I'm in the process of transferring to a new medical practice. I've had a good 5 year run with my primary but have decided to find someone new to meet my changing needs.
In order to get an appointment at the new practice I needed to have my medical records sent from the old one. It was an annoying process of phone calls, voice mails, faxes, missing pages....completely annoying to someone who has no patience.
Because of the confusion I had my records faxed directly to ME. That way I would have them if I ever had to do something like this again.
I picked up the fax, walked to my office flipping through the pages, and there it was.
I sat down in my chair.
My weight. Something that has tempted me for the last 3 years like a someone putting a Parliament Light to their lips in front of me. Calling my name like the Breyers Mint Chocolate Chip in my freezer.
LOOK AT ME! LOOK AT ME!
KNOW ME!
BE ME!
I have successfully avoided knowing my weight since before Rocco was born. I do not remember when I weighed myself last or what I actually weighed. I made a concious decision to stop weighing myself after years of doing it obsessively.
When I went to my OB appointments I faced the opposite direction of the scale and asked the nurses not to say the number out loud. I do the same when I see my primary. When someone asks my height and weight, I simply guess.
It has tempted me. That number. That 3 digit number I once worked so hard to get down to 2. The number I obsessed over. The number I clung to and identified with. I've been curious. But I've done so much work. In therapy. In AA. With God. Over time I lost interest. There wer more important things to focus on.
So...there it was in black and white.
And I started flipping through the pages.
Each visit. Height and weight.
It fluctuated. Not much.
I found myself disappointed in what I saw.
Page after page faced with a number I was somewhat mortified by.
I don't 'feel' that size. (because we anorexic/bulimics know 'fat' is a feeling, right?)
Do you think people know how much I weigh?
What if someone asks me?
Fleeting thoughts of doing something to change it.
SMALLER, smaller, smaller...
They were fleeting.
I feel great. Better than I have in my life.
I am strong. I can plank and burpee for days.
I am healthy. My hair, my skin, brighter than ever.
I feel happy. And that happiness is not contingent on what the scale says that day.
I feel free. From the trap of the scale. The obsession with numbers. The pressure that I allowed it to put on me.
The fax came on Monday. I've been sitting with this for 5 days.
I have not binged.
I have not purged.
I have not skipped a meal.
I ate that Breyers Mint Chip in bed.
I polished off the last of my cupcakes.
I did not over exercise.
I've told myself muscle weighs more than fat.
I've recommitted to NOT knowing my weight.
Because even though it didn't send me into a full blown relapse, it could have.
I'm not playing with fire.
Unless I decide to light that cigarette.....
