This is my first blog and, to be honest, I have no idea what I’m doing. I really doubt anyone will read these posts so I am just going to talk about what I went through “Growing Up Fat”. If anyone does read this, I hope they will share their stories about what they went through as “the fat kid”. I feel like there has got to be a reason for me being fat for my whole life.
I was born in the 1960s and when I came into this world, I was a healthy, normal baby that weighed 7 pounds, 10 ounces. My mother said I was beautiful (I’m sure most moms say that) and had a nice head of hair. She told me that each time the nurses brought me to her, they had my hair styled differently because I was so cute. My mom was only 19 years old when she had me and got married to my father, who was 29 (yikes!), the month after I was born. Unfortunately, I found out that I was born before they were married, and I was devastated. I think I found out in my late teens or early 20s. I was looking at some of their wedding pictures, which were Polaroids. The date was printed on the bottom of the picture, which was a month after I was born. Most of the Polaroids had the dates cut off the bottom, but some were missed. That’s story for another time!
Now, onto my opinions about how my relationship with food got out of whack. The first thing I remember about my relationship with sugar (it’s a horrible relationship!) is a picture of me when I was about 8 months old. The picture was of me in a highchair with a big smile and chocolate smeared all over my face. My mom told me that she and my dad were putting up the Christmas tree and I was in my highchair. My dad had put me a little too close to the tree and, unfortunately, the tree fell right towards me as it crashed to the ground. Well, of course, I started screaming and ended up with a small cut near my lip. I wouldn’t stop crying so they gave me a candy bar. I shut up because I had a mouth full of chocolate.
As I have searched my memory, the next time I remember getting sugar is when I was about 3 years old. I’m not saying that I didn’t get sugary treats on a regular basis, but I just want to talk about specific times that I actually remember. My mom and grandmother were baking a cake and after it was frosted, my mom gave me the bowl with leftover chocolate frosting. I went to town! I remember it was a small green Tupperware bowl. There wasn’t a lot of frosting left, but I was only 3 and to me it was a feast. My grandmother told my mom that I was going to get sick, and I remember getting a stomachache.
Another memory comes to mind, I’m not sure how old I was and I’m sure this happened more than once. My mom was making my dad some apple turnovers. They were one of my dad’s favorite desserts and came in a box, uncooked, so you just had to bake them. The turnovers came out of the oven and then they were iced with a packet of sugar glaze that came in the box. My dad didn’t like things that were too sweet, so my mom used the glaze sparingly. The leftover glaze was given to me, and I sucked that packet dry!
Those are the first memories I have involving my first enemy, sugar. I hope to post every few days and I hope people will share their stories too. Thank you for reading!