When I got out of the pool, I just never thought I would have that emotion of unhappiness and sadness again, over something I knew was completely out of my control, that realisation and acceptance that things have changed.
The last time I felt like this was the night I said good bye to Jenny at her funeral. For some silly reason, I knew I could cope with the whole enormity of the day, flying in from Queensland, then turning up at the funeral, because I could focus for 45 minutes and get lost in my aqua class, forget about it, listen to the beat of the music, sweat and go hard ........ go hard for that burn. I went to bed exhausted yet free because I was no longer worried about her and the saying rest in peace rang true.
So last week, when I came out of the pool, I felt lost, now what? What if I can't exercise? It's become my place of peace and when I am finished I feel like I can take on anything and everything. For the first time in a really long time, I just wanted to cry and I felt really, really lost and I actually felt really alone !!!!
I haven't felt "miserable" over anything ( other than Simone & Jenny) , and especially not over food, but for the first time I could feel the distance between the pool and the car felt so long and I could feel a panic attack, sitting there in the pit of my stomach, and to tell you the truth, it scared the crap out of me. Asking me not to exercise is like telling a greyhound not to chase the mechanical rabbit. This is my love ....... this is my passion.
Exercise has felt like the key to everything, whilst Jenny was dying, it was my escape. I couldn't wait to wake up every Saturday to do my SSS. I knew I could eat a little extra if I was prepared to "burn" it off and that worked for me. But now, I am faced with a whole new set of circumstances, and challenges and what if I couldn't get rid of my blues ....... then what?
So I did some deep thinking in a couple of days, Why do I feel so hopeless? How on earth do I turn this around? I haven't turned to food but by god I could feel the rip tide pulling me in the wrong direction. What if I was floating and sinking out to sea again? What if I can't stop these internal thoughts and I wake up over 100kgs again?
So I open up the computer and I read through my blogging. It's my own thoughts and written words that would be pull me back from my non exercise funk and dilemma. What was it that got me through my thought process?' ..... wow reiki, it's been 8 weeks since I had my last reiki.( my rieki master has moved away)
So I reach out to a friend who does reiki. I needed to be centred again. I had taken on far too much and I needed to make some decisions.
Once I had my reiki, things just seemed to be clearer. I was thinking about moving woolworth stores, because I was looking for more hours but the new store was not accepting hours beyond my contract and I didn't want to let anyone down and questioning do I need a change? What's going on with my knee? Do I go to finale, if I am in so much pain? I've already booked hair & make-up, will I be letting people down? I had planned Michael's Birthday to do private dancing lessons and I can't even walk? I felt like I was letting so many people down.
So many questions and no answers. This is all typical behaviour before 12wbt .... never making definitive decisions until the last minute because I was thinking about how it was affecting everyone else. Not only this but I was beginning to wear my tracksuit pants, and not putting my jewellery on and not doing my hair, all past behaviour that was associated with a person who just didn't care a hell of a lot about themselves because I felt completely blocked.
So by Sunday night I had decided to go back to the doctors, and get more advice, halt the interview for a new job, not go to finale, and look towards the next round in a whole new approach, because I wasn't even going to do the next round and I arranged Michael's birthday. Action ...... I was back into action, making things happen after feeling so lost.
Michael's birthday is the week end of 27th but with Anzac Day, he is taking the Friday off too, which I happen to be booked in to have my Dexa Scan. He was most interested in the details of The Dexa Scan and I thought PERFECT. He watches the 12wbt videos with me and is so supportive of our new lifestyle, that I have secretly booked him to have a Dexa Scan too, so we both have the same focus.
It was a great week ( better than the past 3 weeks) , boys back at school, gym assessment with PT Paul, and Physio on Wednesday.
All my questions were being answered. I am now doing 90 minutes of upper body work in the gym, 2 times a week. Which I have been specifically told ( once again I wanted to be there every second day) YOU ...... need to ONLY see me 2 days a week or you will be doing all that work for nothing, your muscles need time to repair, note has been taken, although hard, I have heard.
Physio has told me it will be a 6-8 week recovery. It looks like I have injured my meniscus, which shoots pain on the outside and inside of my leg and pain through my knee. I am only to do very straight movements. Cross trainer, and bike okay , no rower but I need to be mindful that my knees and legs are straight. NO water, as that gives me no stability and I need a solid surface. I need to keep moving to get the oxygen through it, then it needs to be rested. But just knowing the right actions I need to be doing , not to cause it anymore pain, is amazing , like getting out of the car, getting off the couch, a chair, the toilet, all makes a difference but at least I am not "guessing" anymore. ( surgeon on the 7th of May)
So I am being very measured and smart in what I can and can't do but what has surprised me the most is how much I have changed, but in some areas I haven't . I began feeling really fearful that Anthea 100 kilos plus was coming back.
My weight dances from 90-88kgs and I feel really heavy and revolting but had you asked me at 120kgs would I have been happy at under 100 kgs? I would have said ,"Hell yeah !!!!"
But through all this self doubt, what I have found hard is not getting hung up on the eating Vs the burning of calories because that honestly was doing my head in, it didn't make sense to me because that's the only way I have been operating.
Why do I LOVE exercising? It's because of the way I feel after I have pushed myself to new limits, it's that natural high that you get, of feeling unstoppable, which in turns makes me want to make all the right food decisions because I didn't want to undo all that effort I had put in. When I'm not exercsing it's even harder for me to stay on track.
It has however, always been about the way I feel, the way I feel after exercising, the way I feel after eating crap food, always about the feelings and emotions attached to my choices.
I then realised how important it is, to take care of myself and make me feel good in other means, other than exercising. I continue to have waxing because it makes me feel fresh and sexy, I put a face mask on, I conditioned my hair and I bought new clothes.
Before 12wbt I thought all this was "reserved" for people who were "up" themselves, but I get it now. If you feel good about yourself, you carry yourself differently and you react and action things very differently too.
So yes carry out those milestones and hit all those indicators of calories in and calories out, that's so important for your weight loss but also be aware that it's o-kay to take care of yourself with other things that make you feel good. Be consistent in the 12wbt markers but also be consistent in making yourself feel good about yourself all the time !!!!
We are all human, we all have our emotions, god knows I feel like Ive been completely lost this round, we will have our ups and downs but it's so important to be a bit kinder on ourselves too.
Straight lines is what I need to be walking , for my recovery and to not stray beyond my own boundaries. It's not easy but by god I'm still bloody learning and trying to be the best version of myself, no matter how hard I am finding it.
Breathing from a hole in my lung
I had no one
With faces in front of me
Racing through the void in my head
To find traces
Of a good luck academy
Sparks ignite and trade them for thought
About no one
And nothing in particular
Washed the sickened socket and drove
Resent nothing
There's good will inside of me
[Chorus]
Wake me up, lower the fever
Walking in a straight line
Set me on fire in the evening
Everything will be fine
Wake me up strong in the morning
Walking in a straight line
Lately, I'm a desperate believer
But walking in a straight line
Something I will never forget
I felt desperate
And stuck to the marrow
Invisible to everyone else
I'm a sex-change
And a damsel with no heroine
[Chorus]
I don't need no time to say
There's no changing yesterday
If we keep talking and
I keep walking in straight lines
s so what I need to be walking.
I don't know how many times I have said this, but if I could just be under 100 kilos, I just know I will be happy and everything will be fantastic.
When I was over 120 kilos and staring head on at 130 kilos, being under 120 kilos seemed like an impossible ask, so I never attempted it, my scales became something sitting in the cupboard and had no batteries. I attempted weight loss programs but I never really seriously stuck with something that would head me in the consistent right direction, and I tried them all. But at 120 kilos, I was sad, I was miserable and everything felt dark all the time. I "appeared happy", but mentally I couldn't have been further from the truth.
The littlest thing, seemed like the biggest injustice and I complained about everything and anything to anybody who would listen. I would be complaining to my grandma, Tara, Lisa, Clare, I would be on the phone all day, looking for someone to listen and agree with me on how rough my life was, and if that wasn't working for me I hit Facebook too, to let everyone know it wasn't a good day for me. I just felt it was important to keep everyone "up to date", just in case people stopped being interested in me. I was forever looking for other people's validation to tell me I was o-kay because I didn't particularly like myself a whole lot.
When I hung up the phone or put it on Facebook, did I feel any better because I had ranted about it? No it just seemed I was waiting for the next thing to feed that angry fire. I can't imagine I was a great person to be around, someone who sucks up that much negativity , why would you ? Was it anybody else's problem?
Oh and then there was Michael, Oh my, how he put up with that discussing attitude and poor behaviour , I have no idea, other than he must really love me, that he stuck around !!!! Up, down, up, down. Angry, sad, miserable and a little bit more anger mixed in just in case you didn't know I was pissed off and that had EVERYTHING to do about how I felt about myself.
Once again, I hear myself saying ....... it's the weight, if I am under 100 kilos then I will be happy, like there is some magical happiness meter, that says, congratulations your numbers now read 99.9, and with a flick of a switch, you are now automatically happy, and cured because you made it.
I was doing Weight Watchers for years and could never get past the 10% milestone, it seemed, I would reach it, then boom go the other way because I felt like I had "done it" without realistically looking at exactly where I was at, I still sat morbidly obese !!!!
I adored my weight watchers leader ( I had been with her on and off for 8 years) but when I decided to leave for 12wbt, I gave her a bunch of flowers to say thank you for believing in me but I promised that I would come back and see her at Christmas time, I wasn't giving up, I was just changing directions.
So at Christmas I walked into the complex after the meeting had finished and she couldn't put it all together, could see it was me but I was 27 kilos lighter, something she had never seen.
Once we got talking she could not only see but hear that everything had changed about me. Not the body but the mindset and attitude that comes with it !!!!!
Over the years she watched, all my boys go through surgery, Taj looked like he had to have a full chest reconstruction and for 18 months Michael struggled with a massive goitre that gave him a limited airway passage to breathe, and in that he had a cancerous node, ( the thyroid surgery completely removed the cancer, but it was hard knowing that he had that embedded in him too) , Michael's dad got prostrate cancer and won that battle, and we had Simone's first suicide attempt. She said, " Anthea, you always had something major happening and it always stopped you, I felt so sorry for you and I just wished all these things would stop happening to you", but look at you now? I could hear her sympathise with me. I hear Michelle Bridges saying, spin so much bullshit and excuses everyone around you believed them too, even yourself ............ WOW and that's exactly what I had been doing before 12wbt. The evidence was clear, this is how I had been living.
I said, "Lynn, that's the point & the difference with me today ....... This is LIFE !!!! There will always going to be SOMETHING no matter how big or how small, it's how I want to attack that and make that my reason to keep me heading in the right direction.
I started 12wbt because I needed a great distraction from Jenny dying and Simone's erratic life. I didn't go in with a goal, I just wanted to stop putting on the weight and I just didn't want to be sad because of my weight anymore and I just wanted to be under 100 kilos, because isn't than when happiness kicks in and all my problem's fade away?
I reported my progress to my 3 friends through texts every week and I reported to my Facebook world every 4 weeks. Still looking for people's approval, still trying to stay relevant, but I actually like it ...... showing off and receiving so much encouragement and support, so I should be I'm working bloody hard at it!!!
As I went through my first round, I was hearing Michelle Bridges saying, you need to set goals and mini-goals. I was doing this but I had the only measurement to me that made complete sense, was my happiness.
I felt very pressured if I didn't say, well I want to be X amount of weight by a certain date and I will not stop until I hit my healthy BMI. (don't get me wrong these are soooo important to a healthy body and great goals they just weren't mine) . I was beginning to feel putting the number goal was like setting up that 10% weight loss goal from weight watchers that I could never achieve. What if my goal was to just find a complete balance of happiness and a healthy functioning body regardless of the number? Am I failure because I'm not saying I've made it when I've hit a number?
At the beginning of this round, as well as my Dexa Scan I felt like I was in a great space, I had a mixed previous round with school holidays but once the kids were back at school full time I could push the pedal to the metal and rip through it again. I can't tell you how much I loved my new routine, mixing it up and heaps of gym work, because my body felt so strong and amazing, but then my knee reared it's ugly head. I figured because I had lost all this weight, my knee was no longer an issue.
My knees have been deteriorating since I was 21, having played so much squash. I was playing state squash in Melbourne 5 times a week and after matches couldn't change the gears in my car, the physio said that day, you've played your last game of squash, because you won't be walking in 20 years ....... I wished I had kept his number because he had an amazing crystal ball.
STATE SQUAD at age of 14
I'm just pushing this body to limits I've NEVER been too. I would pull up tender every second week, I would need to rest it for a few days, then once it felt good, bang back into it. I was doing 500 -700 calories burn a day & my full SSS and felt FINALLY I was back in the pocket where I feel complete bliss. I go back onto the bmx track this time not walking it but running it, up and down those hills, with an extreme heart rate and a quick burn and I did 1000 calories at 1000 steps which felt magnificent I spent 3 and a half hours running the outside tracks, I did the stairs once, but the track up and down 4 times. If I could bottle up that feeling up I would. I felt sooo incredible. It felt like this peaceful magical place that I had been missing out on, it was a complete high like a drug, I left alive for the very first time. My weight didn't budge but I just don't care anymore ...... well not care, I don't obsess and worry about it.
It seemed every 4 weeks would be the off week, and the fitness test impossible with running, squatting and stretching the knee is just so bad but I listened to this body ( funnily enough I just don't care to tell anyone yet, not Facebook and not my friends)
I rested enough to get myself right to do Run For The Kids. I initially wanted to do the 15km course and with the amount of walking I had been doing, it looked like I was going to do well with it, but with the consistent pain I was in, I thought lets do the 5.5km instead. So I changed the length, and my husband was thrilled, it was such an amazing day,
Before & after the race with Michael and meeting up with one of my gorgeous best friends Lisa.
I ran 80% of it, not fast, but I ran and I felt like I had ticked off my "goal" box. Doing this 12 months ago with 38 kilos on would have never even been a consideration but here I was, just doing it and feeling free.
My "official" time is 45.46 for the 5.5kms, it's a PB because it's a first for me.
With Easter coming up, I have never been so excited the first Easter that I can say, lets go hiking, lets go for a drive, lets live life, lets be a fun family because I don't feel limited by my weight but on Thursday night I did one too many quick turns on my left knee and I just haven't recovered. It's made me think, of Michelle Bridges, is this all my excuses coming into play because I feel I've been carrying this knee for ALONG time now ? And I have worried that because I can't do all this physical work that I am use to doing, am I all of a sudden going to pile it all on again?
Then I've had a really good think about it. I think "excuses" is telling yourself and giving yourself permission to go and eat 4000 calories and saying, it's okay and acceptable to continue your own self destructive behaviour and blaming everything and everybody else but yourself.
This is a genuine reason, I just wished I had recognised it earlier than trying to push through it with explaining to myself that I could make it better.
So this Easter my knee kept collapsing with every step I made, literally , I could not put my pants on, shoes on, just sooooooo much pain, so I iced, elevated and rested for 4 days until I could get to my regular doctor. Who sent me for my X-Rays.
(It was when I took this photo I could see the difference and the top of the leg is doubled, I thought, hmmmmm, O-kay I not only see it, but I really feel the pain now)
X-Rays have revealed that the arthritis has rapidly increased in the joints and my right knee, the good knee has tripled the amount of arthritis in 2 years.
My bone has thinned behind my left knee cap and I have lost all the tracking behind the knee cap so it has no support. The X-Ray only gives the indication of bone damage and structure, not the ligaments and tendons, so I am beginning physio to strengthen the muscles and I see the surgeon on the 7th Of May, who I suspect will send me for a MRI, but he will tell me exactly whats going on.
Until then I need to suck the pain up with osteo panadol and very limited exercise on my legs. My doctor looked me in the eye and smiled at me, to make sure I was hearing her ..... NO MORE IMPACT HIGH INTENSITY EXERCISE !!!! Slow movement in the water but nothing else but make sure it's 6 panadol a day and make that appointment with the surgeon ...... please.
So I took the film to my neighbour who is a radiologist, who pointed out all the shading and it's not good. But I guess it is what it is. I have my ears opened, I have heard. I don't like it. This has nothing to do with weight loss anymore of course that is still so important, but this is about protecting my body so I am walking !!!!
Michael has been AMAZING !!!!! During Easter he did an overhaul of the kitchen and removed all the crap that has crept in and he made me rest and ice. All through Easter he looked at me in bed and reminded me, your body is not burning calories like it's use to, so you need to be careful about what you eat now. Today he looked at me and said, enough, you are clearly miserable go to the gym, NO equipment other than arm weights.
So I did, I hobbled and the pain is just constantly there but it's the oddest feeling. I am use to spending 3 hours at the gym burning my calories and not coming out until I do. I missed my squats, I missed my 45 minutes on the cross trainer, I felt a bit better knowing I had at least done something but I also feel sad because I know I miss the sweat and the rush. But it's a whole different type of sad, it's not poor me, it's an acceptance of the path has deviated.
There is no doubt I have swapped one addiction with another, I am no longer addicted to food, I am addicted to exercising and pushing as hard as I could.
So for now I have to hear and remember those doctors orders.
I also can't help but think about Jenny. She was in so much pain, did she complain? No, she was gracious, I have no idea how because I am hurting. I think of that conversation about my big fat morbidly obsess body and thinking, I need to get healthy because if I get cancer, how can I ever know when I am moving in a body that is hurting everyday because of all this extra weight I am carrying ?
This may have been the natural course of my body, bones and the arthritis but imagine how I would have coped if I was over 120 kilos and a shitty negative self image and self destructive behaviour with no consequences attitude because that's exactly how I was living before 12wbt.
Thank god, I kept going to get those kilos off when my body wasn't injured. Just like I explained to my weight watchers leader Lynne, there's always going to be something that's going on in our lives, I am just really happy that I kept forging through those first 2 rounds to loose the weight I did, that I have that supportive husband who understand how important it is to have good nutrition and also understand how important exercise is to my mental state too.
Yes am hurting, I am in extreme pain, and sometimes I feel miserable, I am missing exercising like I have been accustomed too, but I've done this before, but on a whole different level. My life was take away and junk food and zero planning and no realistic goals and I had too adjust a new lifestyle (THAT I LOVE) and I just can't ever do THAT again !!!! It's a whole different sort of pain when I was 120 kilo !!!!
What if I never had that conversation with Nina on the side of the pool deck about 12wbt?
What if I never realised that the weight could mask something bigger like cancer, like Jenny's lung cancer started as "a sore back" therefore I needed to work bloody hard to get me into a healthy functioning body?
I shudder to think where I would be, I would still be in denial and unhappy but most of all I would not have the tools and the mindset that tells me I am going to be o-kay because it's all up to me, to make it happen, which is all 12 wbt.
I think one of the greatest things about 12wbt is the SSS. When I did that 1000 calorie burn for the first time and it took me over 3 hours, it gave me a whole new perspective on the worth of the calorie.
There is no doubt that 12wbt has made who I am today but I have had the most amazing support with fitness friends, with the D30 group, with my own support network and more importantly within my 4 wall with my husband also becoming aware of how important this new life is. So next round when I am not doing 12wbt, ( because I will have had surgery) I know I have taken everything from 12wbt and it's changed me completely !!!!
I have never been happier, and it's not because I'm under 100 kilos . It's actually the way I feel about myself and the way I treat people around me and that's all because I am happier with who I am in my own skin, which no doubt has been affected by the weight loss not THE AMOUNT I have lost .
I don't worry and dwell about the small unimportant stuff anymore, and my phone bill is cut in half because I'm not on it complaining all the time. I don't look at Facebook to feel validated & important anymore.
I will still continue my gym and assessments and reviews every 4 weeks, I am still concentrating on my Dexa Scan. I just won't be doing it under the 12wbt official.
But I've reached my measurement, that is important to me, I've found my happiness.
Weight wise I still see my goal weight measurable to my Dexa Scan at 69-72 kilos and I will get there, I'm just not racing in the "weeks" to get there and my knee ( and my doctor) has told me so too, I am taking a detour first to get these knee's stronger, again, can't say I like it but what else can I do? Go eat cake and pizza?
HARDLY !!!!!!!!!!
DON'T GIVE UP BECAUSE YOUR EXCUSE IS IT'S TOO HARD OR YOU CAN'T BE BOTHERED .
Make that body stronger and healthy so when that big "something" comes, you have the right tools and mindset to get through it in a positive way.
I will always maintain that no matter shape or size you are ....... ugly on the inside is always ugly on the inside. Anyone can change their appearance by loosing weight but if you are a negative, ugly, nasty, unkind person .... well that will always remain.
When it's my time to go beyond this life of mine, I want to be remembered as a kind, caring, thoughtful person. Will they say at my funeral ...... and it's really important for you to know that she currently weighted 88.7kgs and her measurements were ........ well ...... NO. It's your overall health that's important not the shape you see in the mirror but geez it's gotta help, if you are living a healthier and happier lifestyle before your time is up.
I was a very spoilt girl growing up, my father as I have mentioned over compensated by not being there emotionally by giving us money.
I was raised by him with the rule of ....... rights with responsibilities, we had the right to do anything we wanted as long as we were responsible. At anytime I would have somebody over to sleep, male or female, they were to stay in my bedroom and I had to look after them, feed them, and make them feel welcomed in our house.
At the age of 14 my best friend was Michael, he was my squash partner, we toured around the states playing squash, he was just my friend, no different to a girl ....friend. Michael and I surfed and played squash for years together and not once, was it anything else, my best friend just happened to be a boy. It would take me another 5 years to discover the other meaning of "boys".
If there was a party I wanted to go to as an underage drinker, I could drink, and my father would buy me my alcoholic beverage, he would buy me 2 UDL's. He would drive me to the party, drop me off and would pick me up at the time I told him. Sometimes I said," there will be drugs smoked here, I might have a cigarette but I won't do anything else, can you pick me up at 12? " Just as I had promised I would only drink the 2 cans for the night, and sometimes I would just give away a can and walk around holding the other because I just never really got drinking, I stayed true to that commitment I made to him and there he would be picking me up at 12.
I was to NEVER go home with someone I didn't know, and if I ever got separated from people I went out with, I was to call at whatever time it was and get him to pick me up and if my plans changed I was to always call and tell him.
Never did I ever do anything beyond these very wide boundaries ...... I had the right to do anything but I needed to be responsible therefore I never disrespected this great trust he gave in me, I never wanted to disappoint him. Funny how with all this space I was given, I always respected his worries, his thoughts and his opinions too. If he asked something of me, I just did it without question because the communication ran both ways and I always respected he was my father and what he said, went.
I went to an all girls school in Geelong and watched many girls get pregnant, and they would "sneak" out, then be grounded for a lifetime because they disobeyed their parents. I just didn't get it. Why would I ever piss off my father?
Because of this trust he installed in me, I just never knew how to tell him that one night when I was 7 years old, while he and mum were having their "cards night" after baseball, I was molested and sexually assaulted by an 18 year old boy, nephew of the people who's house they were in. I figured as long as the adults were o-kay, then I guess this was ..... well whatever it is. I was 7, and nothing made sense other than I know this is wrong.
My mum in her madness of the childhood she lived told me, " if anybody interfered with me, we would become retarded'. You have no idea , how many times when I sat in class and I didn't understand a maths equation, I kept thinking, Oh that's because THAT happened , so I told NO ONE !!!!! For a really long time.
So when we are at high school in a very sexually charged up school girls are talking about boys, I just don't get it. How can that ACT be even remotely nice? Even thinking about it, I would feel sick in the stomach.
Around about this time in High School, my mother wants to embrace her Aboriginality, and wants to become a performer. So we are dragged into this very well known acting group, who want to act out The William Buckley Story, where we are cast as the Aboriginal tribal people. We went out camping through the bush together and we made huts out of bark and we were taught traditional tribal dancing from elders, which was the most amazing experience. I was cast as a lead actor, as a blind boy and had to work very closely with the male "actor".
We did many scene together and were alone a lot of the time. We spent months and hours together. For some reason I just felt awful in the guts about this male actor, he would rub me in the most inappropriate places when we were alone and because we wore very little attire I just felt terrible, but again I had this in my head, someone interferes with me, I am stupid.
So I begin a very different type of friendship with another actor, she is the most gentle, caring, beautifully talented person I have ever met. I ask her to come and watch over my performance & rehearsals ( I am actually just asking for another adult to be present because I DO NOT TRUST him )
She becomes my everything, it's a lot more than a friendship it's something I have never experienced before, she gives me this amazing strength of okayness, she becomes my protector and she is a lesbian. I totally dote and adore her, and I'm in love with her. Our friendship is just something I still can't explain, it's like she was just there to make me feel loved again. I would often spend week ends at her house, have breakfast and then walked to school as she lived only a couple of blocks away. I would often sit there and just have these amazing conversations about the week end we had just spent in Melbourne with all these famous people, at the set of neighbours, quite often over breakfast with her flatmate Rachel.
It was such a wild time, performing and getting standing ovations , being in awe of another human being and just living in a moment. After the show finished I still saw my girlfriend and we had regular contact but it just all of a sudden stopped and then she packed up and left. I was lost, what on earth has just happened? I was so happy? In a world that made no sense, a family that was sooooo dysfunctional, yet this was my happiness ????? Why oh why was this ripped away from me? Why can't I just have some stability and love in my life?
So back to school I went, not knowing where she went, then we had a performance group come through school and boom there she was, and when I saw her we just hugged and cried but she then explained, " this is it Anth, I have no idea when I will see you again, I said yes to this schools performance because I at least wanted one last time to explain that this is the way it has to be".
Here is Ushers Numb again ..... I only believe in what I feel, and she felt right to me !!!!
I would see her perform on tv show and also regularly on Steve Vizard up late show. She would always sing me Annie Lennox songs and I guess that's another reason why I have such an attachment to Eurthymics.
I somehow muddle through Year 12, with mum going off the rails and my family in a mess, I just didn't seem to have my own place in the world. Still wondering, when this lesbian thing will kick in ???? Surely in an all girls school somebody has to find me attractive. Through this terrible time, I'm finding so much comfort in food, the canteen and a wage goes hand in hand. I pile on the weight, no ones watching, no ones really caring about me and this was my comfort, I also have this truly deep rooted feeling that if I am "attractive" then I might have to explore boys and, yuck, just yuck. Being fat and unattractive and invisible sits pretty okay with me. I'll leave all that to the popular girls.
Haley is no longer at school so I have a spare seat next to me on the bus, there's a girl with short hair, her name is Danielle and she's just started back at Geelong Grammer, I'm not sure if she remembers me but we use to go horse riding together in primary school and we use to hang out together too, but then she left suddenly for Melbourne. I pray and hope that she sees the vacant seat next to me and she does. From that moment she is my friend, without Haley for the past year I am just lost, but Danielle brings this intelligence and self confidence and finally I think I have found my lesbian crush I have been looking for.
Every week end is spent with Danielle, she is a few months older than me, so she drives the car to school and we hang out together a lot more, I have ZERO confidence, to express an opinion, that's just impossible but we smoked and drank coffee together, I would watch her study, make her coffees and just love being on her farm, just another escape from my messed up family life. Dan goes to nightclubs every week end, and has perfected the hair flick, god she looked so good when she danced. She taunts me all week after I turn 18, now am I driving you night clubbing? Oh god the thought, terrifies me, public place, I have no confidence and I am soooo overweight and there is nothing attractive about about me !!!
God somehow ...... I have no idea how she did it but I finally go out dancing, and Depeche Mode, Come On Eileen, I just can't get enough seem , to be the songs that drag me onto the dance floor because of her extreme confidence she would pick one guy out in the whole nightclub and usually hands down the most attractive guy and wham work her magic and she would be kissing them by the end of the night. I just couldn't believe the confidence one person could have.
One night when driving home, she asks, why do you not "pick up Anth?" I reply, "Why would anyone find me attractive? Besides if something like that happens to me, I'm already damaged goods". "What on earth do you mean?", Then I told her about my molestation, she was dumbfounded, and in a whisper she knew too because she had gone through the same thing, hence why she had to leave for Melbourne, yet it gave her false confidence and she was masking her pain in a whole different way, she choose the rebellious sexual lifestyle, I choose to hide behind food and no confidence. Eventually I got bored with going clubbing and only watching her go off with ANOTHER new guy. So I would kiss a random guy here gosh maybe 3 in total? But afterwards, I would go and vomit in the toilet because I would hate it !!!!!!! It totally discussed me !!!!! Not only was I discussed, so was she, " Anth, seriously set some goals, these guys are not attractive, you need to start wearing your glasses or buy contacts ". So I met her half way, I bought the contacts and kissed no guys.
So this lifestyle of smoking, drinking, partying, playing enormous amounts of squash, surfing and occasionally working was pretty damn fine when your 18 and legal. Dan ,would see me wear the same clothes every week end and then say," I don't think you realise how much weight you've lost", but I need to get you a make over. So we go into Myer and buy my first pair of Levi's 501's. I remember her bringing in the sizes and I say NA, I'm not a 16, "shut up and put them on", as only Dan could and they are too big on me. So a size 12 , I am, then a body suit, are you kidding me? That's putting it out there, but I guess I just have to trust her.
So I lost 25kgs and a size 12, I felt amazing but I couldn't careless about, "finding" a boyfriend. For all my junior squash years, I saw boys every week end, and competed with them and against them, I was just their team mate.
All of a sudden they wanted to take notice of me, not because I was Anthea, but because I was an "acceptable" shape, all of a sudden I WAS attractive. I felt it so immensely frustrated, I was good enough to talk to .......... now, they offered to buy me drinks and wanted to "dance" with me at the night clubs, when once the were happy to ignore me at tournaments for years. It just blew my mind, that these same guys who over looked me for YEARS all of a sudden, change their behaviour because I change my shape? I'm the same person, I'm the same person on the inside, same heart, same thought process's but I was now "worthy" of THEIR attention ?
I became more confident and begin to go out with different people and not always with Danielle. I begin going out with my new school friends that I was studying childcare with , I had never been out with these girls. We went to The Eureka, which was a great bar with a dance floor. For some reason Alison, whom I was staying with saw a guy she went to school with and he tagged along with all of us girls. then this song came on .
Omg I love this song, and I dump all my stuff, purse, cigarettes on this poor guy, don't know him but yeah, boys don't dance, so he follows us around for the night, he is not over the top confident with the girls, he has nice conversations and he's interesting, and not really that interested in me, which was actually really nice, because in the body suit and enormous boobs, I seemed to attract a lot of attention.
I drove home and thought about that boy, hmmmmm. I couldn't stop thinking about a guy that I barely knew, but he was polite, and kind and just really interesting and a bit spunky.
So the next night I did something I just never thought I could ever do, I drove back into Geelong, all by myself and I went back to the nightclub I last saw him, with the intention of seeking him out and only him out and if I did ...... great, if I didn't , gee it was worth the attempt because for the first time I was flying solo on a thought and a feeling that I had never had before. I knew what I wanted and I was going to at least give this confidence thing ago.
I found him and I hoped I could at least read a sign that perhaps it was worth every little bit of instinct. By the end of the night, he walked me out to my car, and for the very first time it had dawned on me, that every boy I had ever kissed, I never enjoyed. I never said no , I just felt because they wanted it, I had to respond, to them because that's what I thought I had to do. ( it's strange how something that happens to you when you are seven can give you such a mental block, even when you can be so smart in other areas of you life and you are now an adult) . I thought I owed everybody everything because I felt so little for myself .
That walk to the car I stood him in the gutter, because he was tall, I looked at him and I said, " You know it's polite to ask a girl if you can kiss them ........ Do you think you, you might have a question for me? He asked ever so cheekily ....... May I kiss you? And I realised he was the first boy I had ever invited and wanted in my world, it was MY CHOICE to ask, and his choice to say yes or no and it was the most beautiful and amazing friendship, that was developed in the gutter. :) and finally a physical love for a male was created with such a tenderness that I still think wow about because he changed my world once again for the better.
I am ever so fortunate to have had that honesty and openness that was ingrained in me from my dad, because it was not easy for me tell that beautiful boy that I was thinking of another boy 18 months later but I think he knew that Michael had more time with me and our paths were moving in different directions, in different towns, me living in Melbourne and he living in Ballarat. Hardest decision but also the right decision. Nothing had happened with Michael but I was fighting a very strong attraction to Michael too !!!!
I would remain friends with him, even to a point where Michael would play basketball in Ballarat where he was living and we would have lunch together, then I would be watching Michael playing basketball and my previous boyfriend sitting next to me in the grand stand. The most bizarre situation but it just worked.
Again this honesty and trust and always having the good, right, kind intentions but that's also a testament on the type of person those two males were because they loved me, it worked?
I lost contact with the first boy I ever let kiss me .... probably, for about 15 years but we have just reconnected over the past 5 years and I enjoy our conversations, I am so glad his life has turned out so well because he sure has had his fair share of heartache but I am so glad he is married to the most divine looking girl ...... I would expect nothing less, and he is living in his own beautiful bubble, which makes me ever so happy.
Sometimes I feel like the luckiest person to be able to still have these amazing friendships , especially the one I share with my husband.
With that one other missing love of my life ...... my actress.
When I was 23, we went through another really rough patch as a family. My sister's ex boyfriend had stalked her and us, for years and finally attempted to kill her. I say finally because when you are caught in this situation, there's not a great deal you can do, with court orders , unfortunately they can not do anything until they physically hurt you ...... then ....... the police will act. Well that's the position we were put in.
Finally he was sentenced for time in a facility and I even think dad paid money for him to get help. Just to put an end to it all. We were in a pub in Richmond and it was a very serious moment, I thought it was all about Simone and dad and his new partner sat me down and dad had a confession to make to me.
I just had no idea, it felt really serious what had I done wrong ? He then explained how hard he had tried to protect Simone from this creep but felt like he had failed her, yet it was a behaviour that he had repeated and he wanted to apologise to me.
He called my actress all those years ago and told her, hurt Anthea, and I will treat you like a male, don't hurt her. I was dumbfounded !!!!!! This kind of talk , I just cant fathom coming from his mouth. I just looked at him, you don't understand dad. I loved her, I needed her, she protected me and she loved me, she was my comfort in a time that nothing made any sense to me .......... all because I didn't know how to tell you that I was molested at 7 years of age.
So finally at 23, I tell him the most awful truth . Not that I was loved by another female, but my innocence and life changed forever over a pack of cards and alcohol for the adults.
His partner just held him as he cried and he apologised but he could have never known because I never told him but once again I am floored at this openness. He then said, "because I knew this was so wrong, I have found her and I have paid for 4 tickets for us to go to a performance she is doing Rochford winery, with Linda and Vikka Bull.
So we went, and I knew I had dad's partner, dad and Michael's watching my every move that day. I sat there watching her perform it was gut wrenching and beautiful after she played her set, she moved towards the back of the crowd to sign autographs. I lined up thinking crap, crap, crap, what If she has no idea who I am?
I didn't even say hi, and she jumped up and wrapped her arms around me, "Oh Anth", she excused herself from signing and yelled, I'm taking a break ....... then she grab my hand and ran me around the back, and she just looked at me. We didn't even say much, but said everything, it was just a moment of finally putting the pieces together. We sat there holding hands, she had met this most amazing man and was a mum, and was ever so happy. I then filled her in on Dad & Michael then took her out to meet them all.
She panicked when I said, dad was out there, she looked worried, I said. " No , it's all good, I know EVERYTHING !!!! Finally my puzzle pieces were together.
It was so important for me to do that, for dad, too. He needed to wish her well !!!
So yes I have lived through some really complicated stuff in my life but somehow I managed to get through them and become even stronger, I trusted my gut instincts, once I knew to listen to them.
I didn't want to be in an alone situation with the male actor because I knew his actions weren't right, that's why I needed my girlfriend - lesson learnt.
I began the most amazing friendship with her, who taught me, you can be loved in the most magical way and it was o-kay to allow that to happen. Love shouldn't have boundaries regardless of your gender.
Dan persisted with me to keep dancing and keep trying new things, to get out of my comfort zone, get out of the size 20 jeans and wear levi's size 12. She also gave me the confidence to seek that beautiful boy out that night. When I realised that , I had choices, to say YES to a great boy not yes to yuck ones and that I had to take the reins of my own life. I had to perhaps make the good things happen.
Dad taught me rights with responsibility and own my own actions. He also taught me, even if you think you made all the decision in that moment it's o-kay to say, I'm sorry , I did the wrong thing.
Those boys from squash, made me see, no matter what size someone is, to look beyond the shape because there are so many other things that make people "attractive" other than a shape and a size and nothing shines more than inner beauty because that will always remain !!!!
But through all of these things, Ive always hidden behind my weight. That was my escape from all things real. I think this weight loss process is a WHOLE lot more than just a numbers and formula, and my no means is it that easy.
It's about EVERYTHING else that has made you who you are and how you choose to cope with things. I wanted to believe the fat would keep me unattractive for anyone to ever love me, I am always learning about this bigger process of weight gain, weight loss and life, even now I am challenged everyday and my weight.
I have loved 3 times in my life before my 2 boys came into my world.
I hope to teach them all I have learnt and continue to learn, and I just might tell them, the mornings mummy had breakfast with the flatmate of mum's girlfriend ........ Rachel Griffths.
