Sports clothes shopping experience

Reality check

I am 2,5 years after the surgery, and I have reached my healthy weight, I am size 6/M. It all seems quite good, right? Technically yes. But I realized something important today while clothes shopping.

I needed some new sports clothes. Quite desperately, to tell the truth. I was still wearing my old T-shirts and shorts, but they were all so large that it became barely possible to use them for sports reasons. They keep falling and they are way too large.

Old clothes shopping traumas take over

Ok, shopping time. I have been postponing it forever because I keep hating clothes shopping. It goes way back to my past when I was barely able to stuff myself in the largest European sizes.

https://bariradka.com/2024/07/30/bariatric-clothes-shopping/

I came to the sports store, and I still felt that I did not belong, that I was inadequate there, it was altogether a weird feeling. But I went anyway.

Be brave

First of all, I started to check everything black. As usual. Because black makes you visually slimmer, right? And I took out an XL size. Because what else, right? Ok… this was hard. To tell the truth, much harder than I thought.

I had to mentalize myself that I was not THAT anymore, that it was ok to be in a store like that, and that there were many other colors than black and that I could wear them.

It bit me again!

And then I saw it. There was a plus-size mannequin put in front of the legging part. I looked at my partner and I told him: she is like me. He stared at me in disbelief. What? Are you crazy? Not even in your worst times! You have never been this big! It seemed he meant it.

But till today I see myself like that. I went and checked the sizes of the clothes that were put on the plastic model. 4XL. I was just standing there and I didn’t know what to think about it. No, I really never wore this size. But explain it to my brain.

The brain keeps playing games

It is funny, I have to admit. When I was before the surgery, I never thought I was that big. My brain was always downplaying things. And now, when I am normal weight, normal size, normal everything, it keeps making me think that I am a “whale”. My apologies to all the whales of the world.

It hit me so hard that I had to leave the store. I couldn’t stay there. All the super sporty people around, all the weird things, half of which I still have no idea what they are good for. I felt really overwhelmed. A coffee break was a must.

Processing time needed

We went back in about an hour. We talked about this, and I explained to my partner what my brain had just done to me. He was literally perplexed. He never even considered this to be a possibility. Our bari brain is playing nasty games with us sometimes.

Yes, it is one thing to have the surgery and to suffer through the weight loss physically, it is not easy. But the psychological part is the next level compared with the body. It seems to me that the body adjusts in a year more or less and if you feed it right, it starts working again in some reasonable way.

But the psychological part is a hugenormous mess. I am wondering how long this will go on. Whenever I think that things are already under control, that I made peace with my past, that I am over it… something happens. It can be a small visual stimulus and boom. It is like a Nagasaki bomb and I am deep breathing, hoping that my panic attack won’t take over.

Tell me about hard…

I did it!

Well, never mind. We went back to shopping. Result? One new short – ok, black, but short, no bermudas. My thighs will be out because I have said so. And I don’t care that I have some extra skin there! Then one long leggings – grey with pink that kinda held my tummy in, so it looked as if I had a flat stomach. Well, I actually have it, but there is some extra skin left, so it looks bigger than it is. I don’t care! A fab tennis top with a bra inside that I can wear as a T-shirt. And a sports bra! Woohoo!

To the washing machine with it all, and tomorrow morning I will wear it all. Tomorrow is Pilates Day. I will put my yoga mat on the terrace and with the rising sun I will enjoy my new well-fitting sports wardrobe 🤩

And to my silly (still fat) brain:

I am enough!
I can go to a sports store!
I can wear any color I like!
There are tons of clothes in MY size!
I am completely normal!
I can wear whatever I like and want!
AND YOU, ZIP UP ONCE AND FOR ALL!!!