My struggle with weight...

I ran into an old boyfriend recently who'd I'd once asked if he'd love me more if I weighed 10 lbs less.

Sadly, or to his credit, depending on your point of view I suppose, he said he could not answer because he didn't want to lie. We all know that means the answer was yes.

I'm also reading Losing It: And Gaining My Life Back One Pound at a Time by Valerie Bertinelli right now (my office sells used books for 25 cents in the lobby for fundraising, so its not like I went looking for it, but its a good train read), so I've been thinking about weight and its struggles.

Bertinelli talks of times when she was young and thought she was fat, talked about her self as fat, expected to be treated a certain way because she was fat, and then looking back on those photos and realizing she wasn't fat in her youth at all.

I think most of the girls I know thought of themselves as fat when they were young. God knows I did. Which is sort of hilarious looking back. I attended my senior prom with my then boyfriend, and then attended the prom my freshman year of college with a good friend who was going to be a priest and therefore didn't have a girlfriend. Since I was a year more worldly, I wore the same dress, not caring who saw and noticed. But it makes for an interesting comparison since the pose and the dress are the same.

The year I attended as a senior in high school I am straight as a stick on the side view. I did have a chest (thanks to my Polish Nana, we were never lacking in that department), but zero behind, hips or waist. Thank god for my chest, or I'd be built like a boy. By the next year there was a noticeable rear, though still not big by any means. That year I spent much less time comparing myself to all the thinner and more beautiful girls, and just had fun.  

But as I young girl, I think it is almost a rite of passage to be negative about your appearance and weight. I can't think of one of my young girl friends who thought she was ok just the way she was. And yet so many look back on those years as the time they looked the best.

I currently weigh what I weighed when I found out I was pregnant, even then my ideal was a few pounds lighter. I'm probably 5 lbs from my personal ideal and am considered to have a healthy weight. But when friends or co-workers compliment me and tell me I look good or thin or got "back into shape", I am quick to point out those last few pounds instead of just saying "thank you." Most of my new-Mommy friends respond in the same way.

My point in all of this is not whether any of us was fat or thin, but how distorted our thinking could be from reality. And my distortion did not go nearly so far as those who ended up with eating disorders, so I can't imagine the pressure they put on themselves. I think for some reason, we feel compelled to point out the pounds we haven't lost, instead of the ones we have (I did gain 40 lbs when I was pregnant, so being 5 lbs from my ideal should be something I'm proud of, not ashamed of).

Try to see yourself as you really are, not the distorted not-good-enough self, try to say "thank you" instead of "no I'm not" when someone points out something good about it.

I bet it feels a whole lot better.

By the way, you look great today.