A Little T & A

Every once in a while I forget to be all poignant and reflective. Sometimes I just do things for the frivolity of it - thus this blog.

The idea came about today as I was getting ready to go meet new friends. Hopped out of the shower, did the "scent" thing, added the underwear and went into my office to pick out something festive to wear. The closet in my office has those cheesy mirror sliding doors which I hate - they never stay on the track - but today...today I love them.

I've had a lifetime of a love-hate relationship with my body, heavy on the hate - lite on the love. There was always something I wanted to change "before I __________". When I was younger, the "before I ______" was an age. I wanted to be such-and-such weight before I reached whatever age. My mother was always on a diet, always trying something new, looking for some kind of miracle cure for extra-round middles and jiggly thighs.

Part of the reason I waited "so long" to have sex was because I worried about what my boyfriend would see when the clothes came off... Of course, I learned later that when a 17 year-old girl takes her clothes off in front of a 17 year-old boy, he is immediately struck blind, deaf, and dumb, barely coherent, just blissfully grateful. :) Even then though, I wasn't satisfied with how I looked, comparing myself to other fabulous females with the means for personal trainers, personal chefs, plastic surgery, and airbrushing.

That was, of course, 10 years ago. Now, at this crossroads in my life, comes the fear that, somebody else is going to see me naked. Shit.

My body has gone through the traumas of my life. Pregnancy, depression, an eating disorder I don't talk about. Crash diets, fat-burning pills, extreme work-out sessions. Somewhere I got it into my head that all the problems of my life could be solved if I just got to such-and-such weight.

I used to have a recurring dream. Actually, my dreams are more like mini-movies I can manipulate. I write most of the lines, cast the co-stars, that kind of thing. Whenever I was unhappiest, I would retreat into dreams, because there...everybody loved me. So, my recurring dream...my favorite co-star was Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson. Sweet Lord, that man makes me want to praise Jesus that I was born a woman. :) Anyway, I would dream that I was on a late night run to Publix and I met him there, and somehow we embarked upon a friendship that ended up as more...getting off topic. Sorry. The point was that, during one of my dreams I was crying on his shoulder about how very ugly I felt all of the time, that it was because of my weight, my lack of figure, my jiggly thighs that made my husband fall out of love with me. And then he said something like "You're beautiful. Any man who spent 10 minutes with you would know it. The only thing is that you wear your sadness on the outside - but that is not all there is to you..."

Not sure if I got the point of that then, but now, especially tonight, it makes sense to me. It's true that, for years I wore my sadness on the outside. Dark circles under my eyes, watery smiles, hiding behind dark colors that magazine guaranteed would make me look thinner. And, dammit, I was hungry a lot.

When I walked in front of those mirror doors today in my underwear, I was a bit shocked. I know I don't weigh what my doctor thinks I should. I know I have "fall-off-the-wagon" days with my diet. I know that when a man calls me "Thickness" the name still applies.

But it was my face.

I was smiling - grinning really. I did a little twirl in front of the mirror, admiring my ample top and bottom, the tummy that's a bit firmer, the legs that are - well, pretty damn great. The calves, the arms, all of it. I may still be a work in progress, but with a smile on my face, for no reason other than because I didn't feel sad, I felt like myself, my true self.

So there's my story - amazing what a little T & A can do for a girl's ego :).