Fat as Hell…

I don’t know how other people are doing this, but here are my week 1 numbers in FBM’s Pedometer Challenge:

Let’s start out with Saturday and Sunday’s numbers (respectively):

So… that makes my averages look something like this:

Weekly total (I’m not including today in the weekly total): 80,996 steps
Bonus steps (FBM let us include any steps we took prior to the official start): 12,966
Total including bonus steps: 93,962
Daily Average (not including bonus steps): 11,570 steps

Gosh… I have to admit, that’s a lot more steps than I would have guessed that I was capable of when all of this began. And I know it’s a bit cliche to say, but I truly feel as though I’ve already won, even if everyone else in the challenge is outstepping me. Right now, I feel like a rock star.

That said, I realize too that I’m starting week 2 a bit on the low side, (this is the first day that I have *not* topped 10k steps), but I don’t feel terribly guilty about it because despite the lack of actual steps taken today, this was a very busy day for me. In addition to the mountain of housework that I got done this afternoon, my husband and I also stood in line for about 2 hours to see Hillary Clinton speak tonight. Additionally, once we were “in” we then stood for another hour waiting for her to take the stage and then for the entirety of her nearly 3 hour long speech.

I mention this only because I can remember, as a kid, before this crazy internet thing, standing in line for hours and hours and hours on end to get concert tickets… and then standing in line again on the night of the show in order to get the best seat, not to mention the long hours standing up while the band performed. Furthermore, I can also remember leaving those events *not* feeling as though my hips were about the crack in half. Alas, those days might be close to being over, though. I mean… seriously, standing for that long tonight really wore me out. I was *so* glad to walk the 15 or so blocks back to our car tonight, just to get some blood pumping in my tired little legs.

On the drive home I asked my husband when I’d gotten this old.
He didn’t seem to know.

He did, however, challenge me to imagine how standing for that long would have felt eight months ago when I was carrying around an additional 65lbs.

Honestly, it’s tough to imagine, and frankly, that’s a little scary to me. I mean, I really, really don’t want to forget what it was like to be that girl. I want to remember her because I’m pretty sure that forgetting about her would be a mistake for a couple of reasons. First of all, forgetting how it felt to be that fat would probably only make it that much easier to become that fat again. And secondly, how am I supposed to fully appreciate being healthy (and relatively thin) if I can’t remember what it was like to be, well… not.

I think part of the reason why it’s difficult for me to remember being 65lbs heavier is because when I look in the mirror each day, I don’t really see much of a difference. I mean… I *know* that I’m losing weight because my clothes fit differently, people tell me that *they* notice and, oh yeah… there’s the scale too. But, mostly, when I look at my face and my body, I just see the same girl I’ve always been… and on many days, I do wonder when the new girl is going to emerge.

Anyway, this coupled with the conversation I had with my husband tonight made me want to look for a picture or two of me 65lbs ago in the hopes that seeing *that* girl would help me appreciate the new one a bit more… so I started going through some photo albums and files on the computer in search of some photographic evidence of my fatness.

And here’s the scary thing: I couldn’t find any. (Well, that’s not *exactly* true… eventually, I did find one, but it seriously took hours to locate. I’ll show it at the end).

Like most families, my husband and I take pictures during key moments of our lives. Holidays, family get togethers, trips, etc. And while we *do* have pictures chronicling those events, it would appear that I’m not in any of them. At first, I found this pretty shocking. I mean… I’m not *always* the photographer during these moments and even though I’m pretty loathe to have my picture taken, I didn’t think I’d managed to successfully dodge every photo opportunity that has ever come my way. Then, while I was sitting here scratching my head in disbelief, I remembered something.

A couple of Christmases ago, I can remember standing around the tree/fireplace at my mother in law’s house while the obligatory family photos were taken. Her camera was not working, so she asked if we could just use ours and then share the pictures among all the family members. We quickly obliged and soon we were all striking poses and putting on our best fake smiles.

This next bit is really hard for me to admit.

Later in the evening as things began to settle down my husband and I grabbed the camera and started looking through the shots. Gosh, even now, I can remember how hot and red my cheeks felt looking at the pictures in which I was included. I’m not sure I’ve ever felt so bad about myself. Not only was I fat, but I looked unhappy and ugly. I was mortified and literally had to turn away. But the worst part is that after he set the camera down and went to join the rest of the family, I actually sat there and deleted every picture that *I* was in. In essence, I erased myself from that Christmas.

I wonder how many other family milestones I successfully removed myself from, either by throwing away the pictures or deleting them or by simply refusing to have my picture taken?

I know we’ve all spent time thumbing through old photo albums, reliving memories and revisiting the people and places who are no longer with us. In that way, photographs are not only a documentation of a particular moment in history, but they’re also a physical reminder of the people who come into our lives and help shape who we are. Many of the people in my life don’t have that kind of reminder of me… and it makes me sad and ashamed to think about. But also, it makes me wonder, how much do you have to hate yourself to feel like it’s ok to deprive your own family members, the people who love you no matter how much you weigh, of images of you?

Denying the people that you love, and who love you, pictures of yourself is not only selfish, but it’s also very sad. I know that when I chose to delete my own pictures, it wasn’t because I didn’t care about the people who might want them, it’s because I was so ashamed of who I was, because I couldn’t possibly imagine anyone loving me enough to want those pictures.

Now… 65lbs later, I still don’t like the way I look in pictures, but there’s been a huge shift in my thinking. Not only do I see how wrong it is to remove myself from the photographic story of my family’s life, but I also love myself enough to feel as though I deserve to be included in it.

Anyway… without further ado: Before & During.

If there’s nothing else to notice… I think I look a lot happier now.
And that’s because I am. :)