I can’t recall the source, but I read that one pound looks like four sticks of butter. That conjures an image of Oprah pulling a wagon onto the stage during one of her shows, showing the amount of weight she had lost. Sometimes I close my eyes and try to visualize my own wagon full of 432 sticks of butter. It’s difficult because I’ve never seen that many sticks of butter at once, but also because, even though the scale tells me I’ve lost over 100 pounds and my clothes have gotten smaller, I don’t always see myself minus 432 sticks of butter.
If you study eating disorders, especially anorexia and bulimia, you already read that people look in the mirror and see themselves as fat. At my highest weight, I’d look in the mirror and be convinced I wasn’t that big. It’s only now, wearing pants that balloon around me, that I realize how big I was. And yet, when I look in the mirror wearing a size 10, I don’t see myself that much thinner. Not all the time.
There are moments, if I’m wearing an outfit that really fits and one that I’m comfortable in, that I can check myself out. I leave the house feeling confident. But there are other times I just don’t see it.
My distorted point of view and low self-esteem not only impact how I see myself, but how I feel about other people’s image of me. I was always the girl dancing by herself at a club. My friends would be partnering up with guys, getting a lot of attention. Every once in a while someone would take pity on me, but I usually had to just be content to dance amid the group or with one of my female friends. Last weekend, as part of a bachelorette party, I hit the dance floor feeling pretty good about myself. I lost count of the guys that danced with me, but afterward, I asked myself, “Did they dance with me because they were attracted to me, or because it was dark and they were drunk?”
I hate feeling pathetic and lacking confidence. It’s not always like that. I don’t know what makes me look in the mirror one day and see a thinner, happier version of myself, and the next day I still see 432 sticks of butter on my arms, thighs, stomach, butt.
