Why I'm not exactly fat

Today we have all decided to explain to the world why we are fat, or why we should not be called fat, or why we can't get fat, or whatever. As I have already taken up a lot of space with comments on someone else's blog, I should write the rest of it here.

Okay. I'm not fat, or at least not at the moment. I'm 5' 5 and about 140 pounds. I am average (in appearance, anyway). Average size, white (really boring white too, not Jewish or Italian or anything interesting), medium brown hair, green eyes, etc... I might be what you'd call a little overweight.

But I'm not fat. Right now, I can't take a credit for not being more overweight. I had a problem come up in my personal life, and I lost about fifteen pounds. I got some bad news, and I couldn't eat anything for a couple of days. After that, I would try to eat, but it was very hard. By the time I felt like I wanted to eat normal food again, my stomach had shrunk. I would buy a kids meal for lunch, not be able to finish eating it, and end up taking it home and eating the rest for dinner, and possibly still having some left over for breakfast the next morning. That lasted for a couple of months. So, I am now a bit smaller. Still ten or twenty pounds from my ideal weight, but I do look a lot better than I did a year ago.

And the year before that, I think I actually weighed more than 165 pounds. I still didn't consider myself fat, but if I wasn't fat, I got damn close to it. I didn't like the way I looked at all. The funny thing about getting to be 165 pounds, was I meant to start dieting. I meant to start on a diet the next week for about a year. I was just going to have this one last splurge before I got all serious about eating stuff that was good for me. I was going to do that right after the holidays, and then right after some party I was going to, and then right after graduation, and then right after this trip, and then I'll start next week, or I'll start the week after that. So I put on ten more pounds enjoying my last "week" of normal food.

I actually spent my teenage years trying, and not usually succeeding, to gain weight. I would go to the mall and buy some shirt actually meant for a size 11 or 13 girl, cause it was the eighties and that's what we did. But I would look at the size 11 or 13 pants and think, who wears this? Two of size 3 or 5 little me would fit in these. I just could not imagine.

During college I got a job at a place selling hot dogs. I got free hot dogs, french fries, nachos, pretzels, and lots of soda. I didn't get free cookies or pizza, but I could often trade for them. After several months of that I gained about five pounds. I did a dance.

I also tried to be healthy and put on weight by working out. I had to get a PE credit anyway. It didn't help much, and after the class was over I quit trying because lifting weights and such even two or three times a week left me feeling awful the rest of the time. Enough of that. Sure, I'll eventually look like a regular person, but I can't have a life if I hurt all of the time.

The only annoying thing was I gained about five pounds after my wedding was postponed, and it was hard to squeeze back into the dress.

When I got to size 7 I was really happy about it. No more looking at the two or three small things at the end of the rack. There was a whole store full of size 7 and up.

When I got to size 9, that was unreal. I'd grown actual size 36-C breasts. I looked great. I had to buy all new clothes, but that's okay, mom's always wanting to buy me something. And did I mention that I looked great?

When I got to size 11, that was kind of annoying, cause I had to buy all new clothes again. But I had size 38-C breasts, and I looked good. Real good.

When I got to size 13, I had to buy all new clothes again, and there was nothing to really be happy about that time.

After that, it was just really annoying. I had a lot of size 13/14, then 15/16, and eventually a couple of things size 17/18. I didn't buy anything bigger than that. I just refused to buy nice new things until I at least got back down to 16.

So that's pretty much where I draw the line. If I get much over 150 pounds, I need to think about doing something. If even the size 16 pants are tight, then it's time to do more than think about something.

I lost fifteen pounds or so one other time, but that time I did it on purpose by being careful about what I ate. I'll describe that in another post.