It hit me like a ton of bricks...

        It all started with an innocent Facebook browse last night at 11:00 pm. To be honest, I should have been sleeping but I have this tendency to let Facebook distract me from important things. So there I was, lounging in my recliner scrolling through Facebook to see what wonderful things were going on in the cyber world when I saw a notification that my Grandmother had posted some new photos to Facebook. 

        My Grandma Pat is 83 years old, but doesn't look a day over 70. She is the most tech savvy senior citizen I know. Not only can you count on a card on your birthday complete with a crisp ten dollar bill tucked inside, you bet your hiney you'll be getting a text as well complete with kissy face and birthday cake emojis. So there I am scrolling through these pictures. I see my Mom and her sisters with my Grandma, aww cute! Then I come across pictures of our get together last summer at the park and that's when I saw it. 

        You know that feeling when you see something and your world turns sideways? That happened to me when I saw the picture of myself sitting in a camp chair at the park. I was wearing a white linen shirt which was not flattering in the least. My eyes focused on my stomach. I've known for a long time that I have let myself go. It's not something that you go along in life and wake up one day and go "What the fuck happened to me?". It's a slow process, and because it's so slow it's easy to rack on the pounds and just lose control, which is what happened to me.
         I haven't always been fat. Don't get me wrong, I wasn't exactly what you would call "skinny" either. In High School I remember buying clothes in a size 7 and 9. What I would do to be a size 7 or 9 now. These days I'm browsing through the PLUS size catalogs. I hate that phrase...Plus size. There are things you can do as a large person that help to hide exactly how large you are. 

· Wear black, it's slimming. Do you think it's slimming enough to hide this extra 200 pounds I'm lugging around? 

· Buy pants with a "high waist", that way you can pull them all the way up under your boobs and they will help suck in the fat. I do that one on a daily basis.

· Try to squeeze into as small a size as possible and still be able to a)hide your fat to some degree; b) walk, bend over, sit, zip up your zipper.

· Have an amazing sense of humor, that way people are too busy laughing to see your fat jiggling like a half eaten Jell-O mold at a summer picnic. Yep, I have that one down, too. 

       So, here we are now, about thirteen hours after seeing the disturbing image that has haunted my brain since last night. I've decided it's time for a complete overhaul. I loathe the word diet. Diets don't work, at least for me they don't. Surprisingly enough, I do have a strong sense of willpower in the beginning of all things I undertake. It's the staying power that I lack. Do I follow the old cliche' "Take things one day at a time", like it's even possible to take four days at once? I know it's going to be difficult, but it is beyond time for a change. To be honest with you, I don't know what I hope to accomplish by sharing my journey via blog to what could potentially be a very large number of readers. (Yes, I know, I'm giving myself a lot of credit here.) My goal is to be as candid as possible. To share my thoughts, experiences, ideas and hopes with whomever chooses to follow my journey. Even if it's just one person, I'm hoping that by putting all of "this" (points to my very large stomach) out in the universe it will keep me accountable. I know there will be times I will stumble and fall, but I have to be willing to believe that I can get up, dust my big ass off and start again. Rome wasn't built in a day, and all of this fat on my body wasn't acquired in a day either. So with that, I begin.