CHUBBY BLUBBY

It seems that I have a life-long battle of the bulge. I can hardly remember when I used to be thin....but I remember how great I felt about myself when I was!I've always had to battle my weight...I can blame my genes for the slower metabolism and the tendancy to gain 5 lbs just from eating a gum drop, but I can't blame my genes for the situation I find myself in now.

I was a normal weight when I graduated from high school and through my freshman year in college. Then I joined the ND National Guard and got into really great shape when I went to basic training...but I started to gain weight after I got home.A few months after I got home from basic, in 2003, my unit got activated and sent to Iraq--I was among the very first soldiers to be in Iraq for Operation Iraqi Freedom. I spent 14 months total on active duty, and I got back into pretty decent shape while over there.

Then the weight gain really began. It took me over two years to figure it out, but I discovered that I was experiencing post-traumatic stress disorder from my experiences in Iraq, and suffering from depression and anxiety as a result. Meanwhile I'd been eating anything and everything in sight. Bakery chocolate chip cookies, huge bowls of popcorn swimming in butter, cheese sandwiches on bakery buns loaded up with butter were my favorites.

Since then, I've gotten a good handle on the ptsd--for the most part--thanks to a period of time on medication and some counseling, but my weight has continued to balloon until, now, I'm faced with the reality that I weigh TWICE as much as I should weigh...maybe a little more.

I'm to the point where I can't stand to look at pictures of myself--they're so much more revealing than looking in a mirror, aren't they? I never really go out and socialize with people because I'm embarassed of my size. I can't remember the last time I had a decent date...I'm sure that has something to do with my size, but I know a major contributor is also the fact that I don't feel good about myself. Because I don't feel attractive, I'm not exactly attracting the cream of the crop.

In the past few months I've made a real effort to reduce the amount of food that I'm eating, and I've actually maintained my weight within a 5 lb range...so, I'm actually kind of proud of that. I'm no longer "gaining." But that's just not enough for me. I don't want to continue to weigh almost 300 lbs. I want to start losing weight again and weigh an appropriate amount for ONE person, not two.With that in mind, I have several very real challenges and goals for myself. I know it won't be easy...it will be the biggest battle of my life...and that's really saying something. I have to remind myself that I'm a person worth valuing, and I ought to be valuing myself, first and foremost.