disneyland

Perhaps, just possibly, you may have noticed a lack of posts lately. That’s because I have been in DISNEYLAND! Yup. Dreams come true and magic exists. People ask why we go Disneyland and nowhere else all of the time for our big vacations. For us, it’s just easy. Like, you get there and it’s pretty straightforward once you figure out the learning curve of food, hotels, passes, fast passes… You know the fine points of visiting a place a lot, it’s just easy to go there. We know what we can eat, where we can stay and what there is to do. We have a bit of anxiety surrounding travel, so familiarity is nice. It’s just a happy place for our family.

I had a few non-scale victories while I was there:
One, I could wear pretty much anything in the park except kids clothes. I tried a lot of things on and was mostly discouraged about buying anything since I’ll likely shrink out of it before summer. While that seems really nice – and it is in the bigger picture- it is difficult and discouraging to spend 65 bucks on a sweatshirt knowing full well that it will be huge on me by the time summer rolls around. Instead, for the first time ever, I was able to buy matchy-matchy jammies with my daughter! She was a size extra small and I was a large. The last time I was in Disneyland I could wear very little there. It was pretty fun to have the world open up so wide.

The other thing that was really nice was that I didn’t have to worry at all- like AT ALL- about fitting on rides or making the boats tilt. I didn’t have to worry about being the fat girl next to the skinny person all up in their personal space. Furthermore I fit in the plane seat with seatbelt to spare and I was able to put the tray down without it resting on my thighs or belly. I was able to walk down the airplane aisle without turning sideways and my hips did not even touch both sides of the aisle. It was pretty awesome.

The best thing, however, was that my feet never hurt or ached at all. My legs feel totally normal and we walked between 7-12 miles per day, not including the line standing. My back is not all strained and painful and my hips are fine. I was able to run, walk and stand everywhere in line with no pain, no problems. One night we went and saw the World of Color. I put my 80 pound kid on my shoulders and about died- it was amazing to put weight back on. My feet were aching like mad after ten minutes, my spine felt horribly compressed and my knees and hips hurt. It is amazing how much extra weight I was willing to put up with for so long, and the resulting pain and health was such a high cost.

I don’t say stuff like is to be pointed to other people. I have to tell myself these things and document them so when I feel weak or apathetic I can turn to these reminders to keep going. Giving up is easy when you can overlook what you really know, and what I really understand now is that my life feels more comfortable and easier when I weigh less.

I also got a dinglehopper. Yes, my life is complete.
You have no idea how much I love that thing. No idea.