This is me at my High School graduation. (Mom is going to KILL ME. lol)
I practically starved myself my senior year because I thought I was fat. I was delusional. I was happy but uncomfortable. By this time I already would NOT be caught dead in a bathing suit without a t-shirt and nothing made me more uncomfortable then that sleeveless dress.
I really thought about getting skinny constantly. I was pre-occupied with it. Secretly depressed I didn’t look like a twig. I know, I know. Ridiculous. You don’t have to remind me I have imaginary discussions with my younger self ALL the time.
Now here I am graduating college (with Mom again. 
A mere 5 years later (no wise cracks about taking 5 years. I did end up with a Masters Degree after all 
Still preoccupied with weight? Yes
Depressed about my body? YES
Wished I was back in that body I loathed in High School? MORE THEN ANYTHING IN THE WORLD.
What did my obsessive, preoccupation with my body get me? More and more weight. You can read my story for all the up and down details but I said it once and I’ll say it again. Dieting made me fat. If I just lived a normal, non-dieting, happy-with-myself life I probably would have never gained so much weight in the first place. It was the cycle of depravation and bingeing. It was the consoling myself with food. Even the lack of activity because I was ashamed of my body. All of those things made the scale go up. Nothing else (I’m not saying this is the case for everyone, just my personal experience)
Why am I taking this trip down memory lane? Well, I’ve been trying to find my workout groove again since moving and starting this new job. Last year at this time I was running tons, training for my first half marathon, lifting weights and taking classes when I could.
I felt great. I felt better then great. I felt fan-FRAKIN-tastic! Especially when I did that pull up. Talk about confidence and strength and fitness. I swear I was on top of my game and for the first time in my life I felt like an athlete. I really did, and that’s coming from a prior self proclaimed exercise hater.
The funny thing is I didn’t feel fan-FRAKIN-tastic because I was thin. I felt fan-FRAKIN-tastic (ok, so I just like to say fan-FRAKIN-tastic, sue me) because I kicked butt, scratch that, ASS. It sounds better.
Today I don’t kick as much of it. Ass that is. I mean, don’t get me wrong I’m still in great shape. I can still run a few miles and I can do a few push ups but I have no were near the strength or cardio capacity I had last year.
While working out this week I couldn’t help but feel a little tinge of regret. It saddens me that I went backwards a bit. That I lost some of the strength. The girl who would never run because someone told her she couldn’t ran a both a half and full marathon in just 1 short year, now hasn’t run in over a month.
I found myself really get depressed about this.
Then I started thinking about my younger self, that young woman in that picture up there, and how she literally punished herself for not being as thin as she thought she should be. I remember back then thinking my life would begin once I lost the weight. Once I wore a certain size. Once I could wear a bathing suit on the beach.
What bull shit.
Excuse my french. I normally don’t curse here but seriously what complete and utter BULL SHIT.
I had nothing to be ashamed regardless of my weight and ended up punishing myself for what? What did I gain besides weight and an even lower self esteem?
I’m now in a bit of the opposite situation, aren’t I? Instead of looking ahead thinking how great it would be when I lost the weight, when I got into that dress, when I saw that number on the scale, whatever. I’m now looking back and longing for when I was stronger, when I could do x number of push-ups, when I could run x number of miles, whatever.
It’s the same difference and I refuse to fall prey to this type of thinking anymore. Longing for what was or what could be, accomplishes nothing. Life is to short to live in the past or the future. I choose to live in the now.
With the past, I have nothing to do; nor with the future. I live now. ~Ralph Waldo Emerson
