#26 Weight

I would love to lose 30 or 40 pounds, but I'm beginning to wonder if I don't have some kind of psychological block that is preventing any loss.  Not like it makes me sneak yummies - I kept track of every bite I ate for about 4 solid months shortly after Jay died (I was in the habit because I'd had to track Jay's intake), when I was barely remembering (or wanting) to eat but was gaining weight anyway, and I didn't cheat because no one would see the chart but me, and I was eating between 800 and 1,200 calories every day!!!, while I was going to EMT class, not just sitting in front of the TV all day.  In theory, I should have been losing, but I was gaining, until I hit my present weight, and no matter what I do, eat or not, exercise or not, my weight wavers by no more than 1.5 pounds either way.   Back when I gained so fast after Jay died, the theory was that my body had adjusted to high stress during his illness, and although the stress was gone, my body had not yet "reset".  Well, it's been three years.  That theory no longer holds.

Here's my "psychological block" theory.  Back when I was "fully cooked" as Judge Judy would say, and under 125 lbs, I was built like Dolly Parton.  At 4'10", my measurements were 42" 22" 34".  (There's a funny story about the movers and my sewing room dress form...)  I wore baggy high-cut clothes a lot to disguise it, but still, men had a hard time taking me seriously.  They talked to my chest.  They didn't really listen to me when I talked.  They looked like they were listening, but their minds were clearly running on a different track.  They dismissed my ideas and suggestions outright.  Most distressing, they interpreted everything I said as having a sexual undercurrent, as a double-entendre.  It was all about sex, all the time.  I was very unhappy.  I think maybe I put on weight after Jay died as protection, because I didn't have him to protect me any more.  Men who made passes at me within mere weeks of Jay's death exacerbated it.

Now, I'm built more like Mae West, without the whalebone corsets, and finally, for the first time, I'm having real conversations with the male half of the world.  They look me in the eye.  They listen.  They hear what I'm actually saying. My own real words.  I'm actually getting honest attention and consideration.  And nobody's bugging me.

I'm afraid that maybe deep inside I don't want to lose weight because I'm afraid I'll lose all that.  That I'd go from being a person back to being an object.  Psychology, emotions, thoughts, brain, whatever - can have an effect on how the body works.  If my body has decided that this weight is safe, I won't be able to do much to change it without doing something drastic and dangerous.  Logic has no effect on emotions.  Logically, I know that this weight is NOT comfortable, and I know that if I lose 30 lbs or so, I won't be Dolly-like anymore.  I'll have gray hair and wrinkles, and bad knees, and I'll be tripping over my boobs.  That should be enough to protect me from testosterone, even oldfart testosterone.  I know I should be safe now, whatever my weight.

I am writing this here, now, because I have found that thinking about something doesn't cause a change in me.  Talking about it doesn't cause a change.  But the process of composing, of choosing words, of writing it, does somehow change things inside me.  Something gets released.  Like it goes out of me and into the "paper". 

(That was the function of the old Victorian journals - to clarify thinking, to capture an experience and seal it away, and finally, to moderate emotions.)