Body Disorientation

I'm in the strange situation of being slightly weirded out by my own body. I never thought getting in shape would have a dark side, but it does! For as long as I can remember clearly, basically the last 15 years, I've been on the soft side of curvy. Sometimes softer than others :-) Except for a few months around my sister's wedding in 2000 when I killed myself to slim down so I wouldn't be haunted by intolerable pictures forever, I've ranged from feeling slightly dissatisfied to majorly frustrated by my weight. As I got older, especially after passing 35, it just got harder and harder to stay as fit as I'd like.

Not so different from most other women these days, I guess.


What's so strange now is that, having finally committed to a regular and intense enough exercise routine and being cut off from America's endless supply of empty and unnecessary calories, I'm finally getting into the shape I've always wanted and it's freaking me the heck out! My arms do not look like this; you can see the muscles moving under the skin, like snakes in the shadows. I have indentations in places I didn't realize had muscles, and where did my hips go? I find myself watching myself in the mirror and not recognizing myself.

The good news is that my stamina has gone through the roof and I feel much healthier (though my high blood pressure isn't going away. Thanks mom for those genes!). I'm having to buy a whole new wardrobe (which is actually not as fun as it sounds when clothes are as expensive as they are here) and I'm definitely getting more male attention. But, I still haven't accepted that this is me yet and I don't know if and when I will.

Before the problem was that my outside didn't always match how I imagined myself inside. That's still the problem, only now I'm in the position of my head having to catch up with my body.