My body, my identity

There's a show tune running through my head -- a song almost as old as me, composed long before the word "earworm" was coined. It's catchy, but it's dated, trite, and certainly not an example of musical excellence. Only one line of the song resonates with me, but it resonates vividly.  It's the title line: "I enjoy being a girl." It's from the 1958 Rodgers and Hammerstein musical "Flower Drum Song," and it's been covered by singers like Doris Day and Peggy Lee, who belt out perky lines about brand new hairdos and hips that are swivelly and swervy. I do derive joy from being a female human, although at this stage of life,  I've earned the right to be called a woman instead of a girl. But I don't enjoy my femaleness for the same reasons as the "Flower Drum Song" character, who focuses her "girl" identity strictly in terms of being attractive to males. Some of the song, frankly, reeks of rape cul...

I got my bikini. It fits. It's a light blue print called "Zurich," for reasons I can't fathom. The bikini, truth be told, fits better than the X-back one-piece of the same material, which I acquired at the same time -- and which I have water-tested in the aquatic center. It didn't disintegrate in the pool, or split at the seams. I have that not-so-rational fear, every time I try out a new suit. But, oh, my bikini body is nothing like what you might see at beauty pageants or in Sports Illustrated. It's lumpy. When the fat melted away, the flesh stayed, and the loose skin hangs off my bat-wing arms and the newly-visible muscles on my thighs. And the belly. Oh, dearie-dear, the belly. Maybe I should have asked the surgeon who replaced my knee to do a tummy-tuck while he was at it. And, the wrinkles on my face and neck remind me (A) I'm no longer in my 20s and (B) neither is Christie Brinkley, but nobody would ever mistake me for her. Yet, when I try on my...

"To clothe this child is like a nightmare!" Yes, my mother actually said that, about me and within my earshot. It hurt. It still hurts. But in the 1960s -- before "big and tall" clothing became ubiquitous, even in discount department stores -- it was undeniably true. Today, of course, it's a little easier. "Tall" pants are still hard to find (no complaints, short-legged people, about too-long pants off the rack -- you can hem them). But thanks to catalogs like Woman Within and Roaman's, and stores like Lane Bryant and Torrid, a woman who's not in what retailers insultingly call "the popular sizes" can find something to wear -- for work, for recreation, for the gym, even for the pool. And it's not all in the supposedly flattering colors of black, brown and navy. One of the joys of losing a lot of weight is, I can now augment at least some of my wardrobe with finds from garage sales and thrift stores. Here's one of my favor...

The healing I experienced in the warm-water therapy pool wasn't just for my achy-breaky knee. Parts of my soul -- parts that are far beyond the responsibility, and the training, of the physical therapy assistant who guided my water exercises -- also have been healed there, and are being healed still. One of the reasons why I asked the physical therapist in charge of my case, Dan M., whether water therapy might be an option for me is because I love being in the water. When I was a baby, according to my mom, I loved my bath. Later, I loved splashing in the blow-up backyard pool, in the concrete wading pools that used to be at many of the parks in Des Moines, in the shallow end of Northwest Swimming Pool (now Northwest Aquatic Center) in Des Moines and in the deep end with my cousins at "the world's greatest pool" in Aurelia, Iowa. Tall, lumpy women like me often feel clumsy on land, but graceful in the water.  That's what I was thinking, anyway, as I asked about ...

"Something happened to me in that pool." It was my first physical therapy session, after knee replacement surgery, with Dan S., the physical therapy assistant who, a year earlier, had guided me through therapy in the warm-water pool. This time, we were working together on terra firma; my incision was not sufficiently healed for a return to the water. So, as Dan and I worked on straightening and bending my new knee, I shared with him my understanding of what had happened to me, one year and about 100 pounds ago. In the 94-degree water of the therapy pool, I had what I now recognize as a conversion experience. I write a biweekly faith-and-values column. The column that was published on Dec. 31, 2016 -- while I was in Phoenix, barely able to hobble -- addressed the varying types of life changes. There are resolutions -- vague and shallow decisions and goals for self-improvement, usually made for New Year's Day, but almost always abandoned on Jan. 2 or not long after. T...

The Miss America Pageant calls its swimsuit competition "physical fitness in a swimsuit." What it really is -- with all due respect from a true Miss America fan -- is the same thing as the Columbia County Fair's livestock shows. The contestants are being judged by how well they conform to breed standards. Someday, a Miss America judge will forget it's not a dairy show, and admit that he picked the contestant with the most perpendicular udders. All this is by way of marking a potential milestone: At age 60, I'm thinking of getting a bikini. My husband and I plan a return this summer to the place where my physical journey started -- Phoenix, Arizona. We're even going back to the same resort, where I spent most of our last Phoenix vacation in the hotel suite because I couldn't walk. This resort has an outstanding water park. And while I prefer a tank suit for serious workouts in the warm-water or lap pool, I'm thinking a bikini might be fun for vacatio...

This popped up today in my Facebook memories. It's a long rant (sorry), but it's just as accurate an expression of my perspective today as it was then. And it illustrates why I'm doing this blog. A few things that I'd like my friends to understand about weight loss: 1. I did it once before, and I did it BIG. Between 2000 and 2002, I dropped about 150 pounds. 2. When my weight was at its lowest, I was, by medical and actuarial standards, in the "normal range." But I thought, and the people who loved me thought, that I looked too thin. The "right" weight is what's right for YOU, not what some chart says. 3. Massive weight loss, even when aided by surgery, is a very delicate thing -- something that it doesn't take much to undo. One bad injury that keeps you from exercising. One personal or family crisis. One major change in your life. One thoughtless crack from some stranger (or a doctor!). One gathering where somebody pushes food or alcoho...

I have some smart, thoughtful Facebook friends, one of whom recently posted this comment: "You are not your body." That's worth thinking about. My blog's title is "My Body, My Identity." But is all or part of my identity independent of my body? I think so. On the inevitable day when people's bodies stop functioning forever, my Christian faith tells me there's an essential, core part of all humans' identities that lives forever, without inhabiting the aching, decaying globs of flesh that a "Star Trek: The Next Generation" creature called "ugly bags of mostly water." But whether a soul exists independent of a body -- and if so, what does it look like and how will other souls recognize it? -- is a question of faith that will be completely resolved only after earthly existence is over. For now, I live on Earth, I inhabit a body, and my body's height, weight, shape and condition all influence my answers to what Parker Pal...

This is for the one Facebook friend who said she'd never read my blog because, no matter what she does, she'll always be perceived as "the fat lady." Me, too. I've lost 120 pounds, and sort of would like to drop another 10, though I won't sweat it if I succeed only in maintaining my current weight. Like you, like millions of others, my weight is "off the charts" and always will be. In my senior year in high school -- the first time our family doctor suggested I should try dieting or Weight Watchers -- I weighed five pounds more than the amount on the actuarial charts for my height. The rule for women, at that time, was "100 pounds at 5 feet tall and an additional 5 pounds for every inch over 5 feet." My current weight is not anywhere near as low as the number my doctor saw when I stepped on the scale 42 years ago. It never will be. Of course, the doctor added, the right weight is "what's right for you." That was the firs...

Anyone who carries around even a little extra poundage, and then manages to unload some of it, has heard this from a well-meaning person: "Now, don't you feel better?" My short answer is, "Not necessarily." Our culture -- in its admirable effort to take seriously the health risks that affect the approximately 160 MILLION overweight or obese people in our nation -- has created yet another pigeonhole. Heavy people are unhealthy. Thin people are healthy. Not necessarily. The corollary to that pigeonhole is the assumption adopted by all too many health care professionals, physicians and nurses in particular: If you are overweight or obese, whatever symptoms you're experiencing are a direct result of your extra weight, and weight loss will cure whatever ails you. (To every doctor who's ever taken one glance at a patient and declared, "I'll tell you what's wrong with you right now -- you need to LOSE WEIGHT!" : May you contract an itchy, ...

I'm a Luddite at heart. Although I've been a newspaper journalist and columnist all my adult life (plus a good-sized chunk of my adolescence),  I'm inaugurating a blog to explore what happens to the soul of a 60-year-old woman when her body size undergoes a major change. The Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation estimates that about 160 million U.S. people -- about three-quarters of the men and a little less than one-third of the women -- are overweight or obese. I was one of the overweight, and by some measures I still am and always will be. The health risks associated with excess weight are very real and numerous. Heart disease and diabetes come to mind first, but in my case, the extra weight I've carried for most of my adult life (plus a good-sized chunk of my adolescence) resulted in osteoarthritis -- the wearing-away of the cartilage in my left knee, resulting in significant pain and impairment of my mobility. About one of two adults will have osteoarthriti...