Uncategorized

Diet is a four letter word.

28 Comments

 

I used to be one of those blissfully happy women who never worried about their weight.

I’ve never been rail thin mind you, but I was a fit child, a coltish pre teen, a slim teenager and a curves in the right places adult. I wore whatever was in fashion and if I don’t mind saying so…. rocked it.

Then I turned 30 and gained 10 pounds. No biggie, I’m short but I could carry it.

 

IMG_9113

 

I turned 40 and gained another 10 pounds.  Hmm… had to rethink those crop tops and short skirts, but okay.

 

IMG_9187

 

When I turned 50? Only 5 more pounds… I figured I’d reached my leveling off point.

 

IMG_9241

 

Then…. after a medical issue made a full abdominal hysterectomy necessary and I was thrown into menopause? I gained another 15 pounds. That put me in the “Hooray! Long loose tops are back in style and where do I find that Jane Russell 18 hour bra?” category.

WTF? My body was in revolt. Food was no longer my friend!

I dieted,  I cursed my womanly existence, I exercised, I swore like a longshoreman,  I drank the equivalent of friggin’ Lake Erie in water every day and nothing happened. I tried low fat, low carb, I gave up every delicious thing I could think of (except alcohol because… well, geesh. I had to have a reason to live.) But still the weight didn’t come off.

To be honest it drove me nearly crazy for 2 years until I said …..

 

 

Life is too short to never eat bread. And cheese. And every other wonderfully fatty high calorie thing I’d been denying myself. (Come to momma cappuccino mousse trifle… I’ve missed you!)  If my body wanted to be  round,  voluptuous,  larger than it was, then who was I to argue.

So I bought bigger pants. Hell, I have bunions and had to buy bigger shoes, so what…. it was another excuse to shop.

 

IMG_9118

 

Yes, I miss thin. Not everyday mind you  (thank you yoga pants!)  but when I have an event like a wedding, or funeral, or horror of horrors… a class reunion where there are people I haven’t seen in 20 years?  It drives me to drink.  No, I won’t be unrecognizable from my former self, but I’m always conscious of the difference. And women are famous for beating themselves up about that. Men embrace their beer bellies and proudly pat them. Women try and squeeze their muffin tops into torture devices called Spanx.

Oh, well… such is life.  It took me a while, but I’ve learned to embrace the larger version of myself. I may not always love her, but I’m healthy and happy…. and in the end, isn’t that much more important than squeezing into a smaller size?

 

5a5e2b2a194e6fdab5a100d0dd678209

 

And exercise? Okay, you got me.

It was never my strong suit.

 

IMG_9110

28 thoughts on “Diet is a four letter word.”

  1. Loving the “Honey we’ve still got it” meme 😀

    Diet is just the word “die” with a ‘t’ at the end of it.

    We could thoroughly enjoy the limited time left to us,
    Or,
    Starve, adding a few more miserable and restrictive years onto our time remaining.

    It’s a fabulous excuse to shop.

    Liked by 1 person

    Reply

    1. Die with a “t”. Yup… that pretty much sums up what I felt like doing for 2 years.
      As for shopping, I never need an excuse, but it’s nice to be able to say, “Yes. I had to buy 6 new pairs of pants and 12 new shirts” and actually mean it for a change.
      😝

      Liked by 1 person

      Reply

  2. It scares me how we think alike. However…I joined weight watchers and as of last night, I’m down 18 pounds from when Nick passed.

    I celebrated with a pastry this morning……………..yes I did.

    Liked by 2 people

    Reply

  3. Our bodies do amazing things for us every day. They let us get out of bed and stretch and touch our toes and wander across the floor and wash our face and brush our teeth and head out to the kitchen to pour vodka in our bloody mary’s.

    Bodies rock!

    Liked by 2 people

    Reply

  4. I refuse to “diet” anymore. I just try to make healthier choices for what I eat, portion control (not sit and eat a whole bag of chips in one sitting) and treat myself only every so often…not “hey, I woke up, I deserve a cupcake!”

    Liked by 1 person

    Reply

  5. I eat what I like (kinda, gotta be a bit careful, who after 30 doesn’t?) and move as I will. I’m not real good at bein still. However, I have always been an hourglass, and loved it, so being a bigger hourglass has not upset me near as much as it has upset my friends who were rail thin for 35-50 years. The big wake up call is that much of it is NOT in our control and we can love ourselves just as well with that happy and healthy vibe! Life is to be lived well! 😀

    Liked by 1 person

    Reply

    1. You’re right of course. And I do live it well. ( so much cheese, so little time)
      And I probably am genetically cursed. As far as I know I’m the tallest and thinnest woman in my family… which clearly means we have Weeble DNA.

      Liked by 1 person

      Reply

      1. LOL! Weeble DNA! I think I’m the shortest woman, but I’m not the thinnest. I got a cousin who’s all long and lean — she’s an alien, a beautiful, beautiful alien! 😛

        Liked by 1 person

  6. WOW!!! You surprise me by missing such a great opportunity!!! You could easily blame Fred for 20 pounds!!! If you hadn’t married him you would be thin and beautiful instead of just being beautiful!
    Give him hell for making you fatter!!

    Liked by 1 person

    Reply

  8. The missus and I have struggled with weight our whole lives. But, she turns 40 in November and I turn 40 next July. We’ve decided to just say “eff it”. We’ll keep trying to make healthier choices and lead more active lifestyles, but we’re going to stop beating ourselves up. We’re good folks (mostly–I mean, the dark sense of humor is never going away), who cares if we’re fat? Can’t spend the second part of our lives worried about weight ALL the time.

    Liked by 1 person

    Reply

  9. Botticelli didn’t paint pictures of skinny women. Marylin Monroe and Diana Dors weren’t deemed sexually alluring because they won prizes at weightwatchers.
    I am thin.
    Inside the padding.

    Liked by 1 person

    Reply

  10. I gained a lot of weight in an extremely short time a long time ago. I walked around feeling like a whale for years and trying to hide it under baggy clothes, long shirts, 3x tshirts. You name it, I did it (except diet and exercise. I subscribe to a religion in my head that I have been an active member of since childhood-exercise is devils work. I am truly too weak minded to give up a food and stick to it when there are difficult to impossible obstacles – like giving up meat and sticking to it for three months without issue, but then my aunt decides to make Italian Wedding Soup-which I don’t even like-but asks me to please taste just the meat ball because she thinks they’re fine). I spent nearly 10 years fat and miserable, holding on to pants and shirts I would never fit into because I might again someday and my husband would get so annoyed! He would try to force me to cull my collection of M-L tshirts and dresses and stuff and I would refuse.

    We got a divorce.

    Weight fell off of me so fast I thought I had a terminal illness. Doctor says I’m fine. I got in most of those old clothes that I was dying to fit into again. I somehow got down to 5 lbs less than when I met him at 19 which had remained steady since 7th grade at that point. My nice clothes I had gotten when old enough to need nice clothes and heavy enough to have to seek them out look like crap now. The shirts look like dresses, the pants which I would have to pour myself in now require belts to just keep them from falling down. I met my goal. I got in all those old clothes again. SUCCESS!

    But is it? I actually hate it. For my entire life I always felt fat and gross. Now I’m “skinny”. I feel my face looks too equine, my clothes fit like trash bags, my clavicles are visible and kinda pointy, none of my rings fit me, my old tights look like regular pants. I am limited to clothes I fit into in the 90’s because I can’t afford more right now (and hating shopping is another major reason). I look like a bag lady or like I just stepped out of a time warp.

    I have been trying (and failing) to put the weight back on. All I get is the stupid food baby which lets my pants stay up better, but goes away. I do not limit my food intake, I never have. I eat what I want when I want. I enjoy eating and I still won’t exercise. But I am truly one of those people who is a “fat” girl stuck in a “skinny” girls’s body. I was unhappy fat because I thought I was ugly. I’m unhappy thin because *I* am not comfortable with it.

    There truly is no winning. Embrace the body you have. It’s what you got, and as long as you have the ability to, eat everything you like, drink everything you like, be merry. And no matter what, don’t spend any longer than 5 minutes in front of a reflective surface. Just a quick check to make sure your shirt isn’t tucked into your pants only in the back, and DONE! No time to catalogue because nothing is ever as you really want it. Bodies are different. Love yours

    Liked by 1 person

    Reply

      1. Oh I lived that life! Smooshing yourself into a pair of spanx so tight your eyes bulged just to get them over your hips (the button didn’t matter because it would never happen, but THEY ARE ON!!” Versus wanting to wear a fake booty and hips every day just to make your favorite jeans stay up. When it comes to women and their weight, it’s always lose-lose. So put on your most comfortable pants (or just a comfy nightgown), pull out your favorite snack and contemplate it all. Not the weight. That’s the whole reason for the contemplation. Contemplate how amazing that snack is, how you would feel if you truly decided to remove it from your diet for the rest of your life with no ability to go backwards and undo it. To know that taste will never be able to touch your tongue again, that texture will never be able to grace your mouth again. That happy dance inside of you will never dance again. Then think about those jeans. Do you really need to ever fit in that pair of silver and black leopard print jeans again? Are you really ever planning on going clubbing again, at the club where the average age on the night for those pants is 24? Do you even speak to the people that you used to go to that specific club with? No? Then put another jolly handful of delicious in your mouth and realize that no matter what, you got the better end of the deal 😂

        Oh, and even though their hideous and I will never wear them again, I will never throw them away. By the time my niece is old enough to go clubbing (she’s 1 now), they’ll probably be back in style. Then again, when my nephew is old enough (he’s 2) I would not say no. To each their own, let them be free to be them! So they are shiny, but horrible. They’re not too bad folded up kind of ice where it’s just the pattern itself and not the whole pant. And I don’t need them taking up space in my closet. My intention now is to go to the store and get a cheap poster frame. Fold them nicely, hang them where the sun can reflect on them and brighten a room (without lightbulbs for a few hours a day) and keep them as a memory, not of my skinnier days, but of the fun I had when I was that young and dumb. When getting into a hot tub in the middle of a club with 10 strangers fully clothed was not something that made every fiber in my being grossed out. A time when it seemed like kind of a dumb idea (but not the dumbest idea on earth yet) to see other people get piercings below the neck from some chick in the club parking lot armed with a sewing needle, a lighter, and gloves (the stretchy winter kind, not Medical grade) and a safety pin as a temp “ring” until the person got one they liked and realized that (even if it didn’t get infected) the rings you buy are a totally different gauge than the needle and you will have to enlarge the hole somehow. That club was a ton of fun….at 20. Pushing 40 I look back and think “this is why I spent three days arguing bitterly with my parents?” They were ok with me going, even taking my younger sisters because I wasn’t old enough to and still don’t drink so there was no safety concerns (and my sisters were young and kinda dumb because they were so young. The club was dark but had a trillion black lights. They didn’t have to stay right next to me, they could go dance with friends that I introduced them too, but they had to wear their biggest strap white bras so that I could stand on something, survey the room and easily spot them from any vantage point. They never knew that the reason I knew to get over to them and drag them away from whoever was not on the approved list was because of those bra straps!). Their rules were to stay out of the dingy hot tub, to never get pierced by anyone in any parking lot ever, not to let myself get “picked up” at the club in a way that ended up with me in a car outside with a stranger I would never see in a clear light, and other, honestly, very rational demands. I was 19 and 20 when I used to go. These were insane limitations placed on me by overbearing and demanding parents. I never had any intention of being pierced or ending up in a car, but there was nothing wrong with the hot tub, so I fought tooth and nail that I was n adult and could do any of the three. We battled it out for three days. They got me to agree to the two I would never do anyway and they caved on the hot tub. I was able to use the car to go. I went for 18 months every week, I got in the hot tub once because my ex, sisters, and two cousins my sisters age all wanted to go in (yes, they had to buy big strapped white bras too!) I got in with them. It was underwhelming and cold so I got out within 3 mins and never got into it again. They won that too.

        And that’s what the pants represent. A stupid version of me who was always hunting for something fun and who would battle out the dumbest things with her parents for days. But the one thing that never once crossed my mind was to not tell them these things. My parents never went to the club. They knew about the piercings and the hot tub and all of it because I told them. I never hid anything from them. There would have been a significant reduction in battles if I just didn’t tell them, but I never withheld anything from them. And that’s what those pants are for me. A reminder of the relationship with my parents (which was amazing, especially with my mom), a reminder of youth and stupidity, and a reminder of chasing fun when I had the energy and a friend group that could do it with me. Now everyone is settled. And COVID. So, a frame it shall be!

        Like

      2. My clubbing days are long gone, and most of the time it dyed my really bother me…. But when I have to attend a wedding or holiday event? Nothing fits and it’s depressing.

        Like

      3. The best thing to do for a holiday or wedding event is to get a nice summer dress that fits nicely without spanks or anything else. They’re loose and comfortable. Make sure the material is not clingy. That’s the last thing you want! But you have to feel pretty, you have to think it looks good (or good enough depending on how pretty you feel). Buy it in two or three colors. One black always. Don’t bother with white, no one wears white to a wedding but the bride and holiday parties is the time to spill stuff on yourself anyway. Then find a nice coverup. Preferably long sleeves, like a sweater and get two – one also in black (funerals too), and one in any color you want-cream, pink, whatever. Make sure they go well enough with all three of your dresses or get them in a skin tone kind of shade. Then go buy a knock-off pair of spanx or gymnastics shorts that are only marginally tight. You don’t need to be sucked and tucked, the dress looks good no matter what. This is to smooth lines and avoid what I call chub rub. Also go buy workout pants in a simple color like beige or whatever closely matches your skin tone. Buy them in capris length. You have an outfit for every occasion now. Six actually.

        Summer you just need the dress and the shorts (hot chub rub is the worst!) and you have three outfits.

        Summer, you put on the capris leggings under to keep your legs warm, and the sweater. Because you have 2 sweaters, each dress is two outfits giving you six outfits in the winter.

        There are also summery cover up options. Long flowing things with thin straps or short sleeves, mostly a kind of see through color. Grab two of those but get them in any two colors you want (black isn’t necessary as it’s summer and you don’t really need it other than to accent the dress in a different way). That’s six outfits for summer.

        Like

      5. No! That’s for winter! Lol

        The three summer dresses go all year. The sweaters come out in winter so do the leggings. I’m the summer you have three dresses which you can pair with a thin almost see through covering. That way every dress can be made to be worn different ways and look different no matter the season. And your comfortable no matter what

        Liked by 1 person

Leave a comment