So today was a highly over-sensitive day for me. Actually, it’s kind of been a sensitive week.

Something my partner said unwittingly (and unintentionally) last week really triggered me. I’m nearly always only a hair’s breath away from an emotional crisis around my fitness level these days, so it doesn’t take much to push me over. Another friend said something, as well, today that hit me the wrong way.

And by ‘the wrong way’, I mean, it seconded, (well, I guess thirded,) the things I too-often whisper to myself beneath my breath. And it set me to thinking.

I realized that, while yes, it’s good for me as someone who is often over-extended/multi-tasking to the extreme, to ‘pick my battles’, as it were, in terms of the places I allocate my energy — I am too often surrendering the fights that incorporate moving my body in even the most elementary of ways. I wave the white flag on the battles that impact only me; housework, cooking, self-care. To enable this, I’ve incorporated help by hiring friends who are trying to make an independent living by cleaning houses, or enlisting the help of friends/roommates for larger projects, and I buy most of my meals pre-packaged at Trader Joe’s or do fast food/restaurant dining far more frequently than I’d like.

In the moment, it seems logical;

“Well, I could scrub the bathtub, or I could spend that time updating this website, or making calls about a this event, or doing some research, or sending out this email, or writing this press release, blah blah blah.”

It always seems like a reasonable choice to do the activist thing. There’s always so much to do, or that I could be doing. At the end of any day, there still remains a list past an arm’s-length of things i’ve yet to do. That’ll remain true for the duration, I’m sure. In a single moment, it’s a reasonable choice. In a steady stream of moments, it is a rabbit hole.

For the last year, my house has been in shambles, really. It’s been halfway-done, construction-wise. Every single room was affected because every window in the house was replaced. For this reason, the place has felt chaotic — no room restful. Even “clean” the place felt disheveled. I’ve never let the house get “dirty”, and it’s even been downright presentable at times, but i’ve let the clutter stack up these last few months. I’ve been showering in tyvek tape for 6 months, there was a big hole in my dining room wall, there was bare drywall in my living room, I could see daylight through the uncaulked holes in my window frames - why bother trying to get organized when even at its best my house looked like a construction site?

But now it’s done (for the most part) and as I walked past the over-full garbage can for the 3rd time today thinking “I should take that out.” I wondered, how many more times am I going to say that to myself before I actually DO it? Such a little thing - taking out the trash, and yet it feels like a big deal. Taking out the multiple bags of recycling feels insurmountable. I had to have a big conversation with myself to grab the bag and take it outside, and I still haven’t bothered to find a plastic bag to re-line the can with.

Wtf happened to me?

I have created some really bad habits for myself. I was never Susie Homemaker — but this is ridiculous. I have taken whatever self-sufficiency I had on a personal/household level, and delegated it out to the point where I feel downright helpless; where I feel infantilized by my own hand.

The same is true for my fitness level. My lifestyle is increasingly sedentary.

Today, for an hour and a half, a friend and I worked in the yard to set up the inflatable pool. It involved hauling the heavy thing and its tarp out from behind the shed, emptying it of collected muck and rainwater, spraying it down/emptying it of water, and then spreading it out, freeing it of wrinkles and filling it. It’s not exactly easy work, but i felt my weakness/lack of stamina as we did it. I also felt the novelty of using my body in that way. That it felt like a novelty was endlessly bothersome to me. I also got a sunburn near-instantaneously. Also bothersome. I realize that we were working in the most direct sun and in the hottest part of the day, but is my skin so fragile from lack of exposure that a single hour in it would burn me?

I find myself in wonderment at people who are able to motivate themselves to simple tasks like gardening and cleaning their house and grocery shopping on a regular and consistent basis. I have nearly completely divorced myself from my skin. I feel as if I’ve almost completely moved out of my own body. I don’t wish to challenge myself. It’s like, I’ve broken so many promises to myself that I don’t even believe me anymore, so it seems somewhere along the way I stopped trying to even pretend like I was a capable individual.

This is and always has been a huge part of my fat experience — this disconnect between my hyperactive mind and my nearly ignored flesh. My body has been a shameful reminder of my failings, and so for the most part, I have ignored it as a tool for my survival. It has been under-used, abused and all but abandoned.

I am going to try to sit outside of a place of judgment in this. I’m going to try to come at this from a place of self-realization vs. kicking myself in the ass.

This week, my emotional reactions to the things people have said to me, and my over-sensitivity as its played out in several different realms, tells me that I am definitely in a place that is not working for me.

So, my solution then, is to challenge myself for 20 minutes every day.
I don’t care what it is. Taking out the trash. Doing dishes. Scrubbing my toilet. Going to the store. Dicing vegetables. Going for a walk. Sorting papers. Organizing a room. Picking up clutter. Pulling a few weeds. Cleaning out my car. Whatever. Something that involves movement. Something that involves the kind of self-care that I seem to consistently avoid.

For a while, the challenging myself may simply be working up the nerve to challenge myself.
But I’m going to set aside 20 minutes every day where I discuss this with myself and will myself to tear down the roadblocks I’ve set for me and my body. Someday i will figure out what the root of this problem is. But until then, I’ll challenge myself to move past it.

No drill sergeant - just gentle conversation with the aim of understanding. Forceful but loving mothering.

Self-love is a complex and loaded endeavor. The biggest journey in my own Fat Experience will be learning how to re-inhabit my skin, and how to do so lovingly.

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Stacy Bias can be contacted Here.