The head versus the heart

I climbed on the scale this morning and saw the same heart breaking number that I saw last Friday when I stood on it.

124.9

There, I admitted it.

I hung my head in shame and discouragement.  And I was thinking about how next week is my 2 year date from hitting goal and having gained weight officially makes me a maintenance failure.

A memory then popped into my head from nowhere.  I have an incredibly bad memory.  So how and why I would remember this?

My brother was home from college and I had been going over and walking on a local nature trail in the morning for a few mornings and he asked me to wake him up as he wanted to go over with me.  I was probably around 21. 

So the next morning we went over and he asked if I minded if he ran – he was always thin and fit.  I told him no and he ran off while I walked. 

And I can clearly remember walking and thinking that THIS WAS IT.  This was the day my life changed.  Starting TODAY I would exercise and eat right and I would become thin and fit.

I pep-talked myself in my head and tried to convince myself that I could really do it this time!

I don’t remember much more, but I’m guessing that resolve lasted until maybe lunch that day.

That made me think about my life now and how, if at age 21, a magic fairy had dropped out of the sky and waved her wand and made me instantly 125 pounds and I had been able to run that 4 mile trail with my brother?

I probably would have dropped to my knees and sobbed out of happiness.

I know INTELLECTUALLY that I am not a failure and that this is not the end of the world.  But I sit here contemplating that I am 5 pounds heavier then when I hit maintenance and almost 8 pounds heavier then I was last year at this time and EMOTIONALLY I feel like a complete and utter fat, repulsive, failure.

Even thinking about coming in first in the race on Sunday?  I feel like my performance was simply not good enough.

I want to get my emotional side to listen to my intellectual side, but I don’t know how.  And when I get on that scale tomorrow, I will be crushed once again…