My Ups and Downs
I mentioned before that I went from a chubby baby, to a scronnie young girl to a chubby preteen. Looking back at being a teenager I did not fit the size 3 or 5 standard of my friends I was a whopping 13 or probably more like a 12-14 size. Which is what I am today, maybe if I didn't buy into the concept that I was a "fat cow" yes, someone that I love and respect called me that, maybe I would not have gotten into the yo yo dieting syndrome. I was a very active hard working girl, I grew up in a farm community and if I was not working at our family farm/nursery I was working for one of our neighboring farmers. I could tote berry crates, load a truck full of nursery stock, weed a field of onions, pick berries like a whirl wind, drive a tractor, wield a hoe and with all this activity I weighed around 150-160 lbs when I graduated from high school. I then attended Beauty College and kept my weight fairly the same. After starting into my career as a hairdresser which is also a physical job but not in the same way, I started putting on weight. My first diet experience started when my mom got a neighbor lady to take me to TOPS, I think I was around 16 years of age.. Take off Pound Sensibly well this is where I was told to eat smaller portions and to eat an apple before every meal so I would not eat as much at meals. All I remember about this experience was that when you went to the "weigh in" you got applause if you lost weight, but if you gained weight they actually would "oink " at you. Oh Lord, the humiliation. The next big weight loss sensation I joined along with my mom was Weight Watchers, now I will not knock this program, I believe it works, it has been revamped several times but I know people who have had extreme success with them. I actually can count at least 7-8 times that I joined this organization. When I was about 23 years old I signed up all on my own to go to the Weight Loss Clinic, starting out at 186 lbs. I had great success with this program, I lost about 50 lbs getting down to 136 lbs. This program had me eating only 500 calories a day, yes 500, we know now that this will put you body into a starvation mode. I loved being a size a 10 again, I bought the cutest clothes, but I still was not getting asked out, no guys were knocking my door down to date me. The only ones that would have anything to do with me, ignored me and made me feel horrible when I weighed 180+ lbs. all they wanted is what I was not willing to give. This clinic was very expensive and I eventually could not afford it anymore. My weight started climbing, I was back up about 30 lbs when I met my husband. John was like no guy I had every dated. You see, I was what I would say an acquired taste. Most guys I dated got to know me through friends, no guy had every just saw me and wanted to date me. When I turned 21 I'd go out with girlfriends "clubbing" we loved going to hear the live bands and dancing. Everyone of them would get asked to dance, but rarely would I get invited out on the dance floor, I would sit there and wonder why, they were not skinny girls, what was I doing wrong? I once asked a guy who had joined our table what was it about me that I didn't get asked, he told me that there are girls that you know are just the marrying type, and those that are the playing type, and that guys in the Clubs are not looking for the marrying type. Well, I didn't know if I should have been offended or complimented, over the years I have decided it was a compliment. John just pursued me like no other man ever had, we started dating in November, got engaged in February and married that next July, pregnant in September, a baby girl born a week before our first anniversary. Whew that was a whirlwind. Yep we had many in this little town counting on their fingers trying to figure out the timeline. Small town living has it's moments, my John worked for a mobile home manufacturer and was their service man, he'd leave on Monday mornings with a van full of whatever he needed to service newly delivered homes, coming home sometime on Friday. Let me back up a little bit, John and I got married back in the day that we still had to blood tests done to get a marriage license. We went to his MD for the blood tests and I kinda did not want to go to the MD that I grew up with to ask for birth control. So, when I started not feeling well and puking in the mornings I took a "sample" into my MD for a pregnancy test, not telling John. I get a call from Della the nurse while I'm at work telling me that I am pregnant, she asked me if I was OK with this, I answered that it wasn't in the plans but it would be ok, thinking that that was an odd question. Well this was on a Wednesday and I decided to wait to tell John when he got home on Friday, the only person I told was my mom. Here comes John home spitting mad, pissed, livid. He always filled the van with gas before he came home so it would be ready for Monday morning. While at the Station in the lovely little town the attendant congradulates him on becoming a dad. He was so angry that this guy knew before him, rightly so, but so out of my hands. I went storming a whole 2 blocks to the gas station and asked this guy (Carl) how in the heck he found out, Carl was horrified that he had done this to us and told us that at the MD's office the nurses were discussing this and he realized that they did not know I had got married so had informed them I was happily married and everything would be ok. Well, there were not the HIPPA laws like there is now. Well the shock of becoming a father and the way he found out subsided and all was well for the rest of the weekend. Well back to my weight, when I went for my first appointment after finding out about being "with Katie" I tipped the scales at 205, I had no idea that I had hit the 200+ mark. But because of the horrible morning sickness I only gained 5 lbs total, making me weighing less after birth than I did when I got pregnant. After giving birth my weight just kept creeping up and up, John and I had some very rocky times and I don't know if was what going on or just how my body works, but I could not control the weight, joining once again Weight Watchers. John had quit the Manufactured home place and got a job at a lumber mill and things got easier for us, we settled into a fairly nice life, we bought a little manufactured home I worked at the Salon and he worked Swing shift at the mill. This was great for child care, he would take care of Katie till about 2:30 then drop her at a sitter, but no regular meal times and our spastic lifestyle did not help my problem. This is when I met a lovely lady that ran the Diet Center in Woodburn, so I joined up and started to lose some weight, there was menu guidelines and a daily weigh in (M-F). I never got down under 180 lbs, but it kept me in check, I at least wasn't gaining. I'd start, I'd stop, I'd Start again and on and on it went. The Crash, the recession the spotted owl, whatever you want to call it hit and the mill would be off and on. John took any and every job he could find, he pumped gas, worked out at my folk's nursery and actually went 280 miles from home to where he was raised and worked for a farmer he worked for when he was a kid. Katie and I would pack up on Saturday afternoon, drive down just to spend a couple days with him at his mom and dads house. She would sing On the Road Again, by Willie Nelson every time we got in the car. I, at this time had decided to take some time and started Jazzercise, I loved it I was doing really well with my weight. Keeping really busy and John coming home once a month and Katie and I heading down to see him every other week. After almost 3 1/2 years of no birth control and not getting pregnant I went to the MD he told me my fluctuating weight probably was to blame so I was determine to try to get it under control, I also told myself if I didn't get pregnant and have a baby by my 30th birthday I was going to give up on trying, if a baby was meant to be it would happen. Our son was born about 5 months before my 30th birthday so my Johnny was meant to be. This pregnancy was even harder than the first, I even puked the morning he was born, not one day of relief. Again, the only good thing was I did not gain a lot of weight. I seem to wait till the baby is born then put on my 30-40-pounds. So far I have only wrote about half of my weight struggle and strife. I am going to give this a rest for a few days before proceeding. The reason I am writing about my weight is because I believe it has shaped my life more than anything else. To understand me, but probably more so, for me to understand myself.
I mentioned before that I went from a chubby baby, to a scronnie young girl to a chubby preteen. Looking back at being a teenager I did not fit the size 3 or 5 standard of my friends I was a whopping 13 or probably more like a 12-14 size. Which is what I am today, maybe if I didn't buy into the concept that I was a "fat cow" yes, someone that I love and respect called me that, maybe I would not have gotten into the yo yo dieting syndrome. I was a very active hard working girl, I grew up in a farm community and if I was not working at our family farm/nursery I was working for one of our neighboring farmers. I could tote berry crates, load a truck full of nursery stock, weed a field of onions, pick berries like a whirl wind, drive a tractor, wield a hoe and with all this activity I weighed around 150-160 lbs when I graduated from high school. I then attended Beauty College and kept my weight fairly the same. After starting into my career as a hairdresser which is also a physical job but not in the same way, I started putting on weight. My first diet experience started when my mom got a neighbor lady to take me to TOPS, I think I was around 16 years of age.. Take off Pound Sensibly well this is where I was told to eat smaller portions and to eat an apple before every meal so I would not eat as much at meals. All I remember about this experience was that when you went to the "weigh in" you got applause if you lost weight, but if you gained weight they actually would "oink " at you. Oh Lord, the humiliation. The next big weight loss sensation I joined along with my mom was Weight Watchers, now I will not knock this program, I believe it works, it has been revamped several times but I know people who have had extreme success with them. I actually can count at least 7-8 times that I joined this organization. When I was about 23 years old I signed up all on my own to go to the Weight Loss Clinic, starting out at 186 lbs. I had great success with this program, I lost about 50 lbs getting down to 136 lbs. This program had me eating only 500 calories a day, yes 500, we know now that this will put you body into a starvation mode. I loved being a size a 10 again, I bought the cutest clothes, but I still was not getting asked out, no guys were knocking my door down to date me. The only ones that would have anything to do with me, ignored me and made me feel horrible when I weighed 180+ lbs. all they wanted is what I was not willing to give. This clinic was very expensive and I eventually could not afford it anymore. My weight started climbing, I was back up about 30 lbs when I met my husband. John was like no guy I had every dated. You see, I was what I would say an acquired taste. Most guys I dated got to know me through friends, no guy had every just saw me and wanted to date me. When I turned 21 I'd go out with girlfriends "clubbing" we loved going to hear the live bands and dancing. Everyone of them would get asked to dance, but rarely would I get invited out on the dance floor, I would sit there and wonder why, they were not skinny girls, what was I doing wrong? I once asked a guy who had joined our table what was it about me that I didn't get asked, he told me that there are girls that you know are just the marrying type, and those that are the playing type, and that guys in the Clubs are not looking for the marrying type. Well, I didn't know if I should have been offended or complimented, over the years I have decided it was a compliment. John just pursued me like no other man ever had, we started dating in November, got engaged in February and married that next July, pregnant in September, a baby girl born a week before our first anniversary. Whew that was a whirlwind. Yep we had many in this little town counting on their fingers trying to figure out the timeline. Small town living has it's moments, my John worked for a mobile home manufacturer and was their service man, he'd leave on Monday mornings with a van full of whatever he needed to service newly delivered homes, coming home sometime on Friday. Let me back up a little bit, John and I got married back in the day that we still had to blood tests done to get a marriage license. We went to his MD for the blood tests and I kinda did not want to go to the MD that I grew up with to ask for birth control. So, when I started not feeling well and puking in the mornings I took a "sample" into my MD for a pregnancy test, not telling John. I get a call from Della the nurse while I'm at work telling me that I am pregnant, she asked me if I was OK with this, I answered that it wasn't in the plans but it would be ok, thinking that that was an odd question. Well this was on a Wednesday and I decided to wait to tell John when he got home on Friday, the only person I told was my mom. Here comes John home spitting mad, pissed, livid. He always filled the van with gas before he came home so it would be ready for Monday morning. While at the Station in the lovely little town the attendant congradulates him on becoming a dad. He was so angry that this guy knew before him, rightly so, but so out of my hands. I went storming a whole 2 blocks to the gas station and asked this guy (Carl) how in the heck he found out, Carl was horrified that he had done this to us and told us that at the MD's office the nurses were discussing this and he realized that they did not know I had got married so had informed them I was happily married and everything would be ok. Well, there were not the HIPPA laws like there is now. Well the shock of becoming a father and the way he found out subsided and all was well for the rest of the weekend. Well back to my weight, when I went for my first appointment after finding out about being "with Katie" I tipped the scales at 205, I had no idea that I had hit the 200+ mark. But because of the horrible morning sickness I only gained 5 lbs total, making me weighing less after birth than I did when I got pregnant. After giving birth my weight just kept creeping up and up, John and I had some very rocky times and I don't know if was what going on or just how my body works, but I could not control the weight, joining once again Weight Watchers. John had quit the Manufactured home place and got a job at a lumber mill and things got easier for us, we settled into a fairly nice life, we bought a little manufactured home I worked at the Salon and he worked Swing shift at the mill. This was great for child care, he would take care of Katie till about 2:30 then drop her at a sitter, but no regular meal times and our spastic lifestyle did not help my problem. This is when I met a lovely lady that ran the Diet Center in Woodburn, so I joined up and started to lose some weight, there was menu guidelines and a daily weigh in (M-F). I never got down under 180 lbs, but it kept me in check, I at least wasn't gaining. I'd start, I'd stop, I'd Start again and on and on it went. The Crash, the recession the spotted owl, whatever you want to call it hit and the mill would be off and on. John took any and every job he could find, he pumped gas, worked out at my folk's nursery and actually went 280 miles from home to where he was raised and worked for a farmer he worked for when he was a kid. Katie and I would pack up on Saturday afternoon, drive down just to spend a couple days with him at his mom and dads house. She would sing On the Road Again, by Willie Nelson every time we got in the car. I, at this time had decided to take some time and started Jazzercise, I loved it I was doing really well with my weight. Keeping really busy and John coming home once a month and Katie and I heading down to see him every other week. After almost 3 1/2 years of no birth control and not getting pregnant I went to the MD he told me my fluctuating weight probably was to blame so I was determine to try to get it under control, I also told myself if I didn't get pregnant and have a baby by my 30th birthday I was going to give up on trying, if a baby was meant to be it would happen. Our son was born about 5 months before my 30th birthday so my Johnny was meant to be. This pregnancy was even harder than the first, I even puked the morning he was born, not one day of relief. Again, the only good thing was I did not gain a lot of weight. I seem to wait till the baby is born then put on my 30-40-pounds. So far I have only wrote about half of my weight struggle and strife. I am going to give this a rest for a few days before proceeding. The reason I am writing about my weight is because I believe it has shaped my life more than anything else. To understand me, but probably more so, for me to understand myself.
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