Letter from Fat Me to Skinny me

I have been wanting to write this letter for a long time - and now just seemed the right time to do it......

Dear Skinny Carolyn –

Ya You – What the…&*#@! You can be just so impatient – so back up – I have some things to get off my chest!

You know what I have already lost 50 pounds! I was over 316 and now I am at 260. I know I still have a long way to go. But let’s stop a moment and appreciate the work it took to get this far. And I only put on 10 pounds when I had cancer and I took it off again. I have not regained the weight that too is an achievement.  So let’s celebrate that!

Now, skinny you know all the changes I have made, exercising, changing my eating habits, eating healthier, walking more, tracking my food. But you know it is still hard. I still like my sweets and sugar. I don’t always eat as I should, but the good habits are out weighing the bad. I don’t track all the time. I do have a whole box cheese crackers and Rockefeller mud cake. I occasionally make pancakes. I have peanut butter and jelly for lunch. I still bake and sometimes get frozen dinners when I am just too tired to cook. Occasionally I still get a pint of Ben and Jerry’s though I can’t eat the whole pint. There are times when it feels like I am doing really good eating what I should and exercising and then there are times when I do sometimes do the emotional eating – I am always getting better at seeing the pattern and addressing what is bothering me in healthier ways and not using food to comfort the pain like a drug, but I also still fall of the wagon. I still have days – occasionally – when sweet and buttery things rule the day. 

For a long time I accepted my weight - I loved my soft roundness. I celebrated being Rubenesque or like the Venus of Willendorf. I learned how to look really good in the body I had. When my father once fussed to me about my weight - I responded in an annoyed voice that "Diet is Die with T" - that was the end of the diet discussion. I ate what I loved and lived the best as I could. Cancer and other health scares led me to reevaluate my eating patterns, my emotional eating patterns, my issues of hiding and silence and my relationships with food and people, I didn't want to be dead before 65 of something I had a chance to prevent.

I eat more veggies and whole grains. I have yogurt for breakfast. Most days I bring a big salad to work for lunch. I am always finding new ways to keep protein and carbs in good balance. For the summer I have been having Real Fruit popsicles for my sweet after dinner treat. I also don’t go to the bodega for chips on my way home from dinner. So I am slowly changing the physical patterns.

But you know it is more than just eating and exercise – it is psychological – it is the pain and hurt for all those years, the neglect from my mother, the hiding, the silence. The fat and emotional eating were protection from me getting hurt again – and protection for me that I didn’t put myself out there to be hurt – it was a fat wall of protection. This is the truth and I am now finally forgiving myself, my mother and also changing the patterns on so many different levels. It is not just feeling unheard and uncared for as a little girl, but also all of the pressure the culture and society inundates me and you with. How we should look, think, feel, act to get the good job, the right man, to have a happy life. I hid as a way of protection, of saving myself in a world where it felt like people didn’t want to listen or support or love me. I was silent too, I just went about doing my thing in silence. I learned silence in my family – we rarely talked about things and it wasn’t safe for me to share really deep hurts – no one helped me solve the problem or they didn’t support me with encouragement when I did try to fix things – and when I did I got either the fix-it solution for dad or no emotional support from mom.

So along with changing every day eating patterns I am also changing the emotional patterns. I am only learning now how to be happy for me, how to take gentle loving care of me, how to overcome the lack of self-confidence and pattern of silence, and to instead go after my dreams. I know I have hid behind my weight and my silence, and I still do. I can’t do that any more – I want to share, communicate, build community, put my words and wisdom out there at truth but also for hope for others who have been in similar situations to mine – with the message they too can be happy, they too can heal, with hard work.

Changing both these physical and emotional patterns takes work and practice from me every day –

Changing both these physical and emotional patterns takes work and practice from me every day. It takes being aware and careful all the time. It takes practice every day. Maybe it will get easier as time goes on, maybe it won’t.

I know I am scared to be seen and heard. I am scared to put myself out there in both deed and voice. But I can’t stay here either – I can’t stay in the silence and hiding – I don’t like it – I have to get out of this old cocoon and break out in to the light and live as my spirits asks me to live.

I am learning other ways to be in the world, wise but not naively all open. I am learning to put myself out there slowly in small steps. I am learning to be there for friends as much as I can in love and support, even when it is a little uncomfortable for me. I making new patterns that are different from the patterns I learned growing up. 

So Skinny, I know you are there and I am getting closer to you every day. I love that you keep me on track. I keep dedicating my healthy efforts to you again and again. I keep losing more weight and feeling healthier. Together we will get to my goal of 150 pounds. Every day with small acts I get closer to the goal.

Fat me.