Wednesday, May 17, 2006

Livin la vida yo-yo

Yep, you guessed it. I'm talking about my weight. How many days have I put it off? Well, I haven't really talked about it yet, so just bear with me, ok?

I think about my body a lot. Part of it has to do with being married to a younger, and very sexy, man. Yes, Jennifer Crusie could have written "Anyone But You" about me. Well, except I have kids. And I don't have a basset hound mix. And my man is not 10 years younger than me. And he's not a doctor. Well, ok, so really, I don't have a lot in common with Nina. Except that whole younger man thing.

Sometimes, after this many years together, I actually forget about the fact that my darling man is my junior. Then things happen. Like yesterday. One of the kids asked who Divo was. And I started laughing. I tried explaining it, because I could clearly remember Divo, but I was laughing too hard. So I said "Tell them, honey". And he just stared at me. With a totally blank face. "I have no idea what you're talking about." "Oh, come on. DIVO. You know, 'Whip It'?" Still nothing. Then I realized... I was remembering second grade, or thereabouts. Shane was ...ummnm...well.... ok, dammit. Shane was TWO. There. I said it. He was freakin TWO YEARS OLD when I was singing Whip It on the playground!

I had 4 children when we got together. And I NEVER let him see me naked in any kind of light for months. I totally understood that part. And I tried for MONTHS to convince him that he should be with someone younger, and without baggage (read that as kids, ok?) Now, I have to tell you that I don't think I've ever loved him more than when he met my kids. He fell hard and fast for them. And he knew, going in, that it was a total package deal. That's probably why I tried so hard to talk him out of it. Well that, and I really didn't want him to see all those stretch marks.

I was watching Bridget Jones 2 tonight, and it reminded me about this same thing. The part where she's getting out of bed, and she has the sheet wrapped around her, and he asks what she's doing, and she says tht she doesn't want him to see her wobbly bits. Yep, that was soooo me. And to some extent, it still is.

My husband, bless him, professes to love all of me too. As well he should, as there is a LOT of me to love. When we got together, my youngest was just one. I'd finally lost all my baby weight and more, and was looking pretty ok. Then my baby got sick, and I lost even more weight. So we'd been together for over a year, and found out we were having Maggie. There went my waistline. There came more stretchmarks. Emile came along 15 months later.

You know, if you're a regular person, your body seems to take much longer to bounce back after each child. I walked out of the hopsital in my size 3s after having Gret. Same thing with Michael. But after Emile? Not a chance. I wore my maternity clothes for months. She was lovely number 6, so it didn't really matter to me. Well, she's (gulp) FIVE now, and it really matters.

At my most healthy, I'm about 140. I think I look sickly if I'm much below that, I really do. I've been down to 120, and I looked really bad. I'm happy around 140. Last summer, I was up above 190. YIKES. Yep, that was a wake-up call. You know, I don't think I looked that big, but it just wasn't me. So now, I'm hovering around 155. Well, I'll battle back down to that in the next few days. That time of the month and all, I always pack on a few extra pounds.

But really, I'm trying to figure out what the hell I'm doing. I mean, I'm 33 years old. I have given birth to 6 children. I'm not huge. Yes, I'm a little round. But really, not too bad. I think it's just vanity. I mean, people say things like "You look GREAT for having six kids!" And I think, "I don't want to look great for having six kids, I want to look GREAT!!"

I'd like to blame it on society and the ridiculous obsession with being skinny. I'd like to blame it on the media and Demi and Julia. I'd even like to blame it on men. But really, I think it's just me. I don't need to look like I did at 18, but 23 wouldn't be too bad. Of course, I wasn't all that happy at 23, even though I was thinner. I'm pretty happy now, even though I'm not so thin. So I really have no idea where I'm going with this. Is it better to be happy and round, or skinny and miserable, or shoot for the happy medium of content and thin?

You tell me, because I really can't seem to figure it out.

1 comment:

Chari-Dee said...

This is something I wonder about, too. Who am I trying to lose weight for? I finally figured out, me. I wasn't happy being heavier. I'm not thin by any means, size 10 is still bigger than the norm, but I feel good and look good. Although I'd still like to get to a size 8, I'm not working at it like I was. When I'm swimming every day this summer, I'll hopefully drop that last big of weight.

The thing is, I weigh less now than when I was a size 7, but my body is so completely different that I look heavier. Like you said, I don't need to look like I did at 18, and that is a good thing, my body has changed too much for that.