OK so that might be a slight exaggeration, but I can't seem to get a handle on my weight. Of course I know exactly what the problem is.
Me.
If I could just stop eating. If I could just force myself to do more exercise and stop being such a lazy arsed git, then maybe, just maybe I could lose a couple of pounds. I know that once I am at the weight that I want, then I will be determined to stabilise it, and will work at it. Problem being, is that I want a quick fix. I want to be skinny, NOW! I don't want to have to wait a few months to shed the excess blubber, I want it to happen instantaneously and for the sylph like self that I know (hope) is hiding under there to emerge. But oh yeah... this is the real world isn't it? Damn..
Thing is, I used to be skinny, or for an all too brief period I was anyway. I was the picturesque chubby child, rosy cheeks, Shirley Temple hair do and perma smile. Or if you want a more accurate description, a shrunken Michelin man with electro-shock hair and smiling cos I was blissfully ignorant about it. Alas that carried right on through most of my childhood. Chunky child becomes chunky teenager. Then one day it changed. I developed a digestive condition (slight, but through a phobia of vomiting, overblown) and started to scale back on my diet. I barely ate at all, and if I did, it was mainly crap. Lo and behold, the weight started to melt off. I ended up at 7st 4lbs. I was ecstatic that I had finally done it, and it was unintentional! I was now a UK size 8, and loved my skinny self. However, I failed to see how I really looked.
I am a well built lassie, sad but true. My mum says that I have my Great Granny G's build, which she then went on to describe, 'like a barrel', (gee thanks Mum). Broad shoulders and pronounced rib cage (thanks Dad), all of which do not sit well with a stick like lower body. I looked like a coat hanger. My cheekbones were sticking through my skin and my wrists could have been snapped like a twig. Oblivious to all this, I carried on the diet, desperate to keep this figure, which I had finally been 'blessed' with. Looking back on pictures now, I cringe a little. I look terribly scrawny and ill in most of them. A Christmas Dance photo makes me look horrific (and yes the hair had a lot to do with it), and even though I had fitted into my size 8 New Look dress with ease, I now wish I looked a little healthier.
I gradually began to put the weight back on. After all I was only 16 during this time, so it was unlikely that I would continue to be able to maintain it without proper exercise. Especially since I was now entering 6th year and Gym class was no longer mandatory, but free periods and the multiple trips to the 'vendies' for Yorkie bars were. The addition of a boyfriend into my life at that time probably didn't help either. I was introduced to Chinese take-aways, large bags of kettle chips with creamy dips and lazy Sundays spent watching movies and snarfling junk food. Since he was a skinny guy in his own right, with a seemingly continous inability to put on weight, even when eating a whole bar of Lindt a day, he stayed the same size, while I began to balloon. It started to become noticeable when I discovered that I no longer looked cute while wearing his clothes. They fitted me, or in the case of his jeans, wouldn't do up.
I would like to say here, that he was a size 28in waist, and I actually was built with hips, so I try not to feel to bad about that, but aren't Gf's supposed to look adorable in their guy's over-sized shirt? Hah. Not this one. To his credit, he never mentioned it, but he never cut down on the snacks either. After 5 years the temptation to snack along side him hadn't diminished.
By the time it ended, I was a size 14. I had lost weight in time for a summer holiday to Florida, running 2 miles every 2nd day, and was feeling fabulous for the first time in a while. Sadly, the gorgeous food soon put paid to that. By the end of the relationship I felt pudgy and extremely unattractive. However the resulting stress from the breakup caused me to lose half a stone in a month, and I ended up hovering around 10st for a while. The joy of actually finding my waist for the first time in months was amazing!!
But here I am. I thought I had gotten as heavy as I was going to get before I came to the States, although that was underestimating the power of my greed in the land of plentiful portions. Most of the clothes I brought out with me are now feeling a wee bit on the tight side, and I don't feel attractive in anything. I look in the mirror and see the gelatinous slab of pasty flesh that is masquerading as my face and want to rip it off. I prod at the pudgy belly that is slowly competing with my chest for the 'most prominent body part' award. I pinch the wobbly thighs that never seem to lose their curves. I curse the heat that has caused my ankles and calves to look indistinguishable. I look in the mirror and think "This is your fault. You could have stopped this. You can still stop this. Get off your lazy ass and do something about it!!" I don't even want to look stick thin anymore. I'm over that. I would quite happily be curvy, as long as I wasn't bloated. Lose the wobble on my upper arms, trim down the podge on my belly, firm up my thighs, lose the excess chins, generally cut a slice off of most of me.
I have joined a gym. I attend in sporadic bursts of energy, before deciding that I am too exhausted to go after work, or on a Sunday morning, and lie on the sofa instead, nibbling on tortillas. I have attempted to cook healthily, but the lure of the cookie still calls to me at 3.30 at my desk.
Excuses, excuses. I didn't go to the gym this morning because it was such a sunny day. I went and laid out by the front instead. And then cursed myself at how unattractive and lumpy I was in my shorts and halter top compared to the lean bronzed bikinied girls feet away from me.
So who's fault is that now then, eh??
No comments:
Post a Comment