Since February this year I have lost 10kg. February saw me join the local women's boot camp and amp up my exercising. June saw me take up running and I haven't looked back.
I've wrote about this before, but I have been exercising a lot during my life.
During school I was not so much a keen exerciser. I was plump and was not fast and not really "good" at any form of sport. I was good at cricket and often think I could've gone somewhere in that sport had I been born in a different era. Girls playing cricket was not something that was supported in my day.
It wasn't until my last two years of school that I became interested in exercising. Unfortunately, that interest became an obsession and I spent 2 years battling an unhealthy food/exercise obsession. It almost took over my life with counting calories and burning them off through exercise. It was not a good time of my life.
Moving on, I took a job in Emerald Central Qld and while the obsession never left me totally, it eased up as no one knew me as the chubby girl. I reinvented myself in a way. I got involved in the local gym and eventually became an aerobics instructor. Exercise became an obsession again, but I was still fueling myself with enough food. So it wasn't as unhealthy as the last time.
Once I met my husband, the obsession lessened - I still had to do something, e.g. walk everyday but it wasn't the be all and end all.
It's a funny thing, this relationship I have with food and exercise, and I really was trying to find ways to explain it when I came across this article in an issue of Runner's World.
Peter Sagal's article, A Thin Line, sums up my journey spot on. And like Peter, my battle with the fat girl in the mirror, continues and possibly will all my life. I'm not sure how to overcome it. I know I'm certainly not like the girl who battled the food/exercise obsession during my late teens - but the line is always there. It's just a matter of the battle not to cross it.
For my daughter's sake, I work hard at presenting exercise in a positive way, without the attachment to fat and thin. I attach it to being healthy. I work on my self esteem so that I be a good role model for her. What makes it hard is the media and our own expectations of accepting people based on appearance.
Food should not be about being good (eating healthy) and bad (having a piece of cake) - it should be about energy to do what we need to do. Funnily enough, I think women are our own worst enemies. How many times have you had your friend say to you - oh you're being good - when they see you eat some fruit. Or - be a bit naughty and have some cake.
In my head, I say let's move on from this. In reality, it's bloody hard to.
I'm sure I'm not alone with this story, just as I found Peter's own story so much like my own. I'm sure there are other's who read my blog who will resonate with Peter's story and mine.
Peter sums up the way I feel at the end of his article, "I run now for a lot of reasons, for fitness and for times and for friendship and for the sheer pleasure of motion. But deep inside I know I'm also running because with every step, I'm leaving Plumpkin further behind. And I'm afraid if I ever stopped, he'd catch me, and consume me in his unending appetite, and I'd have to look back into the mirror from behind his frightened eyes."
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