Posts Tagged ‘fears’
I’ve read more diet books, articles and magazines over the course of my life than a normal functioning adult should and can spew off so many facts, tips and pieces of useless diet information it’d make your head spin.
One of the questions all of those books ask to some degree is a question I hate passionately–
“When you lose all the weight you want, what will you do with your life that you don’t do now?”
I pass this off as an underhanded way for the shrinks behind the books (none of which are EVER sporting a spare roll in their impeccably-presented back-cover publicity head shot) to get a dig in on us fat girls to make us think that our weight isn’t really a problem and that we can do anything we want.
I get the gist, the intended empowerment behind the question, but I also get pissed off because there isn’t anything I *don’t* do with my life that I want to do because of my weight. I’m not afraid of public speaking (my nerves aren’t from my fatness, they’re from my shaky voice), I don’t sit on the sidelines if I want to do something, I don’t use my fat EVER as an excuse not to participate with friends or doing anything I want to do. I just do it. I hate excuses so I avoid them for myself at all costs, and fat or no fat, there isn’t anything I’m not going to do if I want to do it.
Ummm, sorta. The one thing I physically can’t bring myself to do yet is skydive. Now, mind you, this isn’t going to be an everyday thing. I just want to do it. And yes, the weight tables say I can be up to 250 pounds. I’m under that but I am still slightly scared that if I’m not on the lower side of 200 first, I might get a faulty line. So, OK, I’ve put off skydiving. For now.
For some reason, the other day I applied this thought to the whole of my life, not just the really big things and discovered something alarming: I might live parts of my life differently if (when) I hit that skinny target. My list is only four details long at the moment but now that I’m on this line of thought, it may grow.
Curious? Of course you are or you wouldn’t have read this far. In no particular order:
1. Shorts: I’d wear ‘em. In public. Right now, my thunder thighs combine with the cellulite of family genetics to produce two horribly dimpled legs where I’d like nice legs to be. I can hack the chub rub (we’re like sisters now) but the cellulite I hate.
2. Nakie Time: (that’s pronounced “na-key” time in case this is new to you). A term coined years ago during a wonderfully wild post-summer camp skinnydipping session (wait til I tell you about that one…), nakie time in my own life doesn’t happen. By nakie time, I mean walking around naked without reservation. Mind you, this isn’t coming into play during family Christmas gatherings or the 4th of July pool party. It’s with the hubby. Yeah. Rounding the curve of 20 years of marriage and I am still, to this moment in time, petrified to let him see me completely naked. It just doesn’t happen. And if it does, by accident, I practically hyperventilate. Wouldn’t it be nice to have that mental issue gone? I can’t even imagine what it would be like to be naked anywhere but between the sheets. I just can’t. That’s pretty sad.
3. Fashion: It’s not that I’m not moderately fashionable now. I’m hip in a middle-school English teacher/mom/coach’s wife sort of way. I’m not floppy and frumpy and baggy. I’m somewhat trendy, depending on the day and the mood. But I’d like to be able to wear some of the really pretty stuff out there that my brain chides me for even looking at. The real secret is that I want to be a Kardashian sister but don’t tell my brain. It may explode. Actually, they’re gorgeous and that’s an extreme. Mildly fashionable in a refined woman sort of way will be my angle. When I get there.
4. Clothes: On the same note, I want to wake up some splendid morning and head straight to my closet without hesitation or fear and pick out the outfit that I *WANT* to wear that day, not the outfit I *FEEL* like I should wear, based on my a)bloating b)mindset c) self-hatred and loathing d) what I think I will look OK in. I buy clothes because I like them, so doesn’t it make sense that I should like wearing them? I have a couple of pieces I love but don’t have the courage to wear. We’re not talking thigh-high boots (though they would hide the cellulite…) or mini dresses, but sweaters that show a tiny bit of cleavage or a skirt that hits just above the knees. If I wear any of those things now, I have to talk myself into it for a period of no less than two weeks prior. And even then, I chicken out.
What’s really disappointing is that I think I would feel safer jumping from a plane with a parachute strapped to my back than walking around in shorts during the summer. Wonder if they have naked skydiving…..