The Plan...

Yesterday I was trying on t-shirts at work for an event that’s coming up this weekend. Charity’s seem to stock two kinds of t-shirt – firstly the ‘women’s fit’ which comes in 4 sizes: small, medium, large and extra-large. As embarrassing as it is asking for an extra-large, this is nothing to discovering that the ‘extra-large’ is actually a size 14. And so, on to the second type, the men’s t-shirts, exactly what every girl wants to have to ask for. Now, men’s sizes are in fact a bit more forgiving, but only if you’re a man, as no matter what size you choose they all seem to be exactly the same: a size H for ‘huge’ around the shoulders and a size C for ‘corset’ around the hips. True, it didn’t help that my manager hadn’t ordered any extra-large, but nothing quite compares to the humiliation of putting on a men’s sized large t-shirt in front of a room of skinny colleagues you’ve only know for a week and finding that you can wear it as a crop top. That’s right, I managed to roll it down over my boobs and couldn’t quite manage to stretch it over my stomach and hips. Needless to say, it was not the proudest moment of my life.
And that was the moment – right there – the moment I realised just how much weight I’d actually put on. How could I not have noticed? Never underestimate the power of denial, my friend.
My battle with weight has been one of attrition pitting my will-power and motivation against my love of life and complete disregard of the consequences of my actions, and now that I’ve reached 30 it’s time for the different sides of my personality to call a ceasefire and start working together. The health implications alone are terrifying enough – I have a higher risk of cancer, heart disease, blood clots, diabetes and numerous other things I’m probably completely unaware of. The social implications are pretty bad too though. I’ve lost count of how many times I’ve heard people say that fat people should just get of their arses and exercise and stop eating so much cake. To be fair, they’ve got a point – sitting on your arse all day and eating cake would indeed lead to weight-gain, however, this is not usually what fat people do. My weight is tied up with my state of mind and mental health issues and I challenge those “cake and arse” touters to live a day in my life and tell me that this wouldn’t happen to them too. I also call for them to give me and others like me some credit – when I go out to exercise I work a damn sight harder than they do as I’m carrying the equivalent of a whole other person! Also, it takes a lot more guts (or gut, haha, see what I did there?) to put on a swimsuit when you’re my size than they will ever realise. So when you see a fattie at the gym, or in the pool, give them an encouraging smile, not a stifled giggle, after all, if you feel the need to mock them for being fat why not help them lose the weight?
I started this blog to record the journey from fat to thin, to make weight loss a responsibility, to keep myself motivated and to let everyone know what I’m doing so that they can hopefully keep me motivated too. This is going to be a long, difficult task, but I’m going to do it.