Fat Tuesday, Bigger Slacks

"Bigger snacks mean bigger slacks!" ~ Author Unknown

I don't believe I've ever shared my own personal story about "bigger slacks" with anyone until today.

On Fat Tuesday of 2009, for the first time in my life, instead of purchasing a pair of slacks with a waist size smaller than 34, I had to purchase a waist size that was larger than 34. I had tried on several pair of dress slacks that day in several stores fully expecting to find something with a 34 waist that was going to fit. Unfortunately it did not happen. There was no way my big ole behind was going to fit into a size 34 without splitting my pants.

I came home with two pairs of slacks, one that was 35 and another one that was 36, and mild depression. It didn’t help that someone had told me it was really no big deal. “It’s only one size bigger,” she said. “You are getting older you know.” I was annoyed. Seriously, does getting older mean you have to get bigger around the mid-section. Being Mardi Gras, I went out that night with the family to comfort myself with the very thing that had put me in a bigger size slacks – FOOD.

I woke up the next morning determined there would be no more Fat Tuesdays in my future. I would diet. I would exercise. I wouldn’t be wearing a size bigger come Fat Tuesday 2010. In fact, I was determined I would be wearing a size or two smaller. Unfortunately, my worse fear would come true and I was faced with yet another Fat Tuesday wearing slacks that were another size bigger.

By the time Fat Tuesday of 2010 rolled around, I was wearing a pair of slacks with a waist size of 38. I also weighed 222 pounds which was more than I had ever weighed in my entire life. I thought to myself, “What happened to no more Fat Tuesdays?” Obviously, I had lost track of that goal somewhere along the way.

Again in 2010, I vowed that this would be the year that I said farewell to “bigger slacks”. I did manage to lose twenty pounds in the early part of 2010. However, I lost sight of the goal once again. By the end of 2010, I had gained back the twenty pounds I had lost. It was frustrating, to say the least.

Fat Tuesday 2011 is only seven or eight Tuesdays away. I’m hoping that I won’t be wearing pants with a waist size of 38 or 36. We’ll see what happens. All I do know is that I want to be through with Fat Tuesdays, all of them, not just the one that everyone else celebrates once a year.