Did my body always do that?

People say to me ”ooo at your age…” when referring to the fact I can’t read small print, that I need the loo often, that weight is middle age spread, you’re in mood because you’re a woman of a certain age, when I’ve forgotten where I put something.  I would take heed and adopt that frame of mind.  Having lived under the black cloud of depression for so long I had forgotten what my body and mond were like before.

Over a year ago I had to undergo a skin graft operation following a nasty burn to my upper arm.  I have regular appointments with the scar management occupational therapist.  The last time I met her I asked if the reason I could not straighten my arm was because of the scaring.  Her response has stuck with me – “could you d it before the accident?”  Thinking about it – no I couldn’t. 

My point is I cannot remember how my body should be, how my mind should react, what I should look like.  Why? 

From an early age I was ridiculed by school mates and family about my weight – I was chunky and ate for comfort.  Then at 14 I was quite ill and weight melted off me.  I loved it – I was able to tighten the elastic on the school skirt I wore for five years.  Always a fussy eater I now became even more finicky about food.  Oh the control, the feeling of being hungry…it was a drug.  Reading teenage magazines I found out about laxatives and making one self sick.  I was hooked – more on laxatives which I took at carefully planned times of the day to ensure I was not caught short.

More than a decade later my unhealthy habit stayed with me, but I was in control.  Then for reasons I don’t want to explain now control was taken from me.  I was forced to eat food I would not have chosen for including takeaways the exercise regime I’d created for diluted as it was insisted I need to be picked up from everywhere and that I could do nothing for myself.

My source of control was slowly but surely being taken away, the dark cloud pelted on me all my life failures. 

To skip months and years…and after finally finding a combination of anti-depressants that work I find myself saying to myself – “fat and sane or skinny and insane”.

 

Then going back to what people say tome about my age – well ,I’ve always had dreadful eyesight, my bladder control has always been awful, I am moody because people say such stupid things, I remember where I’ve put something until someone else decides to tidy up.   

 

So what I am saying, “did my body always do that”?  I can’t remember.  But can any of us?  Do we do the same thing, day in day out, month after month, year after year?  Some may and that is their control.   

What I do know – is that I will listen to my body and mind rather than the opinion of others.

 

 

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