The psychological aftermath.
In a little more than two months from now, it will have been a year since I had my weight-loss surgery. So much has changed in my life since then. Slowly, the weight began to fall off of my body when I wasn't even noticing. The only time that I noticed, in real life, was when I took the pictures. Thank God I took progress pictures throughout this entire year!
I think that I might've said this in an earlier blog post, but it bears repeating right now: please, for the love of God, take pictures of your progress throughout this entire experience. It will go a long way towards helping you to see the changes in your body that other people have seen all along. You may not always be proud of the changes made in your physical appearance, some can be downright disheartening. I know that, personally, I hate that my boobs have started to sag, I hate that my arms have their very own wingspan, and I hate that, because my thighs were so full of fat, the skin hangs in my thighs, which can only be fixed by toning my thigh muscles. And though I hate all of those things, I hated my body when I was morbidly obese so much more. I am grateful, truly grateful for the changes in my body.
Once I got to almost 300 pounds, I never thought I'd ever be considered thin or skinny again. When I look at myself, I don't see skinny, but the reality is that I'm 5'6" and 168 pounds of brick house. That is worth celebrating. I never thought I'd be here.
I come from a very large family, and most of the women on my mother's side of the family are all accomplished seamstresses. From sewing dresses for their own children, to sewing wedding dresses and christening gowns, I have always been jealous of the women's ability to make magic with their fingertips. I wanted that for myself, so another commitment that I made after I had the surgery was the commitment to learn how to sew. I don't know if most people realize this, but commercial patterns are a pain in the Royal ass when your measurements far exceed that which the pattern accommodates. I've never been excellent with math without taking years to solve a problem, but you don't know hell until you try to add four inches to a pattern with princess seams, that has to be cut on bias, and your bolt of fabric is like 45" wide. It's a big, huge WTF. I'm no amazing seamstress now, I'm definitely not a Dior or Chanel, but I decided that the best way for me to learn how to sew was by deconstructing garments of mine that were now too big and reconstructing them for my size 10 body.
I can't even believe that I'm saying that, SIZE 10!
Back to the psychological aftereffects though, I am finding it hard to adequately convey what it feels like to go from a size 24 to a size 10 in less than a year. I tried my best to prepare myself for the attention I would get from men, the encouragement I would get from my friends, that shock and awe from people that haven't seen me in almost a year's time (to them, it's a night and day transformation,) and I'm finding it hard to deal with not being able to see myself any differently, except when I'm trying on a piece of clothing I never in my wildest dreams thought I could fit. I'm still amazed when I go into the store, take a size 10 from the rack and put it on effortlessly, able to zip it up without a struggle and without sweating.
Lately, there have been lots of pictures on the web of Kim Kardashian's oil lubricated behind, and I have decided that at the year mark post-surgery, I'm going to sit for some nude portraits of my own. They will be tastefully done, of course, but I am not going to be ashamed of my body. I am not going to be ashamed of showing people what 105 pound weight loss looks like. That is how I choose to directly confront the emerging body dysmorphia issues I'm having. How will you deal?