At a loss for ideas today, I turned to a book of writing prompts. It asked me to look at picture 14 in an old photo album and write what came to mind. What comes to mind is astonishment – pure, unadulterated, oh my God my memory is sooooo flawed astonishment! In the course of my life, I have come to understand that we teach ourselves how to remember. We, or at least I, put pictures in our heads and remember from there. I think that is why photo albums, scrapbooking and photography are so important to me – it’s my way of firmly planting an image and; therefore, a memory in my brain.

This morning I used the book of my mother’s life as my prompt. Upon her death my sister, sister-in-law and I created a keepsake scrapbook of her life to use as a guest book and a display at her wake. It is one of my most prized possessions. But here is the astonishing part – my mother is not obese. I know that may sound cruel, but the whole of my life my mother dieted. She constantly told me she was fat and ugly – particularly in the dressing rooms of department stores. She would stay home from events and regularly, okay always, made mention of her weight. I learned, early, that weight was what mattered. I was in a Weight Watchers meeting at 9-years-old and clearly remember going to Gloria Stephens to “shake the fat away” with those really old electric belts (think treadmill belt) that you wrapped around your waist while the machine shook. I can still smell that building in my mind, and I can still picture my 9-year-old self shaking away in a corner both mortified and excited to be with the grown up ladies.

Fast forward to this morning, and you’ll be shocked to know that my weight is what defines me in my own head. It’s my biggest demon – the thing that keeps me up at night and makes me shudder everytime I need to shop for clothes or attend a large gathering. I regularly acknowledge to myself that I am clearly the heaviest person in the room when with a crowd, and the tapes in my head need to be burned or I truly believe they will one day kill me. My children routinely make comments to me noting that I am not fat. My daughter, God bless her 12-year-old soul charges me $1 everytime I use the word fat, and, yet, I am not obese. No, I don’t wear a size 2 or even an 8, but I’m not, in medical terms, obese. Neither was my mother.

My daughter, again shocking, struggles with her weight. Have I caused this? Have I gone the other way by not bringing her to weight watchers or an exercise class? My honest answer is no. I am aware of what she eats, who she is and what matters. She is 12 for pity sake, she should not be defining herself by her body image, and I will not do to her what my mother, innocently, did to me. We are all big boned, tall, Swedish girls. No petite wallflowers here, so why do we expect to weigh as a waif does? When did weighing more than 170 pounds make me a horrible person? Why does this demon still haunt and define me four children an amazing husband and a successful life later?

Honestly, what shocks me most is that it’s all a lie. The lifelong misconception that my mother fed me (literally) about herself and by extension – me was and is a lie. My mother was not what society would define as thin, but she wasn’t obese either. And, truthfully, at the end of the day, I loved my mother for who she was, what she meant to me, and the difference she made in the world. No one came to her wake or funeral and said, “oh dear, it’s such a shame she never acquired the perfect number on the scale before she died.” No, they spoke of her community service, her great love for animals, her amazing ability to make friends and a difference, how sad their lives would be without her in it, etc…because they did not look at her and see her weight they looked at her and saw Louise – the person they loved.

In the 11 years since her death, I have retrained my brain to think positively. I work daily to focus on the good and many blessings in my life. I have friends that I love as much, if not more, than family, I have a life that I am proud of and believe in and yet, the small inner voice in the back of my head still hates to shop for clothes and cannot acknowledge that I am wholly and perfectly and beautifully me; size 16 be damned!

Last night, we drove by a boutique in the center of town. They were displaying gorgeous fancy occasion dresses. My daughter, with all of her soul, wants to wear one of those dresses. I made comment that I would love one too, but would never wear such a thing in public.

Her reply? “I would – today, or someday when I look like Julia (her skinniest friend), and I’d love it on me either way because it feels good in my skin.”

I want to feel good in my skin.

And now I’m sobbing big ugly gulping cries, because I could not teach my daughter what she so graciously teaches me – that we are all wholly and perfectly and beautifully us, size 16 be damned!