Got Self-Esteem?

A fellow in another department, someone I hadn’t seen for a while, came by my office to ask me a question, but then he stopped, stepped back and said “You’ve lost a lot of weight, haven’t you?” I could have kissed him, but he’s not my type…lol.

Now, I would NOT say that I’ve lost “a lot” of weight. However, I guess a pound or two every month for the past 9 months does add up to a noticeable difference when someone hasn’t seen you for a while. The people I work with every day haven’t really noticed, because the loss has been SO slow (15 lbs in a year). So it’s a big boost to have someone notice, but I wonder if I should be so thrilled about such a small thing.

Last Saturday, Roxie had an interesting observation on the need for external validation and it really struck a chord with me. When I saw Dr D about 2 weeks ago, I was telling her how I was hurt that my mom hadn’t noticed I’d lost weight…or maybe she had but for whatever strange, twisted reason, she decided not to comment.

So here I am, 56 years old, and I'm still seeking Mommy’s approval, which is pretty sad. The bottom line is I'm never going to get it. She's nice to me sometimes, but just as often she's not nice, or dismissive, or downright mean. She wants to be the center of attention, which means I can't be. (In fact, Dr D thinks she's being competitive with me…which is kind of creepy so I'm not sure I want to think about that today…maybe another time after some additional therapy...ha ha.)

Anyway, low self-esteem is definitely MY main issue, I've dealt with it my whole life. I always figured no one would like me unless I was perfect in every way, and that's a recipe for failure right there. If I got positive comments, it would spur me on to ever greater heights of perfectionism, to try to get even more compliments. But at some point, I would fail (at not being perfect) and my self-esteem would go out the window. When the compliments stopped, I'd stop trying. I'd say to myself "What's the use, no one is noticing anyway?" I'd beat myself up for not being perfect...the highs and lows of attempting perfection and then failing became a vicious circle.

The bottom line is… If I’m going to lose weight, I need to do it for ME and my own happiness and comfort, not for anyone else…including my mom. I shouldn't depend so much on the approval and compliments of others for motivation. I should lose weight in a healthy way, a way that doesn't involve perfection, a way that doesn't involve restricting so much that I'm bound to fail. I also need to learn that compliments are a good thing, but not the ONLY thing...they shouldn't be the only reason to work at being healthy and losing weight.

I'm still mulling over all this stuff, working on finding the answers which I know are inside of me, and I think it will come together eventually. I just need to be patient.