Issue of Weight versus Happiness
I have struggled with my weight basically since I was 10-11 years old or so. Prior to that I was a pretty average size for my age, but as I was beginning to approach that puberty stage the weight started to pack on. Now in my mid 40's, at a size 16, I am struggling even more than ever. It is mostly in my midsection - though I would love to lose some in the boob dept. too. I have on today at work, size 14 jeans that I can button (they are snug), but can't zip up all the way so I put on a shirt that covers it. I had been on MyFitnessPal.com (eating approx. 1600 calories a day) since mid-March thru now (with no regular exercise regimen in place), but only lost about 5-6 pounds and have since put some of that back on. I am frustrated. I truly know what I need to do...incorporate the exercise in with the low-calorie diet. Recently I talked with E about getting a folding treadmill for our home as we have a room to put it in, but right now it is being used for E's business. He is working on a pinball machine back there that should be gone in the about 2 weeks. My hope is that once that happens, I will order one. I found a Nordictrak for about $600 on-line at Sears with alot of the features I would like including the most important - a fan built in. My hope/goal is that I will get motivated to use it on a consistent basis and will start to see some results.
I ponder this question alot...Why is it that us, women, worry so much about our weight? I had lunch this past Saturday with an old high school friend that I met in my freshman year. We have seen so much gone on in each other lives since those days and we had a great time at lunch talking about the past. Of course, the issue of weight entered the conversation as we munched on our not so healthy lunch (I had mini bison burger sliders with fries and she had a lobster roll with butter and fries). My friend never had a weight problem for majority of her life. She was always the skinny one in the group. Recently in the last year or so, she has put on about 20-25 pounds and I could tell she is struggling with this. Part of this is due to health issues she has been experiencing, but also in part of being in a new comfortable relationship as well. We must have spent about half the time talking about this...the cruelty of gaining weight, our middle age status, starting pre-menopause, etc., etc., etc. At one point I said, you know, we spend so much of our time, as women, worrying about our weight and being unhappy about it...why is that? We are both in good relationships, we have found a man who loves us, we have good friends and wonderful families who love us...things that most people would love to have. Why do we continue to hate our weight so much that at times it overshadows all that is good and positive in our lives? She so agreed with this, but in the next breath said, but everytime I look in the mirror, I don't recognize that person staring back at me and it makes me sad. I felt sad that she too feels this way now. When I look at her I still see her as the same because it is her personality and character that I see, not her weight. I see the person inside.
I also recently had a conversation with E about food and how I prefer to spend money on the organic and fresh from the farmer's market foods than processed ones. He agrees, but he loves his snacks and I love baked goods, so it's hard to be good all the time. I asked him when he eats something like this, does he ever feel guilty afterwards, which he quickly replied "no way" with a smile on his face. I found that very interesting and wondered to myself why can't I be like that? Almost all of the time when I indulge I do feel the guilt start to creep in. Do most women, who are overweight, feel this way? Is this particularly a women's issue more than men?
I want to be healthy don't get me wrong. I don't want to develop high blood pressure or diabetes. I don't want to worry about having a heart attrack (like Rosie O'Donnell) in the future. But, where do you draw the line between happiness and enjoying your life and being so focused on your weight?
Lots of times I think back to my single life prior to meeting E and how all I wanted was to meet a man and get married. For a while that was a goal for me and not much else mattered. I even made promises to God at times, that once this happened, I won't wish or ask for anything more in my life. I figured once I had the man, the other stuff, like my weight, won't matter because I would have found someone who loved me for me - inside and out. To this day, he does love me inside and out, but what I didn't realize at that time was I don't love my outside enough to be truly happy with me.
I ponder this question alot...Why is it that us, women, worry so much about our weight? I had lunch this past Saturday with an old high school friend that I met in my freshman year. We have seen so much gone on in each other lives since those days and we had a great time at lunch talking about the past. Of course, the issue of weight entered the conversation as we munched on our not so healthy lunch (I had mini bison burger sliders with fries and she had a lobster roll with butter and fries). My friend never had a weight problem for majority of her life. She was always the skinny one in the group. Recently in the last year or so, she has put on about 20-25 pounds and I could tell she is struggling with this. Part of this is due to health issues she has been experiencing, but also in part of being in a new comfortable relationship as well. We must have spent about half the time talking about this...the cruelty of gaining weight, our middle age status, starting pre-menopause, etc., etc., etc. At one point I said, you know, we spend so much of our time, as women, worrying about our weight and being unhappy about it...why is that? We are both in good relationships, we have found a man who loves us, we have good friends and wonderful families who love us...things that most people would love to have. Why do we continue to hate our weight so much that at times it overshadows all that is good and positive in our lives? She so agreed with this, but in the next breath said, but everytime I look in the mirror, I don't recognize that person staring back at me and it makes me sad. I felt sad that she too feels this way now. When I look at her I still see her as the same because it is her personality and character that I see, not her weight. I see the person inside.
I also recently had a conversation with E about food and how I prefer to spend money on the organic and fresh from the farmer's market foods than processed ones. He agrees, but he loves his snacks and I love baked goods, so it's hard to be good all the time. I asked him when he eats something like this, does he ever feel guilty afterwards, which he quickly replied "no way" with a smile on his face. I found that very interesting and wondered to myself why can't I be like that? Almost all of the time when I indulge I do feel the guilt start to creep in. Do most women, who are overweight, feel this way? Is this particularly a women's issue more than men?
I want to be healthy don't get me wrong. I don't want to develop high blood pressure or diabetes. I don't want to worry about having a heart attrack (like Rosie O'Donnell) in the future. But, where do you draw the line between happiness and enjoying your life and being so focused on your weight?
Lots of times I think back to my single life prior to meeting E and how all I wanted was to meet a man and get married. For a while that was a goal for me and not much else mattered. I even made promises to God at times, that once this happened, I won't wish or ask for anything more in my life. I figured once I had the man, the other stuff, like my weight, won't matter because I would have found someone who loved me for me - inside and out. To this day, he does love me inside and out, but what I didn't realize at that time was I don't love my outside enough to be truly happy with me.
I wonder the same thing too! My husband is overweight - really needs to lose about 40 lbs - but it doesn't seem to bother him the way needing to lose 10 lbs bothers me. Where I'm trying to draw the line is in being reasonable about the weight I can maintain. Trying to figure in my age (51 in a few days) and the things I want to be able to enjoy and the level of exercise I am willing to do, I've got a goal weight. It's higher than my goal weight was in my 20s and 30s, but it's something that I think I can reasonably achieve and have balance in my life. I know I could go further down, but that would mean no wine, no cake, no fun.
ReplyDeleteYou're speaking my language! One of my friends and I will get together for lunch - though we'll generally eat pretty healthy stuff before sharing a dessert! - and moan about weight too, trying to figure out why it is it becomes such a big deal. I was also skinny at school (though I didn't know it - I thought I was fat but my hip bones jutted out!) but in my 30s started putting on weight. Lost weight over 5-6 years (the infertility years) but it crept back on, and this last year it has been the worst. I'm working out regularly, but (I'm 49 for a month or two yet) finding it really hard. My target weight now would have plunged me into depression in my 20s. Sigh.
ReplyDeleteI have wondered the same thing too ~ why is weight such a sensitive issue. I tend to think it is because we as women really want to be beautiful and rail thin is what the media projects as beautiful. Women on the screen, on tv, and in ads are all a size 2-4. I think if those women looked a little closer to the real thing, it might not be such a sensitive issue for us. I love what Dove is doing with their real woman ads.
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