Dear Body,
If I had a friend or boyfriend who ever betrayed me like you do, I'd leave them. Break up with them. Do what I do best, and close an emotional door and never speak to them again. But there's no solution for my problem with you. I've tried ignoring you. I've tried goading you. I've tried using all my energy to please you. You give a little, sure; for a while, yes. And then you betray me again. Yet we are stuck with each other. Like a long-adult child and an overbearing mother - we're tied together. Like a ne'er-do-well son and an alcoholic father - there's no getting away from each other.
I just don't understand what you want from me. I eat well. I give you vegetables, and milk and healthy proteins. I feed you three times a day in balanced intervals. I don't fill you with too much garbage (a cookie here and there never killed anyone). I work you out. I run you and strength-train you and we ride my bike together so well (what with my common sense in the traffic and your strong quads and hamstrings - we're a match made in heaven on a bike). I give you vitamins. I protect you from caffeine. So rarely do we drink, and when we do: beer, mostly. I ensure you get plenty of sleep. I stay organized and keep clear eyes and a full heart and this results in very little stress. Seriously, what more do you want from me?
I know, I know. You would say you do your part. We're healthy. So very healthy. No real complaints. Cholesterol - great. Annoyances (like boils or hemorrhoids or hammertoes) almost non-existent. Skin? Yeah, yeah, it's great. Allergies? None. Generally feeling well? Absolutely. No digestive issues for us. Aging? We're doing well for the most part aside from those three chin hairs and the increasing white hairs on our head.
So why, oh why, dear body, can't you just stay trim? Why must you insist on gaining back ounce by ounce, pound by pound slowly to ruin the party? Why react so passionately to exercise and diet only to give up after a year and get soft again? (I've done my part! I've made sure we get up at 5:40 every morning for over two years now to go exercise! I've helped you sweat out your toxins and strengthen all your muscles!) And yet, you insist. Insist on our hips broadening again and our ass rounding out, and our stomach having that extra little padding.
I don't want to fight with you. Our lifelong argument has done a number on me and my psyche. You wouldn't know anything about that, would you? You're just flesh and bones and blood; you don't have to deal with the brain part - that's my area. You just show up and expect me to live with the fact that this year we're bigger again and don't fit in our cute dresses from last summer. You expect me to just put on a smile and hope nobody notices how much you've betrayed me yet again.
And I'll do it. I'll put on a happy face and shore up my confidence and I'll dress you in a bathing suit. (I will! Because we love the water and the sun and we don't want to miss that, right?) You don't care, do you? You like us this way. Why else would you keep going back to this?
You make me tired, body. I wish you'd just play nicely. But you won't. Fuck you. Happy summer.
Love,
Karen
