OMW

These past few months, I’ve been so happy. I’m trying to figure out what happened. I’ve lived the past 20 years as a miserable and emo curmudgeon, and now I’ve had more moments of loopy happiness, that keeps building and building and building, than I’ve had my whole life. I even freakin’ joined the freakin’ YMCA, people. I was even excited when I drove into the parking lot of the Y this morning and couldn’t find a spot because it was filled with cars, and there were mothers with children and old people everywhere. (I think those are the people who use the Y during the day.) AND I AM USUALLY TERRIFIED OF PEOPLE!

But it’s phenomenal that I exercise almost every day. And now, in public. That is a huge NSV for me. I think I’ve finally killed the “fitness” mindset that got programmed into me in high school. Which is that it was basically cool to be miserable while exercising, that you should make up every excuse not to do it, and never let anyone see you sweat.

And then the mindset that developed through adulthood: that you can only be fit if you have a certain (skinny) body. That you’re not fit if you can’t keep up with the tiny aerobics instructor. Screw that. Your level is fitness is relative to what your body could do a month ago. That is the standard you should measure from, not what you think you should be doing.

Today, I’m on a high. I can fit into the pants I wore when I met DH. They’re a little tight, but I can zip them up easily. I don’t remember the last time I could do that. I know that I won’t feel this elation tomorrow, or next week. I know that visiting my family in a couple weeks will probably be difficult and turn me back into Emo Mommy, because they always, always have a way of doing that.

But I am recording this moment for posterity to look back on when I next lose momentum.

I apologize for my crazy writing style. My best friend used to say I write like Yoda. My use of commas drove her nutty. I’m generally not apologetic for my grammar on daily posts, but on pure prose, I feel a tad guilty.

There is nothing I effin’ hate more than the “Wow, you look great!” comments I get after I lose weight. That as the biggest self-esteem killer on the planet. Yea, maybe I look healthier. Yea, maybe I look less … puffy. Whatever. But implicit to “Wow, you look great!” is that I looked horrible before. It highlights only one, and the least important, reason for losing weight.

Not to mention that it totally throws me off track, considering one of the main reasons I have so much weight on my body is so that no one notices me or finds me attractive.

I’ve been freaking out today, and I’m hitting that portion where people have started to take notice that I’ve lost weight. My neighbor. My family, when I see them in two months. They will notice. And my husband. Particularly, my husband.

Today he said I looked hot, bla bla, he’s so proud of me for getting into my body. That I look more confident. Of course I only fixate on the “You look hot” portion of his sentiments. And it freaks me out and makes me want to grab a therapist and sit down for a few hours.

So ok. Bigtxmomma’s big weight gain.

Ugh!! DD’s awake from her nap! I am saved from myself! Sigh.

More later.

I figure I should start blogging a bit, because honestly, I should have a lot to say, more than can fit into the forums. I know that my obesity is a mental illness. And I think about it along those lines all the time and really don’t have anyone to speak those thoughts to, except for DH, and although he listens attentively, he doesn’t know what it really feels like. I don’t think anyone who doesn’t have a food addiction can know what it feels like.

So yea. My body. When I was little, I remember being hungry all the time. All the time. Literally, all the time. And my parents withheld food from me. I wasn’t fat, or nearly chubby, but I think they were afraid that if I ate too much, I would become fat. Funny that that is exactly what happened to me.

So they didn’t let me eat when I was in preschool/kindergarden. That’s really when I remember being so hungry all the time. I don’t think I could have possibly been overeating — I probably was just growing and being fed too little. I don’t think my parents felt that girls should eat a lot. My younger brother ate and ate and ate, and he was chubby, and they kept giving him more food. So I think the fact that I was a girl and so they thought I should be super slim had a lot to do with why they withheld food from me. (My mom was a bit chubby when she was a little girl, and I can only imagine that she grew up with a lot of pressure to be thin, and so transferred that to me.)

I started sneaking food. My parents didn’t like this. Food became an obsession and form of rebellion for me. I was not overweight, but when I was in sixth grade, my parents sent me to an adult Weight Watchers meeting to try to teach me about nutrition and maintaining weight. It was one of the most humiliating experiences of my life. My goal weight was to lose 5 pounds. I think I weighed like 116, and the target weight for my height at that point was 110 or something. But around that time in my life, I really began to think of myself as the fattest child on the planet and started the path of self hate. I look at pictures of myself back then, which is when I thought I was this gigantic blimp, and I just see a tall skinny little girl. It makes me quite sad to look back upon pictures of myself, because the image of myself back then was that I was this monstrously fat person. And I wasn’t. I wish I had known that.

So anyway, therein enters massive, massive self esteem issues and humiliation over my body.

All right. Now I’m getting too depressed to write.

(One note: Overall, I don’t blame or even resent my parents for my weight problem. They did the best they could and thought they were helping me. What I’ve done to my body is my own doing. But I think they did set inadvertently set in motion a lot of the current habits I have.)