(no subject)

So it's REALLY hard to erase an entire lifetime of believing fat-shaming and such, but I'm starting to learn.

An important first step was for me to realize that I'm not doing everything all wrong. I always treated myself like I was and still struggle with shame when buying and eating food. I keep realizing that things that never upset me before are totally not okay. I remember my parents being pleased when my naturally thin brother asked for seconds, but my father consistently saying "Don't you think you've had enough?" or "You don't need that." if *I* was the one enjoying my meal. I remember in middle school how proud my parents were when I decided to only ever eat half of the food on my plate in an attempt to teach myself--MY TWELVE YEAR OLD SELF--portion control. I remember my mother and I competing to see who could lose the most weight over Lent when I was eight years old.

I want to also say that I am NO LONGER flattered when people compliment me for losing weight. I know my dad used to jokingly say, "You're wasting away" but would quickly follow that up with "You seem happier like this; you should keep it up." It struck me the most during my month of no income, which I'll talk about more in a second, where I was barely eating at all in an effort to save what money I had and everyone was constantly complimenting me. I WAS EATING A BOWL OF CEREAL A DAY OR LESS. But it didn't matter WHY I was losing weight: losing weight at all is seen as a triumph when you're fat. No one realizes that something serious could be going on.

I follow a lot of blogs on tumblr that are helping me along the way, and every day I see stories about girls (and guys) who were bullied and teased and called names for their weight. The thing that boggles my mind still is that, other than living under the shadow of my mom's insecurities and my dad's enablement of them, no one ever told me I was fat. I never got bullied in school because I radiated a giant I-don't-give-a-shit attitude. It's interesting, because on the surface I don't seem much different now, but in fact I'm totally renovating my thought processes. The difference is that back then I just ignored what my body looked like, pretended not to notice, and constantly wished I could develop an eating disorder and constantly felt bad if reality ever broke through my little shell of denial. I never looked at photos of myself and rarely looked in the mirror, especially getting in and out of the shower. Now I'm trying to come to terms with what I really do look like and to unlearn that I am supposed to change it. I am not a thin person who did something wrong. If I was ever going to be thin, I have given my body plenty of chances to get there and it chose to remain at this lumpy weight.

This is a much harder thing to learn, because most of the world disagrees. Most of the world believes that being fat means I'm going to develop diabetes, or I'm going to die young. (I have seen studies that disproved BOTH of these, and in fact being "overweight" LOWERS your risk of Alzheimer's.) It's even harder since I just went through the whole pulmonary embolism thing. I was reading the doctor's report and it said right on there that it happened because I'm overweight. Over WHAT weight??? When they weighed me in the hospital I was seven kilos less than when I went to my OFII appointment in May!! I'd spent a month eating nothing but one bowl of grain-based cereal and an apple a day OR LESS. I'd been exercising (only a little bit, but still way more than the first 22 years of my life). Should I have eaten LESS food somehow? I was miserable during those weeks. I had headaches and low energy. And guess what? I'm STILL not a skinny person. SHOCKER.

IT HAPPENED because I was on birth control and I spent looooong amounts of time sitting with my legs crossed, knitting and watching shows online. I didn't know pulmonary embolisms existed.

I will not be told that I am unhealthy until I change my body weight. I only went running a few times, but now that I understand how to breathe normally and maintain a steady pace I don't get winded running for métros. (Well, I would if I tried it NOW because I'm still sort of recovering from being forced to do nothing but lie in bed and eat three huge meals a day for a week IN THE HOSPITAL. BY DOCTORS.) This is the first time IN MY LIFE that I have ever been to a hospital. I don't smoke, I barely drink, and I've never even SEEN drugs. Just because I don't think sports are a reasonable use of my time doesn't mean I'm unhealthy, and fuck society for propogating that I am. I DON'T EVEN LIKE SODA. I LITERALLY, HONESTLY ONLY DRINK WATER, AND I DRINK A LOT OF IT EVERY DAY.

On the other hand, I have noticed that when left to my own devices, I am incapable of entering a grocery store and leaving with "grown-up" foods. Maybe once I have a regular paycheck and a decent-sized kitchen that isn't laced with cat hair this will change, but for the moment I am incapable of passing up a €1 bag of chips in a wacky flavor for a €3 salad. BUT I can also say that after a day of only eating potato chips for breakfast and then having mashed potatoes for lunch (what can I say, I'm broke as hell) I had the presence of mind to go get myself a big container of carrot coleslaw the next day to sort of balance things out. I also ate a tomato like it was an apple today.

I still have a mentality that I need to "get away with" eating the "fun" stuff that I want to eat while no one's looking. I constantly want to snack on something even when I'm not hungry, and I think it's backlash against being pressured into denying myself everything my whole life. Now I'm trying to work out a way to normalize my headspace enough to be able to eat what I want to eat without shame, but to also not go crazy and finish off a whole bar of chocolate in one sitting Just Because I Can.

I'm sure there's something really interesting happening in my head that causes the snacking and the obsession with potato chips and other "bad" foods, and if I keep reading up on blogs like The Fat Nutritionist maybe I can work out what it is and learn to change my thinking in a way that lets me eat normally and also be unapologetic if/when that doesn't lead to me suddenly morphing into a runway model.

Part two, I would really love to lose the secret desire to lose weight that STILL won't leave me alone. When the hospital brought me three meals a day I was inwardly cursing them for ruining the "progress" I had made after all but starving myself (for financial reasons, I promise) over the preceding month.

WHAT IS WRONG WITH THE WORLD THAT I EVEN HAVE TO MAKE ENTRIES LIKE THIS???