I'm back...

...and if I can save just one person from making the same mistakes I did, than this post is worth the writing.

Long story short, I lost my mother a week ago Tuesday. I am 40 years old...which, as far as I'm concerned is way too young to lose my best friend, my closest confidant, my sage, you name it...that was my mom. I disappeared from most of my life, MFP included, to make the mad dash four states away to get back home to be with my father and the rest of my family.

I'll save you the "woe is me" post, and the telling of how miserable I am over all of this, and leave you with a different sort of story.

My mother wanted a very simple memorial service. Nothing elaborate or fancy...just a gathering of the people that loved her.
I am the only child of my parents who were high school sweethearts. I had a storybook childhood and I can only hope that most people find even a sheer fraction of the love in their lives, that my family was filled with.

I started gaining weight about 15 years ago. Slowly, but steadily. And as my face and my hips and my arms got bigger, I got better and better at avoiding the cameras...avoiding them at family gatherings...avoiding them with my loved ones...avoiding them altogether.

As we began collecting photos for my mother's memorial service, I quickly realized that I hadn't taken a photograph, something that I, looking back now, would give my right arm to have, with my dearest and most beloved family members in probably 15 years. I have nothing, -NOTHING- tangible to look at...to reflect on...that isn't ridiculously outdated. Why? Because I was too busy being concerned with the size of my *kitten* to consider any other possibilities.

...and that is something that I will regret for the rest of my life.

Yes, I have memories, and those will last me a lifetime. But, you just don't know until you're sitting in that situation how important the little things like a photograph can be.

Please....PLEASE, I beg those of you who are here, who are feeling so bad and miserable about themselves that you are making the same mistakes that I did. The people that love you don't care if your jeans are two sizes bigger than they were last year. They don't care if they're 10 sizes bigger than they were last year. Embrace who you are right this very minute. If you don't like it, take the necessary steps to fix it, but don't close yourself off. Don't shut the people that love you out. Don't shut yourselves out of their lives. You never know when you won't have a tomorrow to make it right.