Luggage That I Carry - 110 days left

I usually don't watch Dr. Phil.  However, after working out today I was sitting on my couch cooling down, flipping through the stations and landed on his show.  His guest was a girl who had lost 150 lbs.  She once weighed the same as I do right now.  "Great!",  I thought.  "This will be really encouraging to hear after all she had accomplished."  WRONG!  She was there because her male best "friend" had told her that he couldn't be attracted to her, even now after all of her weight loss, because some of her skin sagged and she was hoping that Dr. Phil would pay the $16K for the surgery she needed to get it fixed.  I felt bad for her.  She was beautiful.  Yet some guy had continued to remind her that she wasn't beautiful enough for him.  So even though her weight was gone, the emotional baggage from what people said about her remained.

Will I be like her?  Will I continue to think on all of the negative words people both casual and close have said to me over the years?  So many of the words ring in my ears even though they happened years ago.  The boys in my third grade Sunday school class called me "Miss Piggy".  When I was in high school Spanish class in 11th grade, two boys in that class threw crayons at me and squealed like a pig each time one hit me.  Before I married David, someone very close to me said, "Why would he want to marry you?".  Wouldn't it be nice if the statement "Sticks and stones may break my bones, but words will never hurt me" was true?

I read a book once called You Are Not What You Weigh by Lisa Bevere.  And that is true, who I am at heart is not what the scale says back to me.  The only problem is that a lot of people in the world have not gotten that memo.  And when I do lose 100 lbs, I will still weigh 200 lbs, the same weight I was when I married David.  Still overweight.  Still "morbidly obese".  Which by the way, what a nice name for that.  Thank you medical geniuses for coming up with that term to name me.

So when will the negative words stop?  At what weight will I no longer hear them?  I would like to say there is a time they will no longer be there.  When Karen weighs ______, no one will speak negative words about her and no terrible reminders of the past will be there.  Yet I don't know if that will ever be true.  In fact, I think to believe that would be rather naive on my end.  So besides wearing earplugs to avoid future comments like these or get amnesia to forget the ones of the past, what is a girl to do?

Press on.  Press on knowing that the unkind will always be there.  Press on knowing that I will probably never forget the unpleasant words of the past.  Press on because I am doing my best to become the best I can be.  Of course, as in most cases, the Bible says it best. Philippians 3:12-14 (Message) - I'm not saying that I have this all together, that I have it made. But I am well on my way, reaching out for Christ, who has so wondrously reached out for me. Friends, don't get me wrong: By no means do I count myself an expert in all of this, but I've got my eye on the goal, where God is beckoning us onward—to Jesus. I'm off and running, and I'm not turning back.