It’s a warm weather task many of us dread. I honestly avoided it altogether before I started my weight loss journey a few years ago, but in the summer of 2014, I was excited to go swimsuit shopping. I was down 80 pounds from my heaviest weight at that point, and I assumed swimsuit shopping would be a positive experience.
I was wrong.
It seemed the mirrors in the dressing room highlighted every “flaw” as I tried on swimsuit after swimsuit. One mirror reminded me I don’t have a flat stomach. I could see my not-so-defined arms in the second mirror. By the time I looked at the third mirror, I was nearly in tears. How could I have come so far and worked so hard and still have so much work to do? I walked in feeling like Beyoncé and left like I was in a time machine that took me back to 267 pounds.
The emotions from the ordeal were still lingering in my heart later when my friends and I went to a wine festival in downtown Norfolk. As we took our seats at a table, I just happened to look down at the chair. A red stamp read “WARNING: WEIGHT LIMIT 250 POUNDS”.
It took me a moment to realize the milestone that little red label represented. Years ago, I would not have been able to sit in that seat. I would have been in tears as I found some excuse to sit somewhere else. It made me realize that one bad swimsuit shopping session couldn’t overshadow how far I had come on my journey.
To top it all off, a few days later, I found a better swimsuit at a different store at a fraction of the price of the others.
(Originally published May 14, 2014)
