We all have one. The story that defines us. It may be a story you tell about yourself. Or, a story that others tell about you. Or the story you BELIEVE others tell about you. And for many of us, it’s all of those.
When do our stories begin? For me, it began before my first childhood memory. My story began before I was born, with my grandmother, my Omi. Because the attitudes and perspectives that my Omi passed along to my mother were then passed along to me. And they are part of my story.
It is a story I’ve been told many times. “You were always such a happy child.” The pictures seem to confirm that. And I remember countless instances of laughing until I peed my pants, being carefree and lost in my own world.
But there was also the part of the story that was filled with comparison to others — to my friends who could wear bikinis at the beach, the cheerleaders, the girls who all the boys had a crush on. I wanted to be those girls.
But, you see, I was fat. By age 12 I was wearing a woman’s size 16. Shopping was not a fun outing to the mall. It was an embarrassing trip to JC Penny where I’d pray that none of my friends would see me having to buy women’s sizes. (The reality is that my friends didn’t have to shop there, they could buy all the cute tween clothes that wouldn’t fit me.)
Somewhere between puberty and middle school I managed to lose 20 pounds and become a more “normal size,” although compared to my friends I was still what I considered to be ”fat.” A size 10. My friends were all size 0, or 2–4. But I felt better about myself than I ever had. And boys started to take notice — HALLELUJA!
College rolled around and the famed freshman 15 turned into the sophomore 20. And on and on. Suddenly I was back to where I had been at age 12. Happy on the outside, miserable on the inside. Fake it to make it.
After the end of a very unhealthy relationship, I went on the breakup diet. You know — too depressed to eat (but not too depressed to drink a lot of wine and smoke a lot of cigarettes.) And I was back in the game!
Somehow my husband didn’t care that after we started dating I started gaining all that breakup weight. He never judged. In fact, he gained right along with me. We were wine drinking, ice cream eatin’ machines!! Married and 2 kids later and we were living in a beautiful Ohio suburb. And suddenly (again…) I was back in elementary school. Happy on the outside, but comparing myself to everyone around me, and very unhappy on the inside. More later about WHY I decided to make a change.
But for now, my story goes like this — I became conscious of what I was putting into my body. I made the effort to move every day. And I started to like how that felt. In control, stronger. Writing my own story. And now I am writing it to share with you, hoping that you too will find the courage to share your story. I can’t wait to read it.