Homey Health, Part 2: Weight Loss

Homey Health, Part 2:  To Make One's Way

Physical, Emotional, and Social Experiences with Weight Loss

by Dena Feldman Garfinkel

In a country of freedom and privilege, more than half of adults in America are overweight or obese.  I am one of those people.

However, I am no longer obese; after losing 30 pounds, I am only mildly overweight.  I look and feel good. I have dropped two dress sizes.

Weight has been a lifelong struggle for me.  I was a cute but fat baby, a cute but fat happy toddler, and then a fat, unhappy, teased child.  I was a chubby, sad, depressed teenager who slimmed down at fifteen but ballooned again by nineteen.

I am 5'3" and was 223 pounds when I was twenty-three years old. I'm 45 years old now, and weight has always seemed to control my life in many ways:  my health has been poor, my moods have been depressive, and my confidence has been low. I have always liked who I am, but I have berated myself for not being able to find the wherewithal inside of me to change my life for the healthier.  

Weight has never held me back from living vivaciously.  I am a college teacher. I am happily married. I have skydived, bungi jumped, and sung at karaoke bars.  But until recently, I have never been truly proud of how I looked.

The journey of weight loss and developing a healthy lifestyle is often elusive.  Like many, I couldn't find my motivation.  I couldn't find the right button inside of me to press.  It's funny how you can know what you need to do, but even when the answer is simple, the doing is so hard.

My life changed last autumn because I happened into the right support system at the right time.  It was the perfect storm of goodness.  I joined the neighborhood gym where people were kind and approachable. I met the first personal trainer with whom I've ever bonded and decided to budget to train with her once a week. My husband committed to a pact of his own creation:  we were not to eat or snack after 7p.m.

Somehow, this trifecta of encouragement caused something to click inside me.  I stopped the idea of dieting and decided to just focus on eating healthfully.  Nothing fancy; just smaller portions, less bread, and more vegetables and protein.  I stopped eating at night.  I exercised a lot.  I began to drop weight slowly, very slowly.  It took five months to lose 30 pounds, but I did lose them.

I have not finished this journey yet, and I think that it may be lifelong.  I'd like to lose ten more pounds because my doctor says that would be a healthy weight for me.  I'd like to maintain this weight and this figure.  More importantly, I'd like to maintain the feeling of pride I now have in myself regarding how I look.  I'm not perfect, and I'm not model-beautiful.  But I approach people with a stronger sense of openness now, and I notice that people treat me differently, better, as though they're more interested in me. 

That's been an unusual thing to get used to; there have been times when I noticed the palpable difference in how people treat me, and it's given me pause.  After all, I'm the same old me.

The only thing is:  I'm not.  There is less of me physically.  I feel different about myself. I present more confidently to the world.  I am happier; I am healthier.  I want to see and be seen.  I believe it's the change in how I approach the world that has caused the change in how people respond to me.

The journey never ends.  There are easy days and hard days.  I get tired, I get sad, I get hungry, and I get frustrated.  But there's no looking back.  There's only looking forward.  Life is a very short journey between birth and death, and we have little time to reach inside ourselves for health and happiness.  There is a button inside everyone that can be pressed.  The key is finding it.  And if you keep searching and trying, it will eventually find you.