Despite the fact that almost everything I’ve touched or tried to accomplish during the last seven days has fallen apart, I’m fine. Fat, but fine. That’s how I described myself to a friend today. And that’s pretty much how I’m feeling.
Being fat has taken over an extremely large part of my brain recently, as well as taken over an extremely large portion of my jeans. Absolutely nothing fits anymore. Not even my pregnancy clothes. I’ve outgrown my pregnancy clothes! How did THAT happen? God knows I’ve always been a bit of a fat snob. I can remember a time in my life that was like less than 5 years ago when I would look at fat people, and think, “My God, how could that person let themselves get that fat?” And now, I know exactly how they did it. Here’s how I did it.
When I was pregnant, I took complete liberty to eat whenever and whatever I wanted. I consumed tons of food. Fattening foods. Delicious foods. Glorious foods. And I ballooned up from 175 pounds to 250 pounds in 9 months. I’m lucky enough to be 5 foot 10, so 250 didn’t look especially huge at 9 months pregnant, and the nurse on the delivery ward actually made me switch scales because she coudn’t believe I actually weighed 250 pounds. In the two weeks after delivery, I had lost down to about 210 pounds, and I was thrilled. I thought that the weight would just keep falling off. *Cough* It didn’t.
When we moved back to the Mainland, I went on South Beach right after we moved, and I lost about 20 pounds. Down to 190, according the bathroom scale at Kris and Grant’s house. I was thrilled. And I was looking and feeling better. But I kept kind of slipping up on South Beach, and by two months later, I was just back to eating whatever and whenever I wanted. I seemed to have forgotten that I wasn’t pregnant anymore. I just kept wearing my maternity clothes, and eating. I haven’t bought one non-maternity item since August of 2003. But now I’m not radiant. I’m not glowing.
I’m just fat.
I’m back up to a whopping 220 pounds. And I can’t actually hide the fact that I’m hugely fat now. I have a hard time reaching over my fat stomach to tie my shoes. My “fat jeans” are busting at the seams. I don’t have any clothing that fits me. I’ve been in denial about shopping for new clothes, and have been telling myself for 14 months now that I wasn’t going to go shopping until I was back down to my pre-pregnancy weight. Denial. That is a word I’m becoming intimately familiar with.
For the first time in my life, I’m actually embarassed by my body. It doesn’t feel like mine anymore. I stopped looking at it in the mirror a long time ago. I don’t even recognize my face, and don’t even bother putting on makeup or trying to make myself look nice. I never look nice. I just look….fat.
Becoming fat has effected every part of my life. Especially the picture that I have of myself. I no longer see the confident, smart, funny, ambitious, and sexy woman that I have lived with all of these years. All I can see in my mind’s eye is a self conscious, lethargic, bulging, triple chinned loser.
I don’t want to be fat anymore. But I feel almost suffocated by the work I have ahead of me to lose the weight. I want to hide in a pint of ice cream, and a hide under big thick quilt on the couch. But I have to change my mind. I have to retrain my brain, and make better choices. I have to be strong and move forward.
Basil and I have made a deal. If I’m down to my pre-pregnancy weight and he has quit smoking one year from now, we’re taking a romantic trip to Paris for our 5th wedding anniversary. Whoever meets their goal is going to Paris, with or without the other.
I have to make it to Paris in June. I just have to.