Fair warning...this won't be a post with photos of cats, tales of childbirth or humorous anecdotes about life with a toddler. This is just me, being honest..brutally honest. Folks, this is the harsh reality of my life right now. I know several of you are getting whiplash from my back and forth moods, but it is what it is. It isn't pretty and it isn't happy...but then, neither am I.
There's a phrase that's being bandied about in bloggy-land; "Keepin' it real." There are a few blogs that call out the bloggers and writers who they feel, aren't "Keepin' it real." Well folks, this is my blog, and right now, this is my life and I'm doing my best to keep it real!
A couple of weeks ago I got an email from someone who reads Barking Mad, asking me about the photos of me that are out here (In particular the photo that used to be above the "about me" section) and was wondering how recent they were? It was innocuous enough but it kind of rankled with me for a few days, like a burr that starts to fester if not removed right away.
I never responded to the email because frankly I didn't want to deal with it. It also bothered me that someone asked a question like that. To be honest though, I've been expecting it. The photo in question is not quite four years old. I happened to like it and have used it on various social medial avatars. As a general rule, I really don't like having my picture taken and don't feel I'm particularly photogenic.
I let the email irritate me for a little while longer before I deleted it. I thought, "out of sight, out of mind." But it wasn't. It was still there. Maybe not physically, but on the not-so-subconscious level it was a bit like a grain of sand irritating an oyster, except I rather doubt a pearl with result from this.
I was taking pictures of the Little Imp a few nights ago and asked the hubby to snap a close up of me. I thought to myself; "For fuck's sake, just put a recent picture up on the blog and all the other social media you try and keep up with! Just do it already!" He ended up taking about 90 photos and out of all of them, I only marginally liked one. This is the lone survivor out of all those wasted shots...
I uploaded it and darkened the edges and increased the light and that was it. I slapped it up on Facebook, Twitter, and the blog and called it good.
Except it wasn't. Good. Or anything else remotely close to being good. Or honest.
The photo hasn't been retouched, but the face...the smile... None of it is genuine. It's not an accurate representation of the woman who sits in front of the computer, completely safe from the scrutiny and judgment of the outside world; who regales you with tales of her cats, her toddler and her wretched life.
There's a lot that you don't see when you look at that photo.
You don't see the entire picture, and if I have my way, you probably never will. You don't see the obese woman, who is so terrified of people and the things that come out of their mouths...the judgments, the looks, the condescension and superiority complexes that she stays in her home unless she has a doctor's appointment or her husband forces her to leave.
Oh...but wait, there's more. The coat hides the layers of fat that surround my neck and my 3 ever-present chins.
The make up conceals deep, dark circles under my eyes from nights spent trying to keep myself awake so I won't have the same goddamned nightmares over and over again. Under eye concealer also covers up the cracks and sores on the sides of my mouth created from the hours I spend making myself sick so as not to gain any more weight. It's an ugly little habit, but it's mine. I can control it when everything else is spinning out of control around me.
Let's face it, 60lbs in ONE YEAR is a hell of a lot of weight to gain, I don't care who you are. One might assume, due to what happened back in January of last year, I might have gone the opposite way and done anything to lose the weight. Well, the brain is a strange place and mine is no exception. It wouldn't be too far off the mark to say I'm trying to bury myself alive.
The bottom line...Attractive to no one. Repulsive to everyone. I'm getting the message loud and clear.
This is just one of the many reasons I've decided against attending Blissdom and BlogHer '09. Women, as a rule, can be catty and petty...not to mention consummate gossips. Why open myself up to any more of that kind of bullshit than I have to? I've read the blogs...the ones where they spend time getting off on ripping other bloggers/writers apart. I've seen how they talk about the women who attend these conferences and list all their faults and make fun of them. I'm really no one out here, certainly not an A-Lister, not even a Z-Lister, but why open myself up to it in the first place? There are some wonderfully talented women (writers and bloggers) attending these conferences that I'd love to learn from, not to mention a few truly awesome friends I've gotten to know that I'd love to meet...but not so much so that I spend the entire time making myself ill because I'm terrified of the things that people are thinking about me.
There's one thing I want to know though...why am I assumed to be a second class citizen because I'm not your idea of perfect? Why is it the rule of thumb that I must be slovenly, ignorant, uneducated and dumb? I don't fit your mold of the ideal woman, so it's OK to treat me like something you'd wipe off the bottom of your shoe after walking across a cattle farm?
You know what the most ironic thing out of all of this is? I'm trying to raise two daughters to not give a shit about what everyone else says they should look like. I'm trying to raise them to have healthy attitudes about their bodies and be confident young women who are intelligent and compassionate humans. I'm trying to show them that taking care of yourself and being healthy is important, but not to the point where you try to fit someone else's idea of perfection.
That's really something coming from a mom who just stuck her finger down her throat so she wouldn't gain any weight from eating dinner.
