My son recently celebrated his 21st birthday. All week long on Facebook, I posted photos of him growing up, although I refrained from posting any that might embarrass him. Oh! Like that adorable one when he….. well. He is going to choose my nursing home; so, I’ll just keep all that to myself.  In looking through photos and deciding what to post, I revisited our trip to Chicago in 2010. The one I posted at the top of the page is one of my favorites. My dad and my son goofing with the dinosaur sculpture outside the Field Museum. My two best guys! I also ran across a few of me with my dad standing in front of Lake Michigan. Oh, my.

Yep, the one on the right there. That’s the one that really caught my attention. My waist’s circumference was greater than my shoulders’.  (The word “circumference” should be used in describing planetary bodies, not human ones. When that’s the best word to describe a waist, there’s a problem.) Those pants I was wearing there were actually a little bit too big; so, I thought they were flattering. Not so much. But you want to know something? I didn’t truly know that I was that big.

How is that even possible? Well, it’s the frog in the pot.

You know that analogy: you throw a frog into a pot of boiling water and he’ll jump out. But, if you put him in a pot of cool water, then set it to boil, he’ll stay in it until he’s cooked. I got cooked.

I wasn’t a thin woman who woke up obese one morning; it wasn’t some adipose tissue / Kafka thing. I was heavy as a child, not really super chubby, but dense. So, the word “heavy” was used a lot. I thought that meant fat. So, I thought I was fat even before I was. The first diet I remember being on was in second grade. All my life, I didn’t lose weight as much as misplace it for awhile. I surely found every pound again – with friends! Somewhere in all that yo-yoing, my mental picture of my physical self got stuck at about a size 14. I was a solid size 20 in this photo.  I had no idea how big I was.

And that is still a challenge.

I’m now a size 6 (or 8 or 10, depending on the garment and the maker) and I still don’t know what I size I am. But I’m not so worried about it anymore. As you know, when I started the whole juicing thing, it was to lose those last 10 pesky pounds. I can honestly tell you that it’s not about that anymore. It’s about getting wholesome food into my body. More than ever, it is about being healthy.

That much I do know.