cheap date

whole foods shopping trip last sunday:

1 apple
1 pear
1 avocado
2 oz. spinach salad with chicken and feta

grand total: $5.62

the 300 club

at one of my first appointments with my nutritionist adrienne, she wisely shared how she knew that the world was not made for people over 300 pounds. this early insight was one that let me know she understood the struggle and the pain, though she herself is the size of a pea. a baby pea.

and she's right. as so many of us know, once you're a certain size, you just literally don't fit in everyday situations - plane seats, restaurant booths, certainly amusement park rides, seatbelts, chairs with arms...any tight squeeze is a challenge - a potentially embarassing one. i got really good at visually sizing up spaces and situations, doing whatever i could to avoid drawing attention to my size. in more recent years, specifically once i lost almost all my weight only to regain it and then 60 lbs, i started to understand that people were aware of my size whether i drew attention to it or not. and then i worked up the courage and self-respect to stop shaming myself and ask for a seatbelt extender on the plane, ask for a table instead of a booth and speak up about a chair that felt unsteady or painful. it felt better to do that than to suffer in silence or fear, and more loving of myself. it wasn't without embarassment though, particularly when loud conversation or negotiation ensued, but it was what it was and i learned to live with it.

so now that i'm solidly under 300 pounds, i am taking pleasure and delight in living in a body not so far outside the world's parameters. while i still have so incredibly far to go, it is happening, and it's uncanny to see how 300 really does seem to be a threshhold, under which everything changes. mitchell and i went to the opera this past weekend and the thrill was threefold - doing something fresh and new was good, sitting comfortably in the pretty-tight lincoln center chairs was great, but buying the tickets several weeks ago knowing the seats would be comfortable - that was pretty wonderful.

i accepted my parents' generous offer of a flight to toronto at the end of the month, largely because i feel confident the seat on the plane will be okay.

i sit three deep in a three seat train row, though i so far haven't gotten up the nerve to be the third to sit. maybe in another 20 pounds.

i tried on rainboots at target the other day and it wasn't a struggle to get them on over my ankles, or to get them off. i didn't have to sit or even lean to do it. i didn't break a sweat. i bought them.

and last night, mitchell and i watched a show about disney world, and i daydreamed aloud about going there one day in the not too distant future and riding the rides.

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