Choices Choices Choices!

One of the most amazing and gratifying side effects of losing a ton of weight is the way the fashion world and choices open up to you. 

People usually can easily see the choices of clothing such as pants/blouses, but if they have never been grossly overweight, they don't usually realize that things such as shoes, necklaces, bracelets, rings, hats, small shoulder bags or fashionable backpack-purses.....just don't fit.  I used to go shopping and would spend most of my time in the home wares sections of stores.  Not because I wasn't interested in clothes shopping....but because I didn't have to try anything on.

My choices used to be limited to stores such as Dress Barn, Lane Bryant, Kohls.  Forget Bebe or Claire Russe or any of the other myriad stores in the malls with the cute clothes.  There was usually, if I was lucky, one store out of the entire mall where I could shop.  Needless to say, I didn't spend a lot of time hanging out in the mall or window shopping.

Want new shoes?  Okay....do you have them in wide sizes?  You do?  Great.  Whatever they look like, if they fit, I'm buying them.  There is no such thing as 'choice' when you can't fit into hardly anything.  People said to me "We'll take you shopping when you're thin and teach you how to dress more fashionably"....as if I was a fashion retard.  No, that's not the case....It's a matter of going to a store, picking out the left overs in the large sizes, trying them on, and if they fit.....hurry, buy them!  Who cares if it's not really my color?  Or fits like a paper bag?  It fits, doesn't it?  Buy it.

Now, however, a beautiful world of fashion and color have opened up to me.  High heeled shoes! Cute strappy sandals! Frothy dresses! Tank  tops! Camisoles! Every color imaginable other than black or brown!  White pants or a skirt!  And I can pick and choose whatever I want!  The danger now is overcoming my 'if it fits buy it' mentality.....because everything fits! :0) 

I recently went to DSW, a shoe warehouse that I went into once before, only to run out almost in tears.  Too many cute shoes, none that I could wear. This time, it was like being a drug addict with unlimited choices! Holy moly!  I aimed to the clearance rack, hoping to keep my spending down. When the gal in that section learned that I had just lost 100 pounds and was so excited that I could fit into any shoe in my size, she made it her personal quest to help me find cute shoes.  I spent about 2 hours in that store, trying on everything, walking around in high heels for the first time in15 years....amazing!  (Before, my weight would bear down on my toes and shove them forward, very very painful).  I walked out of that store with 8, yes count them, 8 pairs of shoes!  Work shoes, sandals, dress shoes, casual shoes.  You might say, OMG 8 pairs!  But you have to realize that my current shoes are falling off my feet!  Your feet shrink too!  I went from a size 9 WIDE to a size 8 regular.  My feet have shrunk along with the rest of me, hooray! I had to re do my shoe wardrobe, not just my clothes wardrobe

Necklaces and bracelets.....if you don't have a 'standard' size neck or wrist, you have to buy these things with 'extenders' on them.  Lovely, just lovely.  It's hard enough to have the chain move around your neck when you can wear a regular necklace...think of the embarrassment when your extender chain (which never ever matches the regular necklace) shifts to the front.  Thanks, but no thanks...I'll just not wear anything.

My shirt sleeves actually fit my arms now, instead of extending beyond them ( a problem with large sizes).  I'm still trying to figure out if clothes really 'fit' and have been relying on the kindness of strangers in the stores to give me an honest opinion.  One thing I have found with the sales staff----they seem to be more excited than I am about my weight loss.  It's like they love being part of a winning team and want to make sure I look great.  I never knew sales staff were that wonderful; since I did my best to avoid them.

I wish you much success on your journey.  More on emotions and healing coming up in a future blog.