The Weight thing

I reckon it’s the whole New Years Resolution concept, and the cultural mandate that I, as a woman, have to announce loudly my intention to lose weight this year. I wrote about it some over here: New Year’s Resolutions.

One’s weight, and one’s obsession with it, I believe it’s a control thing. I use my weight to control people’s reactions to me. I HATE being noticed. Put me in a party, or any sort of gathering, and you will find me keeping company with a gin and tonic in the far back corner, happily watching everyone else pretend to have a grand time. It’s easy to do, as I am 50 lbs overweight and no one notices the fat girl.

Mind you, I’m not shy. I can carry a conversation with the best of them. Usually people (men especially) are startled and pleased by my ability to converse about Mr Tebow and the Heisman trophy (and he’s just a sophomore!) or the merits of the 454 vs the 396. Sometimes Sweet Daddio comes home with a mechanical issue on one of his complex machines, one he knows the solution to, but wants to see if his high-school educated 50 lb overweight wife can figure it out, and when I do he shouts SEE! YOU NEED TO COME WORK FOR ME! because his entire shop of highly trained mechanics can’t get it.

See, I was raised that being attractive was Not Good. I was constantly told “It’s a good thing you’re smart because you’ll never be pretty.” and “Why are you wearing that? why would you want to call attention to yourself like that?” I absorbed that information to a level that I’m not sure I’ll ever be rid of it.

I look in the mirror and do not see pretty.

The very last day of my 20 weeks of insurance mandated therapy (apparently they believed any psychological problem could be solved in 20 sessions), it came out that I never, ever looked in the mirror. I would look at my hair, yes, and teeth, ok no broccoli there. I would notice a zit or some other great open sore of a flaw, but I never looked at the whole package. My therapist was horrified by this revelation, and offered me 2 free sessions just to try and rectify this. Have you ever heard of such? Free sessions? I guess he liked me and didn’t want this young housewife wandering around thinking she was ugly.

So he gave me a task of spending 10 minutes every day, “Use a timer and don’t cheat” he said, looking in the mirror, assessing. He found an article in some psychological journal about beauty, and the physical qualities that make a face attractive to other people. He said “Read it, and use the information as you look in the mirror.”

I did, and it was…enlightening and excruciating. The outlined features in the article, those things considered attractive…high forehead, large eyes, round cheeks, rosy mouth. Small ears, soft hair, even teeth…I looked like that, and yet, not. Somehow. I couldn’t reconcile what my eyes saw with what my mind said. I still can’t. The best I’ve managed in the 14 years since therapy is an acknowledgment that I don’t make people stare or retch when they see me.

I still have trouble with it. Sweet Daddio accuses me of being gorgeous. I can accept that he sees me that way, but only if I modify it with the idea that he may be a little biased, or crazy. I am glad he thinks I’m gorgeous, because I think he’s totally hot, but I think we’re both looking through thick and distorted lenses sometimes.

I have ALWAYS…well, since I was 12 and grew boobs and bodacious butt, thought I was fat. I went from being a girls size 10 to a woman’s size 10 overnight. I hovered around 10-12 until after #4 was born (in my 30’s), in a world that went from saying size 10 was NORMAL to saying size 2 is NORMAL and everything over a 2 requires admittance to a fat farm. I learned to wear long flowing skirts and loose pants, never anything clingy, in an attempt to disguise those parts that carried the extra weight. As a girl I was told I was built like a bowling pin, or a coke bottle, and that was something to be ashamed of. So I hid it all.

Then, I got married. This man I married thought I was some sort of goddess and couldn’t believe his luck! Internally I laughed about it because the last person he had been attached to was indeed, a perfect size 2 and I felt like a cow up next to her springbok perfection. Yet here I was, married to HIM and she WASN’T! I did things I’d never done before- I allowed him to photograph me in a bikini bathing suit. I let him see me in shorts and a skinny tank top.

This picture was taken in 1986, on our honeymoon. I have no idea who took it.

Haw…the kids found those pictures the other day. #1 was all “Who’s the woman in the bathing suit?” SD said “That’s your mom.” #1 goes “AAAGH MY EYES MY EYES!” For all his artsy and alternative ways he’s a bit of a Calvinist.

The emotional salvation in all this weighty issue is age. Being over 40 now, I am not feeling the societal pressure to be thin and perfect. That doesn’t mean I’m thinking I’ll just let myself go and weigh 400 pounds, but I am not feeling the knot in my stomach when lithe young women walk by, or when the men in the room turn their attention to the designers and their stylish slim selves. I’m ok with that. A psychological journal from 20 years ago said I was pretty. A medical journal and 4 children say I’m fertile. My husband say’s I’m hot, and who else am I supposed to be convincing of that anyway? Bob the Horndog at work? yeah right. I still don’t think I’m pretty, or ever will be, but I know enough to take an objective look at scientific evidence and recognize that my features fit the bill, so I’ll just go with that.

And as for the weight, well. That’s what elastic is for.