My entire life I’ve been fat. I’ve stopped saying ‘a big girl’ or ‘chubby’ because the reality of it is, that’s the nice way to put it and I was anything but nice to the body I’ve lived in for the last twenty years. Growing up, I always had days filled with southern soul food, McDonald's and too many Icees (read slurpies or slushes) to count. When I was little, my parents and grandparents more than often pushed me towards healthy eating. It rarely stuck, though, since both my sister, Tate, and I played softball and our family was constantly gallivanting from ballpark to ballpark. It was so much easier to swing through and get a kid’s meal than it was to go home and cook a full dinner at eight or nine o’clock at night.

I didn’t see my weight as a problem until the comments started. It wasn’t painfully obvious, and it was never bad enough to mentally scar me forever or force me into a “safe space” but instead it was little things. I was the ‘big girl’ on the team, or people thought I was playing in the wrong age bracket due to my size. Size helped, I won’t lie. I had an awesome swing and even knocked a girl in the stomach once, sending her to the ground. Given, I was six but, ‘big girl’ nonetheless. I was also the biggest softie in the world, so I ran the bases and then hurried my butt over to the opposing dugout to make sure she was okay. I remember bawling my eyes out, and I was the one that hit her!

As the years went on, there wasn’t one single event that caused me to gain weight and become unhappy. I got hurt in middle school and that one injury led to four different knee surgeries, but aside from that, my emotional health was fine. Sure, the fact that softball was no longer a part of my life sucked. It still sucks but losing things you love just becomes a part of life. If you had asked that six-year-old what she wanted to do in the future, she’d probably tell you she’d want to be a dog, BUT had you waited three or so years and asked her again, she’d say she wanted to play softball for her entire life. I loved it. I still love it. As a sophomore in high school, I met a boy. We dated for a year, broke up, dated for six more months, and broke up again. That is when things really went haywire. I had this thought in my mind that I wasn’t good enough. For anyone.

I had always attached my emotions to eating. When I hit a homer, I'd be rewarded with ice cream from the local Dairy Queen. When I was spending time with friends and over the moon about it, we'd go out to eat. When I was upset, I'd eat foods that made me less so. It was only natural for me, then, to begin to fill the void that I was left with. I'd eat and eat and eat until I felt content and couldn't eat anymore. I'd binge out, and try to throw up because I was disgusted with myself, and then cry because I couldn't even do that right. By the time I graduated high school, I could rarely look at a picture of myself and feel good about it.

When college started, so did my control over my life. I finally had a say in who I was without the overwhelming feeling that I was being judged for every move that I made. (Even though it wasn't like that to begin with.) I found out I had PCOS while in high school, but finally started taking medication for it during the spring semester of my freshman year. With the combination of Metformin, Previfim and Adipex the weight was melting off. How could it not? I was pumping drugs into my body just because the doctor said it was good for me. That it helped me. And it did, for a little bit.

While on the medication I went from 287 pounds to 204, at my lowest. It took me from January until August, a total of eight months, to lose 83 pounds. I felt amazing about it too. The way I felt about myself just completely changed. I was smaller now than I had been as a freshman in high school! Unfortunately, I had spent so long in reckless abandon, chasing after a skinnier me that when I finally reached a lighter weight, my happiness was short-lived. I was more confident in myself for a little while; I bought all kinds of clothes that fit better after going from a 2XL-3XL to a large in tops and a 22-24 to a 14-16 in pants. After I could no longer complain about my weight, I found other things to be insecure about. My teeth weren't white enough. My hair was too frizzy. Anything and everything I could find about myself that wasn't good enough, I'd find it. Even after losing over eighty pounds, in my mind, it still wasn’t enough. I wasn’t enough.

So, coupling the personal upset with the regular stresses of college, being an RA, being a part of a sorority that was struggling to keep its head above water, and being broke, I started to pack the pounds back on. It’s been nine months and, had I stayed on track and kept taking my medication I would have reached my goal by now but instead, I’ve gained around thirty of those 83 pounds back.

I haven't gone without learning some very valuable things during this time however.

It will never matter how much weight I lose if I can’t love myself first. If you don’t love yourself as you are before changing things, then why bother changing them when you're going to be stuck in the same unhappy rut you're in now? Your self-love and acceptance will only be short lived if you fail to start your journey without it. I can’t speak for everyone, of course, only on my personal struggle, but it’s something I wish I would have started with. I plan to do it from here on out. I have sixty more pounds to lose before I hit my goal weight, but I know that I can do it now. Because I started by loving myself.