Thought Picnic: A weighty bother

What great bother

As I close on half a century of life, I have begun to bother about things that did not concern me much until recently.

In general, I am not given to exertion if I can help it, I can tire easily, yet if I am engaged in some serious mental task, I can keep awake and alert for as long as it takes to satisfy myself that things are in hand.

The last time I sported a rectus abdominis muscle look, I was on chemotherapy having lost a quarter of my weight, that is what cancer and the treatment for cancer does to you.

The weight of gratitude

I have regained all that weight which if I was still seeing my consultant in the Netherlands would have made him happy and more, but it does not fill me with any comfort that I am close to the heaviest I have ever been.

On my consultant in the Netherlands, I was quite apprehensive after the Malaysia Airlines Flight 17 crash because he could easily have been one of the experts to attend the International AIDS conference in Melbourne, Australia.

I was glad to read that he was fine, yet saddened by the loss of one of his very close colleagues Joep Lange, whose expertise within the highly-skilled team and the body of knowledge that addressed my illness saved my life.

Between Jim and the gym

We have a matter to hand, it is concerns about my weight and obviously that relates directly and superficially to my body.

I would rather I was at least 10 kilograms lighter than I weigh now, and that is the difference between going to see Jim and going to the gym. I do wonder what motivation I need to regain control of my weight and to do that well before I begin to lose confidence in myself because of my looks.

This issue hits you daily, in advertisements that fill our television screens where just the blemish on the skin or the hair growing naturally, but in what we have been programmed to consider the wrong place becomes the whole difference between being ourselves or trying to be someone else.

It is a bother

Thankfully, I have not reached the point of wanting to be someone else, I just want to be a better version of me in thought, in outlook and hopefully, in looks too.

That an estate agent never expected me to be the age I am, but much younger, is a compliment, but compliments do not work off the flab, rather it serves to complement the comfort of doing nothing and thereby tipping the scales on the wrong side – usually, yours.