Looking over the last ten years, I notice that I am rarely in any family pictures. In order to avoid documenting my weight, I have failed to leave complete memories for my kids. Honestly, if you look at our family albums you would think my husband was a single parent.
The funny thing is, I love taking photos and documenting the important and not so important events in my children's lives. I just made sure I was always the picture taker and not the subject of the photos. I have been an avid scrapbooker over the years, and the photos of me in the album are carefully selected to only show the times when I was in control of my eating and exercise.
I am sure it goes back to the whole distorted body image problem that causes the eating disorders in the first place, but I am working hard to realize that my kids need complete memories, no matter how flawed I feel the images are.
It is amazing the power we sometimes give to photos. When I go to my mother-in-law’s house there is an old picture of us on the refrigerator that makes me cringe every time I see it. Not only is it an amazingly unflattering picture of me, but it also documents the effects of what my eating problems did to my family as well. As you can see from this seven year old photo at the beginning of this blog, my entire family is rounder of face than they should be. We were all unhealthy, including the kids, and as parents, we have to take credit for that.
I am trying to give less power to photos, but I still slip back occasionally. Before my last half-marathon, I received some photos of me from a Thanksgiving race where I was 20 pounds heavier. I looked at those photos and was so excited that my Surf City photos would be different. A week ago I got photos from the finish line at Surf City and to my disappointment, I looked no thinner than the Thanksgiving photo. Now I know that I have made significant changes, but I couldn’t believe the power those finish line photos had to make me doubt my accomplishments.
I need to remember that I am a work in progress and that no matter what the photos might appear to document, I am on the road to the flabulous me.
Join me next time when I share my weight loss journey over the last six years.
The funny thing is, I love taking photos and documenting the important and not so important events in my children's lives. I just made sure I was always the picture taker and not the subject of the photos. I have been an avid scrapbooker over the years, and the photos of me in the album are carefully selected to only show the times when I was in control of my eating and exercise.
I am sure it goes back to the whole distorted body image problem that causes the eating disorders in the first place, but I am working hard to realize that my kids need complete memories, no matter how flawed I feel the images are.
It is amazing the power we sometimes give to photos. When I go to my mother-in-law’s house there is an old picture of us on the refrigerator that makes me cringe every time I see it. Not only is it an amazingly unflattering picture of me, but it also documents the effects of what my eating problems did to my family as well. As you can see from this seven year old photo at the beginning of this blog, my entire family is rounder of face than they should be. We were all unhealthy, including the kids, and as parents, we have to take credit for that.
I am trying to give less power to photos, but I still slip back occasionally. Before my last half-marathon, I received some photos of me from a Thanksgiving race where I was 20 pounds heavier. I looked at those photos and was so excited that my Surf City photos would be different. A week ago I got photos from the finish line at Surf City and to my disappointment, I looked no thinner than the Thanksgiving photo. Now I know that I have made significant changes, but I couldn’t believe the power those finish line photos had to make me doubt my accomplishments.
I need to remember that I am a work in progress and that no matter what the photos might appear to document, I am on the road to the flabulous me.
Join me next time when I share my weight loss journey over the last six years.
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