Where it started

I don’t actually remember making the conscious choice to get “healthy”  or to  “Get thin” . I knew I wanted to, I also knew I didn’t know how,  I also knew it was going to be a pain in the ass.

I also knew that I liked my couch and binge drinking but those things I did know how to do. 

I was 25 and I was 220 pounds, none of which was muscle, but I really didn’t think about it too much. I was mostly focused on cracking jokes and having fun. Those things seemed way more interesting and fun than my weight (hindsight, because the were) 

I did have tiny pangs of societal pressures nudging me to get thin.  I remember people making comments, or feeling types of ways while hanging out with my girlfriends who fit the hot girl mold. I would get sad when we where all in our bikinis or when one of them fucked a guy I liked. 

 I would get sad and I would order a diet coke instead of a regular coke and cry myself to sleep. But then I would wake up and go back to cracking  jokes… and drinking regular coke. 

My biggest push for being one of the thins was my wanting of a boyfriend (all the cool kids had one!) and seeing as being fat was literally my ONLY problem (so cute 25 year old me, god I do miss my wonderful ignorant perceptions) all I had to do was get thin. 

I thought if I could fix this thing, this fat thing they would be lining up out the door. 

I jumped into a new world that was supposed to better me;  with few body image issues, high self esteem, high sex drive, a body that had shapes and curves, and a killer sense of humor… only to trade it all for a size 2 and syrupless, carbless, gluten free pancakes. 

I started with an all you can eat buffet of fad diets 

Sugar free for 30 days, One month paleo, food swaps, Veganjuary, I didn’t know how any of it was working but I knew it was working, my body was changing and this made me happy. I also made my surrounding world happy because the world likes skinny people, they must! They tell them how good they look all the time! Plus skinny people are just easier to interact with because they have no problems and they all have boyfriends so you don’t  have to be sad when you talk to them 

First stop on the body image express right here; when people are constantly telling you how good you look the smaller you get it fucks with your head (this is called body talk).  We are social creatures and want to be accepted by our tribe and if our tribe likes us small we like us small! 

This wasn’t intentional or even conscious on their part  but it certainly left an impact 

 I would come to find out later in life people love their fat friends because we do the brave cool stuff like listened, cared deeply for our friends and families, and ordered french toast for the table.

It wasn’t just my body or my image of my body that was changing, it was also my identity.  I could feel the shift of the late night carefree  party girl to the environmentally conscious early to bed early to rise.  

(Who would still get blackout drunk and then eat fast food, but waaayyy less often, and now I would feel really bad about myself when I did.)

  On my worst hangover days I would force myself to run a 5k to punish me for all the fun I had, how dare I, I was supposed to be losing weight so people liked me, not wasting my time socially bonding with new friends and laughing at dick jokes.

The narrative was shifting, I was now the girl who went to the gym and drank diet coke because she knew better, even though the reality was I didn’t know shit about shit. 

This all felt great at first, and then it felt good, and then after a few years became pretty fucked up 

I was getting smaller and smaller and smaller, my boobs no longer  voluptuous pillows, they we sad sacks, you could see the bones in my neck my venus like figure had all but disappeared to something akin to a fitness model or young boy 

I was eating a Whole Foods Plant Based diet.  I wasn’t eating oil of any kind. I thought all oil was basically fat poison that would carry inflammatory markers to my brain and I would have a stroke in 5-7 business days after consumption. 

 I would use veggie stock to sautee my… other veggies, I would butter my bread with…nothing… also I sure as hell wasn’t eating bread. 

I was a slave to the Netflix documentary culture and needless to say with that came a large drop off in my sense of humor.  Life isn’t funny when there are sad baby cows out there people! 

Even sex seemed like a waste of time (yeah because I did score that boyfriend… I would come to find out later it was because of my personality and not my size, but I mean… I didn’t have a boyfriend and i was overweight, and now I wasn’t overweight and i did have one… and that sounds like science to me… ) anyway, sex was useless unless I was on top and was doing crunches at the same time so I would be burning optimal calories (this is joke, but I did feel a big drop in my sex drive, ya know because I was starving)

It wasn’t just my food that was spiraling out, it was also my #movement culture

I was a personal trainer at the time so there was no limitation of workout gear, equipment, or time to do so. When you are a trainer you pad your  time between clients (because people be late)  and if you are just waiting around in the gym and you kind of hate yourself you are gonna work out. 

Also did I mention I am smart? Well I am, despite how dumb I was being I am actually quite clever. Weight loss= health so in order to lose weight I had to eat less, and the only thing getting in my way was this dumb thing called hunger. But I was smarter than my hunger. 

Some of the fun ways I used to manipulate my hormones! 

One; When you exercise you release a hormone called leptin which suppresses appetite. Every time you get a hungry pang just do burpees instead 

Two; you don’t eat when you are asleep.  When you get hungry and it’s dark out just go to bed! 

Three;  I would eat before going out to a restaurant so I could eat my at home “safe foods” and only have a little bit of the other stuff

Four; When I really wanted to indulge I would starve myself for the day leading up to that meal  

I was 119 pounds so in my mind I must be the healthiest I had ever been because I was the thinnest I had ever been and if I had learned anything besides eat less and move more, it’s that being thin meant being healthy! So I was winning!! But I wasn't…

I was a fucking mess 

I was all over the place emotionally, I remember not be happy, like ever, I remember feeling so guilty every time I ate anything that even remotely tasted good, 

And I still, despite achieving so much as far as Fitness goals were concerned, didn't have any type of grasp of what it meant to be  healthy.

I lost my period, I thought I was pregnant, when I found out i wasn’t and I had starved myself so much that i had development  functional hypothalamic amenorrhea (FHA)

Thank god that this shattered my misconceptions about health 

I had starved myself so badly my body was shutting down basic functions to save energy… that’s not healthy… that’s fucking dying 

I was literally killing myself 

I’m lucky that I came to that realization when I did. Some women don’t, but that night I went straight to a  jar of peanut butter and started to nourish myself back to health 

I still hold a very special place in my heart and mouth for peanut butter to this day, it may have saved my life (take that nut allergists, one point for the legumes bitch) 

I phased out of personal training because I knew the body expectations and culture wasn’t sustainable for me 

I began to move into yoga, nutrition, mindfulness, self care. 

I would like to say that now it’s just all better and I am done and love myself totally and accept all versions of me but that wouldn’t be the truth.  The truth is these mindsets, and fears, and negative body images stuck and stick with me and still creep up in moments when I feel vulnerable.  The process of healing oneself isn’t linear and that’s okay. 

I am here, on the other side for the most part of a disordered past.  My body is happy and strong and sexy now. I have full curves and eat with vitality and enthusiasm. And yeah i still have a boyfriend, he is my husband now and I know while my full sized heart my weight would never affect his love for me.   

I know what healthy is now.  It’s feeling good and taking care of  myself. Somedays that is movement, and greens, so days it’s rest and cookies, but acceptance is a pretty plus sized piece of it. 

Me now(ish)