The surprising disappointment of being thin
or getting other things you think you want
Just before Christmas I was thin. Okay, not thin, slim. Not fat. It was my usual post-summer regimen of intermittent fasting, (the cornerstone), plus 10k steps a day and, I suppose, not eating much UPF. And one November morning I stood in the bathroom, feeling thin, but thinking Great, now what?
I have accepted now that while my children are at school, my life will follow a pattern of disordered eating during the holidays and a more predictable pattern in term time. My body shape waxes and wanes with this. (I never weigh myself, that kind of thing would send me mad - I do it on visuals and clothes only.)
But, every time, there is moment of disappointment when all the weight comes off. Fine, it’s gone, it all worked. Now what? Nothing has changed, life is the same. Yes it’s a relief that the system still works: that there is a manageable way not to get very fat. But it’s a bit of an anti-climax, too. I now see why celebrities who really transform their bodies with hard work - Davina, Geri Halliwell, Jools Oliver etc - are so keen to do big, glamorous photoshoots all oiled up and gleaming. If no-one is looking, what was the point?
In retrospect, with my mini-diets, the interesting bit is the journey there: can I do it? Will it work this time? I get up in the morning with purpose. I mean, it’s not nice, I feel anxious and skittish. I don’t like having a muffin top or the fright that this time it might be un-shiftable. But it’s interesting. It’s a challenge.
And I think this must apply to other things, too. The Hollywood psychiatrist Dr Phil Stutz, who I love to the max but try not to bang on about too much, observes that he tends to get new clients after awards season. Actors finally get their award, the thing they have assumed will validate their entire being, and it’s all great for 24 hours but then reality bites and suddenly they’re in free-falll. Nothing has changed. Now what?
This knowledge won’t stop me from dieting, or reaching for various goals - e.g. the cat finally using her microchip catflap, fixing our hot water pump - but it’s instructive and valuable to know that while reaching goals is great, it’s not the end.
Where do you stand on this? Did you ever finally get a thing that you really wanted and found it didn’t make you feel the way you thought it was going to make you feel? Please leave your story to amuse and inform us all in the handy box below.
I spent one third of my life anorexic, and so am something of an expert in this disappointment you share. Being thin was not enough, so I went for skinny. Skinny wasn't enough so I went for emaciated. Having achieved that, I went for audible gasps when I walked faux-nonchalantly on the beach in a bikini. I went for, will need a feeding tube if she goes any lower.
I stopped with the visibly disordered eating in my 20s. My weight climbed to normal range, and I lost my gall bladder, but not my secret focus on staying in a pants size 2-4. I preferred 0 (all the while my soul crying out How can there be a size 0, there could never be a size 0 for men, help me, world, help women, free us!). In my 40s I finally decided, enough. I was disgusted with how much mental space, how much time in my life was devoted to a body that, face it, most people never gave much thought to, no matter how much I tried to tell myself differently. If you put on 40 pounds some people might be unkind but very likely not the people who love you - they'll still love you, because you are not your weight. I found a therapist and I set out on the long strange journey of learning to love myself -I mean, really love myself, not just pretend to accept and like myself, smiling opaquely (is that a word) into the camera.
And now I do. Just in time for menopause to change my body yet again, but now I'm zen. I lift weights so my bones won't snap like twigs if I trip and fall. I do yoga so I don't trip and fall. I run, sometimes still passably fast. I have thoughts about my weight and my no longer 27" waist but I let them pass, like a bad smell. Weight is no longer the goal, self-acceptance is the goal. I think I've achieved it because while I have most definitely reached the age of "invisibility" (which by the way has far more benefits than drawbacks) when I look in the mirror, I see a beautiful woman looking back at me, a woman who knows that beauty is the least of my gifts that I offer the world.
I don't know what you're talking about. 24 hours on from finally fixing the wobble on the children's bathroom bog roll holder, I still feel like THE KING OF THE WORLD.