Green Canary

SUBTITLE: A Million Minus Seven is Too Much

“A fat stomach never breeds fine thoughts.” - St. Jerome

Anyone out there who has been with me for more than a day knows that I struggle with my weight. (And by “struggle” I mean “carry too much but do nothing about it except hate it and feed it.”) My tendency to eat to illness has made me wonder about myself, but since I have so many other problems a-mixin’ in mah brain – MAH BRAIN! – I’ve chosen to ignore my totally f’ed up eating habits.

Until now.

One of the unfortunate outcomes of my move to the B’More Big Girl Apartment is the rearrangement of my furniture and subsequent placement of my antique vanity perpendicular to my bed. This means that there is a set of mirrors – A SET OF MIRRORS! - facing my bed – FACING MY BED! – my sanctum of sheets and blankets and other body-covering fabric swaths – MY SANCTUM AND SWATHS, OMFG!

You think I’m overreacting. You think I’m making mountains of mole hills. Well, let it be known that I’m not talking about a regular ‘ol mirror, plain and simple. I’m talking MIRRORS. Plural. Three of them. At angles to eachother. Catching every. little. thing. From every. which. way. Imagine Dakota-sized thighs from three different angles and you’ll start to understand my mirror-y meltdown.

Since moving (and even before that, but that’s neither here nor there), I have been eating like a loco fool and have felt the changes occuring in my already-too-fat fat. My pudge got pudgier. My blub got blubbier. Lines in my skin got more pronounced. Disturbing soft spots, hollowish and smooshy, appeared in places where no hollow smooshiness should be.

To get into bed, all comfy in a t-shirt and shorts, only to look over and see FLESH OOZING FROM OUT YOUR WAISTBAND from THREE DIFFERENT ANGLES… It’s enough to turn you blind. My thighs are the Medusa of fat.

But even worse than seeing these changes has been my complete and utter physical shutdown from Mr. Mystery, my lovely luvah that lovely loves me and my not-so-lovely smoosh. This weekend I felt the words, “DON’T LOOK AT ME!” bubbling to my lips. Their near-release was unsettling. Those pretties hadn’t been said in a while.

I’d been walking around and fearing the worst, letting my brain agonize and speculate and wonder and fume in silence. I had lost a little weight when I was doing Weight Watchers, but that was five months and 18 dozen donuts ago so my tookus was right back where it started from. And maybe… even… a bit larger than before?

*gulp, stress, worry*

Mrs. Lady Doctor has been trying to teach me that ”fear caused by ignorance is worse than knowing the truth.” Translation: Weigh yourself already, Canary, and find out if you’ve really gained a million pounds instead of stewing about it all the live long day.

So I did. And you know what happened? The fucking Wii Fit made a poingy noise and told me I was obese.

Stupid technology with its stupid sound effects.

I now know how much I weigh and I am back to where I started. Not higher, thank the sweet baby Jesus, though my starting point was never a good place to begin with. And so? And so. Here I am. Square one, round belly.

Things have to change and I’m the only one who can change them, but my track record ain’t so good in that area. My faith in myself is weak, just like my abdominal muscles. I wish I could strength-train my brain so that it could overpower my emotions. Or maybe break my fingers so that they couldn’t hold a fork.

Whatever I need to do, I need to do it soon before my cholesterol turns me into a solid and my thighs take over the world. I don’t think I could last long among a world population who had unfortunately gazed upon my Medusa thighs and turned to stone. Their horror, eternally etched upon their stone faces, would be far, far worse than three mirrors violating my sanctum. Far, far worse, oh yes indeedie.