Bloody computers...

Hi again folks. I know it seems like I ran out of steam after that first post, but I can assure you, my absence was entirely unintentional. Basically, the day after I set up this new blog account, the mains wire to my laptop sparked a wee bit and then completely severed, rendering me computer free ever since. But I decided today to try and log on using my Sony Xperia T, which has been a bit of a ball-ache, because despite having owned this spaceship of a phone since last November, I still don't know how the damn thing works. I'm really more of a Nokia 3310 (remember how awesome they were?) kinda gal, but one must move with the times I suppose. And if I'm honest, now that I've taken the time to figure out how this incredibly complex little handset works, I'm really glad to have found a way to get online, check email, look up calorie counts, waste time on Facebook and update my blog. Granted, it does take a lot longer to type up a few paragraphs one letter at a time, using a stylus, when I'm used to touch-typing a long, rambling entry on the laptop; but it's better than having no access at all and being unable to update my own little slice of the internet - until myself or my other half can be bothered to source a replacement mains cable.

Enough of the techno-talk though. Dieting is what this blog is supposed to be about, so I guess I should give you all an update as to how this is going. In all, it's been going really well. I've averaged about 600 calories every day, with some days accruing no more than 350, whilst one day hit about 800. It's probably good to have a variable daily calorie count as it doesn't allow the body to get too used to one specifically low daily calorie intake and go into starvation mode.

I've actually been really surprised at how easy it's been. Not only switching over from a gluttonous daily over-consumption of unlimited junk food amounting to over 4000 calories (yes, that's how many I was regularly putting away before!) but to suddenly have to be restrictive, accountable, maintain willpower and show self control. Looking at my previous eating habits, people on the outside would most definitely NOT consider me to possess any willpower or self control. I would eat with abandon, choosing to consume McDonald's, KFC, Dominos, Chinese or Indian takeaways, along with sweets and chocolate throughout the day. I looked like someone who had zero self control and who was constantly at the mercy of their burgeoning appetite. Some probably looked on in disgust as I chowed down on whatever I wanted, shocked to know that I have an awesome, good looking boyfriend, despite being the size of a house. Others probably pitied me, thinking I was just too far gone and too weak to make any inroads into losing any weight. I fucking hate pity. 

The surprising thing is, it's not that I DON'T have any willpower or self control; I just wasn't choosing to use those tools, to do anything about my weight. I was choosing to be a glutton. I liked food and really enjoyed eating whatever I wanted, despite all the while despising my ever-expanding corpulence. I know, fucked up, right? You see, that's an example of how I can be a walking contradiction in terms and also my own worst enemy. It also doesn't help that I'm too smart for my own good, quick-witted, smart-mouthed and able to rationalise and intellectualise whatever stance or standpoint I choose to take up. But I guess that's something you'll all come to see for yourself as time goes by!

I've always been a big girl. Even as a five year-old I stood out as being much bigger than my peers and I continued to gain excessive amounts of weight, all throughout childhood and my teens, until I found myself at age 16, fitting into a UK size 22. I'm not sure how much I weighed exactly at that point as we had no weighing scales in our family home, but I'd estimate it to be about 16 or 17 stone. Which on a frame of only five foot tall, isn't exactly attractive.

I absolutely HATED being big. It angered and depressed me and garnered a huge amount of negative attention and comments from the other schoolchildren, their parents, strangers in the street and even my own family. I've gone through my whole life feeling miserable, worthless, disgusting, unlovable, depressed, devalued and ugly. Not just because of the insults and taunting of others, but because of my own inner critic which really, truly, only judged myself, by the same standards I hold everyone else according to. I've never been any harder or harsher on myself, than I have on anyone else. Fact is, being massively fat is NOT attractive and NOT healthy. Carrying more than double your ideal healthy weight, looks disgusting. It swallows up your features so you don't even look like you; it creates bulges and rolls that make clothes fit terribly, stopping any natural female (or male) shape and silhouette from emerging; it makes you tired, carrying around all that extra weight and you get constantly hot and sweaty, just walking around in town; it puts a strain on your heart and causes all your other organs to swim in litres of visceral fat; it makes personal hygiene difficult as you have this huge mass to keep clean, despite sweating more than an average sized person, thus requiring more baths and showers; it clings to the outside of you like a badge of self neglect.

Other people with issues like alcoholism, prescription drug abuse, anxiety, anger management problems or OCD, don't necessarily show their problems on the outside. But an over-eater has no place to hide - we show our weakness, our overindulgence and our lack of self control on the outside in one great big, hot, sweaty fat-suit for the whole world to see. And I've spent my entire life feeling the glare of countless eyes running over my bulging, expanse of flesh, judging me and my issues worn on the outside like a badge of low self-esteem. People look at and judge me by the same standards I judge me; those same standards I too judge everyone else by.

So why have I waited so long to do something about this problem, if it has had such a negative impact on my life? Well, remember how I said I'm a walking contradiction in terms and my own worst enemy? OK, so basically, despite my despising every inch of my gargantuan girth, over the years I've learnt not to let anyone know how I truly feel. I've created this aggressively assertive, intelligent, funny, straight talking, tough as nails persona that belies my inner torment. I will not allow anyone to see how painful it is to be me. Partly because I despise pity and refuse to have people feeling sorry for me, but also because I won't give anyone any ammunition to use against me, as the cruel bitches of this world are wont to do.

And that part of me that refuses to bow down to the big mouths, bitches, gossips and cruel taunting onlookers, it taps into my innate stubbornness. It makes me want to stick two fingers up to what society expects of me and stay fat because then I'm being my own person. I want to rub their noses in my obvious overweight outer shell, telling them to take their expectations of me and fuck off. I want them to see me as fat yes, but not quiet, shy, homely and downtrodden. I want them to look at me and think "How dare this disgusting fat blob be confident, outgoing and happy - she's supposed to be miserable, ashamed of herself and hurt by our honest remarks!" Because that fuck's with their heads to see me so content and unnerved by their bullshit.

And so, for as long as I can remember, I've been putting on this front, perfecting the act of happiness and fending off attacks with my steely nerve. A strategy that's worked perfectly up until now - I suppose it's still working today too, in that the masque hasn't slipped or let anybody know how I really feel inside. But in a way I guess it's also kind of backfired on me too. Because whilst I've defiantly dug my heels in and refused point-blank to capitulate, that whole time I've been simultaneously eating my insides up with self-loathing, depressed at the sight of my own reflection.

Over the years I've missed out on so much, because my fiercely stubborn nature wouldn't allow me to give in and diet. Because I figured that as people found out, they'd realise that by wanting to lose weight, I must actually have hated being fat and desperately wanted to be thin like everyone else. They would see through the chink in my armour, to the soft vulnerable core I've been protecting and hiding all these years. And that, in turn, would give them the perfect material, gossip and ammunition to spread about and use against me, like my own personal Kryptonite. I've seen for myself the way that bullies - the kind who work covertly smug among the perfect and popular crowd - will set upon the idiosyncrasy of any poor victim who appears sad, different, vulnerable or alone and ridicule them until they crumble. I always swore that would never be me, that I would stand fierce and keep my armour intact. Which I did, but I remained fat, remained depressed and had to stand on the outskirts of teenage life, almost as if I were actually outdoors peeking in through the steamed up glass of segregation, viewing everyone else enjoying life at a distance.

I didn't ever get to experience a slow dance with a guy at the school disco; I didn't get invited to any of the 'cool perfect kids' parties; I couldn't go swimming or to the beach and bare that flab; I couldn't wear any trendy clothes and my mother struggled to find me any clothes that fit in the years before plus sizes became widely available; guys never looked at me unless they were treating me like one of them. I could stand about and jostle with them, telling the filthiest jokes, allowing myself to be the butt of their jokes - always laughing the loudest as their words silently cut me to the core. I would play up in class getting myself thrown out with one of the disruptive boys who I would then get to spend the hour with, trying to outdo one another with tales of bad behavioral exploits. But of course I was never going to be the object of any of their affections. As 'one of the guys' I was privy to a lot of their talk about girls. Who they thought was fit, who was ugly, who was a slut who was guaranteed to 'put out' and who they were going to ask out at the weekend. But I was never treated like an actual girl by any of them. My huge outer shell of fat and my ability to play rugby or fight with them, painted me as 'one of the guys', utterly devoid of any femininity or desirability. Every day was a painful reminder of how different and despised I was by most of the girls - and how asexual I was considered by the guys I hung out with.

But when I was 16/17 - and desperate for attention, affection & validation, I allowed myself to be used by older, indiscriminate, married men with sour beer stench breath and only one desire. Met in pubs, off of fishing boats, even out in the street, these guys looking for 'any port in a storm' (pun intended!) would basically buy my company with a steady stream of double and triple measures of spirits,  Not for me the awkward, clumsy yet charming foray into one's first teen romance. No excitement of the first date, first touch, first kiss. No planning the perfect outfit to wear to prom. No chatting among girlfriends about who was cute and who might ask me out. No invitations to the camping trips down by the river. No Valentine cards or someone to kiss at midnight. No rides in cars with boys. The closest thing I had to a romantic date was being plied with Bacardi till I could barely stand - in pubs where the owner clearly knew I was only 16 - before being unceremoniously fucked in a graveyard, children's play-park or heath-lands, where we may or may not have been afforded privacy. Allowing myself to be so casually used like that was a cry for affection and attention, but it merely served to cause me more heartache over time, as the self hatred and disgust, reinforced my belief that I deserved no better.

Being fat and being smart, isn't the most rewarding combination. You can see what's wrong with you, but you can rationalise why you should stay that way, despite how much you hate it. Part of you that has pride in your intellect wants you to believe that you are worth more whichever size you choose to be. But the other part of you that understands the way the world really works, knows that by being fat you will never be happy. It turns the unflattering mirror on you and forces you to see how ugly, fat and worthless you are, every day. Smart you may be, but no two men ever fought over a well developed mass of grey matter.

This is how things have played out for me over the past 30 years. I've hated myself but refused to do anything about it so I've lost out on most teenage life experiences. My stubbornness and unwillingness to capitulate might have done wonders for my integrity, but it did nothing to help facilitate a happier, more involved teenage life, with typical nostalgic teenage memories. As I grew older, I experienced a few brief flings and one night stands with equally unsuitable guys I knew we're nothing but bad news, but I guess I needed to at least try and pretend to myself that I was capable of getting guys, any guys, despite how hideous I was. When I think about some of the men I allowed to touch, kiss or have sex with me, my skin crawls. The thought of their hands on my body, their hot fetid breath on my face and the countless orgasms I faked just to make them hurry up and finish....it all makes me want to throw up and claw the memory out from behind my eyes. I hate that I sold myself so cheaply to the lowest bidder, because all I did was decrease my own self worth.

So where does all that leave me today? Well, for some unknown reason I have yet to figure out, I finally managed to meet a guy who truly loves me for me, treats me like a princess and compliments me all the time. He's tall, dark and handsome, with a rugged outdoorsy exterior, intelligence, honesty, integrity and a great sense of humour. So what's the catch? Why is he with me? What's wrong with this picture? I don't know. But we've been together for a few years now and he shows no sign of jumping ship! Unlike one particularly nasty controlling ex of mine, he doesn't make negative comments on my size, doesn't tell me to lose weight because I'm unattractive/unfanciable and doesn't cheat on me without bothering to hide it. (Oh yes, that was one seriously nasty bastard I allowed to treat me like that a good few years ago!) No, my fiance has been amazing, since the day we met. He is the only person I would come to learn to trust over time, the only person I would open up to and share my innermost thoughts with. It horrified him to hear how much self-hated I had. He hates to hear me talk negatively about myself and is constantly trying to help bring my self-esteem up. But as much as I appreciate his efforts, he will never understand just how deeply the wounds of hurt, rejection, mockery, exclusion, insult and self hatred go. They are not minor issues that can be swept aside and fixed with one man's gestures of love and affection. They are battles I must choose to fight myself if and when I think I need to challenge my way of thinking.

And why am I here? Well now that I'm happily settled in a long term relationship with a genuine guy who treats me well, I kind of feel like I'm now in a secure enough place to actually start taking down some of this outer shell, this fat-suit, and maybe allow a bit of the real me to emerge, like a butterfly, from my chrysalis of corpulence.

I've been restricting my food intake for a few weeks now but I have no idea how much weight I've lost. I didn't know my true starting weight because of a little problem between my apartment and my scales: I live in an old building which has sat halfway up a hill for the past 150 years. Over time the building has edged forward a few degrees, leaving all the internal floors with a slight incline. That makes registering a true reading on my set of scales impossible. I tried to get a ballpark figure by placing them at a dozen or so different locations around the apartment, but the readings varied so wildly that one room had me weighing two stone heavier than another one. It was hopeless. The only figures I can actually utilise at the moment is the reading I got at my doctor's on 14th August. If I remember rightly, it read 122 kilos. All I can continue to do is keep on with the restriction of calories and then see how much I weigh when I next go see the doctor, a week on Wednesday. Maybe once I've got a reading from him, I should come home and try to find a place somewhere in this godforsaken apartment where the scales give out the same number. Perhaps then I could keep them there and use them to monitor my weight at home, providing they don't just happen to be right on that particular day and instead tell me a load of old shite every other day I try to use them!

Phew! This has turned into quite a post. I just wanted to give a wee bit more of a back-story about me, who I am and what's brought me here. I imagine that there are quite a few other women and girls with a similar tale to tell, who want to free themselves from the tyranny of 'fat' for once and for all. And if I can suddenly go from eating 4000 calories a day without thinking, to restricting my intake to less than 1000 - less than 600 on many days - then you all can. You just have to want it enough to say no to huge meals and welcome hunger pangs as a fierce affirmation of your strength and determination.

Until next time

x