A thought for the day (and for a lifetime)

Well, the trip to Minneapolis was good. DH's cataract surgery was a breeze (they thought his would be one of the more difficult ones, probably because of his diabetes and previous eye problems), turned out his was the easiest one done that day.
We had a great time talking and reminiscing with Bob and Robin (he met them when he was in the Navy and then married Robin's sister later on). We talked about all kinds of things, fat acceptance among them.
One of the things that came up was doctor appointments and how we felt when we left. Made me remember my physical in February and how I came home and cried because I thought I weighed 350 (what I weighed at my last physical 9 years ago) and found out I actually weighed 392 lbs. That is so close to 400 and I was devastated. 350 was bad enough, but almost 400? Totally unacceptable (and I didn't know I had gained that 40 lbs, my clothes didn't fit any differently, I was still wearing clothes I had bought when I was 350). DH asked me why I was crying, and when I told him, he said "I don't care if you weigh 600 lbs, I will still love you and want you." One of the many reasons I love this man.
I knew that diets and WLS surgery didn't work, been there done that, but I still found certain weights unacceptable for me (and I was guilty of looking at other fat people, comparing myself to them and saying, well, I'm fatter than that one, but at least I'm not as fat as that one, blah blah blah). I don't see myself as all that fat. I look at pictures of me, and they don't reflect what I see in the mirror (they make me look fatter than I think I am). And after looking at the pictures of fat people (and normal and thin people), it was brought home to me that you can't judge someone's size/weight just by looking at them, so those people I was looking at and saying 'at least I'm not that big', I could have been very wrong. I could have been heavier and just carry my weight differently and the ones who I thought were lighter than me, could have been lighter, could also have been heavier.
Then I found fat acceptance blogs. Man, y'all woke me up to the fact that, even though I am fat, I was buying into the at least I'm not as fat as..... mentality that ranks people's worth according to their size. When I realized that, and recalled how pissed I got when people decided my worth on my size and that I had been doing the same thing to people I thought were bigger than me, I was pissed at me. I took a long, hard look at my attitudes and decided I needed to work on them. Then I decided, ok, I'm learning and hopefully, growing and evolving and improving my attitudes about fat and acceptance, it's time to pass that on to other people. Maybe, just maybe, there is someone out there who has my past attitude, will read this, be moved to read other FA blogs, and come to realize that no one's worth, no matter what their size, should be based on their size, that we all, no matter our size or lack of it, are human beings worthy of respect. But, if I don't put it out there that I had those attitudes, and realized I was wrong, then I don't think it's going to convince anyone else with those attitudes (no matter their size) that they are wrong and can change too.