I am a woman with many guilty pleasures when it comes to TV, and the Biggest Loser Australia is one such pleasure. I'd watched a bit of it here and there, but last year I got into it in a big way. The timing was perfect because I was in a place where I wanted to lose weight, and watching the contestants on this show transform did actually inspire me to make a real effort myself.
I was quite excited when this year's competition started up, having come far enough in my weight loss journey to not be fat enough for the show. When it started there was a contested, Lara, who's starting weight was the same as mine when I began keeping track of my own weight loss: 107kg. (I don't know how much I weighed at my heaviest, I'd guess about 112kg.) As the competition got underway I thought to myself "OK, let's see how this Lara chick does, and I can use her weight loss as a goal for myself."
If you're not familiar with the Biggest Loser, the way they go about losing weight is completely insane. They go from being morbidly obese and very sedentary to training upwards of 8 hours per day. One of the things I really dislike about this show is the contestants diets when they are in the Biggest Loser camp. The show has a lot of corporate sponsorships from various food companies, so, guess what the participants are told to eat? And it gets worse. In order for them to actually get really dramatic results and make the show interesting, they are made to hate their fat selves.
Now, there's a lot of fat-hate out there, and, of course, there's also a fat-acceptance movement. While I don't think that there is anything acceptable about fat-hate, I'm wary of fat-acceptance. I have yet to meet someone who was significantly overweight and also truly, genuinely happy with themselves. Is this because the media tells us to hate on any itty bitty imperfection we have? Sure, that doesn't help matters, but it can't all be blamed on the media. I think that every person with a 'weight problem' (and I am not going to define what that may be) has some personal demon, or potentially many personal demons, that need to be dealt with. If these demons aren't dealt with, I don't think the weight will ever stay off. And hating on your fat self is not going to make those demons go away; it's just adding some new ones into the mix.
Lara proved to be incredibly driven. By the second or third week she had lost more weight than I have in a year. By the time she was eliminated she was down to I think 72kg and wearing a size 10. The thing was, by the time she was eliminated, my flatmate and I had been screaming at the TV for weeks that she needed to go. Sure she looked great, but she had gotten herself into a really fucked up head space and remaining in the competition was doing her more damage than good. She hadn't dealt with her demons at all. Instead, she had just worked her ass off to get as skinny as she could, and lost perspective along the way. She had absolutely no confidence in her ability to keep the weight off outside of the Biggest Loser camp, and that, to me, was the biggest reason she needed to get out: to prove herself wrong and FINALLY deal with whatever her fat demons were. I'm curious to see how she's gone outside the camp, but the finale is still a few weeks away.
Watching Lara made me so incredibly glad that I have not done something drastic to lose the weight. My goals have been small and achievable. They take time, perseverance, and a lot of hard work to achieve, but I continue to achieve them. I have built so much more confidence in myself on my journey because I have done it on my own. I have gone from being an obese, sedentary person to being an overweight, athletic person. And in time, I will be, simply, an athletic person. I currently weigh 89kg, and I think my ideal weight will be between 70-75kg. Though, as I am actually more interested in building muscle than just losing fat, those numbers are really just a guesstimate.
I have never understood the obsession with being a size 8 (I doubt my skeleton would actually fit into a pair of size 8 jeans). I remember the sizes I was wearing in high school, when I was around (or under) 70kg. I was usually a size L, a size 14. That suits me just fine. I don't want to shop in the plus size section anymore. I want to be able to go into regular stores and buy jeans that fit me. I do not care if I am buying the largest size jeans the stores carry; provided they actually look good on me. I want to be able to purchase the funky tights I see in so many stores and know that they are actually going to fit me when I get them home.
Going through my wardrobe, I have to admit to myself that the majority of my clothes are actually way too big for me. As I've said many times, I cannot afford to just buy myself a new wardrobe. But every now and then I take stock of what I've got and what I need, and I make some strategic purchases. This morning I headed into the city on what I thought would be an impossible mission: to find a structured skirt in a shade of brown for around $60.
I decided to go to Burke St mall and check out the newly renovated Myer first, and branch out from there. I've always headed straight to the plus size section at Myer, but this time I decided to give the regular women's section a go first. I had almost completed my walk through and was about to head up to the plus size section when I saw it: the perfect skirt. Figuring "what the hell," I grabbed it in an L and XL, then wandered around and picked up a few other things to try on just for fun, including a less perfect size 16 skirt.
I tried on the XL skirt first, and it was, in fact, perfect. But at $80 it was also a bit more than what I had wanted to spend. I didn't want to spend much on a skirt because I am still losing weight, and it's really frustrating to spend my very limited funds on something awesome when soon it too will be too big. So again, I figured "what the hell," and I tried on the L. And it fit! It is a bit tight, but it's completely wearable and will actually look even better in a few kilos time! Well worth the $80.
I knew I wasn't going to buy any of the other items I'd brought into the change room with me, but I enjoy playing dress-up so I tried them on anyways. And much to my surprise, the size 16 skirt was actually too big! Now, I suspect this is more a case of 'generous sizing' than my actual weight loss, but it felt amazing to know that I don't have to go straight for the plus-sizes anymore! So amazing, in fact, that I went out and bought myself two pairs of funky tights. And sure, when I got home I discovered that one of them doesn't fit, but I also discovered that the tights from last year's epic wardrobe fail now fit me just fine. It's those pay offs that I love the most: fitting into the clothes that were too small, discovering I actually can walk in my heels, watching successive pairs of my skinny jeans become my fat jeans.
My weight loss journey may be taking a lot of time, but look at how that worked out for the tortoise.
amazing joni! :o)
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