Quick Friday update. Guess who showed up last night? I had finally sat down after cleaning like a mad woman all day and what to my wondering ear should appear but whining. Little dog was laying on side porch and looking at me through the screen door. I went out side and she went nuts. Jumped all over me and licked my arms. She scratched the heck out of me. I fed her and gave her water. And petted her. She is filthy... and pregnant. I called Mark and he took her home. No one home again. She did have food and water. I stole the neighbors cat at home because they were neglecting her. I got in no end of trouble. Sigh.
Vickie what do you mean by, "When one doesn't have a 'forever' sense of the size one IS, one probably doesn't LET themselves adjust-it just feels temporary?"
I have been holding my own at 181 to 185 for a year now. Depending on the time period that is 65-75 pounds gone. And yet the weight loss feels temporary. I am a fat girl. Is is like I have locked my real self, the fatter one, in a closet. And she is impatiently waiting to be let out. Sooner rather than later I think she is going to pry the door open and emerge. I will be relieved God help me.
I don't know how to be this thinner person. I have been practising for a year now and it still feels fake. If I got fatter it would feel like I had come home. I would be normal again. Isn't that scary? Why do you suppose I feel like that?
I find myself lately adopting old fat behaviors. I am self deprecating. I am apologizing for existing. I want to wear only baggy clothing. I am in fear of every morsel I eat. I am only walking in fits and starts. I quit putting lotion on my legs. I am thinking about stopping painting my toenails. I've gone back to sensible earrings.
Do you think it is because of all the changes happening and coming up? Am I retreating to a former self because I am scared? I just don't know, but I don't like it. If we get this smaller house I am going to have to give up a bunch of stuff. I want to move forward, and this house to me feels like forward. But that is not how it looks from the outside. Looks like we are going down in the world. Old little house with no garage and no amenities. And at our age. One of my thirty year old friends asked me, "Bea is this going to have to be your forever house?" She was awash in sympathy. No it probably isn't. Because of the nature of Mark's job we move about every ten years. But, the question still threw me. Am I nuts getting rid of stuff instead of hanging on to it just in case? Should I put us deep in debt to have the kind of home expected of us? Am I secretly pining away for a big fancy house? I don't think so. Then why am I dreading getting rid of a bunch of furniture? We do not need three desks. I hate housework. I want a more streamlined lifestyle. Gad am I mixed up. And if that digging outside doesn't stop soon I am going to kill someone.
Thanks for listening. I am looking for imput so if you have any, please comment. I want to know why I am longing to go back to being a fat person?
Take care of yourselves. Love Bea
P.S. Nory I checked your blog and there was nothing on it. What am I doing wrong?
10 comments:
It is safe for me to be fat. It is comfy and soft and I don't have to worry about all the attention, pressure and other things that come with the slimming down of me. I know that much. Also, an impending move, no matter to a smaller or bigger house is a HUGE deal. You have a lot going on, and as far as I am concerned just that digging and stuff going on outside would be enough to put me over the edge. I am real sensitive to the sound of the earth ripping and tearing and the clanging of machinery. You have been without water and had people in the house. Then there was the whole mud thing. It is all very unsettling. I can't get used to having a smaller body either. I picked up a pair of my capris the other day and thought they were my daughter's. When I found out they were mine it was kind of cool but it also felt surreal, temporary and maybe like it shouldn't be. Like I am living on borrowed time or something, tresspassing. But I am sticking it out and staking my claim. Be nice to yourself, blow kisses to the mirror again, and all that good stuff. Or don't look in the mirror if that helps. Put lotion on your legs and pay someone to paint your tonails if you have to. You deserve all things beautiful in the world.
I go through this a lot. I'm leaving behind what I thought was my "forever house" and living in an apartment when guys throw cigarettes butts all over the place and I have to go across the street to do laundry.
You have a home. It may not be the grandest house in the world but between you and Mark and anyone else like pets, it's your home. I've also come to the conclusion that my things own me instead of me owning them. I'm trying to get rid of them but it's hard.
I don't want to be fatter. It may feel like what I deserve and that may be what you're feeling. But you don't deserve it. I may not feel very comfortable (or at times too comfortable) with where I'm at, but I don't want to go back. Maybe I have just enough self-loathing for myself without wanting more. :-)
You also know when you're a fat person what's expected of you. When you're thinner, people expect more out of you. And we expect more out of ourselves and I don't know if we have it. That's another topic for another time.
If you like, I can fly out to where you're at and shoot someone and claim PMS still, if they're still digging. :-)
I am SO bad with names, but someone famous once said that "Comparison is the root of all dissatisfaction." Truer words were never spoken.
While you may be having a hard time parting with the "stuff" accumulated throughout your lifetime -- what you are contemplating sounds infinitely better to me. Downsizing -- or better yet -- rightsizing your home and your posessions can only be a good thing.
The longer I live, the more of a minimalist I become. If only I could become a minimalist in what I EAT!!!
Boy, could I relate to the "fat" brain that still lives with you. I think I could have a BMI of 21 and still feel like I weigh over 200 pounds. And always, the fat beast rages to have her way -- I want what I want and I want it NOW!! (She is scary, and I want her permanently locked up.)
As for taking care of yourself during this horribly stressful time -- please, please paint your toes, wear bright jewelry, and do ANYTHING that makes you feel good. Sometimes the only way out is through, and you are certainly slogging through some tough times right now. Take care of yourself so you can continue to take care of those you love.
P.S. The reason there was nothing on my blog -- is that there was nothing on my blog page yet. I am flattered that you would even go there. Be assured that I will update it very soon. Thanks for the interest, and keep writing such thought-provoking commentary!
Dear Bea,
We weigh ourselves down in many different ways. Sometimes with actual weight in the form of fat, sometimes in the form of stuff. There is something very freeing about decluttering, and losing the weight and the stuff. Fear is scary when it's in the driver seat, never know where you will end up. Be kind, caring and loving to yourself. I know you have the skills try them out on yourself. Do just one caring think for yourself tomorrow. Just one. Acknowledge that you did it and enjoy it.
Love, Ethel
The food and the stuff are the same thing for me. I have/eat the food and HAVE the stuff - same thing.
I think that it takes way longer than a year to adjust.
And when one doesn't have a "forever" sense of the size (stay here? loose more?) one IS, one probably doesn't LET them selves adjust - it feels temporary.
I am going through this with my only pair of jeans right now. I think that I have to get rid of them to have peace. My body has shifted over this summer. My buns have lifted just enough so that these jeans make a muffin top now. Same weight, same jeans - no longer make me feel good. They bother me. Looking around for someone that I THINK they will fit to pass them on. I have a hard time sending things to good will - I like to find them a home.
WHen I was in a loosing mode - I wore clothes that were tight - until I lost and they fit, then I wore them loose (same clothes) until they were falling off me - I avoided many, many size changes this way.
I can NO longer stand anything tight. I can not stand anything tucked in. I am wearing loose and untucked - not baggy - but loose.
I can no longer look at myself naked in the mirror - my perception of myself at this weight - my perception of myself 40 pounds ago - feels the same when I look in the mirror naked. Put clothes on - I can tell the difference. Without clothes - I feel like I have not lost. I think this is because I have nothing to compare myself TO, when naked. It is like a picture - where you don't know the size until they put a penny or a yardstick in the frame so you have a means of comparision.
Is this eating disorder thinking or normal? I have no idea. It is hard to find the line much of the time.
My psychiatrist appt is this morning. I was so pent up over it yesterday that I couldn't go to yoga, couldn't DO anything. I felt like a ball in a arcade game looking for a hole. I understand why it is so comforting for babies to be swaddled tightly.
In times of stress and upheaval we do revert back to old, comfortable or familiar behaviors. It's natural, but that doesn't always mean it's good.
I've been staying in and around 220 for a couple years now -- I may lose a few or gain a few but always come back to this general weight. It's a huge improvement from where I was, but I often wonder if this is were I'm destined to stay -- my "forever" weight, to reference your post.
Nory was right that comparing ourselves never helps us, whether it's weight or houses or anything else. We need to love ourselves and not judge ourselves against others and what they have.
Hold on, and do your best to take care of yourself, even if you don't feel like it. "Fake it till you make it," as they say. We should all pamper ourselves like Edina Monsoon does, at least once in a while, right?
My mother can wear the same clothes now that she wore in high school. Sure she has gone up and down a little with pregnancies and the like - but her body size FEELS like her body size to her.
I still am not sure that mine does. It feels more like me every day. But I still have the feeling that I unzipped the fat suit and stepped out.
I am now the size I was in college. (I am actually much more toned now than then.)
It is like the last 20+ years never happened when I look in the mirror with clothes on.
Take the clothes off - and I don't know who I am exactly. The no means of comparison thing. It isn't the body of 3+ years ago and it also isn't the body of 20+ years ago.
Take my clothes off - I have major wrinkles in my lower belly from fat/pregnancies. My boobs are down to my belly button naked. The fat behind my breasts is sagging everywhere.
Who is that?
I do not know if I am staying this size or going down more.
I stay at the same weight now - easily - but my body is different from month to month - same weight -different body. I am told that this will continue for at least a full year.
My belly is TOTALLY different than it was even 2 mos ago. My butt is now slightly different than it was 4 mos ago. My arms have changed in the last month.
If someone had a magic time machine, blindfolded me, moved me forward another year, took a naked picture, then kept me blindfolded and went ahead another year and took another picture, would I be able to pick my naked pictures out of a line up of other similar size/build women?
I sincerely doubt it.
I have seen pictures of women at 250 that look much better than I did at 215 - because of their tone. I have seen pictures of women at 200+ that look much better than I did at 180. These women do not need to loose anything more to look fabulous.
One of my original yoga instructors (Julie) was 300+ when I met her (just after birth of 3rd child) and at 200+ (3 years later) she looks better than I did at 180 because of her tone.
Does she need to loose more to be happy - no she is very happy at 180 and plans to stay there. She thinks she would be a non-curvy stick and look unhealthy any lower. Her blood work is good. Her health is good. She is happy.
If you lived in a temporary house, would you be different than if you lived in your forever house? I would. If you lived with someone else and then lived alone - would you be different? I think I would then too. So, when one is at one weight and then shifts weights considerably - are they the same then? I am not.
I think Andrea has a bead on part of your current feeling. You've had commotion all around you that has been INVASIVE. You've had lots of company who have wandered through your PERSONAL SPACE. You've been giving & giving & giving. As well, some of this company probably had, before being with you, a mental image of you as heavier. You may easily have felt like they didn't feel comfortable with this bodied Beula, or that they were wondering how long you'd "keep it off".
Now you're moving & contemplating getting rid of stuff.
Who would feel safe with all that going on? & in times of non-safety, isn't food &/or the big body where so many of us want to go?
You've maintained so terribly well for a year. Put off the decision of whether you're fat or not until you've made the move, gotten your things in order & can breathe your own air without it carrying the molecules of your company's curiosity, surprise, doubt, happiness for you, etc.
Or, correspondingly, know that if you gain weight, you CAN reverse it. Sounds to me like right now you need to BE.
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