No you dirty minds, I didnt flash The Girls!!
No, I actually acknowledged my weight loss, out loud, to somebody today. Oh, you think that's not a big deal? Well, it was for me. As completely and totally proud I am of myself, there is a big part of me that would like to hope that people who didnt know me "before" would never know about "before". I guess it's shame. Pride. Fear of being judged retroactively. It, like everything else, is probably a lot of things. At my office, there is a picture of me with my 'class' hanging in the hall. I want to break into the office in the middle of the night and steal it. As much as I dont want to ever forget where I came from, I have a hard time with the visual reminder. And a hard time knowing the visual reminder is there for everybody to see. For those who saw the real thing, its no shock. For those who didnt, I hate that its there.
Anyway, so I was talking to somebody at work today and without really thinking about it I said something that essentially forced me to fess up. I'm pretty sure I turned about 80 shades of red, but I confessed, giving the exact number. (Oh, for those keeping tabs its 137. 13 more pounds and I jump out of a plane!) So you don't that's a big deal? Well there are plenty of my friends who don't know the exact number.
It's kind of odd that I spilled the beans on myself, really. Considering how much I've been bothered by the attention that I get for it. But those ambush "oh my gosh how much weight have you lost" encounters are unsettling. Sharing the information willingly turned out to be not unsettling at all. Although I have to admit, for about ten minutes I felt like I was walking around naked. Very, very exposed. But after that, I felt a strange sense of relief. Which was probably in part due to the fact that during the conversation, I felt not a single ounce of judgment. And the biggest celebration in that is not that the person wasn't being judgmental, but that I wasn't looking for ways to interpret him as being judgmental. Which is what I've always done. Assume people are judging me. Assume the worst. Walk through life with a chip on my shoulder about the size of my butt. Why did I not do that today?
Could it be I'm finally shedding the fat girl identity along with the pounds?
Wow you have lost 137 lbs so far. That is amazing and why you are an inspiration to me.
ReplyDeleteI hope you enjoy jumping out of an airplane. I cannot wait to hear all about it.
Congratulations on your amazing loss and for deciding to "expose yourself." I know what a hard decision that must have been. While I've become much more open about how much I've lost thanks to my blog, there are still times and still certain people that I feel uncomfortable sharing the actual number with. You're amazing!
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