On Feeling Fat

Before surgery, I used to get really frustrated when people smaller than me complained about being or feeling fat. Even now, I have some very slender friends who will make that claim and I have to bite my tongue. I've been overweight to some extent for about 23 years, and was obese for about 15 of them (so half of my life). According to this BMI calculator (and not getting into the controversy over BMI), I'm still obese, despite having lost over 120 pounds over the past year.

My perception of my size is very fluid. Lately I've been feeling very fat, despite wearing clothes from "normal" stores (not "plus size" stores). My weight loss has stalled, which is totally natural at this point, and my loss is still ahead of the average for the first year. I also feel like I can't take that much credit, as all I've done is try to avoid vomiting. With the warming weather, I plan to do more walking, but regular exercise needs to become a bigger part of my life in general.

I recently looked through old pictures on Facebook and was shocked to see the difference in my appearance. My primary measures have been the number on the scale and the fit of my clothing, up to this point. I'm glad that I have those photographs and the perspective that they give me. It will be helpful for me to go back and look at them on days when I look at my body and feel frustrated/disgusted.

With the stall and some pain that has recently struck my left knee and ankle, I want to become more mindful of how I maintain my new body. As I'm able to eat a greater variety and quantities of food, it's easy for me to consume empty calories. Part of my effort to combat this is to read Mindless Eating by Brian Wansink. I also plan to go back and re-read Women Food and God by Geneen Roth, which I read with my mother as I recovered from surgery.

The other part is exercise. With the warm weather and living in Boston, walking is an obvious choice, along with taking stairs more often. I've been adding in walks around lunch time at work, around the neighborhood in the evening, and have decided to make myself take at least a 15 minute walk whenever I have a personal phone conversation at home (although I want to work on walking the whole time). I've ordered one of those little bicycle pedal things for under my desk, in order to stretch out my leg muscles while I work.

After I move to a new apartment and my finances recover from that expense, I plan to look for a gym, or at least get in a private training session to get ideas on what I can do on my own. My office is on the 13th floor of our building, so working up to doing that is another goal that I can start working on, although I may put that on hold until the knee pain recedes.

I'm paving with a vengeance, but I think I've got some reasonable and do-able chunks in front of me. Wish me luck! I've also got a couple more entries queued up, so I will try to get those out soon.