Weight Loss Wednesday

Last Thursday night we were at a local park.  Ava was running around like crazy.  I looked on with contentment, knowing that she was running herself into exhaustion so I would have no arguments on my hands when bedtime came.  She ran up to me and yelled, "I feel so free, mom!"  I smiled.  I remember when running and biking and dancing made me feel that way. 

That night before bedtime Ava said, "Mom, no more Coke.  For the next two days you can't drink any, okay?  I want you to be healthy."  I agreed, though somewhat disingenuously.  I thought food and drink are the things that I live for each day.  There's no way I'm giving my Coke up.  

The next day we decided to go to a splash park.  So we went to the grocery store and picked up some ice for the cooler and like a good girl I put in three bottled waters for us.  As we got off the freeway in Cottonwood Heights I spotted the Golden Arches up ahead.  I pulled into the drive through.  Ava says from the backseat, "Mom, what are you doing?  No Coke, remember?" 

"It's okay, Ava.  I just want one to sip on while you guys play at the park.  It's no big deal," I said.  Ava goes silent in the backseat as I order a large Coke.  While we are waiting in line she pipes up...

"No, mom!  You can't.  You said you wouldn't.  Just pull out of line!"

"Ava, I already ordered it.  I have to pay for it now."

"No you don't.  Just leave, mom.  Please!"  She started to cry.  I tried to quell the rising guilt with thoughts about how it's just a drink and not that big of a deal.  She just doesn't understand what being a mom entails.  This is how I cope with the lack of freedom, the lack of personal space, the lack of close friends and family around me.

I paid for the Coke as Ava sobbed angrily in the backseat.  I pulled out into the road and finished driving to the park.  I said to Ava, "Sweetie, I don't know why you're so upset.  It's just a drink.  It's fine."

"No, it's not fine!  I don't want you to get bigger, mom!"

"Why, Ava?  Why do you care?"

"Because I want you to be a happy mommyyyyyyyyy!" she moaned in the backseat, "And you're not happy!  You're not!"

I had no rebuttal to that, because she was right.  I'm not happy at the weight I'm at.  I hate walking into a room full of people, thinking all they see is my imperfections, thinking about the judgements they are making about me.  I don't like not being able to run around with Ava at the park because I am self-conscious and get out of breath.  I don't like never feeling good in the clothes I am wearing.  My weight makes me want to stay inside and not face people.  Heaven forbid I saw someone from high school or my hometown. 

The next day I didn't buy a Coke.  Or the next day.  Or any of the other days since.  It's time.  I'm being selfish and fooling myself into thinking that eating and drinking poorly is going to make me happy in the long run.  I use food to push away the feelings I don't want to feel.   To numb myself.  To isolate myself.  To have a reason for why my life has not turned out the way I wanted it to.  Because if I get healthy and go after the things I want, I may have to face failure.  Instead of never trying and never knowing.  Which is not much better. 

I read recently that when you overeat past the point of satiety it means you are trying to avoid feeling something about yourself and about your life that you don't want to feel.  For me this is true and it hit home.  There is so much shame and guilt and fear wrapped up in what I eat, and how much I eat, in the way my body looks and feels.  I walk in shame.  Everywhere I go I will people's eyes not to look at me.  This is not living. 

I was brought up to believe that our bodies are gifts from God.  I believe that.  And yet at an early age I felt shame.  Shame in the height of my body.  Shame in the way it developed so much earlier than other girls.  Shame in my womanly figure.  I can't remember a time of not feeling ashamed of this gift.  And so naturally as I've gained weight, shame has been my old, familiar companion.  I'm tired of feeling invisible.  I'm tired of taking zero pride in myself.  I'm tired of feeling like a failure.  I'm thirty years old and I feel as if I am twenty years older. 

I want to be able to run and run and run with my girls and to say to them..."I feel so free!"