Thin and Thankful

I'm back to a hundred pounds. I weighed myself this morning before going to work because I thought I was gaining weight from all the holiday festivities. In short, I felt fat. I expected to be at 110, or 105 at least but no, I was a hairline away from the 100-pound mark. So that actually makes me 99.99999 pounds.

I am admittedly underweight, not exactly by choice but I'm not complaining either. My height is somewhere between 5'3" to 5'4", depending on how straight I stand.

My weight has always been a constant source of speculation among people that I've come across with. For instance, a college classmate once asked if I was anorexic. I thought she was joking. It turned out she used to be one and I was amused to meet the first ever anorexic person in my life. You see, eating disorders were just things that I read about. I couldn't help but be amused. Acquaintances have assumed that I do vigorous workouts or that I enjoy sports at least. They ask me for tips on losing weight. They do not understand that there was never much weight to lose to begin with. Still others just stare at me, then my plate, speechless at the huge mountain of rice for my lunch.

Know that I tried gaining weight at various stages in my growing up years. I was a stick, shapelessly straight from head to toe. Okay, there was a slight bulge in the tummy area. Not a pretty sight but I've since learned to hide it but that's a different story. I wanted to be voluptuous. Curvy. Full-figured. Believe it or not, I wanted to add more meat to my thighs and arms. When I was younger, I would look at my thighs pressed to the chair that I was sitting on and think they should look like that, ideally. Years later, friends would tell me how much they envy my skinny legs and arms so I had learned to think that they were alright after all. I would get complimented on for no other reason than because I was thin.

So I guess I'm lucky. Lucky to not have to starve myself to be thin. Lucky to never have to compute how many calories a slice of chocolate cake has. Lucky to have been born in this century when thinness almost equals attractiveness or even health. Yeah, I'm lucky to be thin. Sometimes I forget.