It's an interesting question, this one.
Why was I fat, why did I let it happen, why did I stay that way for so long?
Brief history.
After I had Jake (18 years ago), I weighed around 100kg. Over the next few years, this slowly dropped to what I estimate to be around 85kg (I never weighed myself, just guessing from the sizes of the clothes I wore).
In 1993 Mark, Jake and I moved to Auckland. We shared a house with some old friends of mine. When I look back, it was a very unhealthy environment - they were lovely people, but we all had very unhealthy habits. We ate large meals, mostly fried or roasted, drank plenty and certainly never exercised.
I quickly piled on the weight - I'm guessing I put on 10kg in the 6 months we lived there, and after that it kept creeping up. I think I probably reached 120kg in the late 1990s and stayed around that weight for a while. By 2005 I was over 130kg.
By then the unhealthy eating was well entrenched - large meals, lots of sauces, ice cream every night, sweet things at morning and afternoon tea, chocolate bars etc. General uncontrolled consumption.
So, there are the bare facts, but that doesn't answer the original question - why was I fat?
If I had to sum it up in one word - laziness.
Despite being a generally high-achieving person, I believe myself to be inherently lazy.
I knew I was overweight, but I was too lazy to do anything about it. Too lazy to properly apply the healthy eating principles that I knew were right. Too lazy to stick to a good exercise regimen.
But mostly, too lazy to examine what it was about my mental and emotional state that led me to behave in such a self-destructive way. I am still disinclined to embark on such an examination.
It was much easier to convince myself that I didn't mind being fat. Sure, I was big, but I could afford to dress well, I had a good job and a lovely family. My man loved me, I was popular at work.
All these things helped me suppress the shudder of disgust when confronted with myself in a shop window, helped me ignore my lack of breath at the top of a flight of stairs, helped me ignore my self-loathing at not being able to do all sorts of everday things.
My laziness made it easier to ignore these feelings, because dealing with them would be such hard work - by the way, it turns out I was wrong about that.
It's not that I was miserable - not all the time anyway. Mostly, I was happy with my life, so long as I continued to ignore my physical self.
Basically, it was easier to just NOT to anything about it.
7 comments:
Interesting post :-)
You know, I can hardly imagine what you must have been like.. you seem so different now! It's really hard to believe that's the same person (kinda isn't?). You seem so driven, and motivated, and strong.. it's hard to believe you weren't always like that in terms of healthy lifestyle.
It's very very inspiring, and you've broken it down, once again to a level where I think.. 'maybe... just maybe I can too!'
Interesting.... easy to ignore ourselves eh? And ignore the reasons why we get fat.... and there is always more than one reason. I am glad you (and I and others) found the courage to change, it is the best decision we made. What was your 'TRIGGER' to start the "journey" to a healthy you? Do you even know what it was? I know I have several small triggers, then one BIG one that made me say "ENOUGH", time to lose the weight or I will either die or kill myself! Sound melodramatic I know, but it's the truth.
Ha, you lazy with everything you have done in the past year! Thank you for writing this post because I put laziness as number one to my own weight problems as well. You are so SO right, to do something about it turns out NOT to be so hard after all :-)
Fascinating reading, Sue! I'm still trying to figure it out in my own life. I'm no longer even sure what prompted me to change. But I remember all those ways I persuaded myself I was OK with my weight, rationalized all my true unhappiness with it. I used to tell myself the same things: I'm successful, I have a fantastic husband, etc., so the weight doesn't matter. It does matter, though not always in the ways that I thought.
Do you think your high achieving-ness made it harder? I think a lot of my former laziness comes back to a mindset of 'if I can't do it perfectly, I won't do it at all'. It took a lot for me to see that going for a walk around the block was better than not walking at all.
brilliant stuff sue! the high-achiever bit is a great point. sometimes i think the more you achieve in non-fat areas of your life easier it is to let the weight creep on, since those other parts of your life are so fulfilling and certainly help the ol sense of self-worth. i know i used to tell myself i was sooo busy with my job that my weight just had to go down to the bottom of the to-do list :)
looking forward to your next post! and have a great week with all those social engagements! :)
Sue, i love this bit
"It was much easier to convince myself that I didn't mind being fat. Sure, I was big, but I could afford to dress well, I had a good job and a lovely family. My man loved me, I was popular at work."
Sounds just like me until April this year, Sure it ws April last year i thought i'd give weight loss a go but i was just being lazy then, only the last 6 months that im actually doing something about it seriously !
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