I’ve lost about 25 pounds in the last year. I’d lost 15 pounds before, then gained back 5, and my goal for the summer was to lose another 15 pounds, and I made it.
In many ways, this is a new experience for me. I’m thinner than I’ve been in my life. I’ve been a size 14 since I reached my full height. I’m now a size 12. I’ve also never acheived a weight-loss goal before. Either I had no goal other than “lose a few pounds” or I drifted away from the diet well before I reached any goal. Now that I’ve made the goal, I’m not really sure what to do.
I’d need to lose 10 more pounds to get my BMI down out of the “overweight” range. I realize that BMIs are pretty arbitrary, and I want to emphasize that I’m not setting my weight-loss goals based on BMI, but that gives you some idea where I’m at. Or, I’m 182 pounds soakin’ wet, 5 feet 9 inches, if that means more to you.
When losing moderate amounts of weight in the past, I’d end up a bit slimmer and my clothes would fit better, which made me feel better about myself. I’d always thought that more weight loss would be more of the same: maybe I’d get the chance to go out and buy some cute new clothes, and losing weight would make my body look better.
Well, now I’ve lost a lot of weight (for me) and I’m kinda freaking out about my body.
When trying to get dressed this morning, I realize that my favorite pants don’t fit. In fact, they look awful. Last week I had to go buy a new belt, because the old one was too big, and my jeans were falling down. I think I’m going to have to buy all new pants. That should make me happy. I thought it would make me feel happy! But instead, I’m thinking, “Nooooo! My pants! My beautiful, beautiful pants! I finally got nice pants that fit me, and now it’s all ruined!”
When I gently grasp my forearms, I can feel bone. I lie awake in bed feeling my ribs, because it just creepy being able to feel the rack of them in there. When I look down at my legs, I find myself thinking, “Who are you and what have you done with my thighs?” I guess they look nicer, and more muscular, and less cellulitey . . . but they don’t look like they belong on my body. Even worse, I have odd globs of fat that persist in a few places on my body, which (IMHO) look awful. When I was fat before, I was curvy. Now I’m thinner in some places, yet globby in others. I feel like this cancels out most of the conventional “attractiveness” I’ve acheived by losing weight.
And that’s totally irrational, which freaks me out even further. Nobody is looking at my body thinking, “Wow, her calfs and quads are really nicely defined. But what’s up with those globs of fat on her inner, upper thigh that I can’t even see because they’re only visible when she’s standing in front of the bathroom mirror in her underwear! God, that’s disgusting. She is completely unattractive!” Am I turning into one of those body-dismorphic chicks? Am I going to go crazy and lose forty more pounds and be mincing around with my collar bones jutting out going, “Oh my gawd, I’m so fat. My body is so disgustingly faaaat”?
And speaking of conventional attractiveness . . . I went through many years of coping with my fatness by thinking that people who diet are shallow, and their physical attractiveness is offset by that fact that they are boring and obsessed with appearances. And, really, I’m more shallow than I used to be, in that use a hell of a lot of brain cycles thinking about calories and fat grams and what I’m going to do at the gym. Am I turning into what I used to hate? Was I wrong for hating that in the past? Should I just accept that the lifestyle changes that are making me a healthier person are also making me less . . . deep?
Okay, really, I know people who are thin who are smart and deep and nice and fun to be with, so I know it’s bullshit, but I’m . . . just . . . Cripes, I don’t even know where my head is right now.
My mom was very hurt by her own mother telling her she was too heavy, and what with growing awareness of eating disorders, she seemed terrified of giving my sister and me an unhealthy body image when we were teenagers. She always encouraged us to eat healthy nurtritious food and excercise, but if we said we wanted to go on a diet she would flip out. She told us over and over that our weight was fine (and really, we were only slightly overweight in high school), that we were beautiful as we were, that losing weight is not the key to beauty and happiness. This is true enough in and over itself, but I halfway suspect that between Mom’s anorexiphobia and my own coping mechanisms, I’m wired so that being overweight means normal, happy, beautiful and losing weight means . . . none of those things.
When my BMI was on the borderline between “overweight” and “obese,” I had some trouble with high blood pressure, and I continue to monitor my blood pressure closely. It is still on the high side of normal, meaning that I’m likely to get hypertension in the future, especially if I don’t maintain a healthy lifestyle. So, if I lose some more weight, it may be that I can bring down my blood pressure further, and decrease my chances of experiencing future health problems.
And, in fact, it seems to be willfully stupid to say, “My diet is working well for me, but, even though my weight is higher than it should be for optimum health, I’m going to stop losing weight because I’m afraid to be skinny and ugly and shallow.”
Right now I’m continuing my diet, more out of habit than anything else. I thought about taking a “break” briefly, not restricting my calorie intake, but continuing to track what I eat and my weight. Does that sound like a really bad idea? I was thinking that I might get used to the way I look, and maybe (please, please, please!!!) my globby fat will redistribute itself a bit, and I will stop feeling so stupid and irrational and weird about all of this. On the other hand I’m afraid that breaking discipline now will mean losing my diet “momentum,” and could even lead to my weight going back up.
Has anyone else experienced anything like this, or am I just special? I cannot even imagine what it would be like to lose 50 or 100 pounds and see your body completely change shape! If you’ve lost a significant amount of weight, were you feeling cool with it the whole time? Did you ever find yourself wishing you had your old body back?
