I love loosing weight. Truely I do. I do have aproblem with it though. You see, as I lose weight my clothes are fitting really nice. Whats under my clothes is a freightning sight. Let me give you some history. I had my babys back to back. I mean really back to back. They are 11 months and a day apart. I weighed about 140-145 before i had my first. ballooned to 180-185. Lost some of the weight dont really remember how much. Got preganant with my second and went up to 200. I lost all my weight and then some over the next year or so. I went down to 137 and loved it. ( sshhh by the way it was with weight watchers)
Last Feb. i went out of work because of foot surgery. I had become very stagnant and ate alot out of bordom. Thats how I ended up here and at 155-158. I am having problems this time around. Not with losing weight but with my body image. I don't know weither I liked my self better at 155 than I do now. I'll tell you why. I have alot of stretch marks. some measuring a half an inch across and almost two inches long. these are on my hips through my wasit. I also have them on my upper thighs and my
rear. I tend to lose weight first in my stomach. And, the excess skin I have below my belly button is awful. The top of my belly button sags and it dosnt even lok like one. Not to mention my breasts. From breast feeding for almost two years all I can say where are they. I keep thinking when I was heavier I didnt see all these imperfections. I wanted to know if anyone else feels the way that I do. This is a very painful thing for me. I have been crying through this whole confession.

I am in a very similar situation. My children are much more spread out, but since the birth of my son in Oct 2000 I have not been able to lose any weight. I have actually gained about 15-20lbs. I feel huge. I have all of the same problems you have described as far as stretch marks and the under the belly (awful) thing. I notice and dislike all of these things now, I can't imagine what it will be like if I do shed all of this weight. I don't have an answer to the problems, but I am sure some exersize that includes weight training for these specific areas can help some.

Rosie

I was having this very same conversation with a friend of mine the other day. I said to her Im a size 10, [Im sure sizes in the states are different cause most with my stats are in a size 8] With my clothes on, I feel I look good and I get compliments. However I have hideous stretch marks all over my abs and stomach, and so looking at myself naked ummm isnt appealing. LOL I Had 2 kids both by c-section and I love them dearly but I wished I could have a flatter tummy and NO stretch marks!

I wish I could give all you gals a hug, especially you, mermaid. Like many of us, I too-often hold my naked body up to the ideal of the airbrushed photos in the mags, and find myself sadly lacking.

What is there to do? well, option A is to take a second job, save, and have plastic surgery after plastic surgery. But somehow, I don't think that will go to the heart of the matter. I don't think it's a cure, and I don't think I'd ever feel satisfied.

So I go with my option B, which is really hard, and which I have to work on constantly. This involves a lot of re-thinking, re-teaching in opposition to what I'm otherwise told. I remind myself that it's not important how I look, but who I am and how I behave. I remind myself that good people will also judge me on the real stuff and that anyone who didn't like me because I had sagging breasts is not worth me fretting over. I remind myself that this demand that women both be attractive to attract men with whom we then have babies and then have babies and the inevitable physical changes pregnancies cause is illogical, half-insane, and at its heart, misogynistic and anti-nature.

I really look at the women in the locker room in the gym--you know what? They all have cellulite. Their breasts all sag. Most of them have stretch marks. And these are the women who work out!--I can only assume women who don't sag more. I collect pictures of real women--not airbrushed--in their beautiful variety.

I remind myself that in, say, ice hockey, men's scars are considered sexy, a sign of the battles they've endured. Well, my lifelong fight with obesity is a battle that makes the biggest Domi-Ray fight look like pansy stuff. When I'm in yoga, in "downward dog" and really notice all that excess skin bunched up on my thighs, I think: these are my battle scars, and by gum, I'm going to be proud of them!

I wouldn't accept from a lover words like, "god, your body is so awful. Look at those stretch marks! I'm disgusted!" Why then should I accept them from myself?

Yes sometimes it feels like I'm losing this fight against bad body image...but more and more it feels that I am winning it.

I want to say thanks. Thank-you for your words of wisdom. I think now I will jump back on the band wagon and start losing again.

Hi mermaid -

I'm sooo with you! My lower abdomen is a mess.

Razzle, I kind of agree with you...but then again I don't. I'm willing to accept the nose I was born with, most of my stretch marks, that fact that my shoulders are kinda slopey and I have a long jaw. I don't colour my hair though I do pluck my eyebrows. But if someone offered to pay for the plastic surgery to fix my stomach I'd take the money and run to the closest reputable plastic surgeon and beg them to do it right away.

Why? Let's see. Those other things I was born with. While I earned that stomach and have two incredible kids to show for it...it isn't something natural for me. As I comptemplate being newly single, the fact of the matter is that this stomach of mine is a barrier to intimacy for me. I would have to feel incredibly safe to show it to anyone.

Just my $.02

Lisa

Boy O boy do I agree with U! I have often said if I could have a tummy tuck and a boob lift I would have the body of a 20 yr old. LOL The reality is that Im 37 and I cant change much so I need to just except who I am...LOL and look at myself naked in the dark I suppose. As for your concern about intimacy....Maybe it will be better in the end...meaning when U feel really comfortable with someone it will be more special?

I know how you feel about those stretch marks. I have two wonderful children, both by c-section and have the rail road tracks across my a_ _ to prove it! They also go down my upper thighs so a bathing suit w/o a skirt is not something I've seen in a long while. I have found a quick and easy way to help camouflage them though, TANNING! I know it is not the safest thing in the world, but it does help and it does make me feel better about myself. If you're totally against tanning beds, how 'bout a tan from a bottle. There are a bunch of real good ones out there now that wont turn you orange.

Good luck to you!
Heather

Hello, ladies.

I've been doing a lot of thinking and questioning lately about my own body image. I have many of the same problems as you--sagging skin, the c-section "below the tummy" flab, some stretch marks--but those aren't what really bother me. I *earned* those, and I accept them.

My questions revolve around the problem I have seeing myself *at the weight I am now.* I know I'm wearing a size 14 (U.S.), I can read the tags in my clothing... but I still see that size 22-24 fat woman a lot of the time when I look in the mirror. Even when I'm naked and surveying the landscape, as it were, and I can *see* a waist, and *see* hips like they're meant to be (that is to say, sloping down a little from a waist and then melding into thighs, rather than that "bookshelf" I had when I weighed 235 or more), I still have trouble believing it's really... well, real.

I didn't keep any of my "fat clothes." I gave them to friends who could wear them, or I took them to Goodwill. Nothing in the closet right now is larger than a size 16. (And most of *those* are too big, with the exception of one cute little slipdress-thing that ran small to begin with--it fits just right, now.) I refuse to have a stockpile of clothes packed away "in case this doesn't work, like all the rest of the times I tried." This time it's for good, it's for real, and it's for life.

So what's the problem? Why am I having such a rough time accepting that I'm now considered "moderately overweight" instead of "morbidly obese?"

Does anyone else out there have this problem? Did you have it, and got over it? Do you still have it and *want* to get over it? I'd be interested to hear from you, either way. This isn't an obsession, but it's terribly intriguing to me.

Yesterday I just went to my closet and cleared out my in between clothes. 9 years ago I weighed about 240 wearing about a size 22 or what ever would fit. I cleaned those clothes out about 6 months ago. So yesterday I cruised by a second hand store and bought a few more new things. [I hate paying full price for brand new things when I can get so much more that are good quality for a lot cheaper..LOL] I wont be throwing out the clothes Ive just removed but have them in a bag in my basement. Is it a security thing? I dunno. I have been maintaining now for 5 months and I feel well and satisfied however just a little part of me wonders if something wont go wrong and I may put some weight on. I sure hope not!

Like you, Karen, I still look in the mirror and see the fat lady. I've been fat for a long time, and, before then, even when I wasn't fat, my perception of myself was that I was. I have lost weight all over so my overall shape is still similar to what it was, even though it is smaller overall, and that is part of it. But also, peoples' self-images are notoriously inaccurate, like the anorexics who look at their little bones in the mirror and see only blubber. It'll be interesting to see how long it takes for my perception to catch up with the actuality. I have gone down four clothes sizes in five months. I do suspect that there is a perception, maybe only on my part, that one isn't really "thin" until one looks like the six-foot tall ectomorphs in the fashion magazines. I never will.
You know, you never realise how alien those girls look until you see them in a photo with a normal person in the frame? They only look normal next to eachother. Next to anyone else, they look quite strange. I saw a photo of two models walking along in front of a little old lady once, and at first glance it seemed as if they were a long way ahead and she was way off in the distance. Then I looked at the paving stones on the ground and she was only about two feet behind them.
Zan

Its funny you know, but I realized about a month ago that I was finally thin and "normal". I think that I started to accept that I looked different after I'd lost about 40 lbs. What's really started to make a difference is weight training. Suddenly I can see muscles under my skin. I can feel how hard my shoulder muscles are. My thighs look so neat! Curvy, with nice hamstring definition. Exercise has really helped me to feel "in my skin"...I don't know if this makes sense of I'm rambling but there you have it!

I do remember, at about 170, when I was wondering if I could do it, and if I did, would I ever feel thin? I think these feelings might be part of the process of losing weight both physically and mentally.

Lisa

After reading your comments, I hear you. I too, am having the same problem. Being overweight all my life and now hearing, what everybody else is telling me, about my weight loss, I am having a hard time accepting it too. I still see myself as fat / overweight. Yeah yeah, I know, reading my stats you can read approx 100-lbs lost but I still see that big body in the mirror. The side view is nice but still see the wide front view. Somedays I feel thinner and others just as big. Even wearing size 36-in waist jeans, down from 46-in, I still don't really see the difference. Have that loose skin thing going on in the waist / stomach area / love handles. Even putting on a pair of my old jeans and having to tie the belt around them sometimes doesn't help. I still feel fat.

So I hear you both. Just a state of mind. Accepting the current size of your body now, will take some time to adjust to I'd guess. I find myself thinking I'm a big guy still, even with friends saying "you've lost enough already", stop it dammit! It will take some time, that's all.

Just my 2-cents.
Cheer, John

Here's something to think about. How many weeks did you spend thinking of yourselves as "Fat"? It might take just as long to get used to being "thin". I remember being 150 lbs in a size 7 back in 1989 - it lasted about a year. I spent the whole year thinking I needed to lose 20 lbs.

Maybe accepting our 'thinness' isn't that different from learning to drink 2 litres of water a day - it just takes practice.

Nat

If a masculine perspective is unwelcome in this thread, please skip on to the next.
Having a Wonderful Gorgeous and Talented Wife and daughter (who takes after her mother's good looks and her father's weird sense of humour!) Body Image is a reality in my life as husband and father. Happily, my daughters trials are currently limited to mean-minded class mates who try to antagonize her by calling her 'fat.'
But my wife is a work of art always to be treasured. True, her contours have not remained unchanged over the eight years that we have been married, but I love her deeply, even when she makes herself ill eating Michelinas yeccch (58 g carb) for lunch.
When I can find it, I will post an observation on Dante Alligheri who apparently cause quite a scandal in his day by falling in love with somone not deemed to be beautiful, the point, IIRC, being that he did not imagine that she was beautiful, when she was not, but rather that he saw her as she really was.
The point, one would hope, of low carbing is to take the best care we can of our bodies while we have the care of them. yet we are subject to time and age and gravity. C.S. Lewis once observed that "100% of the people now alive will die, and that is a percentage that can neither be increased or decreased."
Yet hope is not lost. I find my wife staggeringly beautiful, not just for her appearance, but also for being the mother of our daughter, and for all her manifold gifts and talents. But are you and I so different from her? We all have value that far exceeds our appearance.
I have had the priviledge of knowing a number of octo- and nonogenarian ladies, and even a centarian, and regardless of Alzheimer's or Parkinson's, they are beautiful. Did they become beautiful when they turned 80, or 90, or 100? My experience has been that they have always been so.
My apologies for going on so long, I guess the short answer to the unspoken question "Am I beautiful?" is "YES!" My admiration and congratulations to all who have been working to help and re-educate those of us just discovering this WOE and WOL. I hope we all find someone to encourage us on the restorative work here begun but also to remind us that true beauty, as well as true love, never grows old, and never dies.

Kipling