The conversation started out innocent. The comment was not malicious. It is something we say. An observation we acknowledge out-loud despite knowing we shouldn’t. We know this observation is better left unsaid because, like stating the opposite, it holds a subtext that invites questions.
Had I lost weight? I don’t know. Aside from one time, I haven’t been on the scale in over four years. Four blissful years being happily unaware of what my relationship with gravity was.
Before that, my life was driven by that number. At some points I watched my weight climb feeling disgust and shame. Others, I watched it lower, filled with pride despite that absolutely horrible means I was using the drive that change.
That number held more weight than it should. I knew that intuitively, yet I let it hold me captive. Steer me. Manage me. Dictate my choices. My self talk. My life.
I got myself out of the spiral the knowledge of that number kept me in, and because of that I was able to see the truth: I had lost weight. I had lost the weight of my weight.
But there I was, four years later back in the tornado of thoughts those numbers can cause.
Had I lost weight? Did I need to lose weight? Did I gain weight and then lose it without knowing? What did I look like before this? Did I look ok? What is my body saying about me?
Those three words brought me to questions I hadn’t asked myself in years.
I have been working on my bullshit for a decade. Ten years of listening to my self-talk, monitoring my self-sabotaging nature, observing the messes I could create when I allowed myself to be unattended with my vices is finally starting to pay off: I know when I am going somewhere I do not want to go. I can pull myself back before I get lost there again.
Because of that I realized the truth in those words – the blessing of them. I have lost weight. I have lost so much weight.
I lost the weight of wondering. Wondering what everyone thinks of me. Do they think I am smart enough? Am I doing enough to prove my worth? Do they think I know what I am talking about? Are they talking about me when I leave? Did I fuck up? Say something stupid? Say too much? Do they like me? Do they think I am I too much?
Now I wonder if I like myself. I stop there. Do I like me? Am I doing enough to make myself proud? Am I saying what I need to say to stay in my integrity? Am I being authentic? Honest? Kind?
How many years did I waste judging myself in comparison to the accomplishments of others? Too many. She did this – said this – IS this. Constantly looking outside of myself to gauge my progress in my life.
I’ve lost the weight of comparison and jealousy. I figured out that the time I spent thinking about them, contrasting their accomplishments to mine, was time I could have been using to create my own dream.
I’ve lost the weight of judgment. Now I know every time I judged something or someone, I was really judging myself.
I didn’t see their shortcomings – I saw mine. It was not their flaws I was pointing out. I was shining a spotlight on my bullshit. My baggage. My mess.
Everything I detested in someone else was something I despised about myself.
I lost the weight of diet culture. Thinking I couldn’t eat something because it was a weekend food – not to be enjoyed during the week. That would have meant I had failed, I wasn’t “good,” I didn’t have enough willpower…. I lost the fear of certain foods. I lost the desire to hold myself to impossible standards in the hopes that those standards would earn me a six-pack stomach, and then… maybe then if I tortured and deprived myself enough, I would see something in the mirror I could be proud of.
When my main goal was weight loss, I lost myself every time.
I will never try to shrink myself again – now, my only goal is to be good to me. To treat my body with nothing but respect and kindness because she has put up with enough of my bullshit over the years.
I lost the weight of SHOULDS. What I should be doing. Having. Saying yes to. Saying no to. What I should be wearing. Saying. Being.
It is wild how freeing it is when you stop looking to society to teach you how to live and start looking into yourself for those answers. Honoring what truly makes you happy, proud, and free.
I lost the weight of my past. Who I was 10 years ago, 20 years ago. Who I was 1 year ago. They are all gone. Those girls are not here anymore. They made way for me – and while some of them were a bit of a mess (ok, a lot of mess) and some did things this version of my tries hard not to do – I am so proud of them. They all did their best. And even when they didn’t, they allowed me a chance to learn from their mistakes and bullshit.
You can not know who you want to be without having a clear idea of who you aren’t.
I will never again be the hungry, sad, mad, chronically salty version of myself again. I lost her too.
So yes, I have lost weight. More weight than I could have dreamed of losing years ago