Success stories can come in different ways
A few years back as I was struggling to get my health in hand, I reached a point where I decided nothing I could do was going to make a difference. Oh, I would “diet” and lose a few pounds, but it would always come right back…and bring more with it! Because it really does matter what you’re eating, not just how much you’re eating. The what will take care of the how much when you get that first one right.
Anyway, I had a closet full of gorgeous business clothes that I was saving for “when I lose the weight again.” You know, it’s something we all tell ourselves. Finally in October, 2015, when I had a week of vacation, I spent that week cleaning out closets and donating those clothes to a local thrift shop because I finally faced the truth that I just was not going to be able to diet enough to get back into them. Most were not really that painful to part with. But there was one dress. That dress. I kept it back because I just couldn’t bring myself to get rid of it. I had worn it at a time when I was at a weight that made me feel good. REALLY good! By the end of the week, I realized that I would probably never be able to get into that dress again. Ever. So into the donate pile it went.
That one hurt.
Fast forward to December, 2018. See, I had discovered the low carb way of eating in March, 2018, and the struggle I had had the last several years was no longer a struggle. I just simply ate good, real, low carb (or NO carb) food and the weight took care of itself! It wasn’t even hard! When I found myself losing enough weight that I needed some “interim” clothes, I took myself to local thrift shops, because I can’t see paying retail prices for clothes that I would only be able to wear a few weeks before they also became too big. So I was browsing through the racks of dresses and my world came to a standstill when I found THAT DRESS!
I looked at the brand.
I looked at the size.
It couldn’t be!
But then I looked at the very next dress hanging beside it, and it was ALSO one of the dresses I had donated that same week, and it was such a unique dress that I just knew these dresses had at one time been my dresses. And both of those dresses looked like they hadn’t been worn at all since I donated them. Maybe the person who bought them was trying to lose weight to fit into them.
Well, I took that dress into the fitting room and IT ALMOST FIT! That’s been awhile back, and even if it is now a bit big on me, I am still wearing that dress this year for Easter. Because that’s the occasion I bought that dress for the first time. Not from a thrift shop, but from a very nice store.
I almost started crying right there in that store. It was like a special gift from God to say “I have been watching you and how you have been taking care of the body I gave you. And I also know how much that dress meant to you. This is my gift to you to say ‘good job!’ ”
That story may not mean much to anyone else. But it was one of those things that happens that I know I will never forget because it was so deeply personal. Even my husband hadn’t known about that dress and the way I felt when I gave it away, but I shared the story with him when I found it again and he just kept saying, “Are you sure that was your dress?” LOL. When I told him about that second dress (that I didn’t buy back), he was convinced. I took a picture and sent it to my daughter and she immediately remembered it.
I call it my redeemed dress. I am going to wear a redeemed dress for Easter.
How fitting is that?