Last year I was in denial, but this year I cannot deny it – I needed some new clothes. I had gained 10 pounds in a fast hurry last year, and this year, I’d gained another 10 pounds. I cleaned out my shorts last summer, so I was unmistakably low on summer weather clothing. It was time to go shopping.

At the store, I grabbed the next pants size in shorts. I spent all winter squishing my overweight body in the small sizes I had, and in doing so, I convinced myself I could squish my newly large but still mommy accordion belly into the next size. I was abysmally dismayed when I realized I was not just one but two sizes bigger.

And this is how I found myself at the YMCA the next day with my three kids. Realizing that I no longer fit into anything that was “my” size was the wake-up call I needed to do something about what I assume to be a stress eating problem. I have enough stomach problems to know that I wasn’t eating enough healthy foods – I was consuming chocolates and second helpings, because even though it hurt me physically, it was mostly pleasant and enjoyable in the moment to eat yumilicious foods. The food could maybe relieve the stress, right?

This would be why the girl behind the Publix deli counter asked me if I was expecting again. This was not too surprising since I was gaining an awareness of my extra size and a friend had hinted that I was pregnant for months last year, before I had finally broke down told her why I would not be able to get pregnant any more (apart for the miraculous works of God).

All this would be why the next morning, I got up ready to eat right, and as much as I could it was time to give up carbs and sugar, and the whole 30 sounded like a good idea to try – I thought I would see how hard it was and combine it with the knowledge I had from the Plan. I drank 16 ounces of water before I did anything else, and then vowed to make myself exercise and get this thing under control. I fed the kids breakfast, ate some myself, packed up the bags, corralled the kids to get ready and into the car, drank another 16 ounces, and off we went.

I must have gone to the bathroom 6 times before we left. When we got there, I drastically needed to pee again. I rushed the kids into the childcare with a pained look on my face and then walked quickly to the locker room, where I dropped the bags so I could go relieve myself. Afterward, I unloaded the swimsuits and lunch into a locker, took the bags to a couple of chairs by the pool, and went to the cardio room. I worked out for 30 minutes, and then I went back to the locker room, went to the toilet again, and changed into my swimsuit.

Picked up my kids readied them for the pool, and off we went. Thirty minutes in and I am desperate for a bathroom break ahh-gain. I got the kids out of the pool, sat the bigger ones in pool chairs, took the baby with me, and again off to the bathroom I go.

When we got back, we had the lunches I’d packed (where I drank more water) and waited for pool break to be over. Into the pool, and again, I am starting to feel the pain after only a short time has passed. I look at the clock and decide to wait a few more minutes and then get everyone out and pack up and leave. But by the time I get the kids to our pool chair and bags, I am near right panicked that I might leak on someone any second. I am starting to raise my voice. I even said, “I need to go potty,” in a louder than normal panicked voice once or twice to move my kids along. I know motherhood starts out fairly embarrassing – I just wasn’t expecting this dying to self, giving it all to the kiddos new life I live to cause the bladder quite the discomfort at this juncture.

While I am tugging on kids and bags and trying to run-walk as fast as I can with a trail of duckies behind me to the locker room, from outdoor pool to indoor pool all the while trying not to create my own splash or let a little one accidentally fall into a pool, the lifeguards are blowing their whistle and loudly announcing, “Campers line up.” At that point in time, I should have gotten suspicious, but I did not.

We get to the locker room, and I should explain that the  Y that I go to has two sides for the women. One for just women and one for women with kids. There are NO changing rooms. The space is small, with 3 bathroom stalls, 3 showers, and 2 tiny little locker changing areas. There are no benches in which to sit things or yourself. In the back, there is a curtain tucked into the corner, and we had positioned ourselves near it for changing. We are all a little modest. I drop the kids off at the locker, tell them to change, but truth be known, it does not matter to me if they wait. I run to the bathroom area. I find a long line of camp kids standing there. I position myself at the front, and by this time, I am in some serious pain.

It must have been forever, I mean 10 minutes later, after I had shot the kids in the stalls mean glances saying mentally, “Hurry up, this momma has to go,” before a kid finally came out and I went in. The other two kids were refusing to leave their stalls and were taking tissue and wiping the floor and playing. I was fuming. As I relieve myself, I tell them to stop and go out, but they give me the brush-off and say one would not leave with the other leaving. I say to myself, “well, okay, I feel better.” Thank goodness because the cray cray was just about to hit the fan.

I got to my kids who had not taken off even the first bit of wet swimsuit, and huddle them behind the curtain. They are half way undressed, when about a million little girls flooded in to the area with no respect for the curtain. There are so many of them I realize that I cannot tell them to move out the way. I am momentarily dumbstruck. We move back to our locker, which is just on the other side of the curtain. My kids have put their swimsuits back on. I begin to function on autopilot. This introverted chick does not do well with a sudden influx of people into my space.

Let me just explain: I could not move nary an inch to the right or the left to the front or the back without running into a half-clothed girl. Me plus 3 baby chicks means, we were taking up some space, and it was getting smaller by the second. I begin undressing my baby, tell my son to undress, and Annabelle is paralyzed. A little girl to my right keeps screaming, “I can’t find my panties. I can’t find my panties. Has anyone seen my panties?”

The girls behind the curtain are peeking out, pointing, and screaming – “it’s a boy, it’s a boy, it’s a boy!” The girls outside of the curtain are saying something about a boy and staring at my naked son, and I am wondering why he doesn’t have the mental capacity to put on his underpants first. So I tell him, “Underwear first.” He gets dressed, I shoo him to the bathroom, and help my oldest. He comes back – I send him outside.

Now it is my time to change, and I think, if they were screaming about a boy, surely they are gonna stare and scream at a undressed WOMAN with real girlie parts and all. Ain’t no way in heck I am gonna change in here. This thought slaps me awake and I realize I can go to a shower stall to change. I reach into the locker and find a mysterious pair of panties. “Annabelle are these yours?” I say still in a stupor. “Those are mine. Those are mine,” little girl to the right yells. I go change, leave girls in the sea of camp girls, and come back.

I gather up the kids, the bags, try desperately not to look a kid or camp counselor in the eyes, and finally depart the madness. I grumpily gather the kids to the car; Annabelle says, “Momma I don’t ever want to go back to the Y during camp.” You and me both, sister, you and me both!

All the while, I breath in and drive home where I consider eating the rest of the chocolate in the house and never going to the Y again. So much for the new me.

me not at the YMCA

Photo credit: Creative Commons Peter Kaminski

Linking up with Mommy Moments, the Better Mom, and the Naptime Review.