I used to say that my autobiography, if I ever wrote it (which I doubt I ever will since this blog is already enough about me, as they say), would either be called The Hole in My Pocket or Living XXXXLarge. I feel like the first title would still be in contention since I haven’t gotten any more frugal or less generous in my old age, but the second title is now out of contention for sure. In the last ten months I have gradually gone from XXXXL to solidly XXL, which is to say, I am trending towards a pure XL, which may or not be ultimately achievable given my fundamentally large frame. I have lived my entire adult life over 300 pounds…until now, as I slowly slide further and further down the weight scale towards whatever my final destination may be. I suspect that given my age and the general condition that people lose body mass as they age beyond a certain point, I will never again see 300 and may settle in to what I suspect will be a range of 230-250, which will likely dwindle down further as I get even older and nature takes its inevitable toll of taking back what it has generously given me in my lifetime.
I’ve spoken and written a lot about my Zepbound Journey, as I call it, and that has been about both the changing lifestyles of reduced and improved consumption and increased and improved activity. What I haven’t spent much time considering or writing about is the impact it has all had on my life. There are the obvious “feeling better” aspects of this dramatic change, but it’s really much more than that. I’m getting in the habit of saying that I feel better than I ever have, but I want to be careful about that. The first reason is the jinx reason. I just saw a video clip where a guy says that his brother was healthier than he’d ever been and then had a stroke and died. That “hit by a bus” script is all too common in storytelling and warrants a cautionary approach to getting out ahead of your own good fortune. The second reason is a bit more nuanced, and it’s that for the most part, I’ve always felt pretty good, even when I reached up well over 400 pounds. I skied, I motorcycled, I scuba dived, I bicycledI played golf and even tennis, and while I wasn’t running marathons, I wasn’t terribly constrained in my activities by my weight. Even if I was, I managed to adjust and sit on the bench a bit longer and climb one less hill that others climbed. But now I’ve started to realize something new. Life has gotten easier for me.
Right now I’m sitting next to Kim on the Alaska Airlines plane at SFO, awaiting departure for SAN. That’s a 90 minute flight and since there were no First Class seats available, I took two premium economy seats (the ones with more leg room). We flew premium economy back and forth to Florida last month and were impressed enough by it that we plan to use it versus First Class for most of our domestic flying. It works for the two of us now. We have a slight flight delay here at SFO and no biggie, we’re perfectly comfortable (certainly more than on that silly Amtrak train). But here’s the added things that come with that. We have far more flight options and we feel less barriers to traveling. Even if you can afford it, price points matter in deciding to go or not go anywhere. And then there’s the liberal sensitivities. I feel guilty being elitist when it’s just for ego or minimally better comfort. No one’s traveling for the airline food, even the First Class variety, so premium economy is now AOK for us.
That has made me think about all the other ways my newer, slimmer self has been benefitting. Packing is easier, less because the clothes are smaller and more because everything fits just fine and there’s less fussing about whether this or that makes my butt look big. I’ve mostly lost my Dunlap Disease (where your belly done laps over your belt), so sitting anywhere is easier and getting up again is much easier. Getting in and out of cabs and Ubers is easier. Walking the hills of San Francisco is easier. My digestive system now functions like it’s supposed to with minimal risk of any untoward moments of distress. The hotel beds are more comfortable for me. I still use my CPAP to sleep, but I suspect that’s becoming increasingly optional. But in any case, I sleep better. I take far less meds (still have one BP, but may lose that with my next doctors visit). That’s less meds to order, pack or just take.
Last night Kim and I chose to not go out for dinner and to just eat in our room. We bought a few ramen soup packets in the lobby and used the microwave in the room to cook dinner. Our collective concern about food is almost non-existent. Neither of us eat much any more and since we don’t drink, there’s a whole category of life stuff that others worry about all the time that we rarely think about much at all.
The world is built and organized around the statistical norms of how large the population might be. I’ve always known that and just accepted it. I knew I wasn’t built for the world and that it would likely never change for me. These were just constraints that I had to accept. Being bigger meant things were harder. I was used to life being a bit harder and there was some sort of nobility in that to me. But now, suddenly, things have gotten easier and every day I am running across something that I can honestly say has gotten easier for me. I’m not sure if I’m supposed to be so happy about this since most of these things I’m finding easier are just normal to most people. And its not like I couldn’t have done this all years ago…but actually, I tried and I couldn’t…so maybe its OK to revel in it all a little bit now…finally. There are times in life when life isn’t supposed to be easy, its supposed to be hard. But I think that when you get to a certain age (I don’t like to define “old age” since everyone feels that differently), life should get easier, right?