I was married March 25th 2008 while 4 months pregnant with Lucius. At that time my wedding ring was slid onto my finger with a little difficulty but not very much. By the end of my pregnancy I was wearing it on a chain around my neck for obvious reasons. I had used my pregnancy once again to eat everything in sight and gained back all the weight I had lost after Ella and then some. intrigued? Read on!……
I have to say I really soft sold a portion of my childhood in my little “My story” section of this blog. Why? Because of shame? Guilt? Or more likely I just wasn’t ready to deal with it yet and even writing this post I am not so sure of how my friends will respond.
In my bio section it says my step family had “boundary issues”, I now can call it what it was, sexual abuse. Its real and has affected too many innocent men and women long after the incidents have taken place, myself included.
I’ve been feeling just so off lately, I couldn’t place what it was. I was putting distance between my husband and I and I just couldn’t understand why. So like everything else I tried to just bury the feeling and move on.
Until the Friday morning we were going to leave for Seattle.
I read a tweet, just a random tweet someone posted about how they were doing some activity or something to avoid being raped. The very first thing that popped into my head was “Well I’m fat I don’t have to worry about being raped.” Then it was like a light went off in my head. Since I can remember any time I’d been out late or walking even in the daytime I felt safe, like my weight was a protective barrier against sexual assault. Then another light went off, I was sexually abused by my step-father and step-grandmother. The extent of which I still block out, but it happened, I know it and like everything else have buried it.
But at that moment, after that knee jerk thought/reaction, everything seriously all fell into place. I haven’t been overweight/obese my entire life. I really started gaining weight around age 9, the abuse started a couple years earlier. Like my mom drilled into my head over and over,
My little brain thought that if I gained weight no one would want me and I would be safe from any more sexual advances. I wouldn’t have to be made uncomfortable by unwanted sexual attention any longer. What I didn’t realize was that the attention I would get, would come in the form of bullying for my weight all through school, self loathing, negative body image, a multitude of health problems and now intimacy problems with the person I am so in love with it cannot be equated…well maybe in a Jane Austen novel..
He doesn’t care how much weight I gain he still finds me attractive and its been confusing me. Which was even more confusing because in a healthy and strong relationship that’s what its all about. Love.
Now that I’ve finally found my trigger, the smoking gun to all this self abuse I feel like I can really start the healing process. Which I feel will also be crucial to my weight loss, I know the why and the how. It only took me 20 years to figure it out and I wish I could remember the person on Twitter that helped my epiphany so I could thank them. I have my work cut out for me, it has been in my head that being overweight makes you disgusting and that feeling sexual is disgusting it will take quite a bit of time to get through.
I’ve started reading “The Sexual Healing Journey” and will be getting into contact with a therapist to work through this. A quote from the book really got me.
“I had to acknowledge I was a victim before I could see myself as a survivor”*
I’ve always been a fighter and a thriver but I never really want to go into why or what. I don’t want anyone to see me as weak, needing help. I’ve had a job since I was 15 and been a “grownup” since I was 9 years old. I am working on opening up and being more vulnerable, this post is a means of a step to start that.
Something I am passionate about is cycling, not like your extreme tight wearing speed bike cycling but you know fun cycling on country roads and enjoying the sights around me cycling. It was something my mother in law and I bonded over. She introduced me to Portland cycling and most importantly the Worst Day of the Year Ride. An 18 mile ride through Portland on the statistically worst day for weather in the area. Its usually in mid February and I’ve been participating every year for the past 3 years. Its one of those things you look forward to all year and after you’re done you just have this amazing feeling of accomplishment. I mean you ride 18 miles. For someone like me that is a major achievement.
Last year Tim joined us and we had such a great time! I was really looking forward to having something active that we do together every year. We’re video game folk, we usually just sit around and play video games and read. So it was a nice change up.
I have had a really rough year, with a broken foot, my ONSF eye surgery, major financial hardships and the weight gain associated with all of those I am in no physical condition to go on an 18 mile bike ride and it has made me so incredibly depressed. I was upset I couldn’t do as much as I could before I broke my foot and the road to recovery has been so long and hard. I’ll be honest I’ve lost a lot of faith in the process lately.
Its hard to keep focus when the world around you seems to be falling apart constantly and you are the only thing that is keeping it held together. I’ll recover from one thing only to be afflicted with something else. I’ve been working so hard in the gym these past few weeks and had gotten down to 281 pounds and then Saturday I had to have a tooth pulled and I’m not working out again until at least Thursday. We haven’t done any grocery shopping so in addition to not working out I’m also eating like shit. I’m afraid to step on my scale for fear that all the hard work I have been putting in has been erased by 5 days of poor eating and not moving due to pain or nausea due to the pain medicine. Its just so damned frustrating, I live in that fucking Paula Abdul song.
Trying to gain some perspective and stay positive I registered for the Shamrock Stride, a 5K that is part of the Shamrock Run, like I said I’m not ready for the running/cycling. Ella’s birthday is on the 17th and I thought it might be good to start a tradition with her that promotes physical activity, helping others and gives us a chance to do something that is just ours and special. Plus you get a wicked Adidas shirt, which I am all for.
It is so difficult to let what happened yesterday, this morning or even two years ago, well go. I hang on tightly to my mistakes for some reason. Like it is a badge of the suffering I’ve endured and isn’t something I am proud of but more something tangible I can point to and say “See, I’m not crazy, I’ve been through shit too.” Which is why I’m hoping to start my therapy sessions again. There is so much wrong with my brain that if I continue to try and work on this weight loss and IH battle alone I am going to fail. I’ve accepted it, I need help and can’t do it on my own. Its not an excuse its a fact.
Now if you’ll excuse me I have two double cheeseburgers from McDonald’s I am eating for dinner because I didn’t prepare anything for myself before hand.
Honesty. Yah, this is happening right now.
Its a new year everyone! Are you prepared for the alien invasion on December 22nd?! Ok probably not but I’m sure many of you woke up on the 1st or maybe even a few days before and thought, what is my new years resolution going to be this year? For many it is to drop the pounds they gained during the holidays or for many obese people its that magical day when they get to reset their diet clocks and start again. Gym memberships are purchased, fresh foods are brought home and sales of exercise equipment goes through the roof. Only to be sold in February, tossed into the garbage rotten and gym employees take bets on who is going to come back and who will just go sit on their couch. Its freaking ridiculous in my opinion. The start of a new year doesn’t mean you HAVE to start over. Every day, every hour you can start over it doesn’t take a new year to jump start your fitness goals. You’re perfect the way you are, don’t try to change yourself if you don’t want to or just because the calendar changed.
Frustration with social norms really isn’t the reason I don’t do resolutions though. No, mean 6th graders is why I don’t do resolutions. I was always a really good student, focusing on my schoolwork gave me an out mentally to my home life and the praise I received at school was a small replacement of the praise I would receive at home. School became my safe haven, until middle school that is. Its the same old story, overweight girl gets made fun of by bullies. I was getting asked if I were a beached whale, if I were pregnant blah blah blah that old crap. Well during band in 6th grade we were all supposed to go up in front of the class and tell everyone what our new year’s resolution was. Now being an overweight girl that got made fun of all the time it was natural that my resolution was going to be to lose weight. I couldn’t tell my whole class that, it was embarrassing so I just figured I’d go with the old stand by, to get better grades, yah like I needed better grades, I was an A/B+ student. Well before I could even answer the boys in the back yelled
the whole class laughed and I was forever scarred. I vowed that day to never make a new year’s resolution and I’ve kept to it all these years.
A new year for me simply means that in 3 days its my birthday. That’s really how I gauge a new year has started and this year I am not only getting a year older but I am also entering a new decade in my life. The 30’s. Its the new 20’s.
FitGeekMom 