day two - tick!

One day without a binge and I just caught myself actually feeling good about my body. Fear not though, it only took a mere millisecond for my inner critic to put me back in my place with a reminder it's the very same body I felt shit about yesterday and the day before that. It really is a rollercoaster ride when happiness is so closely tied to body image but my body image is so disconnected from reality.

It was a different story this morning. As I walked to work from the station there wasn't a glimmer of feeling good, I just felt extremely uncomfortable in my clothes. In my head it was just the same as when I was 25 stone; my legs rubbed, my tummy rolled and my silhouetted reflection was unspeakably enormous. It didn't figure in my disgust that now it was now a size 14 jacket that wouldn't do up comfortably and not a size 24-26 one and the skirt that was presently riding up my hips was a size 16-18 not an elastic waisted 26-28. It was the same feelings; most likely not quite as bad but at times like these I blot out the memory of just how bad it was - and just how big I was.

I can't appreciate the net loss of about 60 kilos (9 1/2 stone). In fact I can hardly see it. On the way up the scale I always knew I was huge and hated myself for it but at the same time I don't think I ever really knew the reality of just how enormous I must have been. I'm big enough as it is how could I possibly have been 9 and a half stone more?

So now this is almost a second day without a binge. I ate too much pasta at lunch and had a large glass of wine but neither of them were out of control so they don't count. I've just licked my plate clean of a mushy lean cuisine meal (I can't be trusted to figure out my own portion control or contemplate a supermarket shop so it's frozen goodness for me for a while) and I'm almost satisfied. I'm supposed to feel proud I guess. My mum says I should take my victories where I can, but I'm finding it hard to see one day without a binge as a victory when it's one that a year ago wouldn't have even existed. A year ago I'd conquered the binges.

I'm re-setting my targets. I want to lose 31kg (68lb). Ideally I want to have lost the majority of it by the time I fly back home to the UK in October but I'm too realistic to rush myself so I'll settle for just the 16kg (35lb) I've put back on in the last few months for starters. In Britain I'll be seeing people who haven't seen me since I was 23 stone (146kg) so anything would be good, but there will also be folk who saw me 4 months ago and I'd hate for them to witness the 16kg weight gain - they were all so proud of me.

The UK reference might explain my flagrant switching between imperial to metric, back in blighty my blubber numbers were stones and pounds but a few years in Oz later it's kilo's that define me.