Dumping the old rules that were controlling my life.

During the past year, I lost a lot of weight; and along the way, I learned to like myself better. I also started giving myself permission to break 'the old rules', overcome the negative messages that had limited and dictated how I would lead my life.

In June, I put on swimsuit for the first time in more than 50 years. I stopped believing the old message that I would be the laughing stock of the local swimming pool. I found joy again in the water.

During the past month, I bought my first jeans and stopped believing the old message that I was too old and too fat to wear those denim pants 'that were only for thin teenagers and cowgirls'. :noway:

I realized that those old messages were big lies that kept from living my life. No one laughed, when I got into pool and started swimming laps for an hour each day. Folks admired me for what I was doing, and I looked pretty good in my new jeans for a 69 year old Hot Mama.

About the same time that I bought the jeans, I made another big decision. I decided to dump another old message into the trash can marked "big fat lies". This message was related to one finger nail. That finger nail had been making me feel ugly and had kept me from even wearing my beautiful rings and bracelets for more than 10 years.

The problem began in 2002. I had been wearing acrylic nails for a long time. I loved those long nails and often let my manicurist put special designs on the nails for the holidays and other special occasions.

Then...one day, I booked a last minute appointment with a manicurist that I didn't know. She used an electric drill to file down my acrylics. To my horror, she drilled right through one of my nails and into the nail bed. It bled, and it hurt. The manicurist cleaned the nail with a cotton swab and some kind of liquid. Then, she put the new acrylic right over the wound in that nail bed. Within days, skin on the tip of that finger began to peel. It wasn't long, before the skin was peeling off the sides of my finger too.

I got worried and went back to the manicurist...only to find that the shop was closed. My next stop was my old manicurist. She and I were both horrified, when the acrylic nail was removed. My nail bed had turned green and was oozing some kind of infection. There was no choice. All the acrylic nails had to come off, and I needed to see my doctor right away.

My doctor put me on anti-fungal meds right away. The nail bed cleared up a little bit; but something had changed; and it could not be reversed. Each time that nail would begin to grow back, it would lift off the nail bed and would not grow back connected to the nail bed as it should. That nail could not or would not grow with the nail bed anymore. It only separated from the nail bed; and new, thin nail would peel off, before it grew much beyond the cuticle. Every passing month, the nail bed looked worse. It became a dry pit, not smooth pink surface.

When Ed and I married in December of 2004, a friend put acrylics on my nails...just for the wedding. One day later, the nail bed began to go green. There was no choice but to pull the nails off and begin anti-fungal treatments again; and again, that didn't help much.

After more than 9 years, all that remains of that horrible nail is a dead nail bed. When a new nail tries to grow over that dry hole, it is totally separated from the nail bed and peels off almost immediately. That one UGLY nail bed made me so self-conscious of my hands. I was sure that wearing any of my lovely rings would only bring unwelcome attention to this dead nail; so, I stopped wearing rings on that hand...and bracelets too.

Of course, putting on nail polish wouldn't help, because I only had 9 good nails. The one ugly nail would still look horrible. At least, that's what I thought. :noway:

Then, 2 weeks ago...I did something crazy. I called a local Avon lady and asked her to come to my home and help me select makeup. You see...I had thrown away all of my makeup about 4 years ago. Another old message...another lie went along with the decision to throw away my makeup. I weighed more 280 pounds at the time. So...what was the point of putting on makeup. The old message was loud and clear, "You're fat and ugly; and no amount of makeup can make you look thinner." That internal voice spoke of another rule that began controlling my life, "You don't put makeup on a pig." :noway:

Yeah. I had some really ugly messages that had trapped me in a world of low self esteem. I really needed to unload a bunch of garbage that was keeping me from leading my life...old messages that would not allow me even like myself.

With the help of MFP and my sweet MFP sisters, so much has changed during the past 14 months. I not lost 113 pounds, but I learned to like myself and realized that the old messages were just big, fat lies; and they were keeping me from enjoying my life.

I have a whole bunch of makeup arriving from Avon this week, including some nail polish. I made some big decisions that went against some of those old rules. I had all my beautiful rings sized to fit my new, skinner fingers...fingers on my right hand...the hand with the ugly nail.

Then...on Thursday, I went to a very nice manicurist who was willing to try and help me make that dead finger nail look better. These photos show my right hand, including that dead nail, before my manicure yesterday.

Yeah. That middle finger has an obvious problem.



This dead nail bed has kept me from wearing nail polish and my beautiful rings. I was ashamed of how it looked.



The dead nail bed collapsed inward as the layers of nails peeled off over the past 10 years. I couldn't imagine how my manicurist could fill the pit, but she did with just a couple of coats of gel.



These photos show my hands, after a manicure. My new manicurist put a gel fill on that old ugly nail...what was left of the nail bed. We are watching it carefully, hoping that the fungus will not return. I may not have a perfect nail, but my hands look good enough to wear my rings and bracelets again.

At least, the ugly pit is gone.



It is a joy to wear my lapis and diamond ring again after so long.



From now on, my lavender pearls and topaz rings won't just hold down a space in my jewelry box. They will now get to decorate my fingers, when I go church or out for some special occasion.



Even my coral rings will get a chance to be shown off, though I will go for coral colored nail polish, when I want to wear my pastel colored in the future. The short middle finger may not be perfect; but it doesn't make me uncomfortable, like the dead pit that used to be all too obvious in the past.

By the way, I got a pedicure too. My toenails are now the same color as my fingernails, a rich cranberry red.



Ed helped me take the photos of my hands, and he just couldn't resist snapping a picture of his girl Sue.



Are you still letting old messages tell you how to live? Do you have rules that only apply, because those messages are telling you that you are fat, ugly, unworthy, undeserving or just not good enough?

Keep in mind. Most of those nasty, old messages were things that we decided were true. We didn't fight back against those lies. We let those ugly messages into our brains, where they could destroy our self esteem. Have you imposed rules that keep you from having the best that life can give you, because you decided that you didn't deserve any better.

It is definitely time to dump the old messages and old rules. I can tell you right now that I am so much happier with every change that has happened to me in this past year, and most of those changes simply meant that I finally fought back against the old messages and demanded something better for myself. You can too. :flowerforyou: