Eating

Yesterday I picked my son up from football and another mum said “You’ve lost a lot of weight haven’t you?”. I agreed that I had. “Have you been trying to lose weight then?” she continued. Well, I’ve been watching what I eat so yes a little bit. “Right then. How much have you lost?” She asked. I’m not sure how much weight I’ve lost but I am sure the specifics are none of her business so I just smiled and said “a bit”. She wasn’t to be put off. She started trying to guess. She told me, no offense, but it must be more than a stone because you wouldn’t really notice a stone so it must be a lot and how much was it. Awk-ward. Eventually she gave up and we chatted about dogs. Much easier.

Everyone comments on my weight loss. Mostly complimentary. My mother-in-law, bless her, hasn’t acknowledged that I’ve lost any weight. No, instead she keeps giving me tips: hot water concoctions and Slimming World recipes. I’ll confess these are kind of mixed messages but she means well, I presume.

It’s frustrating as hell being on Quetiapine – a drug known to cause weight gain – and trying to lose weight. I fact I don’t think any more will come off. Nothing significant. I know I can’t eat any less really so here I am stuck, right on the bmi borderline between healthy weight and overweight. Is it so wrong to want to be a healthy weight? Why must everything in my life revolve around the word borderline?!

I’ve been exhausted all day, just mental wear and tear. The sedative effect of Quetiapine won’t be helping either. Once dinner had been sorted, and I had built my daughter a scooter I just lay flat out on the living room. I joked to my husband that I could fall asleep right there. He stood over me. He was wearing shorts so I was trying to perve up his shorts. “You need new pyjamas” he told me. I agreed. Mine were all far too big now. He told me that my bum looked tiny in the pyjama trousers I wore last night. I laughed. As if! As he continued it took me a minute to realise he was actually concerned. He told me he had concerns about my eating, he doesn’t know if I eat when he’s at work, he even used the word anorexia. I didn’t stop to tell him that it’s a physical impossibility for someone with my bmi to be anorexic as that might look like too much knowledge. I reassured him about my bmi and funnily enough he told me that he wasn’t concerned now as he’d checked me out in the jeans I had on and, apparently, my butt is big enough to dispel any concern! “Oh right so it turns out I’ve got a fat arse after all?” I laughed but I was confused again. 

Really all I want is a healthy bmi and it frightens me that people are starting to get involved in something that is actually very private to me (she says posting on the internet!) Surely I should be able to choose how, what and when to eat without feeling that this is also something I do for other people? Christ, does even my eating have to be for other people?! 

I wonder if there is any bit of me that is just for me? Now I’m exhausted so I really must sleep.