Blowing Up A Weight Loss Myth

I've always held to the idea that you should NEVER buy bigger clothes when you want to loose weight.  I've held to that idea for years.  The thought is that if you are uncomfortable, you will not eat as much and you will get more serious about weight loss.  I recently was forced into a situation that led me to find this not true, and had some other revelations about myself along the way.

As I've said lately on my Sensa Weightloss posts, I'm the heaviest I've been outside of pregnancies.  So I was really feeling awful the last few months in my clothes, especially jeans and pants.  I was forced to do what I dreaded doing and buy that darn next size up.  What I discovered amazed me and blew a huge myth out of the water for me....

I felt fabulous!!!

I did not expect this.  I've not really let myself do it before.  Suddenly, I felt like I looked right in my clothes.  Now days I see women everywhere cramming themselves into clothing that causes all manner of unsightly bulges everywhere.  I have a pet peeve for bulges, I avoid them at all costs.  So what I would do is wear my soft pants or yoga pants until I felt better.  This time I worked out and worked on it and was not feeling better.  In fact, what I was wearing was depressing me more and making me feel defeated.  When you feel defeated you have a major disadvantage....

you don't want to move at all, not to mention get out and get going!

Now, mind you, there is always the problem that you will just forget all together about your goal for change but I noticed that when I felt better, I was MORE motivated.  I felt like I'd made immediate progress (of course I'd not but it was mentally just as rewarding to feel good in what I wore).  It finally occurred to me that this was true when I was watching a Fly Lady video yesterday about getting up and getting dressed head to toe when you start your day because feeling good motivates you.  That is exactly what this was.  I felt I could get out, go do, accomplish instead of feeling painful and uncomfortable and way frumpy in my outfit. My clothes not feeling good made me want to hide and it made me feel so discouraged.

Thankfully, I found a few good deals on Gap and Levi jeans at the Goodwill as well as a few tops that I love.      Otherwise, yes this could be very expensive so I would not recommend putting much money into it, after all, the goal is to be out of those clothes soon.  On that note though, it made me think that I was going to change something else about my attitude regarding my weight.  I was going to.....

be okay with my weight wherever it was.  

That is not so say I was not going to set goals to loose, but while I was wherever I was, I wanted to be continually content with it.  It sounds like I'm contradicting myself but I'm not.  It's the same concept as being content with your finances yet still saving up more.  Being okay where you are for the time you are there while you work to make it to another place.  I'd never thought of this before and my clothes were a huge conduit to how content I was with my body.  One practical way I'm going to do this is to stop getting rid of my "big" clothes.  I've done this before, tossed them out!  Somehow I thought doing that would make me never go back where I was.  You know what though, life and my waistline are always changing!!!  I need to be okay with it and always work to make it better all at once.  So, I'm going to keep a tote of "big" clothes just as I have the one I have called "too small" in my storage.  Honestly, this concept is very freeing to me.  I'm not sure what all the psychology is behind it but it's been a powerful revelation.

For the fact is, and this also I've noticed lately, women of all sizes can be stunning.  They may not be meat market sexy in temporal terms, but why should that by my goal anyway?  The meat market is an unhappy endless discontent.  Even the gorgeous ones don't feel like they are, we all know that.  It's really a focus of getting male attention at that point.  That should never be my goal.  I want to do the best with what I have always, and get the attention of one man.  Do you know what wonderful thing he said to me too????  When I was telling him these revelations I've had and told him the crazy number the scale has me at right now he said "You really wear it well".

What a man.  I knew we both needed to be honest that we noticed my situation, we agree that I need to make goals to change it, but he was truly content with me as I was.  I've never let myself be that, for myself.

So, I highly recommend going on a chubby shopping spree and getting stuff that makes you want to live your life!  Set goals and work for them, and love it all along the way.  I don't want to always miss my life shooting for something that will come and go.  My life does not have to come and go with it. My drawer and my storage should be ready to make me feel good at any size.

Perhaps some people all ready get these things....I'm probably just dense.  I'm happy to have realized it, and I just hope this encourages someone else feeling the same way.  I guess we live in a culture that makes it hard to see the more true obvious things.