Day 52: The fight for self acceptance

This is from yesterday, but the pain in my hands was too much to post so here we are a day late and a dollar short….

I have been craving chocolate cake with chocolate frosting. Funny thing is I used to hate chocolate. This distain is also applicable to any type of nut, melon or lope (Yes, I hate watermelon). But as I've grown I've discovered the decadence that is chocolate and the less that it induces. Simultaneously, I have wanted to stick to a workout regimen this year.. I had plans. I told myself if you can write every day, then why can't you work out for at least 15 minutes every day. I've had a vision. I'm coming back to Cranbrook in the spring for the girls graduation and Thesis exhibition, and I wanted to look like,*takes a full body scan* .."Oh, she looks good". I was doing well and feeling good and my body with my workout regimen, then I got stressed out with work. Then I remembered I was grieving. Then I start feeling sorry for myself…And then come the excuses. But also, who said that the way my body is right now doesn't look good?

That's a good question to ask, why I believe it was you (Morgan). There's always been a bit of fat phobia within me. Which is ironic because I've literally always been thick to some degree. Thick is the brand, thick is the mantra, thick is me. And I've always fought against it. I come from a thick ass family. But I've never appreciated it. I was never taught to appreciate it. If first thing you say to each other is how good they look because they lost weight, why would you feel good about being thicker? Since the word fat has been reclaimed, my mother was fat. She was the most beautiful woman I've ever known. She had the confidence and self-esteem of Jill Scott and Erykah Badu. And the fat phobia in me, planted whilst amongst the white children in Carmel Indiana, always marveled at the existence of both. How can you be confident and fat? …Damn shame.. Damn shame… If I knew then what I know now. I don't think I've ever complimented my mother on her body. I might have told her she looked nice, or it was beautiful, but she possessed something that only now i’m striving to achieve. The year she passed I was my largest, I weighed in about 255 pounds. If you saw pictures from back then, you might not recognize me. It's been said that it looks like I had on a “fat suit”. And I wasn't offended by that because, because the weight I was carrying was the the weight of somebody suffering from a deep loss and self-medicating with comfort foods. When I got a noticeable amount off I was about 200 (and still am). There was a a shift in my self confidence level. I felt great about myself. Felt confident in myself. Wasn't exactly where I wanted to be but I got most of the grieving weight off..even if the scale still indicated that I was technically still "obese“. That was an accomplishment for me. While everyone else in the world was potentially gaining weight over quarantine, I put in that work and said early on that I was not going to get any bigger during this pandemic. The constraints and the limited options for how one could spend their time worked completely in my favor. There was nothing else to do. But today, I lasted a week.

Yesterday I Instacarted a chocolate cake with my groceries. One of those little shitty $5.00 ready-made ones from the Pick N Save (Wisconsin’s Kroger).. (they ran out of the “Rich’s Double chocolate with decadent buttercream”). I'm looking forward to enjoying some when I'm done writing this.. While unpacking the groceries I had the cake open with my spoon still sitting in it with a hunk missing out side of it. I grabbed the spinach to put in the fridge and when I came back and there was one piece of spinach on top of the cake. A hidden message? An indication? Cosmic shade?.. Not sure. But I thought it was funny. Did I work out today? No. The motivation is just not the same, I'm not uncomfortable in my body. I like my body. I am comfortable with my body, but there's parameters to it. For example, I could enjoy the company of a man without any concerns or hesitation to reveal myself. I know I have what they want. But ask me to wear shorts outside. Or, a mini dress, where my legs are completely exposed. The confidence I have within the domestic space and being outside in the sunlight are incomparable. Ask me to wear a bikini at the beach. Right now I'm sitting here writing, it would be a whole thing. I do it, but not without a cover up that would be worn majority of the time. But say I would wear a sheer cover-up. It doesn't make any sense… I would be uncomfortable. In fact I was very uncomfortable the night of my graduation. I had this adorable miniskirt from Hanifa and my legs were completely exposed. I was super confident until our plans changed, eliminating our ability to slip into a sexy and sleek nighttime environment, with intentionally dimmed lighting. We ended up Shipping Company which contains nothing but bright cafeteria tungsten lighting. My false confidence was completely exposed and my insecurities were being made clear. I remember looking around and noticing that no men were looking at me.. And I felt unattractive. Now, isn't that telling? I'm hearing myself now and wow, what does that say? To feel unattractive because the vultures aren't swarming? Makes me question who I do it for in the first damn place. It's normal but it ain't right.

I've told a few of my friends how I wish I could dress the way that I want. But why can't I? What is it that is keeping me from achieving Lizzo like confidence and embracing every dimple. Because because that's really what it is, I hate cellulite. I think it's unattractive. There I said it. I would love my body and flaunt it and being naked in public if I had no cellulite but managed to keep my exact shape. Now ask me if I think cellulite is unattractive on someone else.. I'd say she's a bad bitch no matter what dimples and curves and stretch mark she has. But why is there such a double standard for myself? Where does that come from? Wherever it came from its gotta go. I'm trying to find the motivation to strive for a daily workout regimen. It used to be rooted in disgust. It was easy for me to draw that line because I pushed my body to the point of unrecognizability in order to fill a hole that cannot be filled. So what is my motivation today?.. Still trying to figure that out. What's it gonna take for me to put on the skirt? Still trying to figure that out..Confidence really is key. If you don't have it then nobody's gonna believe you. But first I need to convince myself to have it. Because guess what baby girl.. The arms you hate so much or generational. The cellulite you can't stand is biological. The tummy you wish would go away was inherited. So I think I'm going to challenge myself. Not to get the weight off, not to tone up before summer (unless I feel like working out) but to pick out something that I would usually deny myself the pleasure of wearing and to just wear the fucking dress. And if you see me out in the street, and you notice my cellulite before you notice me.. that's fine, because it's all mine.