Can we talk about skinny bitches? You know, I used to be one, prancing around in my size 6 jeans and feeling like there would never be a day when I would have a voluminous extra ass and jiggly hips and thighs... and arms. Then I got hella down in the dumps and foods I would never even eat before, like bagels and croissants, started to be my staples for breakfast, lunch and dinner.
I'm not sure where the turning point came (if it has come) but I thought, do I really want to gain more? I mean, this has REALLY gotten out of hand. (When you have labored breathing getting into your car, it's time to examine your life and diet).
So I decide to sign up for a boot camp in my neighborhood. Right. A normal person might start taking long walks or say, ride the bike at one of her three gyms she pays memberships a month to.
Not me. I may have my "Before" body, but I want my "After" life.
I go to the Pilates bootcamp (yeah, I'm rolling my eyes at my extreme pretentiousness, too). What I remember about pilates is that it's exercise you can do laying down. I'm in! Can we watch TV, too?
Oh, but then the Skinny Bitches who are taking the class with me walk in, each in a more fabulous and more Juicy outfit than the other. Are you kidding me? I'm wearing bright blue Target (half price sweats), a red Gap t-shirt and mismatched socks.
The Skinny Bitches scoff at me. And I scoff at myself. This is not my Burbank pilates - this is a Kick Your Ass and Hand It Back To You workout. I rustle through my purse making sure I have my insurance card with me.
The only comfort I have is that a Very Famous TV Star is in class and he cannot keep up either. I won't say who he is, because ya know, I want to be respectful of his privacy. Okay, it's totally TR Knight from "Grey's Anatomy" and I'm kicking his ass but that's not saying much. He keeps reducing the weights whenever the instructor turns around.
I leave, every inch of me drenched in sweat. I now feel immense compassion for any self-defined big girl who returns to a work out class after not going in like, forever. It's hard. I wonder if people made assumptions about me. I wish I had a t-shirt that said, "I Used To Be Thin Like You."
Hmmmm... it couldn't be much to print one of those up?
I always said, this wouldn't be a diet blog. It's my journey back to the person I used to be. And that person was fit and kick ass. She might have been a Skinny Bitch, too. Someone who wore her perfect outfits to exercise class and took her sensible weight for granted.
I will never do that again.
I will say, when I gain weight, I am in total denial. Even as I'm going from my jeans, to bigger jeans, to sweat pants - I kind of have no idea that I am changing. I think, I'm just me and somehow when I'm ready, I'll (snap my fingers) just go back to a size 6.
Yesterday's insanely, brutal wake-up call in the form of a woman screaming at me to "Get that butt, up! Up! Do you want those saddle bags??? DO YOU WANT THAT JIGGLE BEHIND YOUR ARMS????", told me, this is going to be a frickin' lot of work.
(P.S. I did wonder what would happen if I told her that Yes, indeed, I did want to to keep my saddle bags, but I was too scared. So was TR.)
I went back again, today. I could almost feel tears coming to my eyes, it was so INCREDIBLY hard. Why did I do this to myself? UGH!
But I also felt immensely proud. I didn't let the Skinny Bitches deter me. And I got my butt up, a little higher and my instructor even screamed at me a little less today.
Awesome.
This blog is dedicated to Big Girls who take big chances.
