I was on another thread a little while ago and made a joke that I was going to try on my bathing suits even though it's a blizzard outside.

So....I did. I tried on my 3x/26/28 bathing suits from last year and years prior. Prints in pretty purples and pinks, zebra stripes, all types of flowers and tropical themes, everything dreamy about a bathing suit (except size of course).

We have a pool and it's fairly private, only 1 neighbor could "watch" us if they really wanted to. They are over our house fairly frequently and we have good times. I always wear a cover-up outside the pool but in MY pool, it's just a bathing suit. I know I was big, they (or any other visitor) know I was big, oh well. I love my pool and try to go in it as much as possible.

So here is the thing. I put those bathing suits on today (obviously pretty loosely) and I felt AWFUL in them. I tried on 3 different ones and my body looked so bad, jiggly arms, jiggly thighs. ALL things I never worried about when I was larger. I always just put on my suit and headed for the pool.

I don't think a smaller suit is going to help right now, I do have a couple of older ones I could have put on but I was too stressed to even look at them. This had nothing to do with the suit, it was everything else that I saw.

Obviously I don't want to (and will not) gain back the weight but it just seemed like my confidence went right down the drain with the lost weight. I need to get a grip now and deal with this. I am supposed to feel like a million bucks trying on my big no-longer-fitting bathing suit and instead I feel so defeated.

Oh lordy, do I know that feeling.

For me, it was this... When I was heavier and unfit and didn't care enough about myself, I knew I looked bad. I felt bad. So, my expectations in the mirror weren't high. I wasn't surprised by the image in the mirror.

As I got thinner, my expectations of what I would see in the mirror went up. I felt better, I was fitter, I was healthier, but I didn't have mirrored back to me a fit, healthy looking person. I had mirrored back a 42 year old, wrinkly, baggy, stretch-marked ridden body.

I posted a BUNCH of photos of me in a swimming suit last year here on the forum. I was down to my all time low - 165. Trying on swimsuits made me feel like crapola. Let me see if I can find those posts.

I totally feel you though. I get it.

And... the jiggly/wiggly bits will get better, but some of it never well. That is the part that we all need to comes to terms with - that the way we feel on the inside isn't/won't be reflected on how we appear on the outside.

My grandmother used to say when she was 77 or so, "When I wake up in the morning, I feel like a young girl, and then I see reflected back at me in the mirror this old woman." I totally get that now!

Awww.. I'm sorry it made you feel that way. Don't let it get you down. You need to realize that your smaller now and that the lose skin is just a testiment to how much work you have put in to get the weight off. Be proud of yourself. When the weather permits you can go find something that makes you feel good and you can feel comfortable in.
**hugs**

I think I get what your going through. All my life, I thought that once I lost 50 pounds, I'd look AMAZING. I lost that 50 and looked the same. So I lost another 40. I was 212-214 when everything started getting harder and I didn't feel/(to me)look any better. I felt very defeated at that time and you know what I did? Started being lax about my eating and eventually gained half of it back. There's not a lot of preparation for people losing more than 50 pounds. Half the media shows us people that lost 50 pounds and then they were bikini ready. No saggy skin, nothing like that.

No one warned me about that in between period where you are getting too small for plus but still too big for normal clothes. It was frustrating. I lost the battle that year (that is why my goal is only to get to that weight and sit there for a bit unless i feel like more weight loss). Maybe there is an awkward weight loss phase when you are losing more than 50? Does any of this make sense?

Thank you both! The feeling totally took me by surprise, *usually* I keep myself together. I think the anticipation of putting on the bathing suit was making me "high" and I was so happy not having to stretch and pull on the all the tight spots that I practically ran to the full length mirror. I swear I almost threw up...

The only thing I could find to make me feel better was to put on the one pair of 16 jeans that fit (!!) with some high heeled hooker boots that I am not sturdy enough yet to walk outside in but they look good inside!!

Thank you both for replying so quickly. It's so great to know we aren't alone here, even if there is nothing to fix our issues at the moment.

Ok, found the thread and the little photo album I made. I was 169. (Thinner than I am now). My tummy/inner thighs are/were a mess. At the time, I still was thinking, "with more toning" with more X,Y, Z". Now I'm realizing. No... that's about as good as this body is going to look. Decades of being overweight. Unforgiving skin, and age...

I'm sharing it just to show you that I totally get it.

http://s53.beta.photobucket.com/user...imsuit%20album

Exactly, daimere. I'm stuck in the middle right now, it's like being in the twilight zone. And I will never be bikini ready! Thank you for your reply, like I said above it's so great we are never alone here.

The link didn't work, photobucket said it couldn't find the page. Edit to add--it worked now! Thank you!!

Thank you for looking for that so quickly.

And I assume that we are all our own biggest critic so maybe we don't see on each other the things we think we will. I guess I was just upset that I didn't get all excited that the bathing suit butt was all baggy or that my boobs couldn't hold up the top now no matter what.

I lost my weight pretty quickly (in less than 7 months) so I don't expect miracles but come on!!

I will never be bikini ready. I was about to e-yell at a guy on facebook cause he was telling a friend that she'd HAVE to join a gym to lose weight/look good naked. He said, "Do you want to look good in clothes or naked? That is where the gym comes in hand." If it wasn't for the fact that the post wasn't about me, I would have said, "I'm sorry. I was 300 pounds. Even if I was a member of the best gym in the world with a personal chef, I will NEVER look good naked. Even with DVDs, you can achieve results without a gym."


The really depressing thing was that I found a picture on Myspace that showed (in a group photo) that I wasn't the biggest girl in the group. I looked normal (you know how when you are big that in a group photo you stand out?)? But I had been off plan for a month and thought it was hopeless to get back on that trip. I can't believe I was that foolish!

Melissa, thank you so so so much for sharing those. You have no idea how much you help on these boards. And for the record, I think you looked beautiful!! If I saw you on the beach I'd be looking at the pretty print you chose for a suit, not the flaws that you might think are obvious.

As everyone knows from other threads, baby battle scars are something I am praying for so anyone that already has them are my hero.

I am feeling better already, thank you everyone. But I am not going to try on my smaller suits yet just in case they don't fit!

MEN!! I think maybe they don't think before they speak. And it's true, I will never look good naked either. I have done much too much damage to recover this time around.

I was always the biggest in a group photo too. Even wearing black all the time doesn't hide your face/arms/hands etc. I am finally at a size that I look normal (I think) but not ready for pictures yet. But at least people are finally treating me like I am a normal person too. Like I said before on these forums, I think people thought my heaviness was catchy.

You are welcome and thank you. And I hope you get your wish of pregnancy too. The marks are totally worth it - you are right.

And really, when you find a suit that fits right, you will feel better. One that supports the breasts, nip you in where you need it and so forth. A big swimsuit will only point to all the bad things - as will any ill-fitting suit.

As a tangent, when I was getting married about 20 years ago, my best friend and I went shopping for me to find something for my wedding night. I didn't want anything to racy, just something new and special. Good grief.

I am chesty and they have ALWAYS been saggy. I weighed about 189 (so close to what I weigh now). Every piece of lingerie I found at the mall (the only option) my boobs hung below the cups/place for the boobs. We laughed and laughed, but I also wanted to cry! I finally, FINALLY found an Olga spandex top portion of a nightie and free flowing skirt on the bottom that would hold up the boobies and it make me look wonderful. Everything else? made me look and feel like a fat, blobby slob. Ugh!

This is why I don't do lingerie! I need things to hold up the girls!

I know this feeling so well. I swim in a public pool with very fit people, every day. The worst is the huge bank of windows out into the leisure center hallway that I have to walk by to get in. It takes a good deal of perseverance and full on denial to do that every day! I had to go down a bathing suit size, and I didn't even try it on because I knew I'd be depressed if I saw it.

I had a full blown screaming into the pillow, Scarlett O'Hara meltdown when I took my naked as a jay bird 50 pounds progress pictures. I looked awful. Everywhere. Everything sags, is pitted, wrinkled, hanging. At least at my heaviest, everything was smooth. It's damned depressing to realize at 28 years old that you're never ever going to get a chance to look good naked, or wear a bikini.

I'm working on seeing my wrinkles and butt dimples (seriously??? WTH mother nature) as battle scars. Proof I've accomplished something. But it's hard to do, because I want to feel pretty. I may never be all that I'm cut out to be in a bathing suit, but oh well.

You have done so well, made amazing progress. So enjoy that backyard pool and focus on that nipped in waist and the extra energy, because if you're proud of your accomplishments and hard work, it will be that radiance everyone sees, not your batwings.

I posted this in a different thread, but it applies here too. I'm trying to focus on the health aspects of losing the weight, and the fact that I should be able to compensate for a lot and look halfway decent in clothes (and definitely better than at 250+) but to also start to accept the fact that I will never look good naked or in a bathing suit.