I guess the weight of the world isn’t just on my shoulders

Oh almost forgot, while the boys and I were at the library yesterday, we ran into an acquaintance we haven’t seen in a while. I say “you look great” since the last time I saw her, she was pregnant and longer hair. Legit right? But she proceeds to comment ” ‘wow, you’ve lost lots and lots and lots of weight!’ ” I felt as though I were in one of those pictures where the person is holding up their old fat pants and standing in one of the pant legs. Yes, my weight may fluctuate over the years maybe by 10ish pounds, give or take a child. But never to the point that I’m terrorizing a small Japanese village.

Of course, like a lot of women, when we haven’t seen someone in awhile we always say “wow you look great” but I always view it as a back-handed comment, meaning “it’s great to see you not gnawing on a leg of lamb”. How did I look before? Was I 1 week from my due date, and could only fit my feet into sneakers? Did I fall into a depression and only eat Twinkies and gallons of soda? What makes the comments worse, you weren’t trying to lose ‘all that weight’. You just stand there awkwardly when they ask “what have you been doing?” and you mumble “you know, chasing after the kids keeps you busy”. My husband says I look great and why do I care what other people say? Snort, says the man who twitches when people give him the same ‘compliment’.

Don’t get me wrong, I don’t buy into the fashion industry’s ideals of having to be a size 0 to be beautiful, etc. etc. We eat pretty well, my kids don’t drink soda or eat lots of candy, and we stay active. We aren’t drinking gravy like a beverage. I dress for my body type, and don’t squeeze myself into shorty-shorts and have a muffin-top and all proud of it. It’s hard though not to take it personal, they haven’t seen me in awhile or see old pictures, and in their head may have me (pardon the pun) built up larger in their minds, so that when they do see me again, it’s like, wow! that Subway diet is working wonders. But then I get to obsessing, jeez, just how fat am I in your mind? I remember one delightful comment from one of my sisters-in-law, exactly 3 weeks after the birth of my second kid, when I’m still wearing maternity clothes and before mentioned sneakers; “oh, well, it wasn’t like expecting you to be in high heels, I just thought everything was supposed to go back to normal.” Then I cursed her with stretch marks and that damn pooch that I can’t seem to get rid of, when she has her first kid.