Butterball

This is me the week of my 60th birthday - not bad for 60 right? Yet, I'm not completely happy with the way I look - not completely comfortable with my body to be more precise. 

My Dad lovingly called me 'butterball' when I was a toddler - before my legs were long enough to give me a slender silhouette.  My first memory of thinking my body wasn't good enough was when I was in the 6th grade - my boobs hadn't grown yet and one of my girlfriends told me to eat tiny bites of white bread and drink water and they would grow - so I did it and my family assumed I was trying to diet and made fun of me - I was pretty much the perfect size - that's just how fucked up our culture is - they assume you want to lose weight even when you are slim. 

What am I not satisfied with you ask?  Well, this is a long list - because hey - I live and grew up in America - and all the unrealistic standards of what it is to be beautiful in this culture. So let me restrict the list to just physical shape and not get into face and aging and hair etc.

  • My upper arms are super flabby - got the 'waddle'
  • My thighs have a droop to the skin that I've only ever seen on women who are at least 20 years older than me
  • My stomach sticks out in most of my outfits
  • I've developed back fat - yikes!
  • My ass has cellulite right where the thighs meet up to it
Notice my boobs are not in this list - right after I had my 2nd child I was taking a bath and my mother came into the bathroom and looked at me and said, "Your boobs are really sagging.  My boobs look better than yours".  While it is true that my mother is fucked up in the head in many ways - her words still hurt - and from that point on I hated my boobs.  So, as soon as I had some money - which was over 10 years later - I got those boobs fixed.  The guy I was dating at the time - told me my boobs were just fine and I didn't need to do anything - but of course I didn't believe him and got the surgery anyway.

So here I am - the expert on clothes that work for my body - I have tights in every color and pattern you can imagine - great way to cover up the unsightly legs - I have 'fit and flare' dresses and 'empire waist' dresses to take attention away from that gut that is jutting out - and I wear tops that only come down as far as my bra strap in the back.  And everyone will just have to deal with the flabby arms because I refuse to restrict myself to only wearing tops with sleeves!  Over the years I warned men who were attracted to me that I look better in my clothes than out of my clothes - they didn't believe me - and yes some of them who were only looking for a good time anyway - couldn't wait to get back out of bed!

I was talking to a plastic surgeon one time about liposuction for the fat around my inner knee - this was 20 years ago before there were all these body contouring techniques that seem commonplace now - anyway, he said, "Why don't you just exercise?"  Well, I have been exercising on and off for all of my adult life - and I have to agree that he had a point - but truthfully if I had the money I would be a cosmetic procedure junkie - but I don't have the money (sigh).  

I don't seem to be able to maintain an on-going routine - a lifestyle that includes exercise consistently.  I've had lots of 'reasons' such as raising my kids on my own and going to school full time - later when the kids were raised and I was done with school - then I blamed it on my high-stress demanding job.  If I am being honest though, I will admit that the biggest barrier to me not exercising these last several years has been because I was depressed.  And now, I am retired and a lot of the stress and depression have lifted - so there really isn't any excuse.

The teachers at the Bar Method https://barmethod.com/locations/austin-downtown/ say that you need to go to 4-5 classes a week to see results.  I started out going 3 times a week - and I'm increasing it starting this week.  It is pretty easy for me to go that many times - the drive there from my house is easy peasy and there is no hassle parking - and they offer classes morning, noon and night - all factors that really help to motivate me to get there.  My body is doing pretty well with recovering from the classes now - I did go to another type of exercise class for a few months before I started the Bar Method and that probably helped decrease the 'get in shape curve' so that I could attend more frequently.  

The Bar Method teachers also say to really clinch those muscles to go for the 'shake' which at first had me perplexed - the only times I remember my legs shaking for instance were during childbirth or an all night sex session - so the shaking thing kinda scared the shit out of me!  Well, more about shit and the lack thereof in a later blogpost - that is another topic all it's own and deserving of a much longer conversation to how this all relates to this body I am trying to love!

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Hell Is Planning What To Eat

Image
I think planning a trip to the grocery store is the real reason a lot of people become agoraphobic - I just feel paralyzed - which is why I end up darting to the store for a 'few things' several times a week and grabbing protein bars and cans of white tuna in water.  Sure, I have lots of experience with planning meals for special occasions and I'm really good at it - but here is the thing - I know I need to plan to spend the extra money to make all the recipes - whereas planning what to eat just for myself for an entire week - and let's not forget that it needs to be healthy too so I can drop a few pounds - well that mentally feels like an impossible feat - I mean, how can I pay for all this on my retirement salary?  And let's face it - how much fun is it to cook just for yourself?  Which is why I stick to steamed broccoli with cheese, protein shakes, and apples with natural peanut butter for instance - but I have to admit - this is not working.  I am staying ar...
Read more

Wishing A Small Dropping For You

Image
A 'small dropping' is like straining and straining to produce something and all that you get is this little kernel - and you feel so unproductive - and when people ask you how it is going you dejectedly say, "Nothing but rabbit turds". This is how I've felt for years when it comes to straining to tweak all the many aspects needed to become my ideal self.  So here we are in 2018 and I'm 60 years old and asking myself, "If not now - when?" I mean, I've been working on some of this same shit for over 50 years!  So, feeling in the spirit of the new year, I strained and strained and produced a small dropping in the form of a quicksand metaphor of the goals and barriers I experience. There was the quicksand composition and how that manifests - then what it's like to be in the quicksand followed by why do I give a fuck? and what am I going to do about it?  Let's take my physical body for instance - from YMCA exercise classes to Jazzerci...
Read more

The Ugly Duckling Blues

Image
It was hard to feel attractive this week with a scabby-peeling face and decolletage - and the persistent gray skies - and worse of all - with the weight gain while on my stupid diet of counting calories!  My face problem (healing from the sun damage treatment) was enough to make me want to stay home until it was over - then add the bleak weather devoid of real sunshine - and it is a wonder that I made it to Bar Method class everyday!  And I do apologize to my classmates who had to see this ugly duckling! No doubt that my hours and hours of watching Amazon Prime did not help in the losing weight department - the only activity I did all week was to go to Bar Method class ( https://barmethod.com/locations/austin-downtown /) - so thank God for that!  I have been going once a day now for two weeks straight -  and I do feel tighter and stronger - and I think my form in class has improved and I'm taking as many of the challenges during class as possible!  I a...
Read more