A Challenge From My Sister

My sister over at unbrave girl has issued a challenge to everyone to stop being self-hating and snarky about their bodies. She's sick and tired of being sick and tired of her own body. I can totally sympathize with her. You see, since she and I share the same parents, we also share the same genes for body problems. While she amazingly dodged the "Kimble-family-endocrine-disorder" gene (I did not, I have Grave's disease), we both have the "Thelen-family-overweight" gene. This gene is a dominant one and very strong in its expression. It's not the typical fat gene where you get fat if you sit on your butt and eat a lot, but get thin if you exercise and eat less. Nope. It's not like that. It's the gene where you get fat and stay fat regardless of eating nothing but salads and air, and you stay fat even though you run 5K marathons for fun and can carry 75 lbs. of goat feed on one shoulder. It's that kind of fat gene. The stubborn kind.

Yay... Fat genes....

I have been having trouble with my weight since... birth. I don't ever remember being under 180 lbs. at all until college. I was that big kid in grade school who looked like she was held back a few grades because I towered over the boys and had to buy my clothes in the women's department starting in 5th grade. I did lose a few pounds during college by being poor and living off of Triscuits and grape soda while working at a job that was a 1 mile walk uphill to get to. Even then my lowest weight was 172 lbs.

This is me.

For the last four years I have been stalled at 210 lbs. I recently resurrected the good ol' food journal and saw that while I hadn't gained any weight since 2010 (F--- yeah!), I also haven't lost any (WTF?!). I even had a baby between then and now. I only gained 10 lbs. during pregnancy and pretty much dumped that out on the day the kid was born. That's how stubborn my fat gene is. My weight didn't even move during pregnancy -- how many people can say that!? My body is apparently VERY comfortable at 210.

This is me at 210 lbs.

And so in conclusion, I accept my sister's challenge to stop being mean to my body by thinking ill of it. But I raise a challenge of my own -- GET OFF THE 210 MARK! (And not in the heavier way!). The time is now. I need to work with what I have and who I am to be healthier and lose some weight. I don't want to be over 200 lbs. any more. It's not good for me. I don't care if I still have bags under my eyes or if I still have giant flabby upper arms or if I still can't wear shorts because of my "thees" (like cankles, but where you thigh ends below your knee) -----that is all body-snark and it ends TODAY!--- I really just want to get that scale to move. It's my personal challenge to myself*. I am going to stop bashing my body and I am also going to try to improve it. I am going to work with it, not against it.

*Well, not so personal since I am currently in the "Biggest Loser" contest being held where I work. It started on May 31st and runs through August 31st.