Eight days to 36

I always get melancholy near my birthday. I think of this as the start of a new year, more so than December 31 to January 1. I look back, I look forward. I'm proud of my successes and yearn for what I haven't accomplished yet.

And so on the cusp of my 36th birthday (next Thursday), I think about the fact that I am the healthiest I have ever been. I work out 90 minutes a day, five days a week. I'm dealing with issues I didn't realize still bothered me -- and I'm trying to define and conquer my relationship with food and my own body image.

My relationship with food, and subsequent self-image and relationships with the opposite sex, have been difficult to define. I've always thought of myself as fat. Even when I wasn't. Even when I was nothing more than a solid 10-year-old. I look back at pictures and see a normal, healthy girl. But what I felt, what I saw when I looked in the mirror, what I thought others saw, was anything but normal and healthy.

When I was 10, I was on a diet. I had probably been on several even before then. My mother was always fighting her weight -- after eight children, I don't think anyone expected her to be Twiggy. Her self-perception, her ideas on weight and body image, were transferred to me.

I read the Scarsdale Diet book, went to Weight Watchers meetings, worked out at Kelly Lynn, watched Richard Simmons, did Jane Fonda workouts -- all before the age of 13. I remember getting incentives from well-meaning siblings. "For every pound you lose, I'll give you a dollar." And when my sister moved out of state with her boyfriend, and would call home, one of the first things she always asked me was "how's your diet?"

I can only imagine the effects all of that has on me. In fact, I do more than imagine, because for the past 25 years or so, I have struggled with it. I have tortured myself with diet after diet -- sometimes to fail right from the start, sometimes to succeed and then fail.

Finally, today, I think I've managed to figure out how to succeed, and at least stand still, rather than fall backwards. And so with eight days left of 35, have I finally made a step forward? Have I finally figured it out? By looking back, by thinking about specific incidents, I can let go and move forward.