As noted previously, I am still new to this whole cooking thing. Being blessed to go to a school that forces you to stay on the generally mediocre meal plan for all four years, I did not really ever have to cook in college, nor did I have the cash moneys to buy ingredients. Hauling tons of food from the grocery store into my house and storing it and then figuring out what the hell to do with it was simply too much when I already so much on my plate, like Res Life and class and putting clothes on. Plus, there was that whole eating disorder resurgence thang that generally left me with even less desire to learn how to make food and consume it.
But now, fully and totally left to my own devices in terms of feeding, it's sink or swim. And the Sheriff is swimming (dog paddling, really) but learning that cooking is not my forte. I get immense satisfaction when something I make is delicious, but when it's just palatable, my motivation to cook again is reduced even further by lack of being a cooking show rock star by natural talent. And yet, feed myself I must. So sometimes my meals are less than balanced: breakfast might be a pop-tart stolen from the snack closet at school, and dinner could be Triscuits, cream cheese, and whatever my roommate is making and willing to share. Working out on the regular has been reduced to random planks and pushups and once a week yoga.
So while I do not have a scale to consult/obsess over and all of my clothes still fit, I am starting to feel a bit softer. A bit fatter, even. And somehow, I don't really care. It's not at the level it was my first year of college, where I gained 40 pounds (yep, 40. Suck it, Freshmen 15), and was just impressed by my own fat and also too happy drinking full-fat chocolate milk with every meal too care. But still. There's a level of apathy and simple observation over the changes that I think is kinda worth celebrating.
I attribute this to several things: being so busy that worrying about my maybe expanding thighs simply doesn't fit in the agenda, living and working in a community that (generally) praises and gets a boner over a more hourglass/thick figure (see: every song about booty performed by a black man), the fact that my clothes are usually not very structured so a little expansion is excusable. But above all else, I think it's more that I feel like what I'm doing with my body and my mind is a lot more important than what my body's looking like these days. Besides, I've still got dudes for days so I'm not too concerned about my attractiveness factor.
And yet. I'm a human, and I've been at least a little brainwashed with the idea of what a "hot" body looks like for a young white woman, and know that I am moving slightly away from that as I acquire a bit more cushion for the pushin, as they say. The insecurities are still there; I'm not superwoman at fighting them off all the time. But slowly, I'm getting there. Sometimes, it is that easy.
Ever had this experience? How do you react to bodily change, especially when it's during a period of intense life changes as well?
Much love,
The Sheriff
Going through that right now, actually... We're in the middle of a huge move (from AZ back to Massachusetts... finally going "home", yay) and I've been noticing lately that I'm getting soft 'round the middle as well. It doesn't bother me that much, because after being underweight my entire life and often being asked if I was anorexic, I feel good about my body and the way it looks. The chunkiness only worries me because I want to be healthy--being skinny isn't important to me. I'm a woman, why would I want to keep looking like a scrawny little girl? Ridiculous. Once the stressful move (and its accompanying stress eating) is complete, I'm definitely going to seek out some dance classes or yoga, something to get me active this winter. :)
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