Jack Sprat

The hubby with all the bowling and now the new Tai Chi class, plus his reduction in drinking diet colas and in general eating less, finds himself losing weight. A year ago he had given himself the goal of losing some 30-odd pounds and he's a few pounds off that goal. He's looking good!

However the hubby finds himself in a new dilemna, reshaping the image of himself as someone not so heavy. Each day he finds something new, like hip bones that his belt can hang off of now. The other day he asked what this bony protrusion on his shoulders were. I told him it was the end off his collarbone and yes, they're supposed to be that way.

It's difficult to have been one way for most of your life (me with my long hair and him with his weight) to view yourself any other way. Then suddenly you're not the person you thought you were. And what does that mean and how does that change your view of yourself and the world. We're working on developing a healthy image of himself.

I mean even when he was small he was a chubby kid. His most svelte weight was when he was an undergrad when I think he was 180. He asks me if looks gaunt because now his jaw line is more defined and if he's being more dramatic he claims that he is "wasting away". A part of him worries that maybe his weight loss is not to eating less and exercising more, that he has some deadly disease. Maybe if he lost all that weight in 3 days, but this has been a very gradual descent.

Of course, when I tell him that he was some double digits heavier with a layer of padding, the diva in him denies that he was ever any more than his weight now. Um, yeah. And people who think guys don't worry about their looks and weight as much as women are just lying to themselves!

Hopefully in the next few months as the bowling and the tai chi classes progress for him he'll add a bit of weight from more muscle (those horse stances are killer). The Tai Chi has certainly been helping his bowling as he gets a sense of self and where his legs and arms are.

Although the society tends to push an almost emaciatedly thin look, heaviness relative to size and healthiness is a burden with numerous health consequences: diabetes, gout, heart disease. So I'm happy the hubby is being healthier. It'd be nice if some day we too could have a 50th wedding anniversary.