Whew! Another five months has gone by and I still can't believe how much has been packed into that time. What hasn't been packed in is the gym. FRUSTRATING!!!!
Getting a schedule together is a priority, and hasn't been one while learning the new job (and by new job, I refer to the one that replaced the one I accepted in October). Gym shoes are a must and so is some idea of how to deal with my hair and pool time.
The weight is trickling off slowly. Like most folks, I'd rather it go racing off of me, but that' s just not how it works in the real world. Surgery is not an option. Oddly enough, I'm still too healthy. Never mind the unholy pain in my hip, over-burdened knees and wobbly bits that make a short trip on a treadmill a living nightmare. There are, as usual, bigger fish to fry. Right now... my teeth are taking center stage.
Now I've always wanted a pearly, gorgeous grill full of teeth, but no such luck. I didn't really learn good brushing habits until I was well into my 20s and was denied braces when growing up. Seems the money was better spent on cigarettes and a camper trailer - both of which I was not to enjoy. So now it's on me and I'm still trying to decide if I should go through with it.
My end of the bargain would be about 3k, even with benefits. Seems an orthodontist told my mom when I was still young enough to have it not cost a fortune, that I needed the roof of my mouth split apart or my bite would grow increasingly awkward. Sucking my thumb for a great length of my life wouldn't help either. Now, the splitting would involve surgery.
Surgery? Uh... I don't even like needles in my mouth, much less a goddamned buzz saw! And to say that I can't afford the luxury of a gorgeous smile would be an understatement. So I do what I can to just keep my teeth from falling out of my mouth.
But one of these days I'm going to get them all sparklied up and ready to dazzle, just like the rest of me.
Look out 40... here I come.
Tuesday, March 31, 2009
Monday, October 27, 2008
Six months later
It's been a bit over six months (almost seven) since my last post to this blog. So much has happened; so much that has aged me and threatened to make me lose my way. I can't say I've not veered a little, but I can say that I'm still headed in the right direction.
Working again, I have to admit, helps. Now that I'm working near my gym, it's going to be much easier to get there. Now the trick is to figure out the right hours to go, when I can actually get on the machines and in the pool. Having long hair, also means that I'll need extra time for hair maintenance. Hmm, maybe a swim cap (then rubber smelling hair? what's the lesser of two evils, I wonder)?
In the last six months, I have lost so much. Little of it has been weight, even though I have often been without appetite and therefore not eating. Unlike some, I don't lose when I don't eat. I gain or just get sick. In the last year, I've thrown up more over stress and anxiety than I have in my whole life (and it's not like I've always been cruising at party altitudes for the past thirty years)! I have also had to eat food that I know is not good for me or is something I have trouble digesting, because it's cheap. Love the veggies, but they don't keep you filled up for long.
Having health benefits is going to work well with this journey. I'm planning to get a full exam and get some much needed procedures done (like seeing a dermatologist for the funky bump on my cheek for which I have the fine LA air - and my inability to afford facials - to thank). More importantly, I'm going to be working with my doctor to see a nutritionist or perhaps look into bariatric surgery. I still have a sliver of hope that I might be a mother one day and this body is the wrong vessel for it.
Still, a dark cloud hovers overhead. I've been through too much too recently. My focus is on fighting for and working toward my future as well as my present, and the demons that need vanquishing are the cause of all the bad weather that follows me around. Right now, I am gathering the strength and the stamina to blow those clouds away. And I think the more I take care of myself, the more my journey will be fueled.
I'm just glad I never gave in. I never completely tossed in the towel. I always kept this goal in mind and did my best not to use stress as a reason to hurt myself. Learning is good. Changing for the better, is gold. Try it. You might like it.
Working again, I have to admit, helps. Now that I'm working near my gym, it's going to be much easier to get there. Now the trick is to figure out the right hours to go, when I can actually get on the machines and in the pool. Having long hair, also means that I'll need extra time for hair maintenance. Hmm, maybe a swim cap (then rubber smelling hair? what's the lesser of two evils, I wonder)?
In the last six months, I have lost so much. Little of it has been weight, even though I have often been without appetite and therefore not eating. Unlike some, I don't lose when I don't eat. I gain or just get sick. In the last year, I've thrown up more over stress and anxiety than I have in my whole life (and it's not like I've always been cruising at party altitudes for the past thirty years)! I have also had to eat food that I know is not good for me or is something I have trouble digesting, because it's cheap. Love the veggies, but they don't keep you filled up for long.
Having health benefits is going to work well with this journey. I'm planning to get a full exam and get some much needed procedures done (like seeing a dermatologist for the funky bump on my cheek for which I have the fine LA air - and my inability to afford facials - to thank). More importantly, I'm going to be working with my doctor to see a nutritionist or perhaps look into bariatric surgery. I still have a sliver of hope that I might be a mother one day and this body is the wrong vessel for it.
Still, a dark cloud hovers overhead. I've been through too much too recently. My focus is on fighting for and working toward my future as well as my present, and the demons that need vanquishing are the cause of all the bad weather that follows me around. Right now, I am gathering the strength and the stamina to blow those clouds away. And I think the more I take care of myself, the more my journey will be fueled.
I'm just glad I never gave in. I never completely tossed in the towel. I always kept this goal in mind and did my best not to use stress as a reason to hurt myself. Learning is good. Changing for the better, is gold. Try it. You might like it.
Tuesday, April 8, 2008
Breakdown on the Journey...
It’s been a long time since I’ve posted anything about my journey to hotness. If you know anything about what’s been going on in my life, you’d know why this has been somewhat low on my priority list. But it is worth mentioning, here, that losing one’s sense of self in the melee of stress that is unemployment is something to be watched, something to be concerned about. It is in these times that it becomes easy to forget where we are heading, forget our goals, forget things that are important to us and forget to concentrate on those things rather than the bill collectors and interviewers in one’s life.
I have not let go, have not given up. I am still working on how I feel about myself, my look, my hotness as it were. However, it is true that the trials of life have just reached a fever pitch that I can no longer ignore. I am sleeping too much lately. Sometimes, I am sleeping too little. But I am also drinking pitchers of water that I normally don’t have time to drink while working. My hair is falling out, I have sores on my head from compulsive nervous scratching (even cutting off my nails hasn't helped this) and I have unholy pains in my muscles. Yet I still am trying to get to the gym whenever possible. In fact, that last time I was there, rockin’ out to AC/DC on the seated bench press machine, a sweaty but handsome Tommy Shaw from Styx nearly snuck past me after a basketball game.
Something that cannot be overlooked, is how easily one’s self image can get tied up in money problems. I mean, first off… I’ve not been able to get a hair cut in months. That’s not to say my hair is too bad, but it doesn’t look nice and healthy and taken care of. Surely an interviewer will notice my brittle ends. My skin looks like someone has been regularly beating me. I have bumps that I cannot fathom. A facial would be exquisite right now. Exquisite and financially retarded. My food intake has largely been Barilla pasta (yummy, but not with this much regularity). Those 10 for 10 dollar sales are awesome when one wants to avoid the nutritional backslide that is ramen, but that much processed pasta takes it’s toll. It just does. So right now, for the most part, I seem to be in defense mode… making sure that all the horrible after effects of poverty don’t do maximum damage. And every now and then, I put on an outfit that makes me feel… attractive-ish. I even wore my lovely velvety high heals
to the hole-in-the-wall Mexican joint to have dinner with Skari. Made it harder than hell to get in and out of her car, what with all the aches and pains, but dammit… I wanted to feel girly! It’s rare I really go out any more!
And so it seems that I have taken a small detour on my journey. It’s as though my karmic car broke down in some bum-fuck-egypt town and I have to wait for a part that is nigh on impossible to procure. While I wait, I am still tweezing my brows and winking at myself in the mirror, just so I can remember who I am… and where I’m headed. That is, heading toward my happiness… inside and out.
I have not let go, have not given up. I am still working on how I feel about myself, my look, my hotness as it were. However, it is true that the trials of life have just reached a fever pitch that I can no longer ignore. I am sleeping too much lately. Sometimes, I am sleeping too little. But I am also drinking pitchers of water that I normally don’t have time to drink while working. My hair is falling out, I have sores on my head from compulsive nervous scratching (even cutting off my nails hasn't helped this) and I have unholy pains in my muscles. Yet I still am trying to get to the gym whenever possible. In fact, that last time I was there, rockin’ out to AC/DC on the seated bench press machine, a sweaty but handsome Tommy Shaw from Styx nearly snuck past me after a basketball game.
Something that cannot be overlooked, is how easily one’s self image can get tied up in money problems. I mean, first off… I’ve not been able to get a hair cut in months. That’s not to say my hair is too bad, but it doesn’t look nice and healthy and taken care of. Surely an interviewer will notice my brittle ends. My skin looks like someone has been regularly beating me. I have bumps that I cannot fathom. A facial would be exquisite right now. Exquisite and financially retarded. My food intake has largely been Barilla pasta (yummy, but not with this much regularity). Those 10 for 10 dollar sales are awesome when one wants to avoid the nutritional backslide that is ramen, but that much processed pasta takes it’s toll. It just does. So right now, for the most part, I seem to be in defense mode… making sure that all the horrible after effects of poverty don’t do maximum damage. And every now and then, I put on an outfit that makes me feel… attractive-ish. I even wore my lovely velvety high heals
to the hole-in-the-wall Mexican joint to have dinner with Skari. Made it harder than hell to get in and out of her car, what with all the aches and pains, but dammit… I wanted to feel girly! It’s rare I really go out any more!And so it seems that I have taken a small detour on my journey. It’s as though my karmic car broke down in some bum-fuck-egypt town and I have to wait for a part that is nigh on impossible to procure. While I wait, I am still tweezing my brows and winking at myself in the mirror, just so I can remember who I am… and where I’m headed. That is, heading toward my happiness… inside and out.
Saturday, January 26, 2008
My Crush on Mr. Spock Comes Full Circle
Recently, during a chat with a friend, I suddenly realized that my two most major relationships were with men who bear a striking physical resemblance to Mr. Spock, of the original Star Trek series. I can remember finding him attractive at a very, very early age. My first crush, when I was five, was on a 22 year old friend of my cousin's who was, shock of all shocks, tall, lean, dark haired and of lowish voice. But I say that my fascination was with Spock, rather than the Leonard Nimoy,who portrayed the character (for those of you just crawling out of your cave or the womb or both) because the attraction was a full package. The "package" I refer to, of course, would be the combo of the pointy ears and eyebrows, unreasonably snug clothing, deep voice and unnaturally shiny hair. Until recently I hadn't much considered the character's phlegmatic, if somewhat patronizing nature to be any factor. Yet as I revisited my old flame via TVLAND, a few nights ago, I realized that I had largely found that attractive as well (not necessarily now, mind you). Not knowing what Leonard Nimoy was like, it just seemed right and reasonable and if I may... logical, to assign my penchant to his Vulcan alter-ego. And although I thought this would be a fun enough revelation to share as a blip, I found my way to New York Times article, while searching for a delicious image of my alien love model this morning, and it is just too fascinating (and relevant) to pass up pointing out.
It turns out, that Mr. Nimoy is a noted and published photographer. Naturally, since I don't follow the personal lives of performers I like, I didn't know that. Apparently, he had a very successful run with his Shekhina project and during that time was approached by an obese woman who had asked if he would like to photograph her. The article ends with pointing out that while Nimoy finds his models beautiful, that he is not necessarily sexually attracted to them which, I think, is entirely fair and intriguing that it be his response after seeing all of these women naked.
The reason this blog ended up here, in a place where I am sharing my feelings about how to come to terms with my body image and what I want that image to be, should seem obvious once you have read the article. If you can't be bothered to read it, I'll try to put this as plainly as I can. That is, naked, I look just like these women. To see them being portrayed, not as monsterous, boil festering, filthy, smelly ogres is so new it shocked me to see these images. Even pornography aimed at men who desire women just like the models in this project, usually features the most degrading and grotesque caricatures of everything hateful you could assume of a fat woman.
As I have said before, while I do not find myself to be ugly, nasty, gross, or any other of the usual negative adjectives assigned to women of such weight, I have had more negative input on my body than any other aspect of my life. I was conditioned from the time I was a toddler, as most are, to consider women who look like these models... women who look like me, to be nothing short of disgusting. It is a conditioning I fight every single day. I'm terrified that if I don't fit into the culturally imposed idea of beauty and sexiness, that the deficit of affection, intimate companionship, romance and sexual expression burning a hole in me, will swallow me. Yet my refusal to succumb to that expectation (coupled with my upbringing), is precisely what got me into this predicament. The irony of that fact is not lost on me.
Yes, I do still have a shred of hope that there are men out there who are less concerned with body image and more concerned about ALL of the things that make up the attractiveness of a woman. I've held onto ridiculous amounts of hope for a long, long time. Believe me. I have soldiered through the immense pain brought on by men who have cared deeply for me but could not get past the social stigma of being with a large woman (even when they found me sexually irresistible). I have courageously exposed my hope on dating sites full of men who lust after large women, and learned that a large percentage of them want such a woman for all the wrong reasons (certainly where I am concerned. The two biggest being the misconception that we are either all completely lacking in self esteem, or ball busting Brunhildas). One man described what he imagined my body to look like in a way that I am certain to have been a pleasurable, sexual image, but literally made me want to throw up. Not because he was being nasty, but because everything he had described was exactly what I been being trained to abhor in others, and particularly hate in myself. Just remebering my reaction, now, terrifies me and I believe that moment was the catalyst for realizing that I need to change. fter all, it would never occur to me to hate another person for not being just like me. How sad that I would feel revulsion over someone who does?!
Finding one more man, willing to assert the notion that a flat stomach, tiny breasts and boyish hips are not the only attributes of beauty in a woman gave me the dose of hope I needed today.
So maybe Mr. Spock got all the looks,
but it looks like Lenny got all the character. Maybe I was on the right track after all! ;-)
It turns out, that Mr. Nimoy is a noted and published photographer. Naturally, since I don't follow the personal lives of performers I like, I didn't know that. Apparently, he had a very successful run with his Shekhina project and during that time was approached by an obese woman who had asked if he would like to photograph her. The article ends with pointing out that while Nimoy finds his models beautiful, that he is not necessarily sexually attracted to them which, I think, is entirely fair and intriguing that it be his response after seeing all of these women naked.
The reason this blog ended up here, in a place where I am sharing my feelings about how to come to terms with my body image and what I want that image to be, should seem obvious once you have read the article. If you can't be bothered to read it, I'll try to put this as plainly as I can. That is, naked, I look just like these women. To see them being portrayed, not as monsterous, boil festering, filthy, smelly ogres is so new it shocked me to see these images. Even pornography aimed at men who desire women just like the models in this project, usually features the most degrading and grotesque caricatures of everything hateful you could assume of a fat woman.
As I have said before, while I do not find myself to be ugly, nasty, gross, or any other of the usual negative adjectives assigned to women of such weight, I have had more negative input on my body than any other aspect of my life. I was conditioned from the time I was a toddler, as most are, to consider women who look like these models... women who look like me, to be nothing short of disgusting. It is a conditioning I fight every single day. I'm terrified that if I don't fit into the culturally imposed idea of beauty and sexiness, that the deficit of affection, intimate companionship, romance and sexual expression burning a hole in me, will swallow me. Yet my refusal to succumb to that expectation (coupled with my upbringing), is precisely what got me into this predicament. The irony of that fact is not lost on me.
Yes, I do still have a shred of hope that there are men out there who are less concerned with body image and more concerned about ALL of the things that make up the attractiveness of a woman. I've held onto ridiculous amounts of hope for a long, long time. Believe me. I have soldiered through the immense pain brought on by men who have cared deeply for me but could not get past the social stigma of being with a large woman (even when they found me sexually irresistible). I have courageously exposed my hope on dating sites full of men who lust after large women, and learned that a large percentage of them want such a woman for all the wrong reasons (certainly where I am concerned. The two biggest being the misconception that we are either all completely lacking in self esteem, or ball busting Brunhildas). One man described what he imagined my body to look like in a way that I am certain to have been a pleasurable, sexual image, but literally made me want to throw up. Not because he was being nasty, but because everything he had described was exactly what I been being trained to abhor in others, and particularly hate in myself. Just remebering my reaction, now, terrifies me and I believe that moment was the catalyst for realizing that I need to change. fter all, it would never occur to me to hate another person for not being just like me. How sad that I would feel revulsion over someone who does?!
Finding one more man, willing to assert the notion that a flat stomach, tiny breasts and boyish hips are not the only attributes of beauty in a woman gave me the dose of hope I needed today.
So maybe Mr. Spock got all the looks,
but it looks like Lenny got all the character. Maybe I was on the right track after all! ;-)
Tuesday, January 15, 2008
Romance, the potholes in my road.
Generally speaking, when I am not involving myself in looking for, or thinking of finding a romantic partner, I don’t spend a whole lot of time worrying about whether or not I’m attractive. Although it sounds egotistical or even self-deluding, I think I’m pretty. I’d date me. I’d date me and never let go! Yeah, I would probably support the me I’m dating to continue working toward regaining a healthier lifestyle, but it wouldn’t be a deal breaker that I wasn’t already there. Life, after all, is a journey. We’re all trying to get somewhere. For some, it’s not a big deal if the person they’re seeing is on their way, already there, or been there and ready to stop moving. But whether you agree or not (and I know at least one of my readers will), weight issues and financial distress are probably two of the biggest deal breakers no matter where you are in the journey and it isn’t until I have to consider myself through the eyes of others, in hopes of gaining their attention, that I begin to pick myself apart. When I start picking, it slows down my progress.
So, I have hit a pothole. While I repair the damage, let me talk to you about this a little, okay? Don’t worry, I’m pretty good at multitasking. Our chat won’t slow me down any more than I already am.
Recently I rejoined an online dating site. I’m not totally sure what made me do it. Maybe it was the success story I’d heard from a friend, maybe it was hearing how he was talking about his new girlfriend that made me think, “Awww, I want someone to think about me that way.” I don’t know. As usual, finding sexual activity hasn’t been a problem (unless you consider having to refuse it a problem, which I often do), so that wasn’t it. All I know is that almost as soon as I got started, I wanted to cancel my profile and I’m still debating that option.
Creating a profile is only slightly painful. While I clearly don’t have too much trouble talking about things that interest me, I do feel put out with “packaging” myself for a specific consumer. After all, if I knew how to advertise for the man I’m looking for, I feel certain someone would have bought my line of wares by now. The thing is, I’m a legitimately complicated person, full of all the right contradictions (like being girly but totally able to be one of the guys) and some that might piss a person off (I can be both deeply logical and emotional depending on the topic). The more I divulge, the more I feel each attribute requires definition or at least explanation. That’s bad. Really bad, considering that most men are less apt to read an epic, and I’m disinclined to try to synopsize all the crucial details that someone should know when deciding to hung out with me,much less try to date me. Eventually my description always misrepresents me in some regrettable way.
If I post that I like one thing or the other, these tastes are often the single minded focus of those who contact me and although they virtually never intend it, I end up getting frustrated over this element of their shopping experience and run away from them. Do people really not want to dig that deep before deciding whether or not to enter into a courtship of any kind? Of course, I might be more inclined to be patient if I was being approached by someone I found really, really attractive. That’s where it gets, well, shitty… on both sides.
When it comes to those who wish to pursue me, I do okay until it comes to posting photos; Rather, until I put up a full body shot. When I opened up this muddy can of romantic worms, I was getting pinged every five minutes by men ranging from 23 to 52. As soon as the full body shot was up, suddenly even ones I was chatting with regularly stop responding. So with one perfectly pleasant exception, suddenly the well was dry again. There’s only so often you can have this happen before you stop deciding it must be a coincidence. One man I had found really attractive blocked me mid conversation when the photo was posted. I won’t lie… that stings a bit. It’s happened before. Nowadays when something like that happens, I consider myself to have been spared words of abject disappointment. After all, rejecting is a nasty business. Only the truly despicable find pleasure in dashing someone's hopes of the ultimate hook up.
So, what about that “exception” guy? Isn’t he enough for now?
Ah yes, the one that stuck around. Like I said, this stuff is shitty on both sides and the truth is, based on what I read and what I saw, I wasn’t attracted enough to move forward. That’s not his fault by any stretch. He’s friendly, well spoken in his writing, enthusiastic, involved in his passions. He even sent me a link to some press that referred to him as handsome (my press pointed to my heft!). These are all things I desire and expect in a man. By all accounts he seems like a good guy; that which LA is in short supply. As is often the case, I found myself revisiting his profile in hopes that the last time I’d seen it I was just not open, not in a good mood. But for whatever reason, I just didn’t feel compelled. Feeling like crap over the idea of having to tell him, in any way shape or form, is what makes me want to throw in the towel. More often than not, this is precisely what my dating experience has been… talking to or going out with men whom I should feel lucky to date, feeling lukewarm and hoping that something will develop if I put in enough time. And while I think that some of my past dates deserve to wind up with someone who doesn’t care who they’re with (in the case of those who can’t put forth the most miniscule effort to make themselves desirable, even as a friend), many of them don’t. That is certainly the case for the man who was genuinely interested.
It pains me to feel like there is something wrong with me that is preventing me from connecting. And even though it's always nice to meet good people, I don't really have trouble making friends. I am not on a dating site, splaying my guts out like a sausage squeezed out of it's casing, in hopes of a bigger crop of male buddies.
If anyone had once suggested that I would find myself becoming increasingly closed off to the idea of finding the right man at this point of my life, I would have laughed my guttural, obnoxious laugh and shot some snarky yet playful remark indicating my utter disbelief. But here I am cramming whatever I can into the doorjamb to keep the heavy door to my heart from closing, and finally …the lock from latching. I get more and more closed off every year. And with each woeful attempt at connection, I feel increasingly idiotic for even trying. I honestly never thought I could reach this level of romantic pesimism in my life!
Despite the obvious limitations my flab brings to the table, what I feel doesn’t have anything to do with my body image. It is what I have experienced of dating thus far; the heaviness that weighs on my heart to tell a truly nice man that I don't want to date him, the pain of rejection when someone I am very attracted to feels that way about me, the anxiousness we both feel on that dreaded first date where we're hoping against hope that we won't have to have any more first dates and the deflation of spirit when we realize we are bound for another. It's all too much sometimes. And luckily, I know better than to believe being thin will change what I hate about this process.
So for those of you, my quiet readers, that believe my journey is one where all my effort is spent trying to attract a man and hoping the final destination to be “and they lived happily ever after,” it is most assuredly not. If it… if HE finally comes, I will consider it nothing short of a miracle. Not because I think my being fat makes me less of a catch, but because it is getting harder and harder to meet someone in a more organic way, all we have to go on with these dating sites is a list of ingredients. If I do find love it will be because this brilliant, attractive man figured out what I already know, hot or not, that I am loving and more importantly loveable.
So, I have hit a pothole. While I repair the damage, let me talk to you about this a little, okay? Don’t worry, I’m pretty good at multitasking. Our chat won’t slow me down any more than I already am.
Recently I rejoined an online dating site. I’m not totally sure what made me do it. Maybe it was the success story I’d heard from a friend, maybe it was hearing how he was talking about his new girlfriend that made me think, “Awww, I want someone to think about me that way.” I don’t know. As usual, finding sexual activity hasn’t been a problem (unless you consider having to refuse it a problem, which I often do), so that wasn’t it. All I know is that almost as soon as I got started, I wanted to cancel my profile and I’m still debating that option.
Creating a profile is only slightly painful. While I clearly don’t have too much trouble talking about things that interest me, I do feel put out with “packaging” myself for a specific consumer. After all, if I knew how to advertise for the man I’m looking for, I feel certain someone would have bought my line of wares by now. The thing is, I’m a legitimately complicated person, full of all the right contradictions (like being girly but totally able to be one of the guys) and some that might piss a person off (I can be both deeply logical and emotional depending on the topic). The more I divulge, the more I feel each attribute requires definition or at least explanation. That’s bad. Really bad, considering that most men are less apt to read an epic, and I’m disinclined to try to synopsize all the crucial details that someone should know when deciding to hung out with me,much less try to date me. Eventually my description always misrepresents me in some regrettable way.
If I post that I like one thing or the other, these tastes are often the single minded focus of those who contact me and although they virtually never intend it, I end up getting frustrated over this element of their shopping experience and run away from them. Do people really not want to dig that deep before deciding whether or not to enter into a courtship of any kind? Of course, I might be more inclined to be patient if I was being approached by someone I found really, really attractive. That’s where it gets, well, shitty… on both sides.
When it comes to those who wish to pursue me, I do okay until it comes to posting photos; Rather, until I put up a full body shot. When I opened up this muddy can of romantic worms, I was getting pinged every five minutes by men ranging from 23 to 52. As soon as the full body shot was up, suddenly even ones I was chatting with regularly stop responding. So with one perfectly pleasant exception, suddenly the well was dry again. There’s only so often you can have this happen before you stop deciding it must be a coincidence. One man I had found really attractive blocked me mid conversation when the photo was posted. I won’t lie… that stings a bit. It’s happened before. Nowadays when something like that happens, I consider myself to have been spared words of abject disappointment. After all, rejecting is a nasty business. Only the truly despicable find pleasure in dashing someone's hopes of the ultimate hook up.
So, what about that “exception” guy? Isn’t he enough for now?
Ah yes, the one that stuck around. Like I said, this stuff is shitty on both sides and the truth is, based on what I read and what I saw, I wasn’t attracted enough to move forward. That’s not his fault by any stretch. He’s friendly, well spoken in his writing, enthusiastic, involved in his passions. He even sent me a link to some press that referred to him as handsome (my press pointed to my heft!). These are all things I desire and expect in a man. By all accounts he seems like a good guy; that which LA is in short supply. As is often the case, I found myself revisiting his profile in hopes that the last time I’d seen it I was just not open, not in a good mood. But for whatever reason, I just didn’t feel compelled. Feeling like crap over the idea of having to tell him, in any way shape or form, is what makes me want to throw in the towel. More often than not, this is precisely what my dating experience has been… talking to or going out with men whom I should feel lucky to date, feeling lukewarm and hoping that something will develop if I put in enough time. And while I think that some of my past dates deserve to wind up with someone who doesn’t care who they’re with (in the case of those who can’t put forth the most miniscule effort to make themselves desirable, even as a friend), many of them don’t. That is certainly the case for the man who was genuinely interested.
It pains me to feel like there is something wrong with me that is preventing me from connecting. And even though it's always nice to meet good people, I don't really have trouble making friends. I am not on a dating site, splaying my guts out like a sausage squeezed out of it's casing, in hopes of a bigger crop of male buddies.
If anyone had once suggested that I would find myself becoming increasingly closed off to the idea of finding the right man at this point of my life, I would have laughed my guttural, obnoxious laugh and shot some snarky yet playful remark indicating my utter disbelief. But here I am cramming whatever I can into the doorjamb to keep the heavy door to my heart from closing, and finally …the lock from latching. I get more and more closed off every year. And with each woeful attempt at connection, I feel increasingly idiotic for even trying. I honestly never thought I could reach this level of romantic pesimism in my life!
Despite the obvious limitations my flab brings to the table, what I feel doesn’t have anything to do with my body image. It is what I have experienced of dating thus far; the heaviness that weighs on my heart to tell a truly nice man that I don't want to date him, the pain of rejection when someone I am very attracted to feels that way about me, the anxiousness we both feel on that dreaded first date where we're hoping against hope that we won't have to have any more first dates and the deflation of spirit when we realize we are bound for another. It's all too much sometimes. And luckily, I know better than to believe being thin will change what I hate about this process.
So for those of you, my quiet readers, that believe my journey is one where all my effort is spent trying to attract a man and hoping the final destination to be “and they lived happily ever after,” it is most assuredly not. If it… if HE finally comes, I will consider it nothing short of a miracle. Not because I think my being fat makes me less of a catch, but because it is getting harder and harder to meet someone in a more organic way, all we have to go on with these dating sites is a list of ingredients. If I do find love it will be because this brilliant, attractive man figured out what I already know, hot or not, that I am loving and more importantly loveable.
Thursday, December 20, 2007
Is Being Beautiful Worth Dying Over?
Recently, I was reading a blog written by cult film icon Kevin Smith, about a girl who killed herself over the end of an online relationship with a boy she met on MySpace. The boy, creepily enough, turned out to be the 48 year-old mother of a neighborhood friend who was allegedly on an undercover mission to find out if the girl was talking shit about her daughter (for my thoughts about the supposed adult’s behavior in this, please see my other blog Sunny Spells It Out). Sadly, the girl, nor her vigilant mother, had any idea it was her friend’s mother she had been talking with for months when the imaginary boy named Josh Evans turned on her and crushed her hopes for romance. Perhaps if she had known, she may not have done so, but this turn of events was the final blow that prompted Megan Meier to hang herself by a belt in her closet.
Why? Why would this 13 year-old girl with beautiful, sparkly eyes, lovely skin, gorgeous hair, and a sweet smile (that would soon shed its metallic shield) decide that she had nothing left to live for? She lost the chance of love with a cute boy.
Think that’s silly? Ridiculous? I don’t. I think it is a tragedy of furious proportions, but hardly a shock. I’ve been where she was, and even now I wonder how I lived through it. You see, this pretty young lady struggled with her weight and as such was shocked to have found such a catch in the first place. As Smith points out, it sucks enough to be a teenager. It sucks even more to be a fat one. It sucks even harder to be a fat girl. Believe me, I know.
Of course, we all have our cross to bear. For some of us, it’s that we are too thin, too tall, can’t gain muscle no matter how we try, have no chin, or have acne that makes Bryan Adams look airbrushed. I suppose there is even the possibility that being too pretty or handsome might be troublesome to a youngster. The truth is there aren’t really that many people out there who had the “charmed” life of growing up. It’s easy to believe the opposite when we want to blame our shitty childhood for every rotten thing that befalls us today, but statistically speaking, just about everyone was in the SUCK during their teens. Yet even now, in a time if infinite information and cross-cultural and lifestyle acceptance, being fat still suffers an unending bastion of tormenters that crosses gender, race and most creeds. While it is politically incorrect to badmouth a person of color, religion or disability (at least in the US), we are still showered with permission to practically stone someone for being overweight. That’s hard enough to wrap one’s mind around being an intelligent, fairly logical thirtysomething. To try to fathom that at 13 is… well… almost unimaginable.
I won’t pretend to know exactly what must have been going through Megan’s mind when she came to the conclusion that there was no hope left in her life. After all, unlike myself at her age, She had been diagnosed with ADHD and severe depression and I suspect that if someone had given me those justifications for despair when I was 13, I might not be here to write to you today. To my mind, it is a dangerous thing to tell anyone of questionable mental state that they have been clinically diagnosed with virtually anything, because if it’s one thing people usually are looking for more than anything else, it’s something to excuse them from having to work on their problems (you know I’m right, think of how many people you have met that throw off their shitty behavior to their astrological sign!). That is not to say that there are not legitimate cases that need serious medical attention, but if you were to have run into the amount of people I have (in the last four years) that have been “diagnosed” as manic, you would start questioning the validity of these things , too. Trust me! I’m no hard-ass. People need help. But more than anything, they need to help themselves; including me. And that is rarely something that people are either expected or taught to do in this day and age. But what on Earth did this girl have to be that depressed about? Is being fat enough to warrant such drastic measures?
It feels like it, sometimes.
Unlike alcoholism, drug abuse, personal abuse (such as cutting) and other eating disorders (at least until ones bones are prominent), you can’t hide fat. You cannot quietly deal with or (revel in) your problem because it is out there for all to see. There is no sympathy because it is assumed depraved gluttony got you to that place, although it is not always the case. While everyone who judges you probably has an equally, if not worse vice, it is socially permissive to hate fat people. To that end, I am sure that there are those that behave as though they hate fat people because they the only group left to openly hate and they need someone to vent their rage to. So you feel as though you cannot lose it fast enough. Every day you do not see results, is another day when you feel as if everyone around you is disgusted by your very existence (and many will tell you they are). Before you know it, you are hating yourself for not being done, hating yourself for every slip up, every ounce not lost, every moment you’re not exercising, every date you were not asked out on, and it goes on and on. It is so easy to get into a spiral of self loathing and unless you have people around you that really know how to deal with that kind of thing, who know how to talk you off the ledge, you have to have a will of steel to not let it get you down. Toss the gasoline of lost love onto that fire and friends, I’m here to tell you, it’s a blaze that feels inextinguishable.
In my search for more on the story of this girl, I came across a video from ABC news. Something that caught my attention was that Megan’s mother is very petite, and relatively pretty (in that white-bread, mid-western, suburban way), while her father could easily have been a linebacker in college. I wondered if she had developed her own psychosis about her size or if she felt pressure to look more like her mother. So much so, in fact, I had to watch the video a second time to actually hear the interview. Mostly, I found myself looking at the subtext of what may have sent this girl over the edge. Although in all seriousness, she could have had all the support in the world from her loving parents and still felt like the loss of Josh Evans was enough of a reason. There is no way to know what could have been said, what could have been done to prevent this girl from making such a horrible decision. And ever since I’ve learned of this story, I haven’t been able to get her off my mind. I have been so sad and troubled and didn’t realize until tonight that it was this girl who was plaguing me.
You see, I have had to work very, very, very hard on myself to get to a place where I don’t feel like I would be lucky to get anyone at all to love me, solely because of my weight. It is an accomplishment I am profoundly proud of, because it meant undoing over 34 years of brainwashing by my mother, my former friends, schoolmates, co-workers, boys I admired, men I wouldn’t touch with a ten-foot-pole, my brother, teachers, movies, tv, magazines and comedians; all of whom have told me that I could never find love as long as I was fat. Up until very recently, I still believed that to the world, I was bottom of the barrel, last-resort material. If you had told me I would ever reach this place when I was 13, I would have silently believed you were either nuts, or an alien. I wouldn’t have even had the courage to tell you that you were wrong. After all, I was firmly convinced by all the aforementioned influences that I was a worthless, ugly, disgusting, unlovable creature because I was overweight (and at 13, no more than 40 pounds). It wasn’t something I had created in my mind. It was a belief that was being crammed down my throat every single day of my life, coming at me from all directions. Little has changed in how often I get that message, but my reaction to it has in spades. And I think of how Megan had to have had it even worse with the internet; with all the phonies and fakes, all the pretenders that one encounters on the internet. Even with her mother keeping a watchful eye on who her daughter was encountering, the keenest of maternal instincts couldn’t have foreseen the duplicity that would end her daughter’s life. The more I think about the whole thing, the more angry, the more absolutely fucking outraged I get!
Without even going into the fact that Josh Evans was a fictional being, one of the things that struck my heart the hardest was that in the video interview, Megan’s mother made mention of how shocked Megan was that Josh was so hot. My heart ached so bad it made me sick to my stomach. It was an unexpected jolt of recollection and commiseration. How many times had I felt that? How many times had it been a cruel prank or the boy buckled to peer pressure and backed out with hateful words? So many I cannot count and the ones I remember clearly are hard enough to think of. And I wonder now how many times it crossed my mind to end my life, and therefore my misery, when the truth came out. I wonder what made Megan cross that line when I didn’t, or couldn’t.
Sometimes it feels like that’s the only option to make the pain go away; the pain of alienation, of fear that you will never shed that which seemingly makes you unlovable. The way this story played out for Megan, I cannot say that I don’t understand her choice. Still, I wish she had more strength, more courage, more imagination to think that perhaps she would overcome her loss and find someone new. I wish Megan Meier had reconsidered her options and imagined the debt of pain she left behind that her parents now pay. More importantly, I wish someone had been able to convince her that it would pass before she had a chance to do the undoable.
Trying to become the socially perceived idea of beautiful is such an ugly road to tread. To put your worthiness, your loveable-ness, as it were, in the hands of the public at large is to give up your own opinion of yourself. You will never ever be smart enough, cool enough, pretty enough, whatever enough for everyone. Ever. EVER! And that is totally okay! Really! It is! Know why? Here’s why. Not everyone out there deserves to have their opinion of you matter. I learned that the hard way. And besides, despite that which the cults of celebrity and fashion dictate to us, there is an immeasurable amount of tastes out there. Even if you don’t find them attractive (which is a conversation for a whole other day), there are going to be plenty of people out there who will want you… sometimes quite badly. But the most important thing that schools rarely even attempt to teach, and many parents aren't deep enough to think of, is to love and value your life. You cannot get that love from anyone but yourself and it is essential. When you have it, nothing will keep you down forever. Nothing will make you fear being unloved ever again. Nothing will make you believe that your life isn’t worth living because you will value that life far too highly to give it up for anything. ANY… THING.
Megan, wherever you are… I am filled with grief know that this message couldn’t have and didn’t get to you in time. It would have been such a thrill to hear how you bested your dragons, and came out kickin’ asses and taking names. God, what a story that would have been, and just think of the lives you might have saved in the telling of it.
Why? Why would this 13 year-old girl with beautiful, sparkly eyes, lovely skin, gorgeous hair, and a sweet smile (that would soon shed its metallic shield) decide that she had nothing left to live for? She lost the chance of love with a cute boy.
Think that’s silly? Ridiculous? I don’t. I think it is a tragedy of furious proportions, but hardly a shock. I’ve been where she was, and even now I wonder how I lived through it. You see, this pretty young lady struggled with her weight and as such was shocked to have found such a catch in the first place. As Smith points out, it sucks enough to be a teenager. It sucks even more to be a fat one. It sucks even harder to be a fat girl. Believe me, I know.
Of course, we all have our cross to bear. For some of us, it’s that we are too thin, too tall, can’t gain muscle no matter how we try, have no chin, or have acne that makes Bryan Adams look airbrushed. I suppose there is even the possibility that being too pretty or handsome might be troublesome to a youngster. The truth is there aren’t really that many people out there who had the “charmed” life of growing up. It’s easy to believe the opposite when we want to blame our shitty childhood for every rotten thing that befalls us today, but statistically speaking, just about everyone was in the SUCK during their teens. Yet even now, in a time if infinite information and cross-cultural and lifestyle acceptance, being fat still suffers an unending bastion of tormenters that crosses gender, race and most creeds. While it is politically incorrect to badmouth a person of color, religion or disability (at least in the US), we are still showered with permission to practically stone someone for being overweight. That’s hard enough to wrap one’s mind around being an intelligent, fairly logical thirtysomething. To try to fathom that at 13 is… well… almost unimaginable.
I won’t pretend to know exactly what must have been going through Megan’s mind when she came to the conclusion that there was no hope left in her life. After all, unlike myself at her age, She had been diagnosed with ADHD and severe depression and I suspect that if someone had given me those justifications for despair when I was 13, I might not be here to write to you today. To my mind, it is a dangerous thing to tell anyone of questionable mental state that they have been clinically diagnosed with virtually anything, because if it’s one thing people usually are looking for more than anything else, it’s something to excuse them from having to work on their problems (you know I’m right, think of how many people you have met that throw off their shitty behavior to their astrological sign!). That is not to say that there are not legitimate cases that need serious medical attention, but if you were to have run into the amount of people I have (in the last four years) that have been “diagnosed” as manic, you would start questioning the validity of these things , too. Trust me! I’m no hard-ass. People need help. But more than anything, they need to help themselves; including me. And that is rarely something that people are either expected or taught to do in this day and age. But what on Earth did this girl have to be that depressed about? Is being fat enough to warrant such drastic measures?
It feels like it, sometimes.
Unlike alcoholism, drug abuse, personal abuse (such as cutting) and other eating disorders (at least until ones bones are prominent), you can’t hide fat. You cannot quietly deal with or (revel in) your problem because it is out there for all to see. There is no sympathy because it is assumed depraved gluttony got you to that place, although it is not always the case. While everyone who judges you probably has an equally, if not worse vice, it is socially permissive to hate fat people. To that end, I am sure that there are those that behave as though they hate fat people because they the only group left to openly hate and they need someone to vent their rage to. So you feel as though you cannot lose it fast enough. Every day you do not see results, is another day when you feel as if everyone around you is disgusted by your very existence (and many will tell you they are). Before you know it, you are hating yourself for not being done, hating yourself for every slip up, every ounce not lost, every moment you’re not exercising, every date you were not asked out on, and it goes on and on. It is so easy to get into a spiral of self loathing and unless you have people around you that really know how to deal with that kind of thing, who know how to talk you off the ledge, you have to have a will of steel to not let it get you down. Toss the gasoline of lost love onto that fire and friends, I’m here to tell you, it’s a blaze that feels inextinguishable.
In my search for more on the story of this girl, I came across a video from ABC news. Something that caught my attention was that Megan’s mother is very petite, and relatively pretty (in that white-bread, mid-western, suburban way), while her father could easily have been a linebacker in college. I wondered if she had developed her own psychosis about her size or if she felt pressure to look more like her mother. So much so, in fact, I had to watch the video a second time to actually hear the interview. Mostly, I found myself looking at the subtext of what may have sent this girl over the edge. Although in all seriousness, she could have had all the support in the world from her loving parents and still felt like the loss of Josh Evans was enough of a reason. There is no way to know what could have been said, what could have been done to prevent this girl from making such a horrible decision. And ever since I’ve learned of this story, I haven’t been able to get her off my mind. I have been so sad and troubled and didn’t realize until tonight that it was this girl who was plaguing me.
You see, I have had to work very, very, very hard on myself to get to a place where I don’t feel like I would be lucky to get anyone at all to love me, solely because of my weight. It is an accomplishment I am profoundly proud of, because it meant undoing over 34 years of brainwashing by my mother, my former friends, schoolmates, co-workers, boys I admired, men I wouldn’t touch with a ten-foot-pole, my brother, teachers, movies, tv, magazines and comedians; all of whom have told me that I could never find love as long as I was fat. Up until very recently, I still believed that to the world, I was bottom of the barrel, last-resort material. If you had told me I would ever reach this place when I was 13, I would have silently believed you were either nuts, or an alien. I wouldn’t have even had the courage to tell you that you were wrong. After all, I was firmly convinced by all the aforementioned influences that I was a worthless, ugly, disgusting, unlovable creature because I was overweight (and at 13, no more than 40 pounds). It wasn’t something I had created in my mind. It was a belief that was being crammed down my throat every single day of my life, coming at me from all directions. Little has changed in how often I get that message, but my reaction to it has in spades. And I think of how Megan had to have had it even worse with the internet; with all the phonies and fakes, all the pretenders that one encounters on the internet. Even with her mother keeping a watchful eye on who her daughter was encountering, the keenest of maternal instincts couldn’t have foreseen the duplicity that would end her daughter’s life. The more I think about the whole thing, the more angry, the more absolutely fucking outraged I get!
Without even going into the fact that Josh Evans was a fictional being, one of the things that struck my heart the hardest was that in the video interview, Megan’s mother made mention of how shocked Megan was that Josh was so hot. My heart ached so bad it made me sick to my stomach. It was an unexpected jolt of recollection and commiseration. How many times had I felt that? How many times had it been a cruel prank or the boy buckled to peer pressure and backed out with hateful words? So many I cannot count and the ones I remember clearly are hard enough to think of. And I wonder now how many times it crossed my mind to end my life, and therefore my misery, when the truth came out. I wonder what made Megan cross that line when I didn’t, or couldn’t.
Sometimes it feels like that’s the only option to make the pain go away; the pain of alienation, of fear that you will never shed that which seemingly makes you unlovable. The way this story played out for Megan, I cannot say that I don’t understand her choice. Still, I wish she had more strength, more courage, more imagination to think that perhaps she would overcome her loss and find someone new. I wish Megan Meier had reconsidered her options and imagined the debt of pain she left behind that her parents now pay. More importantly, I wish someone had been able to convince her that it would pass before she had a chance to do the undoable.
Trying to become the socially perceived idea of beautiful is such an ugly road to tread. To put your worthiness, your loveable-ness, as it were, in the hands of the public at large is to give up your own opinion of yourself. You will never ever be smart enough, cool enough, pretty enough, whatever enough for everyone. Ever. EVER! And that is totally okay! Really! It is! Know why? Here’s why. Not everyone out there deserves to have their opinion of you matter. I learned that the hard way. And besides, despite that which the cults of celebrity and fashion dictate to us, there is an immeasurable amount of tastes out there. Even if you don’t find them attractive (which is a conversation for a whole other day), there are going to be plenty of people out there who will want you… sometimes quite badly. But the most important thing that schools rarely even attempt to teach, and many parents aren't deep enough to think of, is to love and value your life. You cannot get that love from anyone but yourself and it is essential. When you have it, nothing will keep you down forever. Nothing will make you fear being unloved ever again. Nothing will make you believe that your life isn’t worth living because you will value that life far too highly to give it up for anything. ANY… THING.
Megan, wherever you are… I am filled with grief know that this message couldn’t have and didn’t get to you in time. It would have been such a thrill to hear how you bested your dragons, and came out kickin’ asses and taking names. God, what a story that would have been, and just think of the lives you might have saved in the telling of it.
Sunday, December 16, 2007
If The Shoe Doesn't Fit Try Another One
A reader’s comment on my last post got me to thinking about fitting in and we all know that once I get to thinking, it's hard to stop. So, I'd like to share some honest reflection on the matter. As always, I welcome your thoughts. As you can see, I pay attention.
When I was a very little girl, I distinctly recall being utterly disinterested in being “normal” in any way. For the first several years, I was convinced that I was extraordinary in some fashion or another. Perhaps I might possess magical powers or a hidden ability to fly. Even now, I could swear that I can feel wings furled against my back and in times when I need comfort or protection, they enfold around me like the soft arms of a protective parent. And as to my magical powers, well, I’m still not convinced that I don’t have them. Of course, I don’t think of them as hocus pocus, Merlin-esque kinds of powers; but rather the kind of natural powers all animals are endowed with but as humans, we lose as we are socialized while growing up. So obviously, I hadn’t the faintest desire to slip submissively into the dull coma of supposed normality. It wasn’t until every abnormal thought or action or perceived weirdness (good and bad) was picked apart, ridiculed and squelched by someone whose acceptance was paramount to me, that I lost my way. I stopped knowing who I was and became who I was told I was. I began to want desperately to be as normal as possible and always failed because my heart wasn’t in it. While I believed for all that time that I wasn’t allowed to fit in, I know now that I made sure that I didn’t. Somewhere inside, that little girl still had her hand on some of the controls (bless her weird little heart!).
I’ll be honest and say that when I deeply respect, admire or am attracted to someone, my first instinct is to try to fit in with them. I try to maintain who I am, but if I feel they are not accepting me, it gets harder and harder to hold on. A reason for that may be that I have only just started to allow myself the freedom to live as I feel and have spent most of my life trying to squeeze myself into a proverbial shoe that never fit … namely, my family.
I have always felt like a satellite floating around outside their world, always making sure that everything was running smoothly, but never really getting to come in for a landing. Ironically, there are a lot of people out there who feel like they don’t fit in with their families. Maybe, on some level, it’s an unfortunate normality on my part; one of the few places I am exceptionally ordinary. Maybe it’s a good thing. Sometimes, knowing others are in the same boat, feeling just as alienated and ostracized as you, actually manages to offer some comfort. Still, if I’d had a choice from the get-go, I would never have signed up for that club.
Please, don’t be frightened of a public unloading of scary family details of an alarmingly over-personal degree. I really don’t have any desire to make you all uncomfortable. It is embarrassing to admit that it wasn’t that long ago that I would have had no problem in doing so, however. I have grown up and learned enough that I look at that part of my life now and see that some of what I have suffered is not really respectable and reasonable to broadcast and I no longer feel the need to campaign for yes-man sympathy. So I will just say that my family was very adept at using their love and acceptance as a bargaining chip for my silent and unwavering servitude. It wasn’t their only transgression, but one that definitely created a version of me that I work every day to bid adieu. And in the spirit of fairness, I have learned (though a hell of a lot of listening and observation), that like everything else they do in a desperate attempt to not be “found out” to be flawed and odd, they are not unusual in that sense. I don’t blame them, really. They just don’t look that deeply into themselves and their motives. I doubt they will ever fully understand how they lost me. But, it was the realization that I had done everything they had asked up to a point of literally giving up my life for them, and they still treated me like the token freak. When I finally grasped that and let go of ever wanting or needing their acceptance and unattainable love, I felt free.like an animal let out of a cage after a lifetime of captivity… as if I could fly.
There isn’t a group or sect or religion or belief that makes me want to be in that position ever again.
Now here I am, on a quest for something that I named “Journey to Hotness”, but it is about so much more than the title bespeaks (as I’m sure you know). It is an expedition to uncover a life where I am not being controlled by anyone or anything but my true self and that includes a body that was built on lies and pain. It is a mission to look in the mirror and recognize what I see as being me… Sunny. To be able to put on the clothes that make me feel comfortable and beautiful and happy. To be able to dance or walk or run or make love or fuck in the way my heart and body aches to do such things. I want to not worry so much about being easy prey for muggers or rapists because I can obviously not run, even if for my life. I want to know what it’s like to lower myself on top of a lover and enjoy the experience without worrying and wondering if I am crushing his bones. These are trifles to some, but they (and others) are and have nearly always been my most profound yearning . And the thing is, when all of these desires (which are reasonable to expect) come to fruition, I know I will feel more genuinely like myself than I have felt since I was a very little girl. And I know that it will make me beautiful. Maybe not to you and maybe not to your best friend or your boss or your doctor or your pot dealer or your ex-girlfriend and that suits me fine. I want it for me. Just… me. And if it makes anyone else happy in the process, well that’ll just be a bonus.
If there is some group out there that seems to fit me, the *real* me, then I’ll be okay to fit in. I feel that way about the people I love. And to all others, they most certainly will get either a physical or spiritual flipping of the bird as my thoughtful reader suggests. My life is not to be spent trying to fit in with or to fall into line with anyone; not any more.
I’m excited. The more I see who I really am, the more I feel filled with joy and the more I remember the seedling I once was. I want to know what kind of amazing things that little girl who wished on stars and wrote songs about cartoon characters and didn’t care if her outfits were like everyone else’s grew up to be. I just know it’s gonna rock tits when I finally do. ;-)
When I was a very little girl, I distinctly recall being utterly disinterested in being “normal” in any way. For the first several years, I was convinced that I was extraordinary in some fashion or another. Perhaps I might possess magical powers or a hidden ability to fly. Even now, I could swear that I can feel wings furled against my back and in times when I need comfort or protection, they enfold around me like the soft arms of a protective parent. And as to my magical powers, well, I’m still not convinced that I don’t have them. Of course, I don’t think of them as hocus pocus, Merlin-esque kinds of powers; but rather the kind of natural powers all animals are endowed with but as humans, we lose as we are socialized while growing up. So obviously, I hadn’t the faintest desire to slip submissively into the dull coma of supposed normality. It wasn’t until every abnormal thought or action or perceived weirdness (good and bad) was picked apart, ridiculed and squelched by someone whose acceptance was paramount to me, that I lost my way. I stopped knowing who I was and became who I was told I was. I began to want desperately to be as normal as possible and always failed because my heart wasn’t in it. While I believed for all that time that I wasn’t allowed to fit in, I know now that I made sure that I didn’t. Somewhere inside, that little girl still had her hand on some of the controls (bless her weird little heart!).
I’ll be honest and say that when I deeply respect, admire or am attracted to someone, my first instinct is to try to fit in with them. I try to maintain who I am, but if I feel they are not accepting me, it gets harder and harder to hold on. A reason for that may be that I have only just started to allow myself the freedom to live as I feel and have spent most of my life trying to squeeze myself into a proverbial shoe that never fit … namely, my family.
I have always felt like a satellite floating around outside their world, always making sure that everything was running smoothly, but never really getting to come in for a landing. Ironically, there are a lot of people out there who feel like they don’t fit in with their families. Maybe, on some level, it’s an unfortunate normality on my part; one of the few places I am exceptionally ordinary. Maybe it’s a good thing. Sometimes, knowing others are in the same boat, feeling just as alienated and ostracized as you, actually manages to offer some comfort. Still, if I’d had a choice from the get-go, I would never have signed up for that club.
Please, don’t be frightened of a public unloading of scary family details of an alarmingly over-personal degree. I really don’t have any desire to make you all uncomfortable. It is embarrassing to admit that it wasn’t that long ago that I would have had no problem in doing so, however. I have grown up and learned enough that I look at that part of my life now and see that some of what I have suffered is not really respectable and reasonable to broadcast and I no longer feel the need to campaign for yes-man sympathy. So I will just say that my family was very adept at using their love and acceptance as a bargaining chip for my silent and unwavering servitude. It wasn’t their only transgression, but one that definitely created a version of me that I work every day to bid adieu. And in the spirit of fairness, I have learned (though a hell of a lot of listening and observation), that like everything else they do in a desperate attempt to not be “found out” to be flawed and odd, they are not unusual in that sense. I don’t blame them, really. They just don’t look that deeply into themselves and their motives. I doubt they will ever fully understand how they lost me. But, it was the realization that I had done everything they had asked up to a point of literally giving up my life for them, and they still treated me like the token freak. When I finally grasped that and let go of ever wanting or needing their acceptance and unattainable love, I felt free.like an animal let out of a cage after a lifetime of captivity… as if I could fly.
There isn’t a group or sect or religion or belief that makes me want to be in that position ever again.
Now here I am, on a quest for something that I named “Journey to Hotness”, but it is about so much more than the title bespeaks (as I’m sure you know). It is an expedition to uncover a life where I am not being controlled by anyone or anything but my true self and that includes a body that was built on lies and pain. It is a mission to look in the mirror and recognize what I see as being me… Sunny. To be able to put on the clothes that make me feel comfortable and beautiful and happy. To be able to dance or walk or run or make love or fuck in the way my heart and body aches to do such things. I want to not worry so much about being easy prey for muggers or rapists because I can obviously not run, even if for my life. I want to know what it’s like to lower myself on top of a lover and enjoy the experience without worrying and wondering if I am crushing his bones. These are trifles to some, but they (and others) are and have nearly always been my most profound yearning . And the thing is, when all of these desires (which are reasonable to expect) come to fruition, I know I will feel more genuinely like myself than I have felt since I was a very little girl. And I know that it will make me beautiful. Maybe not to you and maybe not to your best friend or your boss or your doctor or your pot dealer or your ex-girlfriend and that suits me fine. I want it for me. Just… me. And if it makes anyone else happy in the process, well that’ll just be a bonus.
If there is some group out there that seems to fit me, the *real* me, then I’ll be okay to fit in. I feel that way about the people I love. And to all others, they most certainly will get either a physical or spiritual flipping of the bird as my thoughtful reader suggests. My life is not to be spent trying to fit in with or to fall into line with anyone; not any more.
I’m excited. The more I see who I really am, the more I feel filled with joy and the more I remember the seedling I once was. I want to know what kind of amazing things that little girl who wished on stars and wrote songs about cartoon characters and didn’t care if her outfits were like everyone else’s grew up to be. I just know it’s gonna rock tits when I finally do. ;-)
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