How the Grinch Stole My Body Image

My friends who know how self-conscious I get about my body will enjoy that my hormonal influx/weight gain had made me quite puffy today. So my favorite basic white t-shirt is unusually snug, and I've been walking around all day feeling like I'm mostly made of breasts. I feel like they suddenly grew three sizes like the goddamn Grinch's heart.

Family, Food, Facebook, Fat, Fuck.

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Boosting morale and apparently also your dick

So, hey, Creepy Guy From Another Office in my Building to Whom I've Only Ever Said 'Hi' in a Small Talky Sense...

I have not "been on a diet."

I have not "lost weight."

I DO "look good," but it's pretty gross that you said ALL that while passing me in the hall. I realize I can't get you to stop appraising my body, but it'd be SUPER great if you could stop reporting your findings aloud.

Worse, I said "Thank you," because I'm an asshole, and am now wondering what kind of goddamn hambeast I looked like before. (I look fine, it's just my dress -- sundresses are very kind to my body.)

By the way, yes, I do think I'd be this pissy if it were an attractive man who said it. Because you brought my weight AND dieting into your "compliment," implying my weight until today had been somehow suboptimal. So fuck you twice-baked.

P.S. By the way, dicknuts -- depression, anxiety, and stress can also cause weight loss. In my case, so can being on drugs that screw with your appetite and hopefully prevent you from going crazy. But hey, I'm thrilled I'm able give you your Monday lunchtime semi. I'll go find out who I speak to about adding "fluffer" to my business card.

Who put this Jesus in my vagina?

So today I did the annual gyno exam, which is generally annoying as fuck. I really don't appreciate anyone touching my vagina if it doesn't end in orgasm.

Got put on a birth control pill so I can be a fatter, moodier, assholier asshole. ("What's the Lamictal for?" "It's for Crazy, so make sure I get Pill Lite so we don't make that worse.")

Then went downstairs in the same building to an on-site lab -- SUPER convenient, but the lab is more free about being part of a Jesus-y hospital system. So there are crosses on the walls, presumably so I can pray to Jesus to forgive me for fucking, and also pray while the lady jacks four vials of my blood to make sure my vagina doesn't have any biblical plagues.

This better be the best goddamn sex I've ever had. 

The bitch of it? He's starting to annoy me so I don't think that's even going to happen. But these are all good things to have done in general.

Still, fuck everything. I am dizzy, and getting tacos on my way home. Hmph.

Fat-phobic or fat fetishist?

I woke up to a photo-less OkCupid guy's FIRST message to me: 

"Hey...Would you be willing to gain a little weight to please your man if you were in a committed relationship?
-- Steve"

Well, Steve. First off, thanks for the flashback to that "Family Guy" episode where Peter stuffs cake down Lois's gullet because he decides "fat sex is the hottest sex."

But also, my OKC profile includes photos of my already-weighing-quite-enough body, because men love asking if "curvy" is code for "obese," so I like to just get my mere "overweight" out there up-front.

So I can't decide if Steve wants me bigger than I am because he wants more to love? Or maybe he wants me to say obesity is disgusting and that I am a superior, health-minded individual who would never fall prey to The Fats?

I have so many questions, Steve.

My family shuns my food baby.

I spent the day with extended family, which first means I can't handle anymore noise and am incapacitated in silence on the couch. But it also means I spent the day being lauded for being "so petite!" and looking "so cute in skinny jeans!" Because apparently that's an achievement. "I could never wear those, I'd look like a beached whale!"

Oh, it's TOTES easy, you guys. All you have to do is upend your entire adult life: lose two consecutive jobs; get your heart broken twice (once in love, once in friendship); move apartments twice; doubt your overall worth; get fat; see therapists you can't really afford; get prescribed drugs that make you lose your previously voracious appetite; get thin because you're eating half as much; and constantly worry that even this tiny rug of vague stability you've managed to weave for yo' damn self is going to be pulled out from under you.

In the words of Elle Woods: "What, like it's hard?"

I don't know why I waste my time on my silly blog when I could clearly be writing the next big self-help book. 

I was also told how "natural" I looked holding Baby Cousin, and got the "Maybe you'll change your mind someday, you never know." Um, well, first, I'm 40 and single, so time's a wastin', and second, I was sure enough to end a decade-long relationship over the matter, which you're aware of, so I think I'm set. Thanks for the reminder, though. And also you're a dick.

Besides, in our family, being skinny vs. breeding seems very much an either/or situation. I'm gonna need you to prioritize your pressure. If I'm understanding correctly, being fat is acceptable as long my fat is the result of creating a person? But it's not cool if it's just a food baby?

Weight Loss, Crypt Keeper, Trainwreck, Lipstick, and "La-di-da"

A while back I asked y'all to come kick me if I didn't lose some weight, because my clothes didn't fit anymore and I hate shopping.

Turns out all I needed was a (prescription) drug that fucks up my appetite and makes me so thirsty I drink tons of water and always feel full, plus family, friend, and boy issues. I'm running on bananas, almonds, and kettle chips because that's all my body is accepting.

I feel like hell, I get wobbly, and my face looks like The Crypt Keeper, but I lost 5 lbs in one spectacular shitshow of a week.

I spent most of the past 2 days in bed (took a sick day yesterday), but eventually getting up, cleaning my house, then cleaning ME. It's remarkable how an irresponsibly hot shower and clean sheets can improve your outlook. (Plus watching "Trainwreck" again.)

I am going to be fine.

We're good, now, right, Brain? My family is still fucked, but you'll let me pine for just the ONE guy (the one who's actually worth even a passing thought)? And my friends are OK? And we'll be more mindful of eating at least enough that standing isn't so challenging and daylight doesn't hurt our eyes?

Right, then. Onward. Lipstick. Sushi. Power song!

Cize it up, size me down.

I had a screening at work for insurance discounts, and I got 3 out of 4 of the available discounts -- I am too fat to get the one for healthy BMI. BMI is a bunch of bullshit, but OK -- mine is high, qualifying me as "overweight."

1. Fuck you, I'm adorable. In the words of Cher Horowitz, I'm "like one of those Botticelli chicks." (But certainly NOT a Monet.)
2. HOWEVER...it's getting cooler and I can't just keep wearing summer dresses and ignoring the fact that none of my pants fit.
3. I don't necessarily care that I'm size 14; I just care that all the clothes I own are a 12. I'll be goddamned if I'm getting dicked out of an insurance discount AND have to spend money on larger clothes.
4. Maybe I'm wasting money on therapy when all I need to do to fix a "mood disorder not otherwise specified" is have some at-home therapy with Shaun T​. (It's not, but it can't hurt.) (Also, mmm, Shaun T...)

I've resolved this here before, so if I don't report back soon that I am once again partying in my pants, I'm going to post my address here and one of y'all has to come bust my kneecaps. Deal? Excellent. Glad we had this talk.(As a bonus, if you break my kneecaps, I can't work out. See what I did there?)

P.S. This is going to blow numerous goats, because the weather is changing and pretty much all I want to eat is lasagna. I'm basically Garfield from November through March.

A terrible feminist and probably an awful human being

I am a terrible feminist and probably an awful human being.

Everyone on board?

OK.

I definitely have my moments where I'm like, "Man, I'd kill to be built like Kerry Washington" or whoever.

But last night I watched Chicago again (for burlesque research!), and I realized, "Goddamn, I would much rather be built like me than like Super Thin Renée Zellweger any day."

I sincerely hope the most prominent feature of my chest is never the bones in it. (I can't even see those bones, I forgot there WERE bones there.)

I could floss with that woman. 

I know, I KNOW. I shouldn't judge another woman. There's room for all of us (ahem -- especially her, she's basically vapor), and we're all snowflakes, blah blah, bliddy blah, sisterhood, traveling pants, etc. FINE. I'm an asshole. We've established that.

Also, while she's tiny, I'm sure she does crazy yogalates-ninja-reformer class or something and could kill me with her pinky finger. Plus, she's a floppity-bajillionaire mega-star who can sing AND dance AND act (I'm told), and I live in a studio apartment and have 45 Facebook followers, so who the hell am I? She gives no fucks what I think, and rightly so. 

Now, don't get it twisted -- if you offered a trade of INCOME, I'd be on that shit like white on rice. (Not that she knows what rice is, but you get the idea.) But body-wise? I'm glad I'm me, is the point. Flat ass and all. I'm not a hater -- this was a self-esteem epiphany. So there.

Men > Toys. But toys are still good.

Texting the friend who sold me the new sex toy: "Just did a test run, and you were right. It's bigger than the one I had. A LOT bigger. I only need men for their tongues and hanging curtains now."

(Kidding, men. I can hang curtains. But I also really like your hands. And your voices. And your weight... Ahem. Sorry, what was my point...?)

Quotable Kaling

"Since I am not model-skinny, but also not super fat and fabulously owning my hugeness, I fall into that nebulous 'normal American woman' size that legions of fashion stylists detest. For the record, I'm a size 8 (this week, anyway). Many stylists hate that size because, I think, to them, it shows that I lack the discipline to be an ascetic or the confident sassy abandon to be a total fatty hedonist. They're like: pick a lane! Just be so enormous that you need to be buried in a piano, and dress accordingly."

-- Mindy Kaling, Is Everyone Hanging Out Without Me? (And Other Concerns)

Bass > Treble

Email to friends:

"Sad: This dress used to be loose on me, but since I've gained weight it's tighter now.

"Happy: It actually looks pretty fuckin' bangin' with a little more body in it."

#NoTreble

"I'm not fat. I'm Rubenesque."

I woke up about 2 weeks ago feeling suddenly and substantially fatter*, which is, like, a SPECTACULAR way to wake up. Clothes that had fit are all sausage-casey now, as if I'd gained 10 lbs overnight.

Excellent.

So in my continued effort to "stop being sad and be awesome instead (true story)," FINE, I'll try eating better and exercising. I am the only woman who finds it easier to drop a few pounds than to shop for new clothes. But it took me forEVER, and cost a lot of money, to find a decent wardrobe that fit my short, pudgy Muppet body properly, and I'll be goddamned if I'm going through that again. Running and yoga are free. Not eating is, like, SUPER free. So losing weight is easier AND cheaper. (Plus, you know, health reasons, but...whatever, ice cream is great and exercise blows.)


*I typed "substantially fatter" too quickly at first, and my iPhone was like, "You meant 'duvet sticky regret,' right?"

Jesus Christ, iPhone. No. That was LAST year.