I am much more than a number

Several years ago, I was walking along a path overlooking the beach, when I came upon four men sitting by the path.  As I walked briskly toward them, wearing my workout clothes and sweating, they looked at me, and then they looked at each other and smiled.  When I got directly in front of them, each man held up a sign with a number on it.  They rated me.  More precisely, they were rating my appearance, on a 1-10 scale.

Not all individuals are as blatant as these men were, but the memory is a stark reminder to me that I am, like women everywhere, judged and rated by my appearance.  I don’t particularly blame these men (other than thinking they were a tad tactless and rude).  Rather, I see these moments as being an example of the intense focus we have on people’s, particularly women’s, appearance in America.

Let’s fast forward to January 1^st of this year.  I decided to join a Health Challenge, and my motivation was, indeed, health.  I want to be healthier. Eat healthier. Work out regularly.  Be as strong and as able bodied as I can be. My goals weren’t about weight or size.  Rather, my goals were focused on health-related behaviors.

And then I bought a scale. 

I thought having some measurable way to see if a healthy diet and lifestyle were affecting me was a nice step.  I usually use how my clothes fit as a guide, but having a scale appealed to the numbers nerd inside of me.  I had already started to use an iPhone app, Lose It!, to track my diet and exercise, even though I felt a tad conflicted about the name of the app, given that my goals weren’t directly associated with losing weight.  

After buying a scale, I started weighing myself before breakfast every morning.  Here’s where it got complicated.  Because the scale?  It told me I was 2 pounds lighter after two consecutive mornings of weighing myself!  And I was 1.4 pounds lighter the next day.  I re-calibrated the scale again and again, yet it told me the same thing each time.  I was losing weight.  More weight than I’d expected to lose so quickly. 

After four days of weighing myself, I posted this on my twitter account:

After a full week, I was 5.6 pounds lighter than I had been the week before.  People keep telling me it was great, but I wasn’t as excited.  I knew I was focusing my attention somewhere that wasn't particularly healthy for me. I had started, like so many people, to focus on the weight, to focus on the number.  

Yet we aren’t numbers.  I’m not the number on that scale any more than I’m the numbers those men assigned me. 

Let’s face it:  When we focus on the number, we aren’t focusing on health.  We are focusing on thinness. We are focusing on appearance.  And there are a thousand ways to be thin that aren’t at all healthy.  And there are another thousand ways to be 5, 10 or 15 pounds heavier and be healthy. 

You see, when I focus too much on my weight, I start making less than healthy choices.  I’ll go hungry or eat the less nutritious food that’s fewer calories.  I’ll also potentially tie myself up in knots about being a certain weight.  Self worth based on my weight?  Well, that’s simply a crappy life to live, and I refuse to live my life that way. 

So, I’m going to stop focusing on the number.  I’m going to remember my New Year’s resolution and make healthy food and lifestyle choices.  If other people want to focus on their weight, I will support them if it works for them.  I don’t, however, think it works for me.  Focusing on my weight only makes it more likely I’ll make unhealthy choices. 

And the good news?  I’ve made a lot of healthy food and exercise choices since January 1^st, and I’m proud of myself.  I’m also planning to keep up the healthy choices until the end of the challenge (February 28^th) and beyond. 

As a final note, I know some of you are wondering, so I’ll tell you the ratings I got from those four men on the path:  6, 7, 8 and 9.  Beauty, after all, is in the eye of the beholder.  We aren’t all the same, and we aren’t all attracted to the same thing.

Thank goodness.