Day 63: Me and Ms. Jones

I’m fairly obsessive about my weight. It doesn’t mean that I’m always thin, because I’m definitely not. What it does mean is that I’m always thinking about it, either spending lots of time exercising and carefully planning what I put into my body or throwing all caution to the wind and eating everything (and I mean everything) I can get my hands and my mouth on. Moderation, I know not thy name.

I rarely weigh myself, because even when I’m relatively thin and in good shape I still weigh a lot. I’m not slightly built. I know by how my clothes fit and feel where I am in the weight department. I’ve been inching up to the fat clothes ever since I stopped running in April because of the Achilles problem. I had a really good time this summer eating whatever I wanted. I didn’t really feel like I was all that fat. Somehow I kidded myself into believing that things were still marginally under control. I didn’t see what was clearly expanding right under my nose.

H had a short day at school today – just orientation this morning. Afterwards we went to The Cheesecake Factory for lunch. That’s the first admission I’ve made in all of this blogging that actually embarrasses me. Even I, who love all junk food, have a hard time eating in a place with a name like that. You feel like your arteries are starting to clog just by walking through the door. Anyway, it was the first time I’ve seen a menu with the calorie count listed next to each item and it was mind-blowing. You’d be hard pressed to find anything for lunch in there with less than 1500 calories. And then, of course, you have to have cheesecake, right? Most of it actually sounds pretty gross to me. Chocolate Oreo Mudslide Cheesecake? As my mom would say, that’s just gilding the lily. I was going to go for plain, but H wanted red velvet cheesecake, so we shared a piece. I can’t even begin to guess the calorie count of that baby.

H then strolled and I waddled over to the mall to do a little back-to-school shopping for both of us. Interestingly, I reached for larger sizes than usual, so I must’ve known what was up (my weight!), but I was still wearing blinders. The moment of truth comes in the dressing room. I bend over to pull a shirt off over my head and when I stand back up I see a woman in the mirror that I don’t recognize. For a split second I think it’s the sales lady -- how rude that she didn’t knock! And why isn’t she wearing a shirt? Why doesn’t she cover that up?! And then I see, to my horror, that the woman whose belly looks like, well… honestly, words escape me. I can’t even begin to do justice to what it was that I saw in that mirror. The white puffy pizza dough (and even that doesn’t adequately describe it) oozing out over the waistband of my two sizes too small pants was so ghastly that I actually almost laughed before I started to cry. Holy shit, it’s me! I’m Baby Beluga!

So, I’m not going to go all Bridget Jones’s Diary on you and count my calories and tell you everything I’ve eaten and all that stuff. She’s done that and done it brilliantly. I wish I could tell you that I’m Renee Zellweger and that I’ve gained thirty pounds to play the movie version of Bridget, but no such luck. I just need to process the fact that I have a boulder to lose (thanks to Google I now know the weight of a British stone; I also know what Frank Sinatra died of and whether Albert Einstein had any children) and that tomorrow I need to get back on the program. Please hold me accountable.