What's it like to have your body?

Isabelle_1929

TheVirgoddess wrote: »

Isabelle_1929 wrote: »

I hate my body. No matter the weight, it's not attractive (to men) My skin is not clear and not smooth, and there is nothing I can do about it, so I cannot show my arms, back, and legs (above the knees).

No "bikini body" for me.

However, after some weight fluctuation (I let myself go... Now close to 130 pounds for 5'4) I realized that I feel much better when I am thin, because I am not embarrassed when people look at me, I look somehow more feminine with a petite frame, and I am physically more comfortable - light and flexible.

Also, it is easier to find clothes that fit. It's something !

My skin isn't smooth or clear either ("worst case of KP I've ever seen" - my derm). I'm sorry you feel this way about yourself. I hope one day you can see that you're so much more than just skin. xo

I have bad KP too, amongst other things.

I know I am more than my body (THANKS GOD). And thanks also for clothes, and for living in a northern country where summer is so short !

cincysweetheart

5'10", CW:245 Combination apple shaped (this shape at the beginning) and rectangle shaped (more this shape now). Always been overweight…. ALWAYS. Having lost quite a bit of weight so far, I'm noticing a lot of loose skin. Honestly… even at 245, I'm smaller than I was in high school and much more fit than I've ever been, so I'm still getting to know what it's like to to be in this body. But I am tall. And I have a good additional 3 inches that I can stretch from just raising my arm up vs actually reaching for things. My mom used to call it my "bionic reach." Reaching things has never been a problem for me. I hate when people hang things from the ceiling, because then I have to duck just to walk down a hall! I'm loving this more "rectangle shaped" body. It makes me look taller and athletic. Not to mention, clothes are easier to fit. I used to measure at good 1-2 sizes smaller in the hips than in the waist… it was a nightmare trying to find pants to fit. But now I'm more proportional.

I've always been badly out of shape. So, currently the things I'm able to do is stuff I've never been able to do before. Run (just finished c25k earlier this week)… albeit slowly. I can walk for ages. Run stairs without getting winded. I can dance for hours… but I have no sense of rhythm… so it ain't pretty! I'm extremely uncoordinated and very unsure on my feet when I'm not on solid/even terrain. Hiking is pretty much a good way to ensure injury.

Goals: Weight--I would like to lose about another 65 pounds. Then honestly… skin removal surgery is probably in my future.
Running--I want to run a marathon someday. But not anytime soon. I just finished c25k and will spend a few weeks increasing my distance so I can actually go the 5K distance (not just 30 minutes), then I'll move on to a 10k program. I can keep myself awake at night planning my running future.

callsitlikeiseeit

okay, double edged sword here...

i love MYSELF. and that in and of itself, has been a journey. And that self love has evolved into wanting to become an even better version of me, including caring for my overall health and wanting to lose the excess weight (lots of it LOL)

that love is also what made me quit smoking last year. If you love yourself, why would you CONSISTENTLY do things to HARM yourself. Once that clicked in my head
.... quitting was easy. And changing how I eat and exercising has been easy. I love myself, and i want whats best for myself. i discovered this year that I love working out (mostly cardio right now) at the gym and doing zumba (even if im not very coordinated and half the time making up my own moves LOL!)

All that said, im short. 5'2 (if i stand tall and stretch my neck), 37 years old and a little ball of sarcasm. I regularly have to look for tall (if youre taller than me, i consider you tall LOL) people to reach things in the store for me. I'm very blunt and honest, but you won't find anyone with a bigger heart (have a zoo of animals (which im allergic to) and took in our former neighbors teenager cause shes a piece of garbage and too lazy to work and therefore incapable of caring for her own kid... (dont get me started on that topic LOL)

Ellaskat

I am 5'6. Very small frame. hourglass shape. 36. Natural redhead that is going white. Makes me sad to lose my color- when you're a redhead it's such a big part of how you see yourself. My brain is focused and strong, but my body has always been very weak. I have terrible allergies- and not the kind that most people have- the kind that mean I have many food restrictions, almost always have puffy/runny/itchy eyes, nose, face. I struggle to breathe which makes me very tired. I had a serous bout with Lyme disease which has left me with long period of fatigue, that I can't do anything about. I have always liked the appearance of my body. I was always called attractive. I would give that up in a minute for a healthy body. I cant even imagine what it would feel like to be truly healthy with no pain, fatigue, itchiness. And I've been that way most of my life. I've never felt my body is my friend- it betrays me. I do everything I can to take care of myself, but it doesn't matter, I'll never be truly healthy or carefree the way healthy people can be. When training for a marathon, I had such an amazing time. I loved it. Last training run before my race I tore the labrum in both hips. And that's how my body treats me.

jvt63

I never gave much thought to my body. I'm always in my head, which is probably why I ended up with extra pounds. Losing it is more about the way I "felt" in my body. I felt not "me." I've been normal weight most of my adult life, and at one point was super-fit. I'm also strong for my size.

Age 52 (almost), 5'2", 132 pounds, 5 pounds from goal. Measurements have gone from 39-31-39 to 35.5-28.5-37. (My matronly boobage--extra fat, not genetics--is gone!) The treadmill has helped, although I wouldn't say I enjoy it. Soon, gardening will start. Heavy gardening--digging, moving dirt, being outside for hours at a time. My favorite workout.

But it's almost time to strength train. I put on muscle easily for a woman but dread the water retention. I know it's temporary but clothing gets tight again and atm I'm loving my looser jeans. I'm gearing up for the fluid retention thing, mentally.

To be in my body is to not think much about it. Trying to change that because I want to be fit, strong, and flexible well into old age. I've got the eating down--my energy and mood have improved markedly. I start body weight exercises in the next few weeks.

LoupGarouTFTs

I am 5' 1" and weigh 149 pounds. I started MFP about a month after my 53rd birthday in April of last year, when I weighed 204 pounds. I had just been diagnosed with Type II diabetes and a friend recommended this site to me. My thighs and my stomach were the places I gained the most weight, but looking at my license from two years ago I can see how fat my face was, too. At my heaviest, I had a hard time keeping up with my friend, Dan, who is 20 years older than me--he's a farmer, so he's always outside working.

I started tending goats twice a week for a woman with a small dairy goat farm in Dec 2013. When I first started working there, I could barely move bales of hay and I'd have to stop to rest halfway through cleaning the goat sheds out after milking. I was exhausted after finishing work. When I walked my client dog for an hour three times a week, I came home and fell asleep on the couch because it wore me out. I had been obese for so long that I couldn't remember what it felt like to run instead of to lumber along at a wheezing trot. I stopped taking baths because I didn't want to see my stomach poking out of the water. Yuck.

Almost a year later, I am still not a runner, but I can trot along with the dogs pretty well for a short distance. I am thinking of buying a bathing suit for the summer, because I'm happy with my thighs, which no longer rub together. I can lift bales of hay pretty well, but I have less ballast, so I can't lift them as high right now. I imagine that once I stop losing weight and start building muscle, that will change. I do notice that I've managed to either build or expose some muscles in my arms, which is nice, since I don't have any bingo wings there. My stomach is still not flat, since I have 25 more pounds to go and need to exercise my flabby abdominal muscles, but I am pretty sure I can take a bath now without thinking "yuck." LOL

My major problem is that my legs seem to be alien legs, stuck on my body. I love that they fit in jeans now instead of stretchy knit slacks, but I sometimes wonder how they can support my body. I know it's my brain not quite understanding my weight loss yet, but my thighs look impossibly thin, but my calves don't seem as freakish. I am loving that I have ankles again, but my knees seem knobby to me and uncomfortable when I sleep.

Altogether, I'm pretty happy with my body. I have still got at least a year to go with my weight loss and muscle building before I (hopefully) reach maintenance, but my blood sugar has been well within the normal range for the last five months--no more spikes over 200!--and I'm enjoying what I can eat. I'm going to start teaching a basic dog agility class soon and I am as excited as heck about it. I'm very glad I discovered this site and I think I'm going to stick around for quite a while, at least until I teach myself how to make my new way of eating permanent and habitual.