Run for the Cure

I have decided to participate in this Sunday's CIBC Run for the Cure, which benefits the Canadian Breast Cancer Foundation. There is a choice between a 1K and 5K run or walk; I have entered the 5K event.

I would love to say I'd run it, but my knees just won't let me do that, not for 5K...I can run then walk, run then walk, etc. That's what I do normally when I exercise. If I run too much I definitely feel it the next day...or next week. So I'll be walking. The last time Erich and I were in Ohio, we got knee braces for me (for about 80% less than we'd pay in Ontario) and I'll put them on just in case. But it's all good. I've walked a 5K many, many times in the gym. I'll finish.

For years I've sat on the sidelines, wanting to take part in something like this. My father's sister - Aunt Betty - lost her battle with breast cancer over a decade ago. I spent a lot of time with her growing up and her daughter Leesa is around my age; we were buddies as children.

Aunt Betty:

At almost 450 pounds, I was never fit enough to pay tribute to her in any physical way with a cancer walk, ride or run. But this year, I'm gonna do it. I'll do it in her memory but also for myself; a celebration of my own good health and a reminder to never take it for granted.

Terribly late in the game for fundraising, I initially thought about paying the $40 entry fee and not bothering. But then I thought HEY....I have a lot of friends out there! The goal to waive the entry fee is $150. Surely, I thought, I can get 15 of my friends to give me $10. So I went for it. And raised the $150 pretty much overnight. WOW! Well, I do have very cool friends!! So I upped the ante and raised my goal to $300. Almost there!

C'mon now, you know you wanna help me raise money for this wonderful cause! Everyone knows someone touched by this disease. Click HERE to donate to my fund. The festivities start on Sunday morning at 8:00 a.m. The walk itself starts at 10:15. Erich, bless his heart, will get up at what is for him the middle of the night, to cheer me on. I'll let you all know how it goes!

School must've been hell, right?

I am often asked, in some variation of outright or implied - and often with a sympathetic voice - "School must've been hell for you, right?" The answer to that question might seem obvious. Indeed, the people who ask me always seem to assume my formative years were spent hiding in hallways from bullies. The short answer is no, my school years weren't hell. But the long answer is a bit more complicated than that.

I've been larger than my peers all my life, ever since I came screaming into the world at over 9 pounds. "Big-boned", one might call it. Taller than even the boys till some of them caught up with me in high school and the total opposite of petite, I definitely felt out of place among my female classmates.

However, I was fairly "normal" - for my big-boned self - from kindergarten through second grade. Little boys still didn't want to hold my hand at recess, though. I just wasn't the kind of sweet, shy little girl that attracted boys. My idea of letting a boy know I liked him was to toss him across the room. Yes, I really did that in second grade. I even got paddled for it! I mean, screw the whole note-passing, "do you like me, circle yes or no" crap. Who had time for that?

I really don't know where I got this weird, loud and obnoxious personality. Both my parents are very nice people, I swear!

I started changing in third grade. My school photos show someone who looks totally, completely different from second to third grade. I blame the acquisition of glasses and the cutting of my long, blonde hair. Well, not really. I was blind as a bat and refused to let my mother brush out my curls. Steps had to be taken. Both my grandfathers died that summer; my maternal grandmother was battling leukemia. Now, I was certainly too young to understand all of this but I have a theory that I sensed great amounts of tension in the house. So maybe....just maybe...that's when I started comforting myself with food.

Then the trouble started.

There was a girl who rode my school bus who started giving me grief. Now, she was also no string bean but this didn't seem to deter her from attempting to make my life miserable. My older brother cold-cocked her in the head with his metal lunchbox one day, defending me. There was also another older girl who lived near my maternal grandmother and delighted in riding her bike up and down the road, shouting insults at me. Again, my older brother came to my defense. He shot her in the ass with a bb gun as she rode away one day. Yes, he really did.

Even though there were occasional problems with idiots like these, overall I was doing fine socially. I always had lots of friends - I had a few very close ones but honestly, there were people I called "friend" from every social strata at the school. I was not a "prep" (a.k.a. the rich kids, cheerleaders, jocks). I was not a "hood" (which is what we called those who liked to wear black, listen to metal and party). But I got along with everyone. My little group of friends called ourselves the "in-betweens". While we watched the many Molly Ringwald movies of the time and identified with a lot of the teen angst bullshit in them, the whole "us vs. them" theme didn't affect us very much. I would say the experience was different for those who wore the other two social labels, though.

It helps to understand that I grew up in a very rural area where everyone knows everyone's family several generations back. The same faces stare out from my kindergarten and high school graduation class pictures, just 13 years older. We all always knew each other and they always knew me to look the way I did. It's just the way it was.

But every now and then, someone would come along and seemingly try to make me feel like shit. It was always someone who didn't know me very well. There was a duo of guys in 6th grade who were suddenly in my class and man....that was a tough year. They were relentless. Ever since third grade, I just kept getting taller and bigger. By age 12, as I've mentioned before, I was at least 5'6" and 200 pounds. I looked like no one else at my school, not to mention Mrs. Rice's 6th grade class. It was like these two boys wanted to bring me down to size.

In science class one day, the teacher had something he wanted to show us but wanted us to guess what it was (I have no memory of what it actually was). Our desks were arranged in a circle, so we could all see each other. Kids were shouting out guesses. I said "I know! I know!" and one of those two boys said in response to my enthusiasm, LOUDLY, "Cindy, it's not food." I dropped my head in shame. The outcry from my other classmates was fast and furious. Their immediate response was to scowl at him in disgust and, well, they kinda boooed him! I think he was shocked...he had expected them to laugh with him. One girl - one of the cool kids - said "Don't you say that! You don't know her! That is so mean!" I will never forget that she did that for me. She was and is such a kind person that it was automatic for her. The teacher, to his credit, let the other kids take up for me for a minute then he demanded an apology from the boy, who reluctantly gave it.

It didn't stop him or his buddy though. Like I said, that was a bad year and didn't end until I didn't have to deal with them every day because we were all shipped off to the junior high school. We would be merging with the other local elementary school. I was nervous about how these other kids would react to me, for sure. But it was ok. Junior high was pretty much like elementary school - I made friends and it was fine with the occasional asshole thrown in. High school was the same.

Notice I haven't spoken much about boys. That's because there's not a lot to talk about till my senior year in high school. I met the boy who would become my first husband and finally got to experience normal, teenage, high-school life. We went on dates. We went to dances. We swapped class rings - most girls wound yarn around their boyfriends' rings in order to shrink them enough to wear on their fingers. My boyfriend's class ring fit my size-nine finger perfectly but oh well. He was two years younger than me so I ended up going to a few proms, too. Normal high school stuff.

Boys were my friends. I've always gotten along well with guys. I laugh at the same things they laugh at, I "get" them in a lot of ways. Always have. So I was definitely one of those girls the guys thought of as one of their own (and still am) - not girlfriend material. Did I have a few dates here and there? Yes, but not the normal high-school girl experience until I was almost done with high school.

But school was not day-to-day hell. No hiding in the bathroom waiting for the bullies to leave. My large network of friends was something I could always cling to when the occasional freak came out wanting to hurt me. They didn't stand a chance. I knew the people who liked me vastly outnumbered the people who didn't. Obviously I took some of what the freaks had to say to heart. Words hurt a lot more than clenched fists and weave themselves into the fabric of who you are, no matter what.

I had more problems with strangers on the street than kids I encountered every day. I guess I never realized how lucky I was - or at least, how much worse it could've been - until I lost all this weight and people started asking me about school and how it must've been so rough for me! Honestly - yes, I was the fat girl in school. Always. But it's just who I was. And most of the people I saw every day didn't give me shit about it. To them, I was just "Cindy". I might've been the fat girl but I was also funny, smart and kind. Luckily for me, for most kids I grew up with, that was good enough.

Music saves the soul

Music has been saving me lately, that's for sure!

A couple of weeks ago, I went on a girls' road trip to Sharon, PA with my friend Paris to meet up with yet more friends to see Kris Bell. We all got to know Kris when he played in Bo Bice's band. It has been 4-1/2 years since I've seen Kris so I was pretty psyched. I think he'd seen new pictures of me on Facebook because he wasn't too surprised by my transformation. He just looked at me and said "This is crazy! Crazy!" before giving me a hug. I do have to admit the best part about that hug was that his arms went all the way around me. Yep, I'll say it.

I was also able to get one of his t-shirts at the merch table. I'm telling you, I'm a t-shirt-buying fool. I can't get enough of them! I realized the other day I need more hangers. I probably don't, I just need to stop buying t-shirts!

The Kris concert was pretty amazing. It was so great to be at a real, genuine ROCK show and we all danced our asses off. Not since high school have I busted a move like that. Seriously! Actually, I stopped dancing in high school when some guys from a neighboring school laughed and pointed at me. I would get out there occasionally - and slow dancing was always ok - but those boys probably have no idea what affect their ridicule had on me. And I shouldn't have let it get to me like that, but I'm only human. No one wants to risk humiliation.

But in Sharon, I wasn't worried at all about being humiliated. And it was a BLAST. I needed that weekend. It's very possible I will be driving to Nashville for more of that in the near future. Or at least as far as Cincinnati...right Laura? ;)

I had surgery on the 9th to remove the uterine cyst and insert the IUD. It went well - they kept moving it up and I ended up in the OR about 3 hours ahead of schedule. In the course of answering routine questions, I had to tell the attending nurse about my gastric bypass and she insisted on seeing a "before" pic! She was too funny. My wonderful husband keeps our wedding picture in his wallet, so we showed her that. She couldn't believe it. Also, since all I was wearing was that dreaded hospital gown, the OR staff saw my back tattoo and asked about it. It's always nice to have people oooh and ahhh over your success. It reminds you that you have truly accomplished something noteworthy; don't ever forget your own awesomeness.

I felt really good over the weekend, enough to keep a date with Keith Urban and my good friend Randi, who, although doesn't like country music, I think it's safe to say is now a KU convert. Heh. It's like a Bo show; it only takes one time and you go "WTF WAS THAT??" You want more and more and more. So I didn't sit down for 2+ hours. Danced, sang, clapped. Sooooo much fun. Got my first KU t-shirt, too! Probably not such a good idea for a girl who had surgery three days beforehand, though.

Kris Bell says "music saves the soul" and he's right. Bo says "live music matters". Also right. There are few things in life that can make you feel better than music, especially when it's live, right there in front of you so you can FEEL it.

Maybe I pushed it too far Monday. I haven't felt the greatest since then. Tuesday, Erich and I ended up in the ER because he got a large capsule stuck in his throat. I know how horrible that sounds, but he's ok now - through absolutely no help provided by medical staff at the hospital. Ridiculous, long story but we spent 9 hours sitting there and 3 more hours waiting for an ear, nose and throat specialist. So I got no sleep, which didn't help my own health condition. I got some rest Wednesday but still need more to be "normal".

Tomorrow morning I will attend part two of a three-part workshop called Craving Change. Craving Change is a "How-to Guide for Changing Your Relationship with Food." Lord knows most of us need that, right? I'm taking the workshop because I feel like I need to be more in touch with WHY I want to eat the way I do. Since I can't afford therapy, this seems to be the next best thing. There are already some interesting patterns/triggers coming to light for me and I'll do a more extensive blog on that later.

The Big Sexy Blog

Last night was the second episode in the new series "Big Sexy" on TLC. Now, when I hear the phrase "Big Sexy", the first thing that comes to my mind is pro wrestler Kevin Nash.

Yeah. *dreamy sigh*

But the television show is pretty damn cool, too. I was skeptical when I first heard about it, I admit. How would this show present overweight women? The clown? The slut? The victim? Well, I was pleasantly surprised that none of those stereotypes are present in the main characters on this "reality" show. They are normal women who just happen to be overweight. But they have to navigate their way in the world carrying around extra pounds - which makes for special circumstances worthy of its own series.



Dating, pleasing your parents, finding the perfect outfit, girls' nights out - these are all covered in the first two episodes. But I want to focus on dating.

My fear for the main focus of the show came to light when the girls visited a BBW (Big Beautiful Woman) party in the series premiere. Cringing in horror at the Thunder Thighs Contest and a troubling array of unattractive/weird chubby chasers, one of the girls, Lesley, said "These are my options?? That can't be right."

Amen. I was glad to see the girls in the Thunder Thighs Contest portrayed as the oddballs of the fat-chick world. Most of us don't want to go there.

So they tried speed dating with the "normal" crowd, wherein a man admitted that the only way he'd sleep with an overweight woman was if he was drunk. Again... "these are my options?? That can't be right."

Heavy girls are in a dating no-woman's land: We don't want to be anyone's fetish yet most "normal" guys need to get trashed in order to bear our presence. Is it any wonder our self-esteem takes a hit?

A lot of heavy women (and men) settle. Which is one reason why there's an 80% failure rate for relationships within two years of bariatric surgery. What was once good enough doesn't feel quite so special anymore.

After my divorce, a very good friend of mine told me she was worried that I, at over 400 pounds, would settle; she told me I didn't have to, that I needed to look for a man worthy of me. I took what she said to heart and luckily stumbled upon a wonderful man who was neither a chubby chaser nor did he require a case of beer to be with me. He loved me for me. So trust me, good, normal guys do exist.

Now that's not to say I didn't date my share of losers in that gray area between husbands. The internet dating scene was just taking off, and I made full use of it. I was always very upfront about my size so therefore, I did attract some of the aforementioned chubby chasers. I went out with a couple of the less weird ones and I have to say it was wonderful to look at a man and see complete lust in his eyes. Every woman wants to feel beautiful and desired - that's a rarity if you're plus-sized. It was an ego boost that led me to Erich....I was very bold with him and surprised myself with both my nerve and his favorable response to it.

Confidence breeds results, ladies.

So in response to Lesley - yes, there are other options. And nope, you don't have to settle. I never did! Both my husbands married me when I was very, very overweight.

Now that I've lost weight, I certainly feel male eyes on me that weren't there before. It's a bit weird, a bit scary and yes, flattering. I'm just glad I don't have to navigate that particular minefield anymore!

I'm going under the knife tomorrow to remove the uterine cyst I talked about in my last blog. The doctor will also insert an IUD - both of these things together will hopefully bring some relief to the psycho cycle. Wish me luck.