On my lunch today I came across an article by a woman who lost 180 pounds after having by-pass surgery. Her story really left an impression on me, and made me think long and hard about the journey I have been on. With her, she lost the weight without effort and quickly due to her surgery. She aptly describes the landscape us over weight people have: horror by people who look at us, the incredible self-loathing we carry due to our weight and the struggle we all have to truly like ourselves.

I like the fact that she was completely honest about how society perceives obese and morbidly obese people. Frankly, people who are in this classification are discriminated against on a daily basis and most people make snap judgements on our eating habits and our level of activity. They assume, judge and condemn us to being disgusting and unworthy. How can that not permeate our consciousness? How can we not feel that loathing and start down the path or disliking ourselves because of our size?

I have lived with this my entire life. I was called a whale in school. I was banned from eating sweets as a teen, as if that were the only issue in my weight problem. I developed eating issues with sugar and to this day I fight to not hoard sugary sweets and not eat them in secret like I used to. I also struggle to love myself. Every woman is self-conscious, but when you are obese, it’s even worse because society chimes in to agree with you. Your arms are too flabby, your thighs too big. Why can’t you just lose the weight, be a size 2 and great like the rest of society?

Guess what? Society, in general, is obese! Why do I forget this? After reading her story, it made me realize I need to be better to myself. I need to stop striving to be perfect. I don’t know where my obsession with being perfect came from, but I need to stop putting the pressure on myself and just let myself be. I eat clean 70% of the day. I eat eggs for breakfast, fruit for morning snack, brown rice, chicken and green beans for lunch. Yes, in the afternoon I might have a bit of chocolate because I fucking want to! Dinner is usually similar to my lunch. And yes, I eat out once a week with my husband on date night. And I like movie popcorn. And guess what? I beat myself up every time I eat “off plan”. I get down on myself. It needs to stop. I need to find a way to love myself, flaws especially.

If anyone knows a perfectionist intervention group I can join, let me know, eh???