Non sum qualis eram

I finally found the forums.  They were a good read.  I did 4 miles tonight on the treadmill.  I was feeling bummed out until then.  Somewhere after the 2nd mile the endorphins kicked in.  I’m feelin’ pretty good.  Funny thing is that I’ve done at least 3 miles a night all last week.  I wake up feeling a little sore, but then I go to work and stand for most of 12 hours and don’t have any problems.  Within a half hour of waking, the soreness gets shaken off and I’m feeling fine.  I’ve added supplemental protein shakes twice a day with some glutamine thrown in.  That’s gotta be what’s makin’ the difference.  Oh well, whatever!  I’ll take it.

When I’m at work I usually end up with time to think.  Prolly too much time.  This week I started thinking about the two times in my adult life that I took off most of the weight.  Both times I think it took me by surprise.  At the 300# mark, 5 pounds doesn’t show much.  Loose clothes hide most of it anyway.  At the 200# mark, 2 pounds can make a huge difference in your appearance.  Months and months of hard work and people “suddenly” see a new you after a couple pounds.  It’s like being thrust into a new world overnight.  At least, that’s the way it felt for me.

To be honest, I learned both times that I’d gotten “thin” from my female friends.  Suddenly their boyfriends became awfully nervous about me hanging out with them so much.   I went through school with 2 of my sisters.  I always had a lot of female friends.  Suddenly in college, 3 of my friends just up and stopped walking from class to class with me.  I mean, we had the SAME classes.  Luckily, Amy told me what was up.  I really didn’t have a clue.  The second time it was making the mistake of ending up drunk an alone with my best friend’s wife.  It had never been a problem until then.  Suddenly she decided to make things very, very awkward.   I did the right thing and got out of Dodge.  Looking back, I think he must’ve heard a different story about it.   It would explain a lot.

The two things I remember liking best from back then were clothes and sports.

Mens’ jeans operate under the clown pants theory when you get into the plus sizes.  I mean literally, they’re designed for suspenders or something.  The only way to get ones that work is to either buy them tight around the waist or belt em tight. Otherwise, it’s the old keep pulling your pants up thing that everybody hates.  Somewhere around 38’s jeans start getting tailored to fit better.  Instead of your waist holding them up, they kinda curve and get held up by your behind.  Sounds weird and I know I’m not getting it quite right, but that’s what it feels like.  When you hate your gut anyway, the last thing you need is to have to cinch your pants up around your waist.  The smaller sizes get to the point where it doesn’t even feel like your wearing jeans.  I miss that.

The other thing is just being able to run around and act like an idiot.  Calling it playing sports is kinda over glamorizing the whole thing.  Basketball and frizbee were awesome.   Racquetball was my favorite game of choice.   Tennis was okay, but racquetball was just such an outlet for all of my aggression.  Hit a tennis ball like that and it’s out of bounds every time.  Heck, usually it was out of the courts.

Ah… I will run again.

Kevin