Denial ain't just a river in Egypt. ~ Mark Twain

Denial can be such an ugly thing. It's part of what allows people such as myself to get so damn fat. Denial is simply a defense mechanism that we use to reject something that's just too nasty to deal with. It makes sense, right? It can be good in some instances. Some things that we deny, though -- like obesity -- have a way of forcing us to deal with them at some point.

I know all about denial. How do you think I ended up getting that fat? I told myself it wasn't a big deal because I didn't have any co-morbidities. I thought things like "at least I'm not so fat that I'm disabled." Or, "I may weigh 300 pounds but at least I don't look like that." Where that referred to a person who I thought looked fatter or wore unflattering clothes or whatever. As long as I could find someone that I perceived as somehow worse off than me, then I could tell myself that I was okay. Nevermind that being more than 100 pounds overweight is inherently unhealthy and co-morbidities were sure to follow at some point, or that it's not about what other people look like...it's about my appearance and my health. I couldn't walk up the stairs in our house without huffing and puffing. Bending over to tie my shoes got me out of breath. My knees hurt if I walked for any real distance. I got rashes between fat rolls in the summer because of trapped sweat. The list goes on. Denial.

And as I gained weight, I kept moving my bar for what constituted "a real problem." 50 pounds overweight? Okay, that's not good, but it's not too bad. I'm tall, I carry it well, I feel fine, whatever. 75 pounds? Yeah, that's bad, but when I get to 100, then I'll really do something. It's not hard to just keep adjusting the "when I weigh this much then I will _____." In an effort to make me feel better once, Beau said that he wouldn't urge me to do anything or really be worried about my health unless I weighed "like 300 pounds or something." The day I got on the scale and saw 300 pounds (and told him, I don't understand keeping that a secret from your spouse), he didn't really have much to say. Maybe he thought that day would never come. I sure as hell didn't.

I think when I took photos of myself in my hotel room the day of my surgery, that was the first time I'd really taken a good look at myself in a very long time. The bathroom had a lot of mirrors, including one where I could get a full and unadulterated view of my backside. And I cried. A lot. How could I have been in so much denial that I let it get to that point? Beau didn't really understand -- he thought I was being too hard on myself and calling myself "ugly." I wasn't, but I grieved for the damage that I'd done to myself.

No matter how much weight I lose, I'll carry reminders of that for the rest of my life. I have a million stretch marks. I have loose skin and that'll probably just get worse. I think it's good in a way, though, to have reminders of how far I've come, lest I get there again. Some part of me will always be the fat girl. I still have a long way to go.

I'm still working on the process of forgiving myself and understanding that I'd developed these coping mechanisms long ago. That's not an excuse, but it's part of the reason why. I grieve for that quiet, sensitive little girl who needed gentle guidance, understanding and affection but didn't get it most of the time. This also entails forgiving my family, but I really can't blame them as they don't have good coping skills either. It's a cycle and I intend it to stop with me. But finding the right balance between giving myself a free pass and being too hard on myself is tricky.