Distance

I realized that the amount of weight I want to lose is, for me, more about distance.

The more pounds I lose, the more distance between me and "that girl."

The one I was. The one who haunts my pictures. The one who shows up in my imagination as I look in the mirror. The one who tries to hand me back all the shame... the raw shame... that she carried.

Carries.

Will always carry.

I fight to put pounds of distance between us so that it's harder for her to hand it over, so I don't have to handle it anymore, as long as I'm unwilling to reach accross the distance for it. I want her to keep it all. She has plenty to go around. She has plenty for herself then, now, and forever. And I don't want it. And she's already been carrying it for so long. Maybe if I put a big enough number between her and me... maybe then she'll be out of the frame, and you... I... won't see her anymore.

I think that's why when someone mentions how much I've lost, I don't know how to sort out the compliment. Because what is in there with the nice thing they're saying is a reminder that everyone saw her and she's still lurking behind me. "You look so good!" brings with it a shadow that also says, "Remember how fat you were?"

I do. I remember. God, do I remember.

I think it's still hard because there isn't as great a distance yet as there needs to be. She's close enough to touch me. To force me to help carry her load. Because it's weighing her down so painfully.

I think back to that post from before... where I listed all the things I wanted... all the things that broke my heart... where I dissected out all this shame and begged future me to help me carry it. And here I am, unwilling to help unless I have to. Looking back with spite.

But it's me.

"Remember how fat you were?" they say by accident. I do. But remember how it's still me? Remember how before I put these pounds between us... how it was the same person standing here now? To point at the shame she carried is to point at me today, because things have changed but it's the same person.

She's already hurt and broken, weighed down, hopeless. She doesn't know it will ever get better. She's weak, tired, and just so, so sad. I don't know how to tell her to chin up, that I'm coming to get her. To lighten the load. I don't know how. I pray God forgives me for how I hated her. Yes, hated. Because He loved her as much as He loves me now, and I'm no less broken.

Put it down. Put the shame down and stop picking it up. And stop asking me to hold it. Neither of us have to carry it anymore. No one is asking us to.