Lay off the bride

Note: this entry includes discussion of eating disorders and body issues. If you want someone to talk to about these topics, contact the Butterfly Foundation http://thebutterflyfoundation.org.au/

Here’s a fact about me: I am rather sensitive about my body weight. Wow, a woman with body issues, call the media! But seriously, it’s a hot button issue for me, mostly because of a perfect storm of weight gain as a teenager caused by moving to a different school at the exact moment when my paternal grandmother’s genes kicked in out of nowhere and turned this former weedy, lanky kid into a full-on pear shape. The fact that I continued to live on hot chocolates and baked potatoes and fundraiser box Freddos despite gaining two dress sizes from the age of 15 to 17 is testament to how blithely unprepared I was for a) puberty and b) lifestyle changes. After finishing high school, I joined a gym with my mum as a two-for-one special and discovered that, in contradiction to my nerdy bookish persona and the lessons of 12 years of Phys Ed, I actually like exercising! Thanks to the miracle of a teenage metabolism, even without pushing it that hard I dropped something like 10kg and went down a dress size in the three months between high school and starting uni.

This was awesome and made me feel really good about myself and what my body could achieve! However, like most fast weight loss success stories, I gained most of it back within the next 12 months thanks to discovering cheap beer and not identifying why I had gained the weight in the first place and making appropriate lifestyle changes. I went back up a dress size, and, aside from 5kg gained and lost as part of the coming of age ritual that is share house living, and despite flirtations with fad diets, the psychological lure of weight loss ads and extreme avenues of thought that if explored would most likely lead to a full blown eating disorder, there I have stayed.

The point of pouring out all this is to make the point that even though I am the statistically average size for an Australian woman, I have been bigger than I feel comfortable being for going on ten years now and am pretty darn sensitive about it, though usually in denial. Most people I know are fairly tactful so it’s usually not more than a devil on my back that rears its ugly head on the rare occasion when I read women’s magazines. I mostly just try to stay active, eat well and not think too negatively about myself in clothing store change rooms.

But a funny thing happened when I got engaged – all of a sudden everyone was saying to me “oh you’re not going to go crazy and lose a bunch of weight are you?” By virtue of a ring on my finger, suddenly my biggest taboo topic was on everyone’s lips. My fiancé and I have both noticed that weddings can be a complete psychological minefield to enter into and this was my first big mental landmine. The comments were well intended but (not surprisingly) very unwelcome. Like many brides before me, I’m honestly not comfortable in my own skin and I have decided to use the motivation afforded by the Impending Wedding Photo Deluge to actually get my act together and do something about it already.

This may all sound very superficial and buying into the IWC and it probably is. But is it really such a crime to want to look at your wedding photos and not cringe? It’s my damn body, I can do what I want with it and that includes trying my best to (healthily and sustainably) drop a few kilos and kick the devil to the curb.

But, in rebuttal to those initial comments, I haven’t turned into a hardcore Paleo Crossfit evangelist. I have simply gotten more active, by by going more often to the gym and going to fitness classes to push myself in a fun environment rather than simply hitting the tredmill five days a week. I am also practicing ‘conscious eating’, whereby instead of mindlessly shoving food in my face hole, I plan out meals (so no opportunity for last minute decisions for chips and gravy for lunch), I keep a food journal, and I actively participate in the act of eating to stop when I feel full. I like it because it’s not a “diet” and doesn’t involve calorie counting (which I always give up on). I’m just being aware of what (and how much) I’m putting in my mouth. My fiancé is very much not interested in living with a cranky girl on a diet, so this works for both of us which helps to keep me on track.

I’ve already lost five kilos since our engagement which honestly feels like winning a gold medal. I’ve got three months left to the wedding and three kilos to my goal weight. Most importantly I’m feeling confident and motivated because I’m not doing it to fit into the dress; I’m doing it to feel good wearing it. So, please, keep your damn comments to yourselves.