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Monday, March 23, 2015

Invisible


Being Invisible. 

I used to be invisible when I was obese.  Maybe not to everyone, but to most people I was.  At my former church, the pastor's wife who taught my Sunday school class that I attended for a couple of years, she never addressed me or acknowledged me.  

Invisible.  

I would be at their home to pick up my son from small groups, and the pastor and his wife wouldn't even acknowledge me even though I was inside their home.  

Invisible.  

People at the same church, wouldn't bother to learn my name.  I was only known as "the mom of all those Johnson boys".  

Invisible. 

Being obese will make you like that.  Then, I started losing weight.  I didn't tell anyone what I was doing since they didn't see me anyway.  But, the more I "disappeared", the more they noticed.  I remember very clearly one Wednesday night, I was among several of the church ladies, and the pastor's wife asked me how I was losing weight.  This was the probably one of the first times she's addressed me at this point.  I eagerly say, "Well, I'm working out, I'm counting my calories, and I'm seeing a weight loss doctor."  The pastor's wife laughs and says, "Oh I tried that.  It doesn't work.  You'll gain it all back."  As her mean girl clique agreed with her and laughed.  I stood there, hurt, embarrassed and feeling like I was back in high school, trying to fit in and failing. 

I looked her in the eye and said, "It’s a good thing I'm not you."  And that was the moment that set me on fire.

I  was invisible, but strong and brave.  I am still human though, and I bleed just like everyone else.  But I turned what she said to me into something that burned within me.  

I got mad.  I got mad at her.  I got mad at all of them who laughed at me, who made me feel invisible, who thought I was nothing.  I took that anger out in my workouts.  

I kept losing weight and getting stronger.  And I became less, and less invisible.  The young men would ask me out on dates, not knowing that I was the mother of the boys they attended youth with. 

The women of the church started seeing me now.  And they didn't like that either.  "Who does she think she is?  She's lost too much weight, she must be addicted to those pills.  Look at how the men look at her?" 

You see, I was still invisible to them.  They never wanted to get to know ME while I was obese or thin, even after being in their church for years and years.  And when I was successful at something that they were failures at trying and failing at themselves, they resented me for it.

Today, if I see any of them at the stores, I see their glares, that look of "who does she think she is?"  I smile at them, hold my head full of blue hair high, and thank God that I'm not like them.  He created me exactly how He wanted me.  I was never invisible to Him.

I just want you to know, whoever you are that needed to read this...you are not alone, and you are not invisible!!!


UPDATE:
I eventually left that church once God gave me the release I so desperately prayed for.  But I knew who I was in Christ and I didn't need anyone to be my friend, or acknowledge me, or see me.  I only needed Him to sit next to me and to be my friend there, and He was enough. I stayed because my boys needed to be there, and maybe so did I.  I needed to know what it was like to be invisible, and to maybe share this story with someone else.)


Saturday, March 14, 2015

Behind the Bus


Driving home from the Woodlands, I let a school bus get in front of me on the feeder. 

Forgive me, but I have forgotten what a mistake it is to ever get behind a school bus of high school students.  I should have never forgotten this small thing, because I was a "ride in the back seat" student too.  And the fact that police were never called on us is only because the people in the cars would need to pull over to the nearest gas station to call the police on a pay phone for our back seat shenanigans.

Anyway, as I am behind this bus, in my cute little red car and my freshly cut and styled blue hair, the back windows of the bus filled up with faces and cell phone flashes.  I kept looking into my rear view mirror wondering what was going on behind me.  I didn't see anything.  I look ahead at the rear of the bus and the flashes continued.  We're stopped in traffic, so I turn around to what's going on behind me that my mirror couldn't show me.  Nothing.

Then it finally occurs to me that they are looking at me.  Or my car.  Or my hair.  I was tempted to flip them the bird, but then I would be chancing having the police showing up at my door because of the viral cell phone photo of a grown woman assaulting children with obscene hand gestures. 

It would happen to me, so I kept my hands on the steering wheel and gear shifter instead. 

I almost stuck out my tongue at the mongrels, but then again, I'd be accused of making sexual advances on minor children from exposing a body part, and then I'd have to report in as a child sex offender and have my picture on those apps that tell you where sex fiends  live, and that would be totally embarrassing, I'm sure. 

It would happen to me.  Have you met me yet?  Yes, it would happen to me.

So if you see some random pictures on the internet of me, in my car, minding my own business, taken from the back of a school bus, and I looked somewhat strained, it's because I was trying to not throw out obscene gang sign hand gestures or stick out my tongue at the heathen children in front of me. 

And that's all I've got to say about that.