Isn't it funny, how gaining weight messes with your mind. I don't know if anybody else ever felt this way but, I have thought about this a lot lately. When I was younger and weighed 120-130 lbs., I was a very confident person. Out in the workforce every day, I new I was doing a good job. I was confident and friendly and creative. I got pregnant in the summer of '93 and quit my job that fall. I loved staying at home and raising my child, keeping house and cooking good food. Over the next 5 years that good food got the best of me and I managed to gain 30 lbs. With my baby in school by then I realised it was time to go back to work and started looking for work. Here is where I started noticing how much 5 years and 30 more lbs. makes a big difference. I did get a job as a bus driver and child care worker. I know that this is all in my own mind but I remember feeling that, because I was a 'big girl', nobody cared what I was thinking and
nobody wanted to hear what I had to say. I tried to stay in the background, stay quiet and just be invisable. I remember hating the fact that I had to even go out in public, wishing I never had to deal with people again. I wanted to go home and never leave home again. That is so different then the way I was back when I was younger and skinnier. It even amazed me then that I felt that way. I still struggle with that somewhat even though I have lost 15-20 lbs (depends on what day I weigh in). I do feel better about myself but still have to have a talk with myself once in a while and tell my stupid self that none of that is true. It is all in my head.
How did it effect you guys? Anything like this? Am I just crazy?
2 comments:
Mine isn't so much weight related - I think back to what little confidence I had in grade school and high school - and even though I have come such a long way since then - the old lack of confidence creeps back all the time, and I have to tell myself that I am not that girl anymore - I can do it!! I'm sure I will be dealing with this little part of my psyche the rest of my life, though. Maybe it's what keeps me humble.
How did this effect me? I was always too shy to assert myself, but in the last 25 years, I think I have grown out of some of that. I didn't start to gain weight until I was 30, then it was gradual but increased every year. It has only been in the last 6 or 8 years that I was getting very uncomfortable with my weight. I didn't like how it made me feel, insignificant, indifferent. As you said, ineffective, unattractive, uncomfortable meeting people. Now that I have lost 38 pounds, I have noticed that people treat me differently. But I hadn't noticed that I was treated that way until I lost the weight. Guys are quicker to open a door, cashiers in a store are quicker to wait on you, I get more respect. I know I have more confidence and am more assertive too, something I never was as a young teen or twenty something. So, no you aren't crazy.
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