Weight, To Scale

I did a silly thing.  A really silly thing.  I used the gym scale wrong.

The gym scale is much like a doctor's office scale.  It's got two metal sliders: a little one and a big one.

Did you know the big slider is not just at intervals of fifty?  The little slider is by ones up to "50," with clearly marked halves and tenths.

But the big one, as it turns out, marks fifty pounds, then ninety pounds (signified by a "40"), then one hundred pounds, then one hundred fifty, then one hundred ninety, two hundred, etc.

Guess what I just noticed about the big slider this week?  Yeah.  In my defense, the notches for "40" and for "100" are really close together.

I am not a compulsive weigher (or at least, I'm not since the husband threw out my little digital scale in the winter).  Since June I've probably weighed myself sixish times.  The first of those, in mid-late June, was when I thought I'd gained a certain amount of weight all of a sudden.

I weighed myself as a reality check about four weeks ago, and my weight was low-ish.  (Well, okay, I call it "low-ish."  My therapist calls it "still a really low weight.")  I weighed myself Tuesday and it was all of a sudden healthy-ish, even though none of my clothes fit differently, and my bras were still too big.

"How odd," I thought. "Just like in June, only this time I don't feel like clawing off my own skin.  Yay!  I must be getting healthy!  I mean, I imagine I've put on some muscle as I've been jogging more quickly, but wow, I never imagined I'd get to that weight and not feel disgusted with myself at first!"

Then, on Wednesday, I looked at the scale again.

Then I said, ".... Oh."

Then I adjusted the big slider to the right.  Then I had to move the little slider to the left, left, left some more.

At a remove, I'm fascinated by my reaction in June (when I am pretty damn sure I was doing the exact damn thing with the stupid scale) versus my reaction on Tuesday.  In June I felt as if I were going to fly apart, so visceral was my feeling of engorgement.  Tuesday I felt.... good.

Wednesday I felt embarrassed, and not just because of the silly scale mistake, either.  I felt embarrassed because some larger part of me had finally wanted to gain that weight.  Tuesday I felt scared, but proud.

I am having such trouble taking enough food into my stomach at one time to allow for appreciable weight gain.  The feeling produces such unmatched anxiety that it is hard to hold on, and to remember that feelings are like waves, with peaks and lulls.  At the same time, I am embarrassed about my body.

It feels as though most of my mind is ready to move ahead, but my body has a humiliating hold over some little part of it still.  Hm.

Someone bring me the pliers.