Failure to Launch

Feeling a bit blue today.  Losing weight is 99% mental; an introvert by nature, I find that I am lost in thought far more since I started this path than I ever have been.  Pondering how I got here, the long road I have to travel to be healthy...My weight has always held me back from being the person I want to be: I LOVE dance, but have always been too fat to make my movements look like more than a gyrating bowl of jello...I am very outgoing, but often appear to be a flake because I'm worried about what others will think so I sometimes cancel at the last minute out of embarassment and fear (I especially hate seeing people who I knew years ago for fear that they'll say....DAMN look how big she got!).

I feel alone, depressed, vulnerable...suffocating inside this shell that looks nothing like the person I am inside!  This should be enough motivation to have me running four hours a day, but the harder I work, the more I look ahead at the LONG path I have ahead.  200 pounds feels like it will take a lifetime to lose, but I know that if I don't start now I will never get there.  There are so many insecurities that I keep inside and I feel like this process is bringing them all to the forefront (probably for the best so that I won't be in a thin body with a fat girl's mentality)...I suppose instead of focusing on the negative, I should ponder and attract to myself the positive. 

My life will be completely changed when I lose weight:

1.  I'll be able to fit in stadium seats without feeling stuffed in!
2.  I'll be able to fit into plane seats without the armrest pinching into my thighs (or needing a seatbelt extender)
3.  I won't be afraid to go anywhere or do anything
4.  I'll be able to buy what I like because it's cute, not because it fits!!!
5.  I'll be able to dance freely without being self-conscious about what I look like to others.  (I will also be taking dance lessons to learn contemporary dance once I lose weight)
6.  I will be much more active...I want to compete in a cycling race and join a softball team.
7.  I'll be more self confident and not just pretending to be confident for the benefit of others
8.  Hopefully I won't shed as many tears or feel so alone...unless you've been this size, it's hard to understand even a fraction of the daily struggle.  Once I lose weight, it will be my mission to show others that they, too, can be free!
9.  I will be able to have children...actually, this should be the first item on the list!  I have always wanted to be a mother, but refused to have a child at this size...not only is it probably impossible...it's extremely dangerous for both mother and baby...I need to lose weight so that I can be the wonderful mother that I know I will be.
10.  "I wish I could" will be removed from my vocabulary!!!  Once I lose weight, there is nothing that will be able to hold me back from living the life that I want to live.

My thirties MUST be better than my childhood and my twenties...my weight has been the reason why I can't do things my entire life...I REFUSE to be that person for another decade in my life!

Stop the pity party!

Yesterday I cried. Not the gut-wrenching, soul-bearing cry that cleanses and leaves you feeling revived; I cried the covert, escaping tears of too-full pots bubbling on too-hot burners...the kind that sneak out before you can secure the top.


Naked, sucking in my stomach to trick the scale into believing I did a moment of exercise yesterday only to see two days' worth of hard work flushed with middle of the night binges. This daily shame a reminder of what I've become: unmotivated, uncaring, unchanged.

So I cried. I cried because I'm forced to see what's always been there, but I didn't want to deal with. I cried because the scale forces to me to see the correlation between my actions and the results. I cried because every time I get dressed it slaps me in the face that no clothes can hide this monster I've become.

Today I decided. Not with the sure-footed, inerrant tread of hinds feet on high places; I decided with the trepidation of a woman who can't bear to fall...I think I can, I think I can, I think I can.

Naked, not bothering to hide my stomach I open one clenched eye to see the result of not caring yesterday. 6 days of hard work completely undone by a two-day pity party, quieting tears with sugar. I got back in the bed wanting to sleep the day away, continue my blow-out gala.

But instead, I decided. I decided to write how I was feeling in my journal. I decided to eat breakfast (though my normal response would be to starve myself all day and then binge in an emotional outpouring). I decided to take my vitamins. I decided to clean the house. Somewhere in all of this deciding, I decided I'm worth fighting for. I'm worth LIVING for!

This is unlike any other attempt at losing weight. I'm actually looking at myself, not just what the scales reflect, but my actions (and my body's reactions), my feelings, my motives. I don't know what's ahead, but I'm choosing to deal with it...one decision at a time.

The Skinny Girl I Ate

There's a thin, healthy girl inside of me yearning to be free!


I see her every time I stare at my belly flab and wonder which roll will disappear first. Her bra straps don't hide between her underarm fat and her skinny jeans look like jeans instead of body paint. Her thighs don't rub together and she has a pouch for a stomach instead of a GUT. She doesn't hide behind other people in pictures or pose sideways to hide her wideness. She isn't concerned every moment with how she looks to others.

She is free to do whatever she wants without worrying if she'll break something...she even likes the little plastic chairs. She hikes, jogs, goes white water rafting, plays on a softball team and still has enough energy to be a vixen in the bedroom. In fact, she has quite a few sexy clothes that I would never think of wearing.

She respects herself and demands that everyone else do the same. While she cares for her family, she makes sure that her needs are met first so that she can be the best for them.

The skinny girl inside me has taught me that I have to love myself if I ever want to meet her. She said that if I believe in myself and accept who I am today, slowly but surely she will appear to me.

With every drink of water, every healthy food choice, every decision to work out...I am one step closer to meeting her and boy are we going to have fun!!!