Ambivalent goals: AKA "Well, hello there again, hipbones!"

Image courtesy of The Stock Exchange

I mentioned back in my "Give me a Reason" post that a couple of my reasons - the ones I'm least comfortable with, funnily enough - revolve around visual appearance.  I don't like that they're reasons, but as mentioned in that post, I don't think I'm really doing myself any favours by trying *desperately* to pretend that they don't motivate me.

One of them was about the appearance of muscles. I love the look of muscles moving under my skin - especially when I'm working out, but also those "surprise, bet you weren't expecting us!" appearances I used to get sometimes when I was getting dressed in front of the mirror and there'd be like... whoah... abs... are those really MINE????

What I'd forgotten, when I wrote my reasons post, is that I also used to like being able to see my hipbones occasionally. Now before you panic and figure the Beast has got its hooks well and truly into me again, I should probably say that I'm NOT talking about the angular, gaunt, protruding hipbone look. It's more... when I was lying on my back and I turned my leg to one side, I'd occasionally have this moment of... hey... there's a bone under all that curviness and muscle and flesh.

It's getting hot during the day here in New Zealand, and yesterday was hot enough that I was lying around in some reasonably loose pants and a sports bra. And my husband asked me something and I moved, and... there was one of those hipbones of mine. Still well and truly covered by muscle and... well, not-muscle... but definitely there. For the first time in a long, long, long time. And I could see/feel it moving!  Which prompted a moment of glee, followed by an experimental *prod* *prod*, and then a distinct thought pattern of  "Well, hello there, again hipbone! Long time, no see!" and finally a sense of "Cool! Human anatomy is an awesome thing, and hey, look, I have some!"

As usual when it comes to this kind of stuff, I'm trying REALLY hard to keep it in perspective. It's a mark of progress. Which is nice. But it's not a particularly important one.  It's not like, for example, being able to run an entire 5k without stopping to walk at any point. Or finishing a 10k in less than 1 hour 20. Or being able to do 50 full pushups without stopping or breaking decent form. All of which are current short-to-medium term fitness goals that I will be celebrating like nobody's business when I finally manage to achieve. But it's still a mark. And I'm kind of enjoying it, even if it's mixed in with some... ambivalence.

And I wonder, am I the only one with goals I'm not always 100% comfortable with? Do you have weight loss or fitness goals that you're just a wee bit ambivalent about wanting in the first place, let alone conflicted about actually achieving? How do you deal with the ambivalence?

To quote the Corrs: "Give me a reason"

Image courtesy of the Stock Exchange

I've been meaning to make this post for a while now, and Dani's post over at Battle of the Bulge about the things that have improved in her life since she lost weight has prompted me to get my thoughts out of my brain and down on screen.

Why exactly do I want to do this weight loss journey?

See, the first time I lost a huge amount of weight, back in my teenage years, I knew exactly what I wanted on the surface. I wanted to be skinny. I wanted to be able to wear skinny clothes. I wanted to finally, finally, finally look good, in a way my teenage brain had come to the conclusion that a fat girl never could.  Let's just ignore the fact that churning away below the surface, I also wanted some vestige of control over my life - control that had been ripped away first first by sexual abuse from a family friend, then the early death of my mother days before my 17th birthday, and then my Dad's remarriage to a woman who... well, let's say she had a host of psychological issues with long, interesting, polysyllabic names, and leave it at that.

The second time, I was older and wiser. Or so I tried to tell myself.  I was in my late 20s. This time I didn't want to be "skinny".  I didn't want to be "thin".  I wanted to be "strong". I wanted to be "fit".  I wanted to be "healthy".  But at the root of it all, I really wanted to be able to wear leather pants and short skirts and the odd corset or midriff top and look HOT in them (once again, at the back of my mind "in the way a fat girl can't").  The affirmations I said to myself were all around the numbers on the scale and the size on the garment label. And again, in a new country, in a job that I had ethical issues with, feeling out of control with pretty much everything else, I wanted control, damnit. Yeah, that ended predictably too, although at least I got to my goals by adding compulsive exercise in with my crash dieting. Which meant I at least I *looked* healthy.

So you can understand why, despite having been on my weightloss journey for slightly over a year now, I've been absolutely loathe to focus on the way I looked as the reason for my journey.  I've worked hard, over the past years, to try to change my core belief to one where beauty is a matter of attitude and confidence and strength, and not a matter of size. And I've tried my hardest to be beautiful with what I have and who I am - not holding out with the belief that I can't be until I meet a given set of numbers.  So instead, I took a functional goal I was aiming for - to complete the 100km Trailwalker 2011 walk - and convinced myself that I'd do a far better job of it than I'd done the first time around (wherein I got to KM#88, but couldn't finish the full 100) if I did it at a lower weight.

Which was all well and good, except that... well... Trailwalker 2011 isn't happening any more. I didn't manage to pull a team together for it, and it's something you can't do unless you can find three other suckers... willing volunteers... as crazy as you are.  And I couldn't. So now I'm left without my original reason for losing weight... but still feeling, very strongly, that I want to continue with the journey.  And I thought it was about time I started exploring why - what the reasons that are relevant to me now are.

Here are the ones that come to mind:

• Running more easily: I'm not entirely sure whether this is just my mind replacing one functional goal with another, but I'm enjoying the hell out of this "being able to run when I've never been able to before" thing.  I'm booked into 7 (count 'em *7*) 10k races from this December through to July next year, and then a half-marathon in August. And just as with Trailwalker, I just can't help thinking that the less excess weight my body is carrying, the easier I'm going to find it to run.
• The joy of *muscles*: I'm one of these women who puts on muscle really easily when I do any kind of resistance work. I love that about my body. I love that it makes me feel strong. And I love watching muscle move under the surface of my skin when I move. It's not about getting super lean and ripped or going all bodybuilder or anything (not that there's anything wrong with that if that's what floats your boat, but it's not a Starfire thing).  I just like seeing my own muscles. And yeah - I can see my muscles more easily when they're not hiding under ~47% bodyfat.  So losing weight *sensibly* can help me with that.
• The health benefits: I'm torn here. I *know* the research is conflicting, and that overweight women with healthy habits are likely to be healthier than average-weight women who live unhealthily.  But here's the thing. My genes give me a history of obesity on both sides of the family tree. My mum died of breast cancer before she hit 40. My dad has had to deal with heart disease, heart attacks and diabetes. Various cousins and aunts and uncles have or have had a laundry list of cancers and other ills.  If I live my life in a way that allows me to become or stay severely overweight, I'm *not* likely to be any different.  And people, I *CHOOSE* to be different.  I love my family, but I do not want their health issues.
• The looking hot thing: yeah, I debated with myself back and forth whether I was allowed to include this as a reason. What about beauty not being a matter of size, hmmmm?  What about the danger of focussing on looks to the detriment of everything else? Because, y'know, that's worked so well for me before.  Here's the thing. It is a reason for me.  I don't do myself any favours by pretending it isn't.  Despite the stupid practices I used to get there, I *loved* the way I looked when I lost the weight the last time.  I loved what I saw in the mirror - the strength and the lines of my body. I loved being able to wear size 12 (s8-10 American) leather pants.  I loved knowing guys - or girls - were looking at me and liking what they saw. I loved it. I'm vain that way. And gods above and below help me, I want that again. But I *DON'T* want it at the expense of all the other reasons, and I think I'm finally in a place (please? maybe? pretty please?) where I'm strong enough in myself that that's never going to be my most important reason again.
• The not being embarrassed about my body thing:  ooooohhhhh, I'm opening up a can of worms with this one. I know I am. I *hate* the concept that I have to be a certain weight or shape before I can be proud of my body. I don't want to be that shallow - that... conditioned by the media and what's supposed to be conventionally beautiful. But here's the thing.  I am. There was a day a couple of years back where I found myself making excuses to avoid going swimming with good friends because I couldn't face the idea of being in a swimsuit in front of them. Summer after summer, I wear long trousers and ankle length skirts because I can't handle anything that shows my balloony, swollen legs.  The ironic thing is that losing weight won't actually help with that last (it's a lymphatic condition, apparently). But the more things I have to be actively proud of in my body, the less I focus on the things I don't like.  And so yeah. This reason makes the list too.
• And finally? Because I've never been able to lose weight healthily and keep it off before:  I really, really don't like admitting defeat and accepting that just I can't do some things. That doesn't mean I don't have to do it sometimes - there are a whole host of instances where acceptance of my limitations is my only healthy option. But I haven't learned to like it yet, and part of me prays I never do.  I was the same way with running. For the longest time, I knew, beyond the shadow of a doubt, that my body just wasn't built to run. I found lots of other things I could do instead.  Every now and then I tried. And failed. And injured myself. Which just proved I couldn't do it.  And then? After 37 years of knowing I couldn't run, I found Couch-2-5k. And suddenly, hey, look at me! I'm running! For interval sessions that last an hour!  I can do it! Finally, at last, I can do it!  And part of me wants to know... is losing weight and healthily, sanely getting to a size that I'm 100% comfortable with seeing in the mirror (and then maintaining it) going to be another thing I knew I couldn't do, but yet somehow I manage to anyway?

Y'know, when I go deep down and look at my motivations, I think it's that last one that really fires me up.  It's not about losing weight for a specific occasion (although I can think of plenty of them if I really want to).  It's not about being able to get into - or back into - clothes of a given size, or seeing a particular number on the scale. 

It's about proving myself wrong for every time I've said "I just can't do it" in the past.  It's about working towards something that's hard because if I just kept taking the easy way, I wouldn't in all honesty - be living the life I want to live. It's about stopping lying to myself about what I really want; and starting to become the best, strongest, most in-integrity me I can be.

That, ladies and gentlemen, is why I'm staying on the weight loss journey.  How about you?