junoesque
Full Member
I have always been big. I was a plump baby, a chunky child and a substantial teenager. This is my story and a revelation I have had, that I just need to get out of my system. This very self-indulgent, so I apologise in advance.
I have walked 3 times now down the rocky, painful path of weightloss.
I have seen the bodies of the fallen at the side of the way and felt smug, even as I helped them up , because I could do this! And I could!
3 times..
So what goes wrong? Why do I have 100lbs+ to lose before I am at a "normal" size?
I'm not comfortable being thin. I like being thin, but it takes me so far out of my comfort zone that my survival instinct kicks in.. (which is where chocolate, the tool of satan comes in).
I don't know how to be a thin person.
I'm used to blending happily into the background. I'm used to walking past men without a backward glance from them. I'm used to being able to have male friends. I'm used to being able to have girl friends without boundaries..
When I became thin (the first time) my male friends started to look at me differently, and I hated it. My girlfriends looked at me differently, and I hated it.
My male friends were now would-be suitors and my girlfriends now saw me as the competition..
the problem was that I didn't know that. Everyone knew these social rules, but me!
When I was big it was as though I was invisible physically. People liked me because I was interesting and funny, not because they wanted to be seen with me, or fancied me.
When I lost weight and became socially visible, a whole other set of rules kicked in.
Thin people know these rules. They are learned in childhood and adolescence.
They are the rules of mating, flirtation and advancement in society. If you are fat then these rules don't apply.You know your place and can't challenge the beautiful, so you are harmless and tolerated (mostly).
So whilst I was young and fat (and exempt) all the thin and lovely girls around me were engaged in a pitched battle to find out where they fitted in the pecking order, which I was completely unaware of.
The battle fought, and the pecking order defined, they continued with their lives knowing their place in the order as beautiful or attractive, looks-good-with-makeup, tragically challenged or ugly-but-has-a-good-body.
When I lost weight I didn't know where I fit. I kept acting invisible.. but everyone could see me.
I was now attractive, but didn't know it and just carried on being the person I had always been. Thin girls learn to be mysterious. They learn to let someone notice them rather than having to grab them by the lapels.
I had always been invisible.. I didn't know what mysterious was!
So I carried on as normal, cracking jokes and being open with everyone. All the men loved me and all the girls hated me.. but no one like me as me anymore.
I had really uncomfortable moments when a dear friend (married, and I was friends with his wife too) made a pass at me. The really embarrassing thing was that I didn't recognise it. I had no idea why he was acting this way and pretty much made a fool of myself.
For years I had been able to share hotel rooms or meals out with this man without a problem..it never occurred to me things between us would change. I thought our relationship was defined but obviously it wasn't .
I was only looking at my change in isolation. Invisibility was so ingrained into me that I didn't ever think it would change how people felt about me because I looked better.. why would it? I hadn't changed.. I could just wear smaller clothes.
I had entered into a whole area of society that I was woefully under-equipped to manage.. so I got fat again.
I didn't realise that was why I got fat again. I just found I didn't really mind as I got bigger and bigger again..I slipped right back into the comfortable old shoes of largeness.
I met my husband, and decided to lose weight again.. and this time it was women who frightened me back into size 22.
I had babies, and we new mothers would all hang out together and discuss stuff (as you do..). except the stuff wasn't stuff I could join in with.
I couldn't really join the race to fit back into my size 12 jeans, because I'd only worn them for a nanosecond before getting pregnant..I wasn't that important to me.
I didn't know how to go clothes shopping with friends.
Clothes shopping was something that was done at dusk in special shops, or through catalogues.. and we bought what they allowed us to buy.
I knew nothing of going into changing rooms and trying things on together. Not in a million years would I have ever asked the question "does my bum look big in this"!!
I had lunch at a friends house one day, and after our quiche and salad she whispered conspiratorially " I have a special treat for pudding" and pulled 2 100ml pots of ice cream out of the freezer. 100 ml!! I could down a 500ml tub without breaking a sweat!
She was treating me like I was thin, but I was a fraud. I was really fat inside my head.
I was a stranger in a foreign land... and I got fat again.
I tried one more time to be thin, but I just didn't know my way around.
I wasn't happy which everyone KNEW I must be, because everyone wants to be thin..don't they?, so even while they were congratulating me I was feeling like a fraud and sneaking chocolate into the house to eat furtively, like a mouse... and got bigger and bigger.
I tried various other diets but it was no use now.
I had lost the ability to succeed.
I would feel invincible in my ability to stick to a diet, but just when I was at my strongest I would find myself at the cupboard eating a jumbo packet of crisps.
I have never been able to work out why I fall just as it becomes apparent that what I am doing to lose weight works (which is a significant way into the diet.. I have added to my size with each cycle of loss and gain), but now I think it's because my subconscious wants to protect me from myself. It doesn't want me to be unhappy again.
So, now knowing the devil, and being that much older I can tackle this, and be happy and thin.
I am going to learn the thin rules of society. I've seen films. I can work it out. I am going to get a personal shopper to shop with me to show me how to dress, and I am going to learn how to be thin, so that this time I can enjoy it!
Losing the weight is half the battle, and knowing what to do with what you've won is the other..
..so on with the Battle!
Juno ..
I have walked 3 times now down the rocky, painful path of weightloss.
I have seen the bodies of the fallen at the side of the way and felt smug, even as I helped them up , because I could do this! And I could!
3 times..
So what goes wrong? Why do I have 100lbs+ to lose before I am at a "normal" size?
I'm not comfortable being thin. I like being thin, but it takes me so far out of my comfort zone that my survival instinct kicks in.. (which is where chocolate, the tool of satan comes in).
I don't know how to be a thin person.
I'm used to blending happily into the background. I'm used to walking past men without a backward glance from them. I'm used to being able to have male friends. I'm used to being able to have girl friends without boundaries..
When I became thin (the first time) my male friends started to look at me differently, and I hated it. My girlfriends looked at me differently, and I hated it.
My male friends were now would-be suitors and my girlfriends now saw me as the competition..
the problem was that I didn't know that. Everyone knew these social rules, but me!
When I was big it was as though I was invisible physically. People liked me because I was interesting and funny, not because they wanted to be seen with me, or fancied me.
When I lost weight and became socially visible, a whole other set of rules kicked in.
Thin people know these rules. They are learned in childhood and adolescence.
They are the rules of mating, flirtation and advancement in society. If you are fat then these rules don't apply.You know your place and can't challenge the beautiful, so you are harmless and tolerated (mostly).
So whilst I was young and fat (and exempt) all the thin and lovely girls around me were engaged in a pitched battle to find out where they fitted in the pecking order, which I was completely unaware of.
The battle fought, and the pecking order defined, they continued with their lives knowing their place in the order as beautiful or attractive, looks-good-with-makeup, tragically challenged or ugly-but-has-a-good-body.
When I lost weight I didn't know where I fit. I kept acting invisible.. but everyone could see me.
I was now attractive, but didn't know it and just carried on being the person I had always been. Thin girls learn to be mysterious. They learn to let someone notice them rather than having to grab them by the lapels.
I had always been invisible.. I didn't know what mysterious was!
So I carried on as normal, cracking jokes and being open with everyone. All the men loved me and all the girls hated me.. but no one like me as me anymore.
I had really uncomfortable moments when a dear friend (married, and I was friends with his wife too) made a pass at me. The really embarrassing thing was that I didn't recognise it. I had no idea why he was acting this way and pretty much made a fool of myself.
For years I had been able to share hotel rooms or meals out with this man without a problem..it never occurred to me things between us would change. I thought our relationship was defined but obviously it wasn't .
I was only looking at my change in isolation. Invisibility was so ingrained into me that I didn't ever think it would change how people felt about me because I looked better.. why would it? I hadn't changed.. I could just wear smaller clothes.
I had entered into a whole area of society that I was woefully under-equipped to manage.. so I got fat again.
I didn't realise that was why I got fat again. I just found I didn't really mind as I got bigger and bigger again..I slipped right back into the comfortable old shoes of largeness.
I met my husband, and decided to lose weight again.. and this time it was women who frightened me back into size 22.
I had babies, and we new mothers would all hang out together and discuss stuff (as you do..). except the stuff wasn't stuff I could join in with.
I couldn't really join the race to fit back into my size 12 jeans, because I'd only worn them for a nanosecond before getting pregnant..I wasn't that important to me.
I didn't know how to go clothes shopping with friends.
Clothes shopping was something that was done at dusk in special shops, or through catalogues.. and we bought what they allowed us to buy.
I knew nothing of going into changing rooms and trying things on together. Not in a million years would I have ever asked the question "does my bum look big in this"!!
I had lunch at a friends house one day, and after our quiche and salad she whispered conspiratorially " I have a special treat for pudding" and pulled 2 100ml pots of ice cream out of the freezer. 100 ml!! I could down a 500ml tub without breaking a sweat!
She was treating me like I was thin, but I was a fraud. I was really fat inside my head.
I was a stranger in a foreign land... and I got fat again.
I tried one more time to be thin, but I just didn't know my way around.
I wasn't happy which everyone KNEW I must be, because everyone wants to be thin..don't they?, so even while they were congratulating me I was feeling like a fraud and sneaking chocolate into the house to eat furtively, like a mouse... and got bigger and bigger.
I tried various other diets but it was no use now.
I had lost the ability to succeed.
I would feel invincible in my ability to stick to a diet, but just when I was at my strongest I would find myself at the cupboard eating a jumbo packet of crisps.
I have never been able to work out why I fall just as it becomes apparent that what I am doing to lose weight works (which is a significant way into the diet.. I have added to my size with each cycle of loss and gain), but now I think it's because my subconscious wants to protect me from myself. It doesn't want me to be unhappy again.
So, now knowing the devil, and being that much older I can tackle this, and be happy and thin.
I am going to learn the thin rules of society. I've seen films. I can work it out. I am going to get a personal shopper to shop with me to show me how to dress, and I am going to learn how to be thin, so that this time I can enjoy it!
Losing the weight is half the battle, and knowing what to do with what you've won is the other..
..so on with the Battle!
Juno ..