It’s a big ugly cruel world out there full of people who would prey on our flaws and if we don’t have any… well they are there to make sure that we believe we do. Allow me to illustrate… I have spent my whole life – literally and seriously my entire life – thinking about my weight. And food. And what I should and shouldn’t eat. What I should look like, how I should be shaped. I have bought pills and and dieted extensively with only limited success (my smallest size as an adult was a 12 and that was achieved by literally eating nothing but popcorn and apples for four solid months). I have tried throwing up after eating – turns out this isn’t something I can do – and let me just admit while I am at it that I felt ashamed of myself for failing in that effort.
After I had my son, my body definitely changed. I will tell you flat out that I want to hurt women who have babies and nothing irreversible happens to their bodies. I didn’t just gain weight. My whole being changed… cognitively and emotionally… and of course, physically. I have fought this hard. I have mostly balanced myself emotionally by practicing TaiChi and cognitively by doing brain puzzles and physically… well, as it turns out, physically I have achieved nothing. Epic failure. I have tried. In the beginning, I did everything I could think of. Everything that had worked before. First, I did Weight Watchers and in a year and a half I lost 20 lbs. WooHoo. And THEN I plateaued for six months. I changed it up, I introduced new foods… I did everything I was supposed to do. I added Jazzercise. Nothing. In fact I gained a little – muscle if I am to believe the experts… pfffft… when you’re me, the scale going up in the middle of a plateau is failure. End of story. Sorry, exercise gurus… And then I went on Atkins. For a boost. Give it a whirl… Why not?! SIX weeks… DILIGENTLY following the induction phase of old-school Atkins… I lost two, count ’em: one, two buckle my shoe, pounds. Two.
And then I went mad. I literally ate whatever I wanted for about a month and gained 30 pounds. In a month. Then after an appropriate amount of self-degradation… I began again. The dieting and the exercising. Over and over and over again. Nothing. So basically, that’s my story in a nutshell.
Until now.
Now things have to change. I realize the following… I eat better, healthier foods than most people that I know. I do not eat beef or pork because I can not digest them and I have been eating gluten-free for five months to combat inflammation/arthritic pain. (It’s working, BTW) I don’t formally exercise except for TaiChi and the time I spend on my WiiFit, which apparently doesn’t count. Not that I HAVEN’T tried exercise – but it doesn’t help. And it exhausts me. I don’t drink soda. I drink one cup of coffee in the morning and then good ol’ plain water all day long – a good amount of it especially on days when I am not in school and then I often have a glass of wine with my dinner. I eat about 1600 calories a day. Some days, a little more and some days a little less… I move around quite a bit – when I teach I NEVER sit.
I think the task I have before me is to be okay with me. What if this is it? What if this is who I am? What if I just decide it is ok to be me – this size. That is why I started this blog. I have to learn to shut all that noise out of my head… If I make healthy choices every day for my body, then that is good enough for me. I think. I hope.
It’s harder than it looks… 
Isn’t it wonderful to receive a genuine, unsolicited compliment? Personally, I can get a LOT of mileage out of a carefully crafted compliment. Once, when I was 16 someone told me I have devastating eyes. I STILL smile when I remember that. That’s a lot of mileage!
Abundant Style 