ladytking88
My Worse Day Since Surgery...Hands Down
Jun 03, 2009
Between A Rock and a Hard Place I am mad. I am furious. I am so livid with myself that I nearly weighed 400 pounds. That in my short lifetime of 21 years, I was so addicted to food I allowed my weight to distend 227 pounds and required an intense medical procedure to save my life. Day after day I committed the sin of gluttony, while children starved and died of hunger; I lacked the miniscule self control it takes to simply stop placing food into one’s mouth. Everyday I undergo such severe shame and disgust even despite already having done the operation to change the atrocity. This is the cut and dry fact of the matter and I suffer great remorse and sorrow that I can never reverse time or relive my life to change the reality of my past. Everything in me desires to scream, weep, and throw myself into chaotic tantrum; the single inspiration binding me to sanity is the knowledge that after collapsing into this uncontrolled conniption, the weight will still be there, a scarlet letter representing my repeated transgression. Fifty pounds have vanished these past six weeks, but I am still technically super morbidly obese. I am not where I want to be and won’t be there until next year… In interim, children still are scared at first glance and adults continue to laugh and baulk. I don’t know the poetic and sensual way to stimulate your mind, enlighting you of how mentally drained I am, but that is my truth. I am tired. I am not tired of being me, but tired of me in this way, this rendition. Period, plain and simple. Let me be the first to tell you that I am not someone who will ever use being African American as crutch to anything, but there are facts in life that can not be ignored. And before I say what I am about to say, please be informed that I am proud to be African American and feel that my history is rich, one to be both respected and cherished. I am disappointed that my renewed appreciation for my heritage and love of my culture has in turn led some people to believe this also constitutes a hatred for races other than my own. Despite numerous misconceptions, true love never begets hate, but nothing more than untainted love. The actions others have taken as a result of their ignorance of diverse cultural history and unawareness of members’ perspectives of other races, has taken a debilitating toll on my psyche. New Mexico’s environment has the power to destroy black young men and women. This statement is not spoken with the intent to degrade or point a finger of blame, but to stimulate rumination that has never crossed some minds. Before making the choice to disagree with my statement, please take a quick moment to ask yourself a few questions. The first, how many African American doctors, lawyers, or even professors or teachers do you know native of Alamogordo, let alone, New Mexico? Second, how many African American business owners do you know in Alamogordo, and better yet, how many of those own thriving, legitimate establishments with state of the art supplies and equipment? These questions are posed with the rationale to lead, if no more than one, to the awareness that black children in New Mexico, and most places in the world, frequently do not grow up with an abundance of positive role models. There are a diminutive amount of individuals whose character and careers inspire and reinforce the truth that our race as a whole, despite media and institutions born of racist ideology, is competent of earning education and deserving of career pathways leading to wealth and success other than through athleticism and/or illegal or immoral measures. Graduating from a class where you are one of only three females of full African American heritage is harsh and unrelenting on the self esteem of a teenager. Now add being the darkest of those three…. and an anomalous female height of 6’0 and a half of an inch… and now 382 pounds… I can probably name on one hand the number of people my age that have met me and have not later revealed one or all of these facts: when first meeting, they were unnecessarily frightened; they actually had tried to hide; or they were wrong about me and were sorry for the unkind statements they had made to others before yet even knowing my name. After revealing these “secrets”, they always seem to expect me to be truly shocked, humbled, and/or appreciative that they were honest and “did the right thing”… What do I say to that? How do I respond? What is the appropriate reaction and perspective to hold after reliving take after take of this same scenario, different actors? As a young lady, how do I ignore walking on campus into African American Student Services and having men of my own race laugh and yell to the public, “You look just like a gorilla, where’s your cage, girl? How did you get out of the zoo?” How do you heal from “friends” both of and outside of your race, openly saying statements such as “No offense, Tabitha, but I would hate to have as dark a completion as you have. I couldn’t deal with guys never wanting to touch me.” How do I avoid disgusting college and abhorring going to class? How do I not anticipate people to shun me and laugh when that is what life has entailed? I am emotionally murdering myself everyday to loose weight, but does anyone grasp the intensity of my effort? It seems as though people choose only to see an overweight-Aunt-Jemima-looking girl. In their eyes, I intrinsically possess deficiency of etiquette, aspiration, beauty, grace, and intelligence. To them, my emotions are wholly animalistic and entertaining. What, in this matter, is left to say? Days like today, when my heart is torn and trickles physical tears from my soul, I doubt my patience and, if I have the courage to say, God’s willingness and plan to help me change. Days like today, I resign all effort to bring standstill the stereotyped sub-humanism as beast and fiend, to ever end looking into my reflection and feeling rolling nausea. I am trying the hardest I ever have, but still I land short everyday… Everyday… EVERYDAY. I have, by now, done everything I know to do, but I keep falling on my face. How many tears will trace the fullness of my cheeks before I am transformed into normal? Before I am human? What happens to a dream deferred? Does it dry up like a raisin in the sun? Or fester like a sore- And then run? Does it stink like rotten meat? Or crust and sugar over- Like a syrupy sweet? Maybe it just sags Like a heavy load. Or does it explode? -Langston Hughes
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About Me
Albuquerque, NM
Location
50.1
BMI
Surgery
04/21/2009
Surgery Date
Dec 30, 2007
Member Since
