Mixed Emotions

I have this fantastic green jacket. I love it so much, and take advantage of any chance I get to wear it. Which means that today, when it was rainy and gloomy outside, I busted it out after looking at it longingly all summer. It is a beautiful color, a cute style and length, and when I wear it, I know that it loves me. I get compliments by the boat load when I wear it (good thing I'm a Noah... I'll store those compliments in my ark), and it just plain makes me happy. My sister always threatens to steal it. I threaten to steal her son. I figure it would be an even trade.

So you can imagine the inner turmoil I am feeling today. Today I put on my jacket, and rejoiced in the wonderful fact that it is much looser than it was when I wore it last. The 30 pounds I lost in the last few months gives me room to wear a thin pillow under the jacket if I so desire. I won't, because that's sorta weird, but I'm just saying that I could. So the weight-losey part of me is ecstatic right now, but the part that loves that jacket so much is not so thrilled. I can get it altered, or alter it myself and save some money (I do have some mad skillz in the sewing department), but I'm just gonna keep losing weight, and then what? Either I take the entire jacket apart and remake it in a much smaller size at the end of this shrinking journey upon which I have embarked, or I say goodbye to the jacket. The same goes for all my clothes, but other clothes are easy to replace. My emotions aren't so tied to them. I know there are a lot of cute jackets out there, but this one (and also the peacoat my mom gave me for Christmas a few years ago) feels like part of me. Well, that may be a bit of an exaggeration. But I really love it.

Let me help you experience the love of this jacket vicariously through these pictures:



Despite my chunktastic face, this is one of my favorite pictures of myself. The jacket is part of the magic.



The jacket accompanied me to the Rose Parade, along with many people that I love. It wouldn't have been as much fun without the jacket.



The jacket provided companionship to my fantastic Aunt Jo and me when we sat in line to see the Ellen DeGeneres show for hours and hours and hours and hours, and it never complained. Not even once.



Here, it is helping me enjoy a pfeffernusse cookie at my parents house. My jacket loves to visit my parents house!





And here we are today, that lovely green jacket and me: happy together, though no longer a perfect fit.

You know what, though? It's totally worth it. It's worth losing a few pieces of well-loved clothing to feel like I do. It's worth the cost of a new wardrobe to be healthy and have energy, and not feel fat in a wedding dress, whenever that day comes. It's worth it to be healthy for my future pregnancies and the children that I will raise. And yes, sometimes I get overly attached to things that don't really matter, like a jacket, but I'm sure there will be jackets in my future that I will love just as much. And as I'm working out the issues that led to all the extra weight in the the beginning, I'm letting go of this tendency to form emotional attachments to material things. Things are not important. The important things are intangible. God. Relationships. Health. Joy. Love.

Bring it on.