It’s been about 21 years since I have set foot in a gym and been active while there. I mean a bonafide, weights and sauna kind of gym. I’m 28. No, I wasn’t a body builder at the age of seven; my mom was. She was also an aerobics trainer and worked full time at a gym in Lake City Florida. I can remember going to work with her, especially during the summer, and attempting to keep up with her aerobics class as I hid just outside the door and watched in the mirror. It was dancing to me and I loved that. I would use the 2 pound hand weights as she toned her arms and mimic her movements. We would leave the gym and make our way to my ballet, tap and jazz class each evening, the air at Ms. Ursala’s school of dance pungent with the scent of mothballs and this was one of my most favorite places to be. I was able to move, dress up, play a part and socialize with all the other little ballerinas as I did so. As I grew older, I took gymnastics and some acrobatics classes as well and felt the same energy as when I was dreaming of being the prima ballerina. Finally, BMX racing became my physical outlet of choice as I went through high school.
But life has a funny way of sneaking up on us. Before I knew it, my active lifestyle of adolescence became a thing of the past. Beyond the occasional watersports and dirt bike ride, I was stationary. Three children later, my 121 pound figure had grown to a miserably depressing 205 pounds. For someone who is 5’3” tall, this is considered obese. For someone who was also always teetering on the edge of low self-esteem, this was catastrophic. While I understood that weight gain was to be expected with pregnancy, this seemed completely unfair to me. I hadn’t engorged myself with sweets and mountains of candy as I grew little humans inside of me. I never had blood sugar problems. I just could not understand it.
The bad thing about extreme weight gain, for me, was the fact that it made me feel the one emotion I hate more than any other. Self-pity. The woe-is-me attitude that I cannot stand to see displayed in others was the only one I seemed to exude. I would berate myself for not doing anything about it, yet I would still do nothing. I had all the knowledge one could possess from the years spent living an active lifestyle. In fact, these rules and routines had been ingrained in my mind by my Mom when I was very young. But I could not manage to apply them.
As with others who have the same feeling of self-pity, I pouted. I complained about the way I looked and I would start one regimen, for about a week, before I would give up on it when I saw no results forthcoming. Finally, one day while visiting my Mom, we went to have lunch with my little ones. We were at a restaurant, my kids were behaving like four, two and one year olds usually do in public places. I was once again feeling that same pity for myself as I looked at the menu and ordered something I knew I shouldn’t while my 105 pound mother ordered a salad. I looked up and saw someone I’d gone to high school with, someone I’d been fairly close to and should have recognized me, and smiled and waved at them. They either did not recognize me or chose not to, because they looked directly at me and walked past.
I find that after self-pity comes anger. I was livid. At myself, for this person who should have recognized me but didn’t, at what I had allowed to happen to my body and my mind. And so it began. It was a slow process, painstakingly so at times. It was hard, so hard to make myself stop and consider what I was doing. Was the best option for me to eat at this particular time? Was there something more physically productive I could be doing with my time? I would stop and ask myself these questions each time I felt an urge to give up. Slowly, old habits resurfaced. I began to notice subtle changes in my shape and when I did, all bets were off.
The first time someone asked me if I’d lost weight, it was like I’d won the lottery. When I was too small for the way too big jeans I’d been wearing, my pyromaniac persona surfaced and I burned those “fat clothes”. Yes, I burned them and it was the most glorious fire you’ve ever seen. When I ran a full mile for the first time since high school, I sat down and cried, even though it wasn’t as fast as the 6:55 I used to run. My weight crept down, 155, 140 and what was so great about this was the more I lost, the more motivated I was. I maintained each and every day to do one thing that would benefit my health, my weight.
Finally, 5 months ago, I stepped on my Wii balance board for some fitness test fun. I hadn’t weighed myself in three months but I knew I was close to where I wanted to be if my pants size was any indication. I stood still as the blue circle on the TV screen circled, calculating my information. I waited as the scale ticker slid up and down, awaiting my final number. 119. I had done it. There is no feeling like that in the world and when you feel it, you understand. I had done it. I picked up my youngest child and we danced in the living room for a good thirty minutes, his squeals of laughter were music to my ears. I had done it. 86 pounds in two years.
Now, I still have little insecurities. I am only human. I don’t like when someone tells me I don’t need to lose weight because they have no idea the battle this has been for me. No idea at all. I get snide remarks from time to time, backhanded compliments from others. But I’m learning that I cannot hide my accomplishments and self-confidence because of the insecurities of others. I am learning to be comfortable with whom I am what I’ve done and I am proud of myself for doing it. It is not easy, to overcome the fear, the temptations and the comfort that come from food and solace that comes from lying in bed. But the feeling of a stitch in my side means my run was effective. The heaving in my chest means my heart is pumping blood through my body and my lungs are filling with desperately needed oxygen and the aches in my muscles mean I am growing stronger. So I will continue to do so. Not because I want to lose weight. But because this, it makes me feel good, and I am proud of that.
