Looking Good Naked

I posted this entry on my WW blog back on May 16th.  I was having a down day. I will be putting a few of these up since I don’t generally share my WW blog with the outside world.  For the past 18 months, Weight Watchers has been a big part of my life.  Actually, it’s been the main focus of my life as I’ve thrown everything into losing weight and getting healthy.

Having said that, it’s not without its downs as well as its ups…

I have a little problem.

I’m having some body issues.

Aren’t we all? I hear you say. It’s pretty much why we’re all here. Body issues.

Obviously one does not get to 152kg without there being some collateral damage along the way. In particular, my skin. For those who started this journey off particularly large, I doubt it’s something that’s thought of much and to be honest, there’s a bigger (no pun intended) issue at hand when we start and that’s losing weight. Everything else is secondary. I haven’t really thought of it much myself.

In my enthusiasm for this journey, I conveniently forgot all about this issue. We’ve all been told that the slower you lose the weight the better as not only is it healthier (obviously) but skin has time to slowly bounce back.

In theory.

Unfortunately I believe there is a caveat to this. Even the toughest elastic doesn’t bounce back after years of being stretched taut over a frame that was just too large. I have many pairs of bathers and old granny undies that prove this.

I caught myself in the mirror last night while getting changed. It made me pause… then it made me cry a bit. I could deal with losing the girls – hell, I’ve already shrunk from an overflowing D to a smallish-completely-in-denial C. I could deal with forever having thick legs – had those even when I was thin.

I can’t deal with this.

I’ve lost enough weight now that I don’t even need to suck in my gut to see the way the skin over my ribs puckers and wrinkles or how my slowly shrinking belly apron is loose and sagged out. I find it difficult to look at the skin beneath the girls and see it there, a crinkled, scarred (operation in 2009 where the surgeon was effective but sloppy in stitching me up again) and crepe-papery-textured mess. No amount of shay butter or Moroccan oil is going to plump that shit up again.

I’ve always laughed and said that I would get a boob job when I got to goal as I like luscious boobies, though it would be more of a lift than an implant dealio. But I can’t exactly get a skin job, can I? A tummy tuck, when all is said and done, won’t help the condition of my skin. I’ve never once deluded myself into thinking that I will be the trim and tight-bodied Amazonian warrior that my personal trainer/ex-WW leader is now. Trim, yes. Tight-bodied? Not on your nelly. I just wanted to be healthy and I will still be healthy, I know this.

But… I also want to look good naked.

Me as at November 2011, having lost 29.8kg at that stage, holding a pair of size 28 pants that were too small for me the preceding January.