I’ve lost 33 pounds and friends tell me they see a difference. I stare into the mirror and don’t see a change. Honestly, I don’t expect to see a thinner me yet. My ingrained belief is that when you have sooo many pounds to lose, you have to lose a higher percentage in order for there to be a real noticeable change in appearance. I feel the change as some clothes are looser and I can already walk and move easier. That’s all good.
Appearance is such a big deal to many of us. Body Image is a huge (pardon the pun) issue. I have what I call “fat eyes”. In the past when I have lost weight, often great amounts, the image of myself in my brain is always swollen from the reality. Conversely, when I’m at my heaviest, I look worse to myself in photographs than in my mind’s eye.
In addition to my less than stellar self-perception, I automatically project the reaction of other people. I’m positive that when I walk into a room of strangers, their first reaction is not, “What a nice person with a friendly smile”, but “Oh my God, that woman’s a walking whale.” I know for a fact, that stems from teenage trauma when some younger people were relentlessly cruel. A high school classmate used to yell, “Thar she blows” at me across the Quad. You’d think that almost 40 years later, I’d have banished that memory and the resulting damage, but even now I flinch. I believe if I had dealt and processed it properly at the time, it would not still affect me now, but I didn’t so it does.
I don’t remember a time in my life when I was thin. I have degrees of thinner and also of fatter. My sister-in-law showed me a picture of me from her wedding. I was surprise at how good I looked. I eagerly anticipate looking that good again. I have to believe that I’ll believe it when I see it.
Since I am still medically obese, even though I’m losing weight, I’m again projecting other’s reactions. What happens when they ask me how much weight I’ve lost and then when I tell them they realize they don’t see it? I know I’ll watch their facial expressions to see what they think. That’s a reflex. I know that what I need to do is shore up my mental and emotional health so that I’m not adversely affected by a negative reaction. Instead of crumpling inside and feeling lousy, I will remind myself that it doesn’t matter what other people see. The only important thing is that my effort is paying off in positive results and every pound lost is great progress. I will prevail.
Where I am today isn’t where I’ll be tomorrow or the next day, next week, next month. Six months from now, it is entirely possible that I will have lost close to 100 pounds. Even I, with my fat eyes, will see the difference in my body.
Weighty Matters 