Laundry day conversation

You know the day I mean.  You look into your closet or dresser, pull out the very last outfit you can possibly put together without resorting to knee socks and cocktail dresses, and think "Yep."  Then you suit up as quickly as possible and tiptoe out of the room, trying to avoid eye contact with the teetering mountain of fabric as it sits there, looming at you.

In my case, the laundry-day outfit usually isn't too crazy.  I have a ton of old tee-shirts from high school and college - for plays I've been in, concerts I went to, the sorority I was in for about a week, etc. - but the lower half is slightly more difficult to clothe.  My thighs have this awesome power to eventually shred the inner thighs of every single pair of jeans I've ever owned.  I've got about four pairs of these sad sacks - they're actually starting to look more like chaps than jeans, except the ass isn't worn off (yet) - in my dresser, dreaming of the day when I will be handy enough with needle and thread to fix them up.  For now, I mostly just wear them anyways and keep my knees together.

Today, however, I'm going to my chiropractor.  Something tells me he wouldn't be amused if he got me all twisted up, trying to snap whichever part of my body defies me today into place, and suddenly my pants decided to finally give out all together.  Well, at least I hope "amusement" wouldn't be on the list of emotions.

But anyways.  I reached for a pair of pants that are still somehow intact, but which I almost never wear anymore, because they fit so oddly.  They're trouser pants in this really thin, kinda stretchy pinstripe material, and they're almost tight on my quads but really loose everywhere else.  As in, I don't have to unzip or unbutton them to put them on.  So they just look weird.  But they cover the naughty bits, so they'll have to do.

So I wandered down to the kitchen, grabbed a frying pan and started chatting with Amam as it heated up.  I looked down at my pants.  "You know," I said, "these pants used to be my skin-tight go-clubbing-in pants."  No really, it's true!  I can't even picture how that worked now, but I used to only be able to button them without discomfort on a "skinny" day.

She nodded.  "You've made a lot of strides!"

I smiled a self-satisfactory little smile, confident in the fact that damn, that is true.  I gloated for a moment, but only in the cute way.  And then I thought...

"I think the biggest stride I've made is the fact that my "weight goal" is now something that I want to LIFT, as opposed to something I want to BE."

I think I amazed myself a little bit with that statement - I've been pondering on it ever since.  That difference - the complete 180 mindset shift - really is the biggest and most wonderful change I could have hoped for, in this entire quest for health I've been on for gods know how long.  Of course I'm not immune to the bad-body-image demons - there are days when I entertain thoughts of going on a crash diet and losing the few bits of pudge that still drive me crazy...but then I go to CrossFit, and remember how important and awesome it is to fuel yourself with clean, delicious food.  The more I take the time to fuel myself correctly, the better I feel, the more I can lift and do, and the stronger I am.  And I LOVE that.

And then I ate three eggs cooked in butter for breakfast.  True story.

Lurkers: Tell me something you love about yourself.

-Nelly