rose in bloom - Going Shopping!

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Going shopping! 





Going shopping was a nightmare! Each time - every time. It was a matter of grit your teeth, get in the car, get to the supermarket, get as much as you can in the trolley without giving anyone the time to look at you, get out of the supermarket back into the car, and get back home; FAST.  Don't waste time, because people will look at you. People will point their finger at you. People will talk about you. People will laugh at you. They did to me. 

I don't want to go through this every time I go out. I'm screaming with pain, but no one even gives me the time of day. No one comes up to me and tells me my hair looks nice, or that the colour of my clothes suit me, or that I look like I'm a kind person. I can't bear going shopping. It's driving me literally crazy. 

People look at what I've put into the trolley. They then look me up and down. I know what they're thinking. They're thinking I'm a slob, and that I spend my entire life eating. I can't even buy something out of the ordinary because they're saying to themselves, “she's certainly let herself go, and she doesn't care a damn”. Please, please listen to me. I do care a damn. I want someone to tell me I'm worthwhile, that I'm OK, that they could grow to like me, if they tried.  No one does. So the humiliation and the fear and the hurt and the pain of shopping stays with me yet another day. It will be the same next week when I go shopping. 

Going shopping for clothes? You've got to be joking. I rush into K Mart, forage through their racks for the biggest, the ugliest, the darkest garment I can find. Anything that will hide me. Anything that will make people look the other way. Anything that will cover me so much that all they'll see is my feet and my head. I'll cover up my feet too, because my ankles are swollen. I even go around to the local Op Shops in the hope of finding clothes to fit.  No, not many BIG garments for sale here, my dear. Oh, hell, when will this end? 

I just can't bear to look at myself in the windows as I rush past the stores. The reflections only show an obese woman who doesn't even care what she looks like. She's not me, so I'll ignore her. Yet sometimes it's hard not to look at that reflection. It just adds fuel to the fire. She's fat, and she IS me. I can't get away from her. So it's back to base - I've got to lose weight, and then I'll be able to go shopping, and then I'll be able to buy clothes, and then I'll be able to go into the supermarket and people won't talk or laugh about me. Then I'll be able to look at myself reflected in the windows. That's it, I'll try another diet tomorrow - this time I'll lose weight. This time I'll succeed. I'll try one more time. Oh, God, give me the strength to try again. Please, God, help me lose some weight. You know how unhappy I am, what can I do, please tell me. 


My objective? 

 I was too blind in my anguish to see what I was actually doing to myself 



What I gained! 

Again, nothing, because I wouldn't allow myself to see further than my own pain







"Rose In Bloom" - © Copyright 2002-2020, Rosemary Parry-Brock, Australia



(Please bear in mind this booklet was first printed in the 1990s.  Compare that with today's attitudes.)

Copyright © R Parry-Brock, 2002 
Reprinted 2010
Reprinted 2012
Reprinted 2014
Reprinted 2017
Published on Blogger © Rosemary Parry-Brock, 2020

All rights reserved. No part of this concept
or publication may be reproduced; stored in 
a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form 
or by any means electronic, mechanical, 
photocopying, printing, scanning, recording, 
CD, DVD, USB or otherwise, without the prior 
permission of the author.  

ISBN 09577809 4 

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