I’ve spent pretty much my whole life hating my body. I’ve been overweight forever. Actually, that’s a lie. When I was young, I was a perfectly healthy weight; I just didn’t believe it. I didn’t look like one of Charlie’s Angels (my favorite was Jaclyn Smith) or Wonder Woman or any of the rail-thin, badass women I liked on TV. I didn’t resemble the random models and folks you’d see in magazines or catalogs or movies either. So despite being reasonably active with ballet classes and Girl Scouts and jungle gyms, and despite having placed first in the modeling/charm school I attended, I always felt kinda ugly because I was fat.

Did I really just admit that I went to modeling school to the whole of the interwebs? Well, look at the tagline – people are complicated, right? Honestly, I really enjoyed the modeling/charm school program. I’d walk around the house balancing books on my head to help with my posture. (My whole family actually had pretty rad posture to start with – family of Marines and all.) My mom had given me this pretty brush and hand mirror set with a pastel Victorian tableau on the back and I’d brush my hair the requisite number of strokes each day. I loved wearing little white gloves and knowing how to properly cross my legs at my ankles, how to curtsey, what fork to use, and having impeccable table manners. It was all so very civilized.

In 6th grade, we all had to go to the nurse’s office to get weighed. I don’t really know why. They lined us up single file and one-by-one they weighed us and recorded the results. I found this very anxiety-inducing, like waiting in line during gym class to try to climb the ropes in front of everyone, knowing I didn’t have the upper body strength to do it. When it was my turn, I nervously and sardonically said to the nurse “I bet I weigh 100 pounds.” I had no idea how much I weighed, but that sounded like a number astronomical enough that whatever I actually weighed would sound petite in comparison. I stepped on the scale and the nurse announced amiably, aloud in a voice that seemed to fill the room and travel down the elementary school halls, “Almost! You weigh 99 pounds.”

Aside from feeling utterly mortified, I don’t recall my reaction. But it’s possible my first heart attack did not, in fact, occur last year, but rather way back when I was 11 years old in the school nurse’s office.

(1) I’m the ballerina on the far right (2) After modeling school graduation, with my mom (3) In elementary school, pictured at a Girl Scout ceremony

I look at pictures of myself from the time and I don’t think I look especially pudgy, but by 7th grade, I was clearly not the only one who thought my weight was too high. Being of the opinion that I just wasn’t pretty (read: thin) enough to be a cheerleader, I decided to try out for the Pom Pom Squad. Don’t ask – I have no idea why I thought either activity was a good idea; I suppose I wanted to be involved in something or to fit in somewhere. The day of try-outs, the girls were all gathered in the gym and they were taking our names. My on-again/off-again BFF, clearly in an off-again phase, stage-whispered to the older girls who were holding the audition that an easy way to remember my name was to think of me as “Fat Pat.” I didn’t make the Pom Pom Squad. I don’t remember if I even stayed for the try-out after that.

In Junior High, pictured with my adorable niece

Don’t feel bad. It all worked out quite well for me in the end. I joined the Pep Squad to get my school spirit on and I used my talents to create the kind of school experience I wanted to have. I’d long before come to a resignation that it didn’t matter so much that I would never be thin and pretty (still synonymous to me at that time), because I was smart and that was infinitely better anyway. Not only was I pretty clever, I had a knack for organizing. I planned cool events that I would want to attend or participate in – trips for my ROTC unit to ride in helicopters at Andrews AFB and to go to the White House to see the President (Reagan, at the time); a debate series about topics I thought were important and interesting (i.e. gun control and Strategic Defense Initiative); talent shows; dances and formal military balls. I became committed to community service, working on events like Hands Across America and on fundraising drives for the American Heart Association and the American Cancer Society. I organized canned food drives, volunteered at a nursing home and taught an adult education night class for immigrants and new Americans who wanted to learn English.

I had a small but lovely group of friends through Junior High and High School who were all delightful misfits. A neutral-good character, unaligned with any particular clique or community, I was able to move between social groups and be friends with weirdos and non-conformists from all corners. At different times through these years, my dearest friends included a theatre girl, a valedictorian, a salutatorian, a drug dealer, an All-American soccer star, several drug addicts, a few evangelical Christians, some musicians, a class president, a remarkably talented History teacher, a number of punk rockers and a beautiful, kind-hearted skinhead.

Junior High, with some delightful misfits

I didn’t always recognize it at the time, but there was a lot of good stuff going on in my childhood. My body was not my focus, for either good or for bad. I suppose if I thought about it, I still thought it was a drag I was so fat (and therefore unattractive), but it didn’t seem to get in the way of my life. I had other issues that did, but generally speaking, I had plenty of friends, plenty of boyfriends, and I was crazily, happily busy.

So what the hell does this have to do with my feet? Not much. Have you not yet noticed that I tend to go off on tangents?

Age 14: (1) At an ROTC event (2) At my brother’s wedding

For several reasons, in the past few years, my body had become more of a focus for me. I developed all this self-loathing about my physical condition and the things I wanted my body to be able to do but it couldn’t. My weight had become legitimately out of control and the more depressed I got about the consequences of my weight and poor health, the more weight I gained. My blood pressure mysteriously remained perfectly normal, but a doctor noted my cholesterol was a tad high. I reduced the amount of meat I was eating… and my cholesterol levels went up. I eliminated meat from my diet… and my cholesterol levels went up again, as did my weight.

In the months before the heart attack, I had been actively investigating the possibility of bariatric surgery. I know some people who have had it and have had great results. I hated the idea, but I was feeling helpless. I was certain I was shortening my life every single day I remained obese, but I couldn’t manage to affect serious change. There is a kind of bariatric surgery that doesn’t actually remove or re-route part of your insides. That was appealing to me; I don’t like the idea of messing with my factory-installed equipment unless there is some kind of serious malfunction.

I was still deliberating about bariatric surgery when I had my heart attack. As it turns out, my weight wasn’t the primary factor in it happening. I’m sure the emotional stress and the strain the extra weight put on my body didn’t help, but the heart attack was caused more directly by other factors. Still, as a lifelong body-hater, I’ve had a hard time not blaming myself for the heart attack in addition to the other woes I blame on my body. If only I had more willpower; if only I wasn’t so lazy; what was I trying to do, suicide by donut? Blah blah blah. I can be surprisingly cruel when it comes to me. In times of sanity, I look at my life and I recognize that I’m not actually lazy or weak or whatever my inner body-hater wants to tell me. I try not to listen to the self-critical din, but it’s really effin loud.

Finally… My Feet

I was looking at my feet this morning as The Buddhist and I were planning our day. I rarely wear shoes because I kind of hate them, so my feet were right there at the ends of my legs. You know what? I have pretty awesome feet. They are not too big and not too small. My toes make a pleasing angle, big to small and small to big. They are very tidy, with no weird angles or bumps or scars – not even from that one time I broke my foot. And they are wonderfully functional; they have been with me through everything.

When my BFF and I drove cross-country in college, my feet did a fair portion of the driving. When we stopped at Yosemite National Park and climbed that mountain to get to the gorgeous waterfall? My feet did all the work. I didn’t have proper shoes and kept slipping on the steep granite rock face, so I took off my shoes and my bare feet kept me from sliding and falling off the mountain. When we trekked into the Grand Canyon early one morning without as much as a canteen of water and the rest of my body wanted to totally give up as we trekked back out at high noon? My feet were the ones who kept going, dragging the rest of me along.

Cross country trip with Caroline, 1989: (1) Grand Canyon (2) Giant Redwood Forest (3) Venice Beach

My feet have taken ballet classes; tapped danced in a parade; won drill team competitions; and walked across several brightly-lit stages, delivering my hands to robed men who would hand me diplomas or awards. They have splashed in rain puddles and creeks and rivers from the Mississippi to the Nile. They’ve acted like fins, propelling me though the pool at the Boys Club when I was 10 and through the Red Sea, 25 years later. They’ve climbed Mt. Sinai; ambled around Montmartre; spelunked caves in Borneo; dug into sand in Bali; and explored tombs in Egypt, rainforests in Vietnam and ancient ruins in Cambodia. Every time I have ever walked over to comfort or hold someone I love, my feet have taken me there.

My feet have transported me around the world. They have carried me every place I have ever been. Whether I was thin or fat, young or old, walking or running, my feet have been there for me and done their job – even when I’ve had to force them to wear shoes.Thus, this is a Patricia’s Feet Appreciation Post. If I’m going to learn to love my body – or at least not to hate it – my feet are an excellent place to start. Cuz, you know, my feet totally rock.

~~~~~~~

I’ll get back to work on The Day I Didn’t Get a Blood Transfusion, Part Three and get it posted asap. In case you’ve been worried, [SPOILER ALERT!] I didn’t bleed to death or anything.