Five Years

These pictures were taken 5 years ago yesterday.

We had walked from the Nuthaus to Nau's Enfield Drug store for breakfast, but got there too late and had to have lunch. A few things about this day: 1) It was HOT, and we're all sweaty. 2) Mei Li's feet were bleeding because she hadn't realized we would be walking all over creation and had only brought flats (and we still had to walk home... uphill). 3) D was there but I didn't include that picture, since D doesn't like public photos at this stage. 4) My back was in constant searing agony. Bonus for 5) James and I look pretty young, and he looks well-rested (I wasn't sleeping more than a couple of hours at a time because of my back).

It's only in hindsight that I know what happened to my back, but here it is: The weekend I moved into the RV park in Austin, I slipped and fell in the laundry room because water had accumulated in a clogged grate in the middle of the floor. I went down in the splits and my left knee swelled to ridiculous proportions almost immediately, though I didn't remember hitting my knee. That was in mid-August 2012.

It wasn't until December 2012 that my back started hurting. Once again, Khrys and Mei Li were visiting, but this time with Patsy and Kitana. Every time we got into a car, I writhed in a shock of pain. It got worse and worse until I couldn't sleep more than 3 hours at a time because I had to get up and stand up. I couldn't sit normally, either. I stood and I found one of those 1980s ergonomic kneeling chairs. I had sciatica that was excruciating, and lower back pain.

The night these pictures were taken, March 30, 2013, I actually told James he didn't have to marry me if he didn't want to, because I was a different person than he had started dating. I was sleep-deprived. Everything else in my life suffered because of this. I was moody and exhausted and couldn't go on road trips. I felt like my whole life revolved around avoiding pain, which I couldn't, so I felt like a failure. My sweet kid would often ask, when I cried out, if I was okay. At some point, I said, "I'm not. Please don't ask me anymore. Neither of us can do anything about it."

Several months later, I would find that I had a ruptured disc, and after pursuing many treatments (chiropractic, acupuncture, massage), time, gabapentin, and a failed pregnancy healed me completely. I only took gabapentin at night for about 3 weeks, but that allowed me to sleep through most of the night for the first time in months. That, I believe, gave my body the energy to start healing. Then the spike of pregnancy hormones, I fully believe, finished the job. Also, I'm well aware that the gabapentin might have contributed to that pregnancy loss, but we were not expecting to get pregnant so early, not even sure that was a possibility.

By the time we went to Haiti in June 2013, I wasn't too uncomfortable on the plane or in the shuttle van. By the end of summer, I was pain-free. The whole cycle took a year.

I mention all of this in conjunction with our anniversary, because I had an epiphany this week...

The RV park where I lived ended up reimbursing me for my medical costs due to the injury. That was the only concussive thing that had happened to me. It was the cause. But I exacerbated the situation by not listening to my pain, and by "pushing through" to work out.

I remember vividly lying in the floor of the trailer, trying not to half-ass workout components I had done easily for years. Tears would stream from my face as I pulled and stretched, fighting against my body, which was telling me, "STOP IT! This isn't the 'good' kind of pain! You're hurting yourself!"

But I couldn't stop.

Why?

Because I was afraid of what would happen if I stopped.

I was afraid that if I didn't work out, the nightmare would come true.

I would get fat.

And the lesson I'd learned all of my life was that gaining weight was the absolute worst thing that could possibly happen to a person.

When I was in junior high, a friend's mom told her daughter and me that we needed to watch what we ate, because her husband once told her that "boys don't want to hold on to no chalk."

How I wish the 14-year-old me had had the confidence and swearing ability to tell her, "Then eff those guys."

Because, seriously, EFF THOSE GUYS.

(Side note: same message for the ladies who won't date someone shorter than they are. Idiots.)

I overheard a guy saying he couldn't date me because I was "too much woman" for him.

I felt like I was a pretty cool chick, but never had a boyfriend, while all of my friends around me did. I was desperate for someone to love me. I dated gay guys, not knowing even if I kind of "knew" because they were the only ones who didn't seem put off by my large physical presence... which, at the risk of being offensive, is really part and parcel to being a "beard."

Then I got married. Twice. When people enter into a marriage, they promise to love each other through all sorts of situations. However, it became clear to me that "fat" was not one of those circumstances.

Both of my husbands had issues with my weight. Neither of them said anything initially, but they both began to treat me with disdain. I could feel the resentment boiling beneath the surface, and confronted them about what was going on. Denial. Confrontation. Denial. Confrontation.

Finally, they both cracked and told me. I was overweight. It was difficult to be attracted to me. I looked pregnant. "Why didn't you say anything earlier? "I was afraid you wouldn't marry me."

I tell these stories together, because they were strikingly similar. They played out almost the exact same way.

In one situation, the guy had a breakdown later in the day of our conversation, confessing that he was afraid I would leave him. I wish I'd had enough gumption to tell him that was it. Or at least to inform him that he didn't have the right to have a crisis of confidence in which I had to reassure him. It was my turn to spiral out of control, and he needed to man up and take responsibility for the pain he'd caused. Instead, we stayed married more than 4 years after that. I developed an eating/exercise disorder, lost a ton of weight, and was pretty dang hot for a few years.

I garnered a lot of attention with my newly-slim body, and after a while, was over being ignored and left alone by the workaholic husband. We got divorced, and a couple of years later, I married my second husband.

After OUR conversation about my weight, he is the one who said he wanted a divorce. I fought against it, as we had a 1-year-old child. I lost weight in a more "healthy" way (meaning I ate more than jellybeans and candy corn and fat free bread with fat free butter substitute and jelly), and kept it off for a long time. We stayed married 9 years after the "you need to lose weight" conversation. Sometimes, he seemed pleased with me, but mostly he seemed to dislike me a great deal. And I always knew I was only a stone or two from losing his affection entirely.

Even my failed attempts at dating after my second divorce reinforced this idea that my natural body was not okay. One guy I tried to date referred to my "weight fluctuations" and how he weathered those, still finding me attractive... when I didn't realized my weight was fluctuating. I had long jettisoned a scale, knowing my relationship with it was not healthy. And I was post-divorce, trying to keep my head above water, so was focused on other things. Apparently he was not.

And a second person I met online told me after our first meeting that he couldn't date me because he wasn't physically attracted to me. I can only assume that this was because I am heavy, since I'm pretty symmetrical and have (or had, when I had the time to "do" it) great hair, and my eyes are amazing, and all of that.

Incidentally, this guy changed his tune after a while, when he got to know me better and realized that my high school self was on to something: I'm a pretty cool chick.

Why all of this, and what does it have to do with my anniversary?

I haven't wanted to have to worry about my weight. Ever. When I worked in an all-woman office in my mid- to late-20s, I saw ladies in their 50s and 60s obsessing over the latest diet, what they could and couldn't eat, how grossed out they were by their appearance. I'd seen the same thing in my first post-college job at a newspaper, but that was young women my age.. I was incredulous that women were wasting decades of their lives focusing on depriving themselves and being negative about themselves. I didn't want to be on that track.

It's taken a long time, but now, at 45, I'm finally 5 years into a life that is giving me the gift of loving myself because I'm married to a man who loves me unconditionally. He loved me when we first got together. He loved me when I was a mess because of chronic, unmitigated pain. he loved me when I had baby brain. He loves me when I'm over-tired and grumpy. He loves me when I'm dressed up or when I'm still in the pajamas I wore to bed two days ago. He just loves me. And knowing that I don't have to be anything I am not to retain his affection has made a revolutionary difference in how I live.

This is definitely a process. I'm only about 18 months out from the time I saw a picture James snapped of me on his cell phone and declared, "If that's how I really look, I should just kill myself now." I'll never forget the shock that flashed across his face. That was the last time I tried to drop weight, and I did so by eating only 1200 calories for two full months and seeing zero difference. I was hungry, obsessed with food thoughts, packing the early part of my day with food and then not being able to eat after about 3 PM, and constantly thinking about food. I knew it wasn't healthy, in addition to not working. I've probably messed up my metabolism horrifically by all of the times I've lost 25-50 pounds (which is probably 3.5 times, and I've kept weight off for five and then almost ten years, but it's always come back).

So I stopped. And I decided I was going to try to love myself and focus on other things. It's amazing how difficult it is to accept myself. I have a photographer friend who has captured a few candid moments between Mal and me over the past couple of years. One was of us giggling and having a good time at the apartment pool. My first reaction to seeing the picture was to pick apart "problem" areas on my body, but I forced myself to ignore that and focus on the joy. And I put the picture away to enjoy when Mal is 10 or 11 or 12, and I know it will just be more precious to me then. Same thing with a picture of my holding his hand, walking him down to the lake. I wanted to think, "That shirt is NOT flattering... I look so short and stocky!.. The rolls!" but again forced myself to see the relationship instead of being vain and making it about my physical appearance.

Because that's the crux of it. My weight loss has never been about health. Most people's isn't. It has been about vanity. About looking good. About earning the male eye of approval.

My husband's eye of admiration regardless of what is going on at the moment has been the catalyst to the greatest strides I've made on my journey to freedom in this area of my life. And I am grateful.