Being Thin Won’t Make All Your Problems Go Away

I’m not trying to dash anyones hopes here, or downplay how good it feels, after being really fat, to be thin.

It feels great. It’s worth striving for – for so many reasons.

But it will not bestow endless happiness upon you.

I’m currently 60 lbs. down from my top weight and have been (more or less) 60 lbs. down for six years.

I continue to live low carb explicitly because I don’t want to gain that 60 lbs. back – in fact, I want to lose another 20 at least.

But I want to be honest with myself and realistic in my expectations. As this article from MSNBC.com notes (and I experienced myself when I was at my thinnest), when you take being fat off the list of things that bother you, there’s yet another thing waiting in line to piss you off.

For most of us, it’s a long line.

I mean, to think! I still sat in traffic. Picked up dog crap. Misplaced my car keys. Spilled ketchup on my  shirt. Was happy sometimes, and sometimes sad. These things shouldn’t happen to a thin person!

At my thinnest, I remember talking to my sister, who is fat and has also battled her weight all her life. She was going on about how great it must feel to be me – to have lost the weight. To her, I had seemingly conquered life itself.

Now, I love flattery as much as the next person, but I didn’t feel all that heroic. Yes – I had worked hard and achieved a goal I had tried at and failed at for over 20 years, which felt good from a spiritual, emotional, and physical standpoint.

But I didn’t feel that the accolades she put on my success, the way she painted it, were honest. For her to believe, nor for me to buy in to.

I told her: you know, once you’ve lost the weight and keep it off for a while, it’s just another thing.

Here’s the point: don’t put off being happy until you lose the weight. Work at being happy now.