Skinny

Warning:  I’m going to talk a little about sex… not graphically though. :)

I’ve sort of slumped back into my old frame of mind.  I don’t think I’ve gone all the way, because I still feel like I’d stand up for myself and before I didn’t have that feeling of… confidence.  But I am starting to feel like I’m not good enough, that I’m worthless, unimportant, fat, and ugly.

I think it’s cause of Jon.  The most ironic thing about my life is this:  Me, pretty much the most horny person I know, married a man that couldn’t care less about sex or anything else remotely intimate.  Why couldn’t I have found someone that was at least compatible with me in THAT regard?  That would be too easy, that’s why.  Besides, if I didn’t have someone to help me feel this way, I may actually get skinny and we all know that would ruin everything (I’m really into sarcasm…).  At least he could help me get my kicks off in SOME way.  Instead I just get to suffer.  I can’t even just find a random online person.  He gets too jealous.  I may as well be a statue.  All I do for him is bring home money and give him someone to talk to.

Somehow, in my simple pea brain, I’ve decided that sexual desire is akin to mattering to someone.  It’s the ultimate form of mattering.  Because if someone wants me sexually, they think about me all the time, the want me all of the time, they need me all of the time.  Sometimes I wonder if I’m not really horny or perverted, but I’ve adapted those things in order to find a way to matter to someone.

Then there’s the matter of when I was a kid.  I started gaining weight when I was 7-8.  I think it’s cause my dad started working days and I started being around him more.  With him, I can’t seem to do anything right.  When I was younger, I tried.  I tried hard.  But I was never good enough.  He’d tell me to shut up, then ask me why I was quiet.  He’d tell me to go outside, then yell at me for not coming in.  I think he stressed me out, made me nervous and anxious, so I ate.  I don’t eat because I love food.  I actually can’t stand a lot of it.  A few months ago, I realized I eat to take my mind off my anxiety.  I just eat and eat and eat.  Then when I’m done eating, I’m so full I hurt… and that pain also distracts me from my anxiety.

 

But, it’s a double edged sword.  When I finally get anxious enough to stuff my fat face, when I’m done, I feel even worse about myself.  So my own private binge can last for days, until I manage to pull myself out.  I had a day like that on Sunday.  Yesterday I wanted to, but I held back.  Today, I want to again, but I think I’ll manage to hold back again.  These last two days have gotten me thinking though.  Once I started gaining weight when I was a kid, this is the message the people in my life sent to me.  First, I have to note, I realize these people were only worried about me and the impact weight gain could have on me, but they all handled it horribly.  Instead of trying to find out what caused my weight gain, they all just judged me.  My grandma told me once that if I came to spend the summer with her, she’d get the weight off me.  I think I was 9.  My sister used to tell me that every Dorito I ate I had to lose 1 pound.  My mom used to put exercises in my daily chore list.  Guess what all of this taught me?

I don’t matter unless I’m skinny.

But what if I lose all my weight?  What if I lose all this weight and I end up still not mattering?  What if my flaw as a human isn’t my size, but my actual being?  What if I actually am just worthless and being fat gave me some twisted sense of worth?

There was once, when I was 10 or so, that my uncle came over to our house to talk to my dad.  He’d brought my little cousin with him.  She could walk, so she must have been 18 months or so.  Anyway, my uncle asked me to watch my cousin so he and my dad could talk.  I took her outside and we were playing, but I couldn’t distract her long enough to stop her from trying to constantly run to her daddy.  I managed to keep her with me until right before my dad and uncle were done talking.  She ran into the house, right to her dad.  I swooped in behind her, scooped her up, and turned to leave.  While turning, my uncle stopped me while I was facing him.  He said, “How am I supposed to talk to your dad with your big fat body in my way?”  I was shocked!  And hurt.  I turned to my dad.  He just looked at me.  He met my eyes and I swear I saw a bit of a smirk.  When he said nothing, made no move to defend me… I turned back to my uncle, muttered my apologies, took my cousin back outside, sat under the tree and cried silently while I played with the baby.

 

It crushed me to realize my dad agreed with my uncle and his words.  As a result, I’ve always been guarded around this uncle.  He was probably 20-25 when he said that… definitely old enough to know better.  How would he feel if someone had said that about his daughter?  Maybe he’d be like my dad and agree that he had the most horrible, ugly, fat, and worthless daughter in the world.

I know this is something I need to bring up to my dad.  I want to know why he never told my uncle to shut up… probably he doesn’t remember it.  Plus, the last time I actually got the courage to bring something up to my dad (because I can’t defy him in any way, I must always obey), he just wiped his hands in the air and said, “I wipe my hands of it.  I did the best I could with what I knew.”  I wish he could just say he’s sorry for not doing a better job.

B