hello

[emmaus]

Hi! I was searching on the internet on the subject of "how to stay focused when you live in the public eye" and this site came up. I am 1 of 14 children and I am number 13, next to the youngest. Growing up I felt as though I had multiple parents although my siblings were more crude than parents. I can see how this was preparing me for living a public life along side my husband, yet it did have its crude moments. I have a weight problem. I started gaining weight around the age of 30. At that time my mother n law started buying panty hose for my special occasion days that said BIG MAMA across the top. At that time I was 5'8" and weighed 148 pounds. As I began to put on more weight, at the family reunions she would have a guessing contest of how much I weighed (175 won the contest in her mind although she didn't know for sure how much I weighed). I worked very hard to get the weight off and lost 58 pounds and after that I received a picture from her that she had taken when I was bending over to tie one of my children's shoes and the picture showed nothing but my seat end. This crushed me and I started eating emotionally again and the contests continued over the next few years at the reunions and she started having her extremely obese friends (40+ years older than me, give me their hand me down clothes). Now, I was up to 218 pounds so I went on another strenuous workout/diet and I was down again to 150 pounds. I maintained that weight for the next year until I received a phone call from a 'plus size' store saying that a lady in my church was in the store and wanted me to know there was a sale going on, but did not want the clerk to tell me the name of the lady who had her call. Anyway, this rude and crude conduct has been going on a very long time and I want so much to stay focused and not give these people power. Weight is not the only issue that people attempt to tear me down. I talked to my sister and she said that I was always the sensitive type. I told her that these things are very personal issues and very cruel means of trying to get one's attention and that this cruelty does not have a possitive affect on me and what female would not be sensitive. When my sister returned to her home I received an email of 6 women in bathing suits whose stomachs were hanging past their knees with a sign that read, don't eat too much chocolate. I received this same email four times over the next 6 months so I asked her why she started sending me that email and she said she wanted to show me what I could potentially look like. These things hurt my feelings and do not motivate me. How do I stay focused and not give these people my power to live a heatlhy life? My husband says that he feels these women are jealous in other areas of my life and it is their attempt to keep me down but that doesn't motivate me either, it saddens me because why can't people just be kind and love each other and we all work for the positive good of each other through kind words of support. I am starting again today to take my latest weight gain off, can you suggest how I can stay focused if there would be one who would attempt to bring my down if when I am successful in taking the weight off. Oh and by the way, I am a far cry from having a stomach hanging below my hip bone much less my knees! How can I be smart this time?