I know I have a disconnect between reality and perception, and whenever that happens, its not good. But if I had to make a choice, I would prefer to think I was smaller than I am rather then the other way around. I have seen anorexic women on tv suffering so very much thinking they are fat when they are not. Of course that is an extreme, and the best path is to have a fairly accurate body image where reality and perception are in alignment.

I am interested to read so many of you had the same misconception (denial?) I have when heavier, and lost it as you lost weight. Another fun thing to watch for as I continue to lose. Who knew all this body/food/weight stuff was so very complex.

Jan

My problem was I thought I looked perfectly fine 40 pounds ago. I looked in the mirror and didn't see anything wrong. True, I was reasonably fit -was still managing to shoehorn into size eight jeans and I exercised an hour a day. But I thought I maybe weighed 150 or so at 5'4. Imagine my surprise when I stepped on a scale and it read almost 170! Ow. :) Plus I saw a picture of myself and I kept asking my husband "I'm not really that fat, am I? Must be the baggy sweater and you know everyone looks bigger in pictures..". ROFL. :)

So now that I'm in the 120's again (haven't been there in years) I look in the mirror and don't see much of a difference. Everyone ELSE does, but I keep thinking 'geeze, I don't look THAT different!'. I don't think I look FAT, but then again I didn't think I looked fat before. Major denial here! :)

I'm new to this whole maintaining thing so I assumed that my insecurities with my body now were a result of that. I still feel fat and look fat to myself in the mirror....though when I see myself in pictures I'm always shocked at how different I look. There have been a couple of times that I almost didn't recognize myself. I assumed my inability to see myself as others see me was because I was new at this and of course there is the excess skin that doesn't help my self image. It's interesting to see that a lot of you that have been maintaining for a while are still plagued by this. I guess it helps me feel normal. I was also thinking about how "Thin for Life" touches on this subject a little bit. The author refers to it as phantom fat. I guess it makes sense that I can't see myself as I am now since I couldn't see myself as I was when I was at my heaviest.

The thing I am struggling with now is when do I know when I am done loosing and really truly at my goal. Will I ever feel thin enough?

BTW Where the heck is the spell check??? LOL :lol:

That pretty much sums up this thread, eh? It seems like photos were/are a shock to most of us. For some reason, we didn't and still don't see very accurately when we look in a mirror, but it's different with photographs? I wonder why? :?:

Good question about how do you know when you're at goal, Dee -- I think it deserves its own thread, so I'll start one up. :)

As for spellcheck, I need it too! I've asked and it's not part of the bulletin board software right now. So what I usually do is compose in Word, spellcheck there, and then copy and paste. ;)

Meg --I should copy and paste too from a doc because once again this morning I lost a really nice post...argh!!

Anywhoo....

Dee -- I read this morning in Thin for Life about the "phantom fat", and I thought OMG I must bring this up on 3FC... but you beat me to the punch...

I certainly didn't see myself as I really was, at a size 14 either... When the gals here would post "I wear a size 4" along with their pics...I would think "No Way, I see their pics, I look about the same but I'm a size 14!" NOT!!! :lol: I laugh about it now though because I was sooo wrongo!...

Ilene,
I used to have that reaction- size 4? 6? who the H#$^ could possible wear that over the age of 21? Now I look at some of my old "good clothes" (I know, I'm supposed to get rid of them!) and wonder what in the world filled them. Particularly bras :lol: My main annoyance now is shopping and wondering why the store only ordered clothes for fat people :o

mel

Me too, Mel! Although honestly, when I look at the one and only fat outfit that I saved, I just feel like crying. I'm not sure why, but I get so sad when I look at my old huge clothes. :?:

The funny thing that it's even extended to other people's clothes. When I was much, much bigger than DH, his jeans looked miniscule when I pulled them out of the dryer. Now they look enormous. Go figure -- he didn't change; I did. :dizzy:

Other than being 5'2" instead of 5'4", I could have written your post. My other excuse in looking at pictures over the past few years has been, oh it's just pregnancy weight, my face gets fatter when I'm pregnant, etc.

But I really don't see the radical difference in my appearance that other people apparently do.

Great minds think alike huh Ilene? ;)

I was disappointed that the author didn't spend more time discussing phantom fat...It seems like all of us here could write an entire book on it!

I wear a 4-6 now too. I used to think that those sizes were incredibly tiny...now they don't seem so tiny. My old clothes seem enormous in comparison...though when I was wearing them they didn't seem that big. The other thing that has changed for me is my standard of skinniness. People that I used to consider super skinny don't seem that little anymore.