My weight has been a source of problem since I started puberty. My body was growing at a rapid rate, and I did not know what to do with it. Plus, there was this implied prohibition against the activities I enjoyed prior to my entry into womanhood. As a child, I was quite active. I enjoyed rigorous activities that burned many, many calories. I ran, I jumped, I competed against the other kids in the neighborhood. That all stopped after my first period. It seemed that all the tomboyish activities I enjoyed so much were now forbidden to me. Entering puberty meant the end of the games. I had to be a lady now. I had to behave with decorum, not get dirt on my clothes, or play with boys. Immediately, I started to gain weight. My body was no longer active, thus I was unable to use all the calories I was consuming. Simply put, I was gaining weight.
As I became more and more housebound, I gained more and more weight. I couldn’t break the cycle. My parents made matters worse by ridiculing me for my weight gain. I was even nicknamed “pig.” This habit of teasing me and taunting me about my weight continued for years. Throughout middle school I gained more weight. I became more withdrawn and I lived in a dream world where I was thin and popular. In high school, I retreated into my dream world nearly full time. I had elaborate fantasies about my alternate life, which was always much more exciting and wonderful than my reality.
My senior year in college I started to exercise regularly. I lived in Morrison Hall, which had a workout room on the first level. I would get up and exercise for an hour or so before going to breakfast. This routine was wonderful. I was able to maintain, then lose some weight. In fact, I went down to about 150 pounds. That was probably the lowest I weight since before my weight gain.
After graduation, I moved back in with my parents, and tried to maintain a regular exercise routine, but I never quite managed it as I did the year before. I slowly, but surely gained weight. It was noticeable by the spring of 2003. My arms were tight in the sleeves of blouses that were loose in the fall of 2002. By the time I moved to Los Angeles, I was about 165.
In 2003, I joined the faculty at a middle in South Los Angeles. I gained and lost the same 10 pounds every semester. I was mildly depressed the whole time I worked at that school. The stress level was much higher than I had ever experienced in my whole life. I took comfort in food.
I tried several times to lose enough weight to get to the recommended range for my height. I’m 5′2″ and I should weigh between 100 and 135.
At my heaviest I was 186 pounds. This was right before my trip to China. I lost about 5 pounds in China. This was mostly due to the fact that I was sick and the food wasn’t very good. However, I noticed the weight loss and the I noticed the way my clothes were fitting differently on my body. I decided then that I must put in a determined effort to get to a healthy weight.
Upon my return I looked into gym membership, but was not satisfied with any of them. So, I put off signing up for gym membership. I found a treadmill on Costco.com that was on sale, so I decided after a couple of days to buy the treadmill. I have not been totally committed to an exercise routine as I was in college, but I am more active than I have been for over a year. I am now about 176.
Having spent some time thinking about my weight and the reasons why I couldn’t stick to a diet plan or an exercise plan, I’ve come to the realization that my weight is symptomatic of my unhappiness with my life. Knowing this, and acknowledging it is helping me to deal with my weight and my attempts to lose some of it. I hope to lost about 20 pounds by my 30th birthday; if I lose more than that, so much the better.
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