Need for Change

When I was a child, I had a pretty severe speech impediment.  I could not say Rs. I lived in a small town and the school system actually provided no-cost speech weekly speech therapy at the school. I don’t know and somehow doubt that this type of thing still exists in public schools.  There were no other kids at my school who couldn’t say Rs and the kids who couldn’t say Ws and I didn’t get along in the class so I had one-on-one work.  For many years I was not really aware of how severe my impediment was.  I only usually interacted with my family and friends and they were used to me and I avoided words with Rs in the middle or end.  Words that had Rs in the beginning allowed me "get a running start" at them and weren’t a big problem for that reason. 

But once my therapist tape recorded me.  I remember that it was right after Mother’s day and I had made my mom scrambled eggs but I didn’t know that you scramble them in the pan and not just in the bowl so they came out “rubbery.”  I talked about the day and my efforts at cooking and I specifically remember the words rubbery and scrambled.  After 3-5 minutes, the speech therapist played it back for me.  I broke down.  It was completely unintelligible.  I didn’t know I sounded like that. I couldn’t imagine how people ever knew what I was saying.  That was not what my words sounded like in my head.  I cried and cried and eventually the principal called my home and the housekeeper came and got me and took me home. 

I feel like I had the same sort of experience a few days ago.  My weight has been very steady and consistent for years.  I don’t particularly try to lose weight. I just workout and try to eat healthy and I fit into my clothes.  I am aware that if I lost weight I would probably run faster but I haven’t really been motivated to make that happen.  I’ll also admit that I feel like there’s some variable I’m not aware of.  When I go through periods of calorie counting, I always am under my recommended counts but don’t lose pounds. 

Whenever you run a race, there are race photographers and they snap thousands of pictures and then for weeks (months, more months) after the race they send you e-mails with links to let you buy the pictures.  I have never bought any because I’ve never thought I had a particularly good picture.  But this time I got an e-mail that there were 9 pictures of me from this race. I clicked through and just sat there in horror as I thumbed through the pictures.  I looked terrible.  Fat.  I looked like I was barely moving.  You know those shirts that say “In my mind, I’m a Kenyan” or something like that? In my head I am running well. I’m not fast and I know that but I love the feeling of moving and I feel like I look good when doing it.  And that I look ok in my running outfit.  But I looked terrible in these pictures.  My black shorts looked too tight. Or I was too big for them.  My long sleeve shirt was unisex so not fitted and my sports bra gave me a uniboob so from the waist up – yuck. 

I can’t look like that.  I can’t go on looking like that.  For the first time in my life I’m tempted to put that picture on the frig or door to the pantry or someplace that I see it all the time.  But I don’t want to do that because I don’t want to embarrass or shame myself.  I just want to look different.  And move differently. 

So Noom is my current plan.  I'm going to eat more healthy.  And less.  And I'm going to go from weighing close to 170 pounds to 155 or less.