OVERWEIGHT!

Today is a big milestone for me. I've lost 23.9lbs and am officially "overweight" BMI-wise, rather than the horrible and depressing "obese." Now it's just "there's a little more of you to love" rather than, "aaaah!! Jabba the Hutt!!" It's amazing the difference that wording makes. As a law student, you learn to use words artfully--your goal is precision but also implication. Thus, when we complained about being fined for not picking up after our dog at our old apartment (even though we always DID pick up after our dog), rather than saying that we disputed the claims we said that our apartment was making "unjustified accusations," making them sound like crazy psychos. When their attorney responded that they were justified in making these charges, he did not claim that they had "justified accusations" but rather that we as tenants had an "inability to pick up after our dog." Not only were we unwilling to pick up after our dog, he implied, we were also so subnormal as to be incapable of taking responsibility for our pet, so the apartment complex had to and they were totally justified in charging us for that unsavory task. (even though the maintenance people at the apartment never did pick up the pet waste that others had left out).
To me, overweight implies jolly indulgences--you're pretty close to where you should be--you just need to keep an eye on things. Obese, on the other hand, implies that you are gross. You lack the self-control to keep your indulgences in check and you are waddling ever nearer to the grave in your depravity.
I don't say these things to offend people who are still in the "obese" category--or even because I think that BMI is a really accurate indicator of a person's health--I say it because as I've noticed as I've lost weight that there is such a moral component in our conception of weight loss. Fat people must be lazy--they don't take care of themselves--they don't have self-control. Skinny people, whatever else they may be, are pleasant to look at, they're in control, they're "better." We only have to look at Hollywood to see that skinniness has very little to do with the inner goodness or badness of a person--and also very little to do with how well they've got their act together. It upsets me when people congratulate others on their unhealthy weight loss. Not all weight loss is good. I was reading a blog a couple days ago, where a woman posted that she had lost 30lbs in the past 30days. Unless you're starting weight is super-super high--that's just not normal. She weighed about 30lbs more than my starting weight and she lost 30lbs in her first month as compared to my 8lbs. And yet people were congratulating her. It made me wonder if people would just mindlessly congratulate someone on weight loss if they lost 25lbs because their arm got eaten off by a shark. It also reminded me of my aunt Amy, who died several years ago of a terrible cancer. She had been quite overweight at times in her life, but toward the end of her life, she shrank down to around 80lbs. I remember the last time I talked with her, she said how girls would come up to her and say, "Lucky! I wish I could be that skinny!" She would tell them, right to their faces, that they were stupid. As a society, we seem to sometimes see weightloss as a positive, no matter what the circumstances. When people get too skinny, we worry that they have a disease--anorexia or bulimia or something. When people get too fat, we think they are lazy, gross and lack self-control. This puts enormous pressure on people who are overweight. Not only are they not in peak health, they also feel socially undesirable. It's hard to lose weight when the friend that will never abandon you--food, is also the thing that is causing you to feel unwanted in the first place.

My mother-in-law is visiting and asked me the other day why I decided to really pursue weight loss NOW, at this point in my life. My answer was probably a little convoluted. On the one hand, I don't feel like now is any different than any other time in my life. There's a lot of stress, temptation, depression, fatigue, and work to be done. On the other hand, my whole perspective has changed. I'm not losing weight because I need to redeem myself as a person. I don't feel bad about being and having been overweight anymore. I think that weight loss is finally working for me because I've taken the shame out of it. I'm willing to talk about how much I weighed at the beginning: 210lbs, and how much I weigh now: 186.1lbs. I'm not going to beat myself up when I eat a piece of cake--I'm just going to monitor what I take in more carefully. When weight loss stops being about going from bad, lazy person to good, well-balanced person and starts being about feeling good and celebrating small success, that's when weight loss will be successful. You can't lose weight when small setbacks send you right into a binge again.

I'll be honest. I get depressed when I catch a glimpse of myself in the mirror before I get into the shower, and I still have cellulite in abundance and a pounchy (I don't know if that's a word, but it seems to describe it well) tummy. But I'm starting to see changes in my body, too--positive changes. I feel better and more capable of things than I ever have. I feel like I control food rather than food controlling me. I am proud of myself and I'm learning to not fear failure--because I only have to deal with one day at a time, and if I can do it today, I can do it tomorrow.