Weight is weighing me

Midnight musings

Popsugar says the biggest thing they want to become a writer for them is to pick a topic and stay on it.  It suggests health, wealth or something else.  I want to talk about health specifically mental health and how it has affected all of my other health problems. 

A Fat Girls Take on Weight Loss

I’m a very large woman.  I don’t qualify for shows like My 600 Pound life but in my mirror, I look like those people.  I have three defining moments in my life that contribute to my weight.  There are genetic components and mental health issues too but mostly it’s those three moments.  I am tall for a woman in my immediate family.  So naturally with my height is a heavier weight. 

Yearly weigh ins at my elementary school killed me.  I was over 100 pounds in 4^th grade.  My other taller female friend was skinny but weighed more than our classmates too. I had a belly back then, she didn’t.  Neither of us had breasts but I also had a big butt where she was rail thin.  Her extra height meant she and I really weighed about the same.  That year I was really sweating the weigh in.  We had a great class.  The boys didn’t tease us about being different much and the other girls weren’t catty.  The most unsupportive conversations were with the students struggling with grades while we didn’t.  I had been friends and classmates for most of them for 6 years so far.   I just knew I was more different because of my home life than my weight.   My mom had mental health issues and poor eating habits.  So I ate like her.  I knew there were things I could do to keep my weight down.  I just didn’t do them often.

In 1984 my mother married and we moved to a place where I lived too close to the school to ride the bus.  I walked to school and back again every day.  It was about 6 blocks one way.  From the beginning of the school year to late October, I lost a lot of weight.  It was enough that I needed to take in my jeans and skirts.  My step dad had us eating much better and the walking made a difference.  When they split up and we ended up with my mom planning meals my weigh went back up and my weight went back up with them but not by much.  So through high school I was still a heavier girl than most but my body proportions had changed. My lower abdomen was still a round shape instead of flat or concave and I hated it.  When I got pregnant and had severe morning sickness the summer between my jr and sr. year well most of my real fat melted away as I supported new life.  Christmas 1987 I got a great pair of jeans but by May I couldn’t wear them anymore.  After I delivered my son, they were loose on me.  They didn’t fit like they used to anywhere, so I took them in.    

In 1997 I was living with my now husband.  We both worked jobs but we had too many expenses to eat well.  Our saving grace was a friend from the days my boyfriend was in the Army National Guard.  He brought us most of the expired MRE’s and canned food the “kitchen” he worked in.  I ate those for lunch almost every day and sometimes for dinner and a midnight snack.  Each package was about 1500 calories.  I packed on so much weight that my mother thought I was pregnant when I announced we were engaged and getting married in 3 months.  I just couldn’t understand why I needed to buy or make all new clothes.  I gained about 75 pounds in a 6 to 8 month span.  My husband didn’t mind but my doctor was like you need to drop these pounds if you hope to have a baby.  The weight kept me from conceiving for 3 years.

So, there are my defining moments.  I have steadily gained weight since then.  I’m 375 now.  I know I need to lose the weight.  A childhood trauma and the weight made me need a knee replacement.  In the 9 months since the surgery, I have lost a little weight but not because of exercise.  I had a round of IBS-D with vomiting a few weeks back that caused me to drop a few pounds and took away some bloat.  I knew I had lost a few inches when I put on a pair of pants I had been saving for my son’s high school graduation.  The pants were loose enough to sag when I walked.  Eventually, I’ll need to alter them for now, I’m going to enjoy the extra room while I interview for a new job or two.