Why I Refuse To Wait Until I’m Thin To Enjoy Life
Do you ever find yourself saying things like this?
- I’ll wear that when I’ve lost weight.
- I’ll go there when I’m thinner.
- I’ll have more photographs taken when I look better.
- I’ll feel more confident when I’m smaller.
I don’t know how many times I’ve had some version of those thoughts over the years, but I know I’ve wasted far too much time believing there was a thinner version of me waiting somewhere in the future who was finally going to be allowed to properly enjoy her life. I thought I had to wait until I’m thin to do all these things. The strange thing is that I actually met her.
I lost around 10 stone. I went from my heaviest of over 22 stone to around 12 stone and, at my smallest, I was wearing size 6–8 clothes. I achieved the sort of weight loss I’d once imagined would completely transform not only my body but everything about how I felt.
Some things did change. Of course they did. Shopping for clothes became easier. Moving around was easier. I could do things physically that had previously been much harder. I had experiences I probably wouldn’t have had before, and there were parts of losing weight that I genuinely loved.
But I didn’t cross some invisible line into a perfect life. I was still me.
And after regaining weight, I’ve realised something I wish I’d understood much earlier: I don’t want to spend another chunk of my life waiting to become thin enough to deserve it.
I spent years believing thin Jen would have a better life
When you’ve been overweight for a long time, it’s incredibly easy to create a fantasy version of yourself. Mine was thinner.
She would wear whatever she wanted without worrying about her stomach. She’d happily be in photographs. She wouldn’t wonder whether chairs were going to be uncomfortable or whether people were judging what she put on her plate.
She’d be confident. Most importantly, she’d somehow be happier.
Losing weight therefore became about far more than changing the number on the scales. Without really recognising it, I’d attached all sorts of things to that number.
Confidence. Clothes. Experiences. Happiness. Approval.
It made weight loss incredibly powerful because every pound wasn’t just a pound. It felt like I was getting closer to the life I was supposed to be living.
The trouble with putting your future happiness behind a weight-loss target is that you can spend an awful lot of your present life waiting for it.
There were things I genuinely couldn’t do at my biggest
I don’t want to rewrite my history and pretend my weight never affected my life, because it did.
At my biggest, there were practical limitations. Some activities were difficult. I worried about whether I’d fit comfortably in certain seats. Walking long distances was harder. Clothes shopping could be frustrating because I couldn’t simply walk into most shops and expect them to stock my size.
Losing weight changed some of those things enormously.
That’s one reason I sometimes struggle with the way discussions about body positivity become so polarised. It can feel as though you have to choose between saying “my weight affected my life” and “I deserved to enjoy my life at that weight.”
Both can be true. There were things that were physically harder for me at over 22 stone. I still deserved a life.
I thought confidence came in a smaller dress size
One of the biggest surprises after losing weight was discovering that confidence isn’t quite as straightforward as I’d imagined. Yes, I became more confident in some ways.
Being able to walk into shops and pick clothes from ordinary rails was exciting. Wearing things I’d never previously felt able to wear was exciting. Seeing photographs where I looked dramatically different gave me a huge boost.
But there was another side to it.
When so much of your confidence is built around becoming smaller, staying small suddenly feels incredibly important. Instead of worrying about losing weight, you can start worrying about regaining it. Instead of finally being free from thinking about your body, you can find yourself thinking about it more.
I had achieved this huge thing. People noticed. People commented. Losing weight became part of how people knew me and, eventually, part of my work too. That’s a lot of pressure to put on a body that is inevitably going to change.
How Losing 10 Stone Changed My Life
Being thinner didn’t cure all my insecurities
This is the bit nobody really tells you when you’re losing a lot of weight. You imagine you’ll reach your goal and finally look in the mirror without finding anything wrong. Except your brain has had years of practice.
If you’ve spent decades criticising your body, reaching a particular weight doesn’t automatically make that voice disappear. Sometimes it simply finds something new.
Maybe your stomach isn’t flat enough. Your skin has changed after losing weight. Your arms don’t look how you’d imagined. Perhaps you start comparing yourself with people who are even thinner.
There is always another improvement available if you go looking for one. At some point I realised that if confidence depended on finally reaching a point where I couldn’t find anything to criticise about myself, I might be waiting forever.
Then I regained weight
Regaining weight after losing so much was difficult in ways I hadn’t anticipated. There was the obvious disappointment, but there was also embarrassment. When people know you’ve lost a huge amount of weight, regaining some of it can feel very public.
Clothes stop fitting and old insecurities return. You see photographs and compare them with photographs from when you were smaller.
And if you’ve spent years telling yourself that your thinner body was the version that deserved nice clothes, photographs, confidence and experiences, weight regain can feel as though you’ve lost permission to have those things too.
I could very easily have gone back to waiting. I’ll buy clothes I really like when I’ve lost weight again. I’ll have more photographs when I’m thinner. I’ll feel confident when I’m back where I was. Except I’ve already lived that story once. I know where it leads.
I don’t want my wardrobe to be a waiting room
This sounds like such a small thing, but clothes have been a huge part of changing my attitude.
When you want to lose weight, buying clothes in your current size can feel like admitting defeat. You tell yourself there’s no point spending money because hopefully they won’t fit for long. So you make do.
You squeeze into things that are uncomfortable. You wear the same few outfits repeatedly. You keep a wardrobe full of smaller clothes as motivation and promise yourself you’ll have nice things again when you fit into them.
I’ve done it. But opening your wardrobe every morning to clothes that don’t fit is a fairly depressing way to start the day. It’s like having an entire rail of fabric telling you your current body is temporary and unacceptable.
I buy clothes that fit me now. That doesn’t mean I’ve decided my weight will never change. It means my body needs clothes today.
If I lose weight and need different clothes in the future, I’ll deal with that future body when I have it. My current one deserves trousers that actually fasten without cutting me in half.
I want to be in the photographs
This one matters to me more as I’ve got older. When you dislike how you look, avoiding photographs feels completely logical. You stand behind the camera, volunteer to take the group picture or quietly remove yourself from photos before they’re taken.
At the time, you’re avoiding seeing an image you might dislike. But photographs aren’t only records of what your body looked like. They’re records of your life.
They’re holidays, birthdays, ridiculous moments, family days out and ordinary afternoons that one day won’t feel ordinary at all.
I don’t love every photograph of myself. There are still pictures where my immediate reaction is to notice my weight or find an angle I don’t like. I’m trying not to let that be the deciding factor anymore.
I’d rather exist in photographs with a double chin, bigger stomach or whatever else I’m currently worrying about than disappear from years of my own memories because I didn’t think I looked thin enough to be included.
I’m going on the holiday
I love travelling, and this is another area where weight can make you hesitate. Perhaps you’re worried about the plane seat. You’re nervous about walking. You’re wondering how you’ll look in summer clothes or whether you’ll be able to keep up with everybody else.
Some of those concerns are practical and worth planning around. But I’m not waiting until I’m thin to travel. I want to see some places now.
If I need to plan more carefully, I’ll plan. If I need comfortable shoes, breaks or a different type of activity, I’ll make those choices. There is no guarantee that some imaginary future version of me will have more opportunity to travel than I have today. Bodies change, but life changes too.
I don’t want to look back and realise I had the time and opportunity to go somewhere wonderful but decided I wasn’t the right size for it.
I’m not waiting to exercise either
Exercise is another thing we often treat as belonging to thinner people. You tell yourself you’ll join the gym after you’ve lost some weight, go swimming once you feel comfortable in a swimsuit or start running when you’re fitter.
There’s an obvious problem there: how exactly are you supposed to become fitter while waiting until you’re fit enough to exercise? You are allowed to be a beginner. You are allowed to exercise in a larger body.
You are allowed to walk slowly, use lighter weights, modify exercises or need a break. Most importantly, you don’t need to look athletic before you’re allowed to move your body.
I’ve written separately about how to feel confident exercising at any size, because I know how intimidating exercise can feel when you’re conscious of your weight.
I can want to lose weight without hating myself now
This is where conversations around weight can become unnecessarily black and white. If I say I refuse to wait until I’m thin to enjoy my life, that doesn’t mean I have to promise never to want to lose weight again. I can want to change things about my health or body while still believing my current life matters.
Those ideas aren’t contradictory. I can make choices that may help me lose weight without spending every morning criticising the body I woke up in. I can want to improve my fitness without believing being unfit makes me a failure.
I can choose nutritious foods without deciding cake is evidence that I’ve been “bad”. And I can buy clothes in my current size while knowing that size may change. For me, this has been a much healthier place to get to than the constant cycle of “I’ll be happy when…”
Why I No Longer Believe in Good and Bad Foods
Losing weight isn’t the entrance fee for confidence
I think people sometimes misunderstand confidence in larger bodies. If an overweight woman wears something revealing, posts a photograph of herself or says she likes her body, someone inevitably seems to think she’s “promoting obesity“.
I find that bizarre. Feeling ashamed of yourself isn’t a treatment for obesity. You don’t have to dislike your body enough before you’re allowed to take care of it.
In fact, I’ve found the opposite increasingly true. When I treat myself as someone worth looking after, I’m more inclined to make choices because they’re good for me rather than because I’m desperately trying to punish myself into becoming smaller.
Confidence isn’t claiming you’re physically perfect. It’s not requiring perfection before you’re allowed to participate in your own life.
I’m done saving things for “when I’ve lost weight”
- Nice clothes.
- Photographs.
- Holidays.
- Swimming.
- Going somewhere alone.
- Trying something new.
- Feeling attractive.
- Being proud of myself.
I’ve mentally attached so many things to weight over the years that I’m sure there are others I’ve forgotten. Now, whenever I catch myself thinking “I’ll do that when I’ve lost weight”, I try to question it.
Sometimes weight genuinely matters. There may be an activity with a safety-related weight limit, or something my current fitness makes unrealistic. Pretending those things don’t exist wouldn’t help me. But often, there isn’t actually a practical reason.
I’m simply withholding something from myself because I don’t feel I’ve earned it yet. That’s the habit I’m trying to stop.
Your life doesn’t start at your goal weight
If you’re reading this while trying to lose weight, I’m not going to tell you to stop. You know your own reasons for wanting to lose weight, and there can be perfectly valid health and practical reasons for doing so. What I would ask is what else you’re postponing alongside it.
Is there a dress you won’t wear? A holiday you’re avoiding? Are you refusing to be photographed? Do you keep saying you’ll start dating when you’re thinner? Are you putting off swimming, joining a class or going somewhere because you don’t think your current body belongs there?
If you reach your goal weight, those things will still be available. But the months or years you spend getting there won’t be. That’s what has changed for me.
I’ve already lost the weight once. I’ve already been the smaller woman I thought would have everything figured out. I’ve also regained weight and had to work out what that means for how I see myself.
I don’t know exactly what I’ll weigh in a year’s time, five years’ time or ten years’ time. I do know I don’t want those years to become another waiting room.
I’m not waiting anymore
I still have insecurities. I still see photographs I don’t like. There are clothes I put on and immediately take off again. There are days when I’m much more conscious of my body than others. Refusing to wait until I’m thin doesn’t mean I’ve achieved perfect body confidence.
It means I’m trying not to let those feelings make all my decisions. I have already spent years believing a smaller body would unlock a better life. I’ve been much smaller. And one of the most important things I’ve learned from losing weight, regaining some of it and getting older is that life doesn’t wait for your body to be ready.
People change. Circumstances change. Health changes. Opportunities disappear. The people we love won’t always be here. I don’t want photographs of my life where I’m permanently missing because I hated my stomach. I don’t want a wardrobe full of clothes for a woman I might become while the woman I am has nothing she feels good in.
And I definitely don’t want to reach old age and realise I spent decades trying to become acceptable enough to enjoy myself. I might lose weight. I might gain weight. My body will certainly continue to change because that’s what bodies do.
But whatever size I am along the way, this is still my life. And I’m not waiting until I’m thin to live it.
