I Never Could Have Imagined

There was a time when Paul and I were dating that I would jokingly say, “Would you still be with me if I weighed 200 lbs?” Naturally, he said yes. I didn’t doubt the fact that he would stay with me regardless of how much weight I gained. However, I did doubt the fact that I could ever get close to weighing 200 lbs. In fact, I never thought it was possible because 200 lbs seemed an eternity away from the 135 lbs I weighed at the time. And can you believe I thought I was fat back then?

Fast forward to the present day and here I sit at 202.5 lbs. Yes, I just put that on the interwebs for the whole world (ok, maybe not the whole world, but it could be if they all happened to visit my blog) to see. ::facepalm:: I’ll regret it tomorrow. Shoot. Me. Now.

When I look at myself in the mirror, I am not fat. When I picture myself in my own mind, I am not fat. Although I try and squeeze my post-baby pouch into my jeans so that it’s not spilling over, when I look in the mirror I’m just as thin as I was in my early 20s… maybe just a tad ‘thicker’. Clearly I have a distorted image of my body. What my pretty little mind pictures and what I actually look like are two totally different things.

It’s not until I see pictures of myself that the harsh reality of what I actually look like hits. Anyone else have this problem?

I’ve tried countless times to lose the weight. I’ve tried Weight Watchers, Nutrisystem, Kickboxing, Boot Camp and I always fail. Now I’m not saying those programs don’t work, I’m just simply saying that I failed at them.

When it comes to changing my diet, I always find a reason why I should pig out today and start my diet tomorrow. When tomorrow comes and I happen to have one cookie, or a larger breakfast than I had planned, I figure that I might as well pig out again today and wait until the next day to diet. If I happen to stick to a diet for a few days, I’ll convince myself that I deserve a ‘treat’ for doing so well, and then that ‘treat’ turns into, I’ll just give myself an entire cheat day… and so begins the cycle.

When it comes to exercising, I am completely gung ho about it the first couple days, then I come up with a million reasons as to why I have to skip a workout because I have so many other important things to do that day. Once I miss one day, it turns into a week and sooner or later my exercise regime is completely out the window.

I have issues. Serious weight issues. I’ve had people try to help me lose weight, and unfortunately, no one can help me lose weight if I’m not ready to help myself. It’s safe to say that I am the only person responsible for all this weight gain. I’m not going to blame it on having two kids because I was overweight before I had kids. Having the kids pushed me past 200 lbs, but I have only myself to blame for getting this big.

I’m addicted to food. I think about eating all the time. I’ve even looked into Overeaters Anonymous meetings. Did you even know they existed? I figured the first step to me losing weight is admitting I have a problem. I’m tired of people telling me I need to lose weight because I know. I’m tired of people telling me that I am beautiful the way I am because while that may be true, it is not healthy for me to be this big at only 5’3″. I’m tired of looking at myself every day and wishing I were skinnier. I’m tired of visiting my favorite blogs and seeing thin, beautiful women wearing amazing outfits for their What I Wore Wednesday posts and wishing that I had the confidence to do an outfit post. I’m tired of putting on my clothes and feeling like a cow.

So every Wednesday I plan to do a weight loss post. I won’t necessarily talk only about weight loss, but I will share my issues with being overweight and practically obese. I need to work through these issues and blogging is cheaper than therapy. If you care to join me, I’ll include a linky next week.