Size 8

Before I got pregnant, I was a size 8.

For five hours. On one day in 1991. More than a decade before I actually got pregnant, but technically the statement holds true. That’s one of the perks of becoming a Mommy. You finally have someone to blame for the extra pounds.

I remember size 8 like it was yesterday. Most likely because yesterday is the last time I looked in my closet, where the size 8 dress still hangs. I wore it to a wedding. After months of sweating to the oldies and fasting between diet shakes, I’d managed to slim myself down to a svelte size 9. I then stuffed myself into a pair of control top pantyhose that were one size too small, yielding just the right amount of constriction to enable my size 9 body to squeeze into my size 8 dress.

The wedding was fabulous. I danced all night. Not because I wanted to, because I was afraid to sit down. I couldn’t eat, drink or breathe, but I was a size 8 and all was right with the world. I avoided using the Ladies Room for fear I’d never wriggle back into my undergarments, but I was a size 8, and the fact that my circulation was practically non-existent paled in comparison.

In the car on the way home, I ripped off my pantyhose. It felt good to breathe. I remember thinking it would feel good to eat, too. At the drive through, my growling stomach said “Yes, I would like fries with that – make it a double.”

The next day, the dress no longer fit. I hung it in the closet, vowing to wear it again soon. And there it still hangs, waiting fifteen or so years for me to keep my promise.

“We’re going on a diet,” I inform my husband, who in turn, gives me a look that says, What’s with this “we’re” nonsense?

“We’re getting into shape, too.” I think I hear him whimper, but I’m a woman on a mission and I won’t be deterred.

After researching weight loss programs online, I’m overwhelmed. When I was a size 8, there weren’t so many options. I now know the difference between saturated fat and trans fat (as well as trans fat and fat transsexuals, thanks to one wayward mouse click). I know that to calculate my BMI, I need to square my height and divide by my weight or multiply my weight by the ratio of the square of my height or…really I don’t know how to calculate my BMI. I’ve come up with a number somewhere around that of the national debt, which oddly enough, is also the number of Girl Scout Cookies I’ve consumed over the last fifteen years. I think an accurate application of the BMI formula would require a trip to my high school algebra teacher, but I fear I no longer fit in the desk.

I turn off the computer. “I’m going to Weight Watchers tomorrow morning,” I announce to my husband, who is no longer in the room, but probably off in the kitchen with the kids, hoarding the Doritos.

In the morning I stand in line awaiting my first official weigh-in. I woke three hours earlier to prepare. In the effort to reduce my weight by every last fraction of an ounce, I’ve cut my hair, shaved my legs and clipped my fingernails. I’ve removed my earrings, my bracelet and my wedding band. I removed the underwire from my bra before opting to remove my bra altogether. On the drive over, I blasted the heat in the hopes of sweating off another ounce.

The line is dwindling; it’s almost my turn. In a last ditch effort, I jog in place and try to remove the elastic band from the seam of my stretchy pants.

“Next!” the woman behind the desk summons. Ummm who me? I think of ways to stall. As I take off my shoes I contemplate running, but a mad dash to the door is impossible from this stooped position.

“Good morning,” Angela greets me. I know her name is Angela because it says so on her nametag. It also says she lost 52 lbs. in 2002. “Step on the scale, please,” she requests.

I don’t know what happens next. As I step up on the scale, I have an out of body experience. I haven’t felt this short of breath since the control top pantyhose. I see a burst of light. I want to walk into it, but I realize someone just opened the blinds.

She doesn’t tell me the number registered on the scale, she just writes it in my membership book. She hands me the book and I hand her twelve dollars, the current market price of shock therapy. I read the number and wonder if there is a defibrillator on the premises.

“Are you staying for the meeting?”

Umm yes, I need to sit down.

I nod to Angela.

“Okay, great! Then you will need a nametag.”

I watch her jot down my name in thick black ink. I contemplate asking her to make it read, Hello my name is Christine. Before I got pregnant, I was a size 8.