Chapter 3- Middle School

Before I get into the whole Middle School experience, I forgot to mention one very important thing that happened in 4th grade. As I mentioned, I was heavy but the one thing I was good at and did despite my weight was swim. My parents had the bright idea of getting me on a swim team (I secretly thank them over and over now!) where we went to meets and competed. I wish I could say I did an awesome job and came in 1st all of the time but that's not true. I won a black ribbon (12th place) for the 50 yard backstroke. That was it. The real story is in the fundraising event we did. The club held a Swim-a-thon and swimmers took pledges from people based on how many lengths of the pool a swimmer would swim. My parents and grandparents all donated like $7.00 a length or something like that. I remember it being a good amount. Other kids were getting .25 to $1.00 a length. The coach thought it was odd but the truth was, my family (and me too!) figured I could only swim a few lengths and I would be done. I could swim, but my size and weight kept me from being able to do a lot. They knew it and I knew it. I think I screwed everyone up that day. I swam a total of 84 lengths of the pool non-stop. I kicked ass. The club didn't make my sponsors pay their full amounts because if you do the math...that was a lot of money. I sure ended up raising the most money though! It's that experience that drives me today. But we'll get more into today in later chapters.

I think anyone can agree, middle school is a bitch. Pubescent kids running around thinking they're all top dog. Many kids are starting to find out who they are, and many are still searching to be someone. I, on the other hand, wasn't sure of anything. Well, maybe that's not entirely true. I knew who my friends were and I had some good ones. I was lucky. I surely wasn't popular but at least I had others around me to help make the "loser" feeling a little less obvious.

Sixth grade: This was the first year that we started switching classes. I can remember sitting next to this dorky kid in homeroom and wondering if I could even talk to him. (Just a note, he's not dorky anymore AND for the record, I was even dorkier!). I was shy. I don't think I had come out of my shell yet. I certainly had a large enough shell to break through too! It was like coming out of a friggen ostrich shell, 6 feet thick! Even in 6th grade, I was still larger than the other kids, although I don't know if I would have called myself obese. Hefty...yes. (See...told you there were other words for it.) I'll have to find the picture I have of the first day of homeroom. My hairdo was hilarious! I thought it was cool at the time though.

Probably the worst part of 6th grade (and most of the other grades) was the dreaded gym class. We had to start changing into gym clothes. I never understood this ritual until I, myself, started teaching. Kids stink! Now it's very clear why we had to wear (stinky) gym clothes instead of our school clothes. In any case, the worst part of any gym day: changing in the locker room. You probably guessed it. I avoided it like the plague. I couldn't even begin to tell you how many times I "forgot" my clothes. (Secretly there were clothes in my locker-like hell I was going to change into them in front of all of the other girls who were like skinny as hell, didn't have to wear bras and were basically feeling good about themselves, or so I thought). Ironically, I was avoiding doing physical activity because I was ashamed of my body BUT the kicker was that doing physical activity may have actually helped my body! I didn't see it that way then but now it's all so clear. Isn't it funny what 20 years can do to you?

Back then (1987-1988) the punishment for not bringing your gym clothes was to write "I will not forget my gym clothes" over and over and over and over....until the end of the class. I normally got about 20 done and then goofed off with the other "forgetters" and "sicklies". Needless to say, I didn't have good gym grades. Even worse, I was just gaining weight. Did I care? Nope. Didn't even realize it. One day, I decided to get smart and instead of writing the infamous sentence, I drew a picture and put under it "A picture is worth a thousand words". That didn't go over well.

Grade 7: I had low self esteem and didn't even know it. I was pretty shy to start and now I know it had to do with the way I looked. Now, before I go on, I want to digress a bit. If you were the person in my shoes (less than good looking, dorky or something of the sort) you went through what I did- you may have been ridiculed, picked on, bullied etc. You remember things a certain way and you know how much that behavior hurt you. If you were on the other side (you did the picking, ridiculing, bullying) you tend to forget the things you said to those like me. I don't know why but we remember and you don't. I'm hear to tell you first hand that it sucks being on my side. It was horrible to hear people call you fat or geek or anything else for that matter. You have no idea what that feels like until it's done to you. I'm not going to claim that it was so bad that I had any drastic thoughts like suicide or anything but trust me when I say that your words hurt more than getting hit in the face with basketball.

It was in 7th grade that I had my first true crush. Yep, it's the one you remember forever. I don't know why now...but for some reason, I really had it bad for this guy. He was in our friend group but didn't even notice me, other than as a friend. Why would you? I was dorky and pushing overweight. I still stalked him quietly as most 7th grade girls do. I was far too shy to say anything to him about liking him and sometimes I couldn't even bring myself to talk to him. I never said anything to him and I was careful with friends and what they said. I'm sure I did the whole "Ask Sam who he likes" or "Ask Sam if he's going out with anyone". I was just too shy and had such low self esteem that I wasn't going to say anything to him directly, no matter what.
One day though, out of the blue, that ostrich shell cracked. There was a big hole in it all of a sudden. I just decided to ask him out. (Yeah, I'm well aware that dating in 7th grade is a farce...but I didn't know that then!). I did it. I asked him out. Well, after a day worth of waiting, less than patiently for the answer I was really hoping I would get...I got shot down. I can remember being devastated. I came out of this really thick shell and attempted to express myself and BANG! Nothing. It took about 5 days to get over the initial shock and I moved on to liking someone else. Isn't that how it always goes? All was good until a friend told me why he said "no". Apparently I was too fat (at least he had the balls to use the word that I never could!) and he didn't like my hair. Devastation....again.

Eighth grade: I hesitate to go into 8th grade honestly as so many of my actions were to gain attention and definitely less than appropriate to share with everyone. I'm pretty sure I could still get grounded for some of it, even this many years later. Suffice it to say...it was a different year. Other than having a "real" boyfriend, my first "real" kiss, preparing to move to small town, New York and a whole slew of other less than proud moments, the most memorable thing of 8th grade was my friend Missy (name change!). We rode the bus together and we had been friends since about 2nd grade, give or take. She was heavy too but despite her weight, she had an absolutely beautiful face, skin that tanned like no other and the main thing that I didn't have- she had a smaller bone structure so even though she was heavy, she had the smallest ankles and wrists. (Can we say JEAL---OUS?) One day Missy and I were on the bus and she was comparing her wrists to mine. Why...who knows. Anyhow, she made it painfully clear that you could see the bump on her wrist (the one on the outside of your arm) and mine you couldn't see. I was quickly dubbed as having no wrists. Yep, that sure pissed me off and above all else, hurt my feelings. I've never forgot it and I've often looked at my wrists thinking about the conversation that day. I know it seems stupid but this fat girl remembers those things.

Over time I just accepted the fact that my wrists weren't obvious and even hidden behind thick skin but it didn't push me to do anything about it. At least not then. Meanwhile, I was still gaining weight as I had been throughout middle school. I would venture to say about 20 lbs. a year. My mom even tried to help me do something about it by signing me up for Nutrisystem. Back then it was even more expensive than it is now. I applaud her efforts (now that I'm looking back) but I didn't truly appreciate it at the time. In a total of $600 spent on food, I lost 5 lbs. She thought I was cheating the diet when I would go to Fantasy Island with my friends. Truth was...I didn't. I always drank water (or their special orange drink) from this big bottle I had. I spent my money on games but never on food. I just didn't lose any weight. Needless to say, mom cut that out after realizing I was getting nowhere. Can't blame her.

It may have been sometime after that when I started hoarding food, or at least that's what she called it. I thought I was just saving it for later. Know how you get all of that awesome candy at Halloween or Easter? Well I would sneak some and put it in my desk drawer in my room. Unfortunately I had a mother that was smarter than me (although I would NEVER admit that then!) and she would find it. I would get yelled at, and sorry mom, it's true, but called a few not so nice names. They stung but not enough for me to do anything about it. I think I just accepted me for who I was at this point. I tried to put the facade on that I didn't care what anyone else thought. Truth was, I cared, and I cared deeply. Those things hurt and they obviously stuck with me, if I'm able to tell about them today. I cried everytime the words "fat" or "lazy" were used to describe me. Truth hurts.

Eighth grade also introduced me into the world of dating. Now those of you who already know the WHO of my first dating experience...please don't hold that against me. Those of you who don't...well, again, name changes are important for a reason. Rob was from small town, NY where we were moving to at the end of my 8th grade year. I had met him on our weekend visits down there. He was a bit older, which of course was a status thing for me. I was barely a teenager and I had a 16 year old boyfriend. Awesome. I "dated" him for close to a year. It wasn't until he was sure we were moving down there that he finally broke up with me. I took it hard, as any teenie bopper would. I tried over and over to change his mind and it didn't work. I found out later...he dumped me because he didn't want people to see us together now that we would be in the same school. Sad, but very true. In the meantime though, while we were dating, I made choices that, looking back, defined who I was going to be for my high school years. Without going into details, I gained a fake self confidence that made me seem like I felt good about myself but no one knew what I truly felt on the inside. I didn't tell anyone because that wasn't cool. I hid it as well as I could. I couldn't hide that I was chunky. People could see that for sure. I guess I felt that if I acted a certain way, they wouldn't notice my outside appearance. Wishful thinking...