Another Hot 100

Maybe it’s because I’m getting up in the years, but I’ve recently taken to celebrating “hundreds” of things. And this week is my 100th week on Weight Watchers.

My “week” starts on a Saturday, so technically I’m already into my 100th week. If you’re wondering how specifically I celebrated on Saturday, it was by eating an entire week’s worth of points between 2 and 11 PM. I don’t think I’d ever actually done that in the entire 100 weeks I’ve been counting points, so it was its own kind of milestone.

One hundred weeks ago, I was in my dining room surrounded by my book group and I was wearing the only thing that fit me at the time: a Kelly green tie-dyed cotton shift that is absolutely the wrong color for me and should never have been bought in the first place.

I declared to that small audience that I was planning on starting Weight Watchers that week. I actually had no intention of doing any such thing and was just trying to add drama to my explanation for wearing such an unflattering outfit. But two of the women said that if I went, they would come with me. So four days later, the three of us found ourselves in a bright loft on a long line, trying to hold our skepticism in check.

That was 100 weeks ago. Fourteen thousand points ago. And God only knows how many vats of popcorn ago.

Not so long before that book group meeting, I had gone running off to my doctor to see if I had some frightful disease. My belly was bloated constantly, taking on a shape it had never been. I’d look at myself in the mirror sideways, aghast. I looked six months pregnant, even though my childbearing years were far behind me.

My doctor is diligent and he is kind. So it was only after a thorough exam and a face filled with apology that he gave me my diagnosis. “That’s just how women your age start to carry their extra weight,” he said.

“Oh my God! I’m fine? I’m fine, and just fat!?” I was elated. Except for the fat part.

Based on his diagnosis, I got the idea in my head that my weight gain was inevitable, and worse, irreversible. I didn’t think there was a thing I could do.

I could write a week’s worth of posts about how a relatively small weight loss completely transformed my life. How I’ve only had one head cold in two years. How I can now easily get to short balls on the tennis court that I used to just let go. Most profound, though, is that with the shedding of pounds, I’ve ended up shedding a lot of negativity that was (sorry for this) really weighing me down.

I know, to a lot of folks I sound like a Weight Watchers huckster. I can’t help it. I’m a point-counter. And I’ve got 100 weekly log books to prove it.