And her heart grew three sizes that night…

Me, pre-weighing-myself last Christmas,
with my own grinchin' reindeer-pup.

The more weight I lose, the more I learn about myself.  As it turns out, it may not always be something I want to learn about myself.  I have been trying to write about this all week, but I’m not very good at talking about matters of the heart.  Lately, there’s been a steady increase in the frequency of me feeling like I’m wearing a poorly made Santa costume with a little reindeer-pup looking on as my heart slowly expands. 

I have no problem with getting a little weepy every time I watch Sleepless in Seattle, after those darn Folgers commercials, or from a song that blindsides me…  I’ve heard Debussy’s Claire De Lune at least a hundred times, but it just came on and still managed to choke me up.

But the real things – the big things – they’re mine, all mine.  I’ve kept them all to myself in a somewhat precarious, secret tree fort surrounded by a surprisingly reliable wall made of flubber. 

I don’t like to be weak.  I don’t like to be vulnerable.  I do not like it when my heart is affected by things I cannot control.  I’m beginning to realize that my fat has proven to be a rather effective fortress.  This flubber fortress works similarly to the “premature failure” that I’ve mentioned before, but guards the things that could get hurt if I don’t prematurely fail effectively enough. 

It seems like the more I shrink, the more of me there is.  There’s less to hide behind.  Before long, I won’t have the fat to blame or hide behind anymore, and there will just be Sarah.  I have inadvertently suffocated parts of myself for far too long, and through some crack in this ridiculous wall I’ve put up, they’ve gotten just enough air to try to break out.  My heart is softening.   It’s wonderful, but it’s also scary.  Fixing my exterior really is just bringing to light the interior problems at the root of it all. 

I stopped by my parents earlier in the week, and my Grandma had sent me a note saying how she is proud of me and my progress.  My dad and I talked for a moment afterwards, and he said how scary it is for a parent worrying they might outlive their child, both figuratively and literally, and that my whole being really had changed.

He’s right.  My whole being is changing, and I’m experiencing some growing pains, but it’s worth it.