Is it worth it?

Today I attended a friend's 35-year company anniversary party. I saw a lot of people I've worked with throughout the years but haven't seen for a very long time. Some of them knew me when I was skinny (123) and some knew me when I was fat (240), but every single one of them said almost the same thing...Oh my God! You're so skinny! You look fantastic! I probably heard that at least 30 times today. It was a huge morale boost. Just what I needed.

First of all, I AM NOT SKINNY. Far from it, I'm about 20 pounds from my perfect weight (135). My weight this morning was 156.6, up a tiny bit, so definitely not skinny. On the other hand, I really wouldn't call myself fat either.

What was interesting was they had a slide show displaying on one wall, showing pictures of people that had worked with my friend over the years. There were several pictures of me, from about 15 years ago, during one of my normal weight phases. I heard people say, Diana, there you are! I looked up at the screen and I'm serious, I didn't recognize myself at first. My hair was different, I use to wear it shorter and curly and not as blond, and I was about 15 years younger. I have a thing about having my picture taken, I've always hated it. For the obvious reason, I always thought I was fat and ugly.

As I looked at myself on the screen, I thought, why did I think I was so fat back then? I probably weighed about 130. I remember the shirt, it was a size small and I was wearing size 6 jeans. Funny, I can tell you my weight and what size I was wearing at just about any point in my life. Then I thought, and why on earth did I think I was so ugly? The woman, about 38 years old, looking down at me was not ugly, nor was she fat. She was kind of cute and definitely looked healthy. I remembered back then I did a high-impact, step aerobics class four times a week and was a vegetarian. Honestly, I looked pretty good.

It made me start thinking, in another fifteen years when I'm 68 am I going to look back at my pictures from today and think the same thing about myself--why did I think I was so fat and ugly back then?

I have terrible self-esteem issues that I've been trying to work through. It's really hard after a lifetime of negative self-talk-- I'm fat--I'm ugly--I'm stupid-- to turn it off. The voices in my head sometimes take over and I can't seem to shut them up. I know this is why I've had so many weight problems over the years. In a way, I guess I didn't think I was worthy of losing the weight and keeping it off. I wasn't worthy of being happy.

Something has changed in me this time around. I can't quite put my finger on it, but this time, I do think I'm worthy of being happy. Maybe because I'm older and wiser, maybe because I know there isn't a lot of time left to waste being fat and unhappy. At 53 my days are numbered. I'm on the downside of life, past middle age, entering into the last few decades on this earth.

Whatever age you are right now, you are worthy of being happy. Don't waste years of your life like I did, bouncing up and down by 50 or 100 pounds at a time, always unhappy with yourself. Always being critical, saying negative things in your head about how you look. Feeling worthless because of your weight and your inability to lose the weight and keep it off. I know it's hard to lose weight, damn hard, and even harder to keep it off. Some days even now I think well screw it. I don't want to exercise and I'm sick to death of counting Points. Then I remember myself from February 2008. That sad 240-pound woman was broken, in body and in spirit.

Is it worth it? Yes.