I am... normal?

Starting Weight: 19st 9lb - 275lbs
Current Weight: 11st 3.6lb - 157.6lb
Total Weight Loss: 117.4lbs

About 7 weeks ago I hit the extraordinarily unlikely goal of actually losing a hundredweight – an old British measurement which is 8 stone, or 112 pounds – from my original starting point a little over 15 years ago (see last post, Finally Got There)

Having lost another 4lbs since then I have actually crossed the BMI threshold from "overweight" to "normal"

There's no doubt this feels extremely odd – like I've been told I have entered some kind of fantasy land.

The world still looks the same (well it doesn't actually, but that's because of Covid-19 Lockdown), but now, according to the rough-guide-to-health BMI – Body Mass Index – I am no longer overweight.

I was a teenager when I was last this size.

And even then I didn't feel particularly normal because both my brother and sister have smaller bone structures than I do, so were more elfin by comparison to my outsize dwarf body shape.

"If only I was as fat as I was when I used to think I was fat" is a common cry among those of us whose weight only ever seemed to climb upwards.

And yet, here I stand (or sit because I'm typing at the computer), in a position where society can no longer sneer or judge me because of my weight.

But again, like the last milestone, it isn't elation I feel.

Perhaps incredulity.

However, I also know that BMI is only a rough guide, that doesn't take into consideration muscle mass or fitness.

And the reality is, I am definitely not fit. The ME/CFS limits the amount of exercise I can do before my body gives up and shuts down.

Nor have the psychological demons, that led to me self medicating with food, disappeared. They are still there, but I have a better control over them.

I can still hear them whispering in my ear, "you know, now that you're lighter than you've ever been, surely you can treat yourself to a thick chocolatey cake..."