Saturday, August 22, 2009

Age 22

I grew much faster than those around me. By the time I was 10, I was 5 feet - 3 inches and 220 pounds. I was fat. Plain and simple, I was unhealthy. I never managed to feel comfortable in my skin while in school, and as a result, I isolated myself and ate food for something to do when I was bored and lonely. By the time I graduated from high school, I had arrived at 280 pounds of unhealthy, unhappy 18 year old girl.

Then, I went to college and was forced to walk a couple miles per day to get to and from my classes and somehow I managed to begin to focus less on my appearance and how it was perceived. I was a girl doing something healthy - exercise every day! I could walk miles more than my peers without getting exhausted. I began to appreciate the things my body could do, and began to love it. My legs were amazing for being able to carry me. With that mentality, I started to try to see how much it could do. I started exercising much more often - taking up new sports. I began to love every inch of myself. My big thighs are muscles that can take me miles on my bicycle. My round butt is screaming with a megaphone how many hundreds of stairs I climbed in Europe, and my large arms testify to the fact that I swim for miles every week. Every inch of me tells my story. While numbers aren't important, I want to share for those of you out there who are still large - I am saying these things while still weighing in at 220 pounds. 220 pounds of strong woman who loves the look on people's faces when they see this beautiful body climbing out of the pool after 100 laps!