Body Image

I honestly cannot remember a time in my life when I ever truly loved - even liked - my body.

Sad, huh?

Sure, I can look back now and say "what I wouldn't do to have those thighs?" or "why didn't I appreciate perky breasts a little bit more?" But, at the time . . . not so much.

I was a boney kid. All knees and elbows and skeeter bites. I remember the summer after sixth grade, my mother made me go to Vacation Bible School. One of the leaders in my group was a high school boy that I was in l-o-v-e with. We had to make "baseball cards" as one of the activities. It featured a picture of us on the front, wearing a sneer and holding a bat. On the back, we had to list our "stats."

These stats included weight.

Now, I was 12-years-old. I was 5'2" tall and weighed a whopping 85 pounds. But, for whatever reason, I had it in my head that that was too much and I could not let the high school boy know that I weighed that much. So I wrote 5'2 and . . . wait for it . . . 58 lbs!!! on my trading card. LMAO. It's funny now.

Even if the 85 pounds was too much in my pre-teen head, it was too much of the wrong things. It was "too much" in the form of knobby knees and "I look the same from the back as I do from the front." I wanted BOOBS. I read Are You There, God? It's Me Margaret by Judy Blume and would practice the same exercises the girls in the book did every night before I went to bed. I must, I must, I must increase my bust.

It took a couple years, but when that bust finally increased . . . yowza! Did it ever increase! I went from looking like a 10-year-old boy to curvy and soft. Those knees, elbows, and skeeter bites became boobs, butt, and hips.

And I hated it.

I did the junior high thing in the early 1990's. Kate Moss was posing for Calvin Klein in ads where you could count her ribs and with her collar bone jutting out. Sir Mix-a-lot may have liked big butts, but he seemed like the only one. It wasn't "cool" in those days for a white girl from the suburbs to have booty. These days it's everywhere: in hip hop music where they rap about looking for a dime, whose top of the line, cute face, slim waist with a big behind. Even in - of all things - country music, where they sing about a honkey tonk ba-donka-donk. But when parts of my body were starting to curve, so not cool.

I hid the curves by wearing my dad's t-shirts down over my butt. I was in school in the days of the tucked in-then-puffed out shirts and that helped to hide some of the C cups I was hauling around at age 14. But I hated my body. I hated the crude things boys would say. I hated being curvy and wanted nothing more than to be one of the super thin girls . . . the girls with no curves.

I began my senior year of high school in a pair of size eight Eddie Bauer shorts. Now days, I would absolutely die to be in a size eight. I would broadcast it to the world. I would take pictures of every single lable on every size eight article I own and post them everywhere. You would be able to google "size eight" and see my smilin' face.

But, of course, at 17 you never know the power of your own body, of your curves. Surrounded by the Heathers and the Tiffanys in their size 3's, I felt like a hippo.

It was a rough year for me. I was juggling trying to graduate in the top 10 of my class, way too many extracirricular activites, college applications, and all the things that go along with being a senior in high school. My eating habits became the worst they ever were in my life. If I wasn't shoveling Taco Bell down the hatch, it was Arby's or Sonic or the buffet at Pizza Inn.

I started twelfth grade in a pair of size 8 shorts. I graduated twelfth grade in a dress that was a size 13/14. I was embarrassed, humiliated, and hated every single part of my body. But I didn't have the "umph" to do anything about it.

Before I could begin college classes, I had to have a physical done. I can honestly remember gasping when I stepped on the scale: 168 pounds. I couldn't believe it. All the clothes that I bought to begin my classes were a size 14. I was bigger than I had ever been in my life.

And I just so happened to go to Baylor University.

Baylor is pretty much the all of the 18-22 year-olds in the suburbs of Houston, Texas, regurgetated into one place. The girls were tan, blonde, pretty, and rich. And, most of all, they weren't fat. I stuck out like a sore thumb. A decade later, a size 14 seems not that bad. But at age 18, it felt like the worst thing in the world. I felt huge compared to the other girls on campus. I didn't look and see other fat people . . . because I chose not to. In my mind, I was the largest, ugliest girl on that campus. And it was horrible. I hated the feeling.

I can look back now at pictures of those times and point out things about my body that were wonderful. My legs were strong and toned. They had definition, not cellulite. My arms were boney still. My tummy was flat and my boobs were full. But all I could see was 168 pounds, size 14.

The next semester, my mom and I went on a diet. We cut out the junk and we joined a gym. I was only 18 years old and the weight literally flew off of me. By March, I was back in a size 10. I went on a trip to the coast for my 19th birthday in May and wore a 2-piece. But the same old insecurities were there. I thought my "girl bubble" (which is what I called my belly) was too big. I swore I had "thunder thighs." The list could go on and on.

For the next several years, I managed to stay anywhere from a size 10 to a size 12. I had a boyfriend who everyone thought was a sweet guy. And, while he did always tell me I was beautiful, he was also good about making little comments. "Maybe we should go on a diet together." "Hey, let's join the gym." "Let's have a contest to see who can lose the most weight this month." When you're already sensitive about these subjects, comments like that can send you over the edge.

Luckily, I love food too much to be anorexic and I hate throwing up too much to be bullimic. But that doesn't mean I didn't try "not the best approaches" to losing a few pounds here and there. I went on Xenadrine, but it made my heart beat so fast and had me so jittery and nervous that I dropped it after a few weeks. I lost 12 pounds on the Atkins diet, only to regain it as soon as I started eating carbs again. I did the SlimFast diet once and lost about 10 pounds.

That boyfriend and I eventually broke up. I moved away. And, in just a year's time, I packed on more weight than I ever thought was possible. I worked in retail, a crazy schedule, and one of the few people in retail who actually got to sit on their ass all the day. The combination -- no exercise + eating at weird times + eating a combination of vending machine food and fast food -- equaled once again blowing up to a size 14. When I found out I was pregnant in 2006, I was strugging to get in to those 14's. I had to buy maternity clothes before I really needed them just to be able to wear something.

It was after the birth of my first son that I really began to see just how beautiful my body really was . . . at a size 8, a size 10, a size 12, a size 14.

A c-section followed by a nasty infection that led to a surgical debreedment left me with a scar that runs from hip bone to hip bone. It's hidden by a "dunlap . . . " a belly that no Pilates or crunches or sit up will ever get rid of. The boobs, considerably larger than the C-cup they were when I was 14, point to the floor and I cannot leave home without a bra that defies gravity. I have come to terms with the cellulite on my legs. I can live with the wingspan that my arms have become. Because I know there are things that are worse. At least I can do something about those. It will take yet another surgery (a tummy tuck) to get rid of what my gut has become.

Maybe one of these days, I can look at my body fresh out of the shower and say "wow, that chick is hot."

Or maybe one of these days, I'll look at my body fresh out of the shower and say "I wish I'd known what I possessed at 28 . . . "

Daily Menu for Monday:
Breakfast:
2 slices turkey bacon
Egg beaters
Wheat toast
Total: 4 WW pts

Lunch:
2 mini bagel pizzas
Green beans
Total: 4 WW pts

Snack:
Cherry cobbler
Total: 4 WW pts

Dinner:
Taco Salad
Total: 7 WW pts

Snack:
WW chocolate cake
Total: 1 WW pt

Daily Total: 20 WW points