still too many. I started to feel like I was living in that bar.”

“Example three,” Harper says. “The one year anniversary.”

3.

“Is it too much?” Bellamy asks, taking a nacho from the plate and leaning across the table. “It’s not too much, right?”

“It’s gone beyond too much,” Emori tells him, slapping Murphy’s hand away from her plate. “But I think it’s gone so far beyond too much that it’s circled back to charmingly extra.”

“Is that a thing? I don’t think that’s a thing.” Murphy grins at Emori through a mouthful of food.

There are six of them sitting in this cramped little booth- Bellamy, Emori, Murphy, Raven, Monty, and Harper. Echo is absent on account of this being the ‘Bellamy Blake Plans His First Anniversary’ council.

Bellamy quite likes his list of top ten ideas for the best anniversary celebrations ever, and if Harper is going to label them as ‘fuckin’ wack’ then that’s her problem.

“I’m putting a ban on you hiring things,” Raven says as she examines the list. “That means no horse-drawn carriages, Blake. There is no way you can afford that.”

“Octavia’s college fund?” Murphy offers, and Bellamy glares at him. “Joking!”

“That was kinda sweet actually,” Harper muses. “My god, you love that girl.”

“Yeah,” Bellamy says, lost in thought as he scans the page. “Yeah, I really do.”

-

“A horse-drawn carriage?” Echo looks a little crestfallen for a moment. “You considered that?”

“I couldn’t really afford that,” Bellamy protests. “It was just a brief idea!”

“She considered a hot air balloon,” Emori tells him, winking. “You’re as bad as each other.”

“Okay, I have number four,” Murphy says. “Last year. The hospital.”

4.

Before the sunny fall afternoon Bellamy gets a concussion from Miller accidentally winging a football straight into his head, it would have been fair to assume that Echo was the type to be level-headed in a crisis.

She is not.

They’ve been together for two years, and she’s his emergency contact, which means that when she gets the call from the hospital she practically flings herself over the couch to get out of the door.

Her phone beeps a few times as she hurries down the street (their local hospital is a bus ride away but there’s no way in hell she’s waiting for that thing) and she finds herself ignoring the sounds of it. In a slight blur, she checks in and is directed to the third floor where she arrives, slightly out of breath and a little tearful.

Already in the waiting room, she finds Miller with an expression of sincere guilt on his face, and Murphy who looks like a kid in a candy store.

“What happened?” Echo breathes.

“Um, we did text you,” Murphy says, and Miller groans and puts his head in his hands.

Echo takes her phone out and scrolls through the texts.

Miller: hey i just knocked ur boyfriend tf out with a football but like

he’s fine

not happy with me but fine

Murphy: before you start getting cryptic texts from miller

bellamy is fine he just got whacked lmao

he says to tell you not to worry

Echo looks up and groans. “Seriously?”

“You are bright red,” Murphy says. “Please tell me you didn’t run here.”

Her silence must confirm it to him, because he starts cackling like a madman.

“Why didn’t you just take the bus? Or look at your phone?”

“It’s Bellamy and Echo,” Miller says, raising his head. “They don’t half-ass things.”

She flips him off, even though she’s smiling a little with the rush of relief that Bellamy is completely okay, and takes a seat in an uncomfortable plastic chair.

She might be a little embarrassed half an hour later when Bellamy returns with a bruise on his head full of insults for Miller and she gets a little over-emotional, but Bellamy would have done the exact same.

-

“I can’t believe you’re saying I was too dramatic!” Echo says, frowning at Murphy. “I thought it was serious!”

“You ran so far,” Raven whispers. “So far. So fast.”

“Yeah, yeah,” Bellamy says. “I think it was fair of her. What’s number five?”

“Number five is right now,” Emori says, pointing a finger at them. “Need I remind you that you hired this whole place out to celebrate getting engaged?”

“I’ll allow it,” Raven says. “Free booze.”

“It is not free,” Bellamy reminds her. “I told you I would pay for two drinks.”

“Whatever,” she says, winking. “Congratulations, guys.”

Echo wiggles her hand with the beautiful ring on it, the one Bellamy had spent months picking out, and everyone cheers.

“I love you,” she says to Bellamy, leaning her head into his shoulder and smiling.

He tilts her head up to kiss her properly, ignoring the whistles around them. “I love you too,” he says, and he knows that this is the truest thing he’s ever said. Their friends can tease him as much as they like, anyone on the street can think they’re as dramatic as they want, but as long as he has this girl by his side, none of it matters and everything is perfect.

[gerigibbons]

Intermittent Fasting Gets a Bad Rap

Intermittent Fasting, My 21-Day Self-Challenge

What do you believe is true about losing weight?   We’ve all got our theories on what works and what doesn’t, based on personal experience, and media bias.

Fasting has had a bad rap.  If you’re at all like me, you’ve been on a hunt – for many years – to figure out how to continue to eat and lose weight.  What’s the right mix of food, the right timing? It’s exhausting.  Fasting isn’t really talked about as an option.  It’s so simple. Yet not a lot of mileage in it for marketing.

I shared with my subscribers this week (join me!) and Facebook peeps  (visit!) that I was setting myself a 21-Day Intermittent Fast Challenge because in managing through some major life events, I defaulted to that well-worn groove in my head that went something like “you don’t want to think about this stuff, it’s big and serious, you should eat.”

But that’s not really who I am anymore. So it didn’t last for long.  And it felt terrible.

One of the times I do feel amazing is when I’m doing intermittent fasting.

Yep.

For me, that means not eating for 24 hours at a time (9 of which I’m happily asleep) two or three days of the week.

I feel more amazing when I fast than on any other diet plan, assuming I manage the thoughts and feelings that come up.

I’m going to tell you a little about fasting, and I’ll blog here each week about how I’m managing in the midst of social events (dinner, dates, and a family reunion).

Are you nuts?

I was introduced to intermittent fasting about 20 months ago by Brooke Castillo. We were on a video call and when she suggested it my facial expression said everything, “Sister, are you KIDDING?”

But I was willing to try it, and it was surprisingly simple, and incredibly effective constraint.  I talked myself out of it eventually (much more on that), but for now I want to introduce you to the concept.

Eat. Stop. Eat.

One of my favorite books on fasting is “Eat Stop Eat” by Brad Pilon.  He delves deep into the science and marketing behind dozens of the most popular diets – from Atkins to South Beach to the Omnivore’s Dilemma and more. He believes, and this resonates with me, that research on food and nutrition is as much (or more) about sales and marketing than health and well-being.

His analysis of the books revealed two truths:

Prolonged calorie restriction is the only proven nutritional method of weight loss

Humans can only be in one of two states: Fed or Fasted. We’re either eating and storing calories; or we’re burning calories.

So what should we eat to lose weight? And what happens when we don’t eat?

Definition: Fasting is the “acting of willingly abstaining from some or all food and in some cases drink for a pre-determined period of time.”

The minute you stop eating, your body slowly enters the fasted state.  As you use up the energy and nutrients supplied by your last meal, you slowly ramp up the energy you use from body fat. For most people this occurs between 16-24 hours after your last meal.

Pilon says that being willing is the difference between fasting and starving.  Starving is where your fat reserves are almost completely used up and you can’t supply your body with enough energy to meet its needs.  That’s not what happens with a short-term 2-3 day fast, which Pilon has researched extensively.

In “Eat Stop Eat” Pilon recommends that you are only in fasting mode for one or two 24-hour periods per week.  This means, in effect, that you eat one meal a day – for me its dinner – two days a week.

But then there’s hunger.  Pilon says that what we call hunger is, most likely, a learned reaction to a combination of metabolic, social and environmental cues to eat.  I buy that to some degree, and I will say that really feeling hungry is something many of us never experience.  And are not particularly willing to experience.

…which brings me back to the look of shock and horror I gave Brooke when she suggested I try a little intermittent fasting.

I will admit. I panicked a little. A lot.  But a 24 hour fast, it turns out, is not that big a deal.  I am not a big breakfast eater.  I don’t usually eat until 10 or 11 most days anyway. So I started Pilon’s protocol by fasting til noon one day, then 2pm;  then 4pm, then finally 6pm.

Now people. I like my food. I really do.  But this was not that hard for me.  And I lost 4 lbs in a week. So the slight discomfort (and I mean slight) that I felt was worth it.  I did not lose 4lbs every week I practiced intermittent fasting, but I did have much steadier, long-term weight loss than I’d previously experienced.

The rules are pretty simple:

Take small, 24-hr breaks from eating.

Do some resistance exercise 2-3 times a week.

Done.

Whaaat? Yes. That simple.

Fast, but Manage Your Mind!

Now I’m going to tell you the truth. I did this for several months, and I dropped 30 lbs, and felt incredible.

But.

My mind was a hot mess. I was very focused on my weight loss result, and on the scale, and a whole lot less focused on why I had been overeating to start with.  And when I stopped doing the thought work, my old time diet brain came back full force.  I did not abandon fasting 2-3 times a week because it wasn’t working. I abandoned it because I did not treat the root cause – negative thinking,  ignore my thinking.  I was laser-focused on the result of weight loss…but not on the “why” behind it.

But that doesn’t mean I failed. It means I had something to learn about myself, which I have.  I’ve learned that I can get in my own way very easily, and that journaling my thoughts and my food are VITAL to reaching the healthy weight that I want.

Because it’s never about the food, it’s always about what you are eating over, what you’re not willing to explore, feel, or deal with.  And me, these days, I’d rather deal with my mountain of unpleasantness and feel that discomfort, than numb with nachos, ice cream, wine, and so forth.

I’m writing this on Day 2.  I’m fasting until 6p.m. then having a regular dinner with my friend Kristin. Stay tuned for more.

For Further Reading:

1. Eat Stop Eat

2. Brad Pilon’s Blog