I’m still lingering in the 3-5 pound territory above my low; I haven’t updated my weight in several weeks, so I’m starting off with that admission. I did have a bit of a mental war this last week; I’ve been in the habit of weighing every morning, but the scale broke and needed replacement parts. For a little more than a week, I didn’t weigh, and I had to fight the thought that since I didn’t have a way to be accountable, I could just eat off plan.

I didn’t, but I need to do some thinking about why that thought was even in my head. Not having a tool to measure immediate accountability is no reason to go jump off the wagon; eventually, you pay for those indiscretions. I didn’t cave into those thoughts, which is good, but I’d like to be in a place where those thoughts never even occur to me. I still have work to do; of course I do.

If you’ve been a reader of my blog for a while, you know that I’ve gone through my stores of old clothes a couple of times. I have so many clothes that are too small; they tend to fall into two categories: things that I wore before gaining weight back, and things I bought in the hopes of being able to fit into them one day. Regardless of how I got them, there were a lot of clothes to go through. I’ve thinned them out, before, and I’m doing it, again.

When I first lost a large amount of weight roughly ten years ago, it was a pretty fast process; I lost the majority of my 140 pound loss in about a year. (Comparatively speaking, I’m currently at 52 pounds and almost at the year mark.) I needed a lot of clothes in a short amount of time, so I went to thrift shops; it was an inexpensive way to buy clothes that I knew I wouldn’t be in for very long, and for those circumstances, it worked.

Things are different, now. I’m losing slowly. I imagine the rest of my journey will take time, as well. I’m still wearing many of the same clothes I was wearing a year ago, despite a 52 pound loss. That’s the nature of the upper range of plus sizes; it takes a great deal of weight to change size.

One of the downsides of being on the high side of plus sizes is that I often just buy what will fit rather than things I really like. The sad reality is that many large plus sizes are just duplicates of clothes created for woman who aren’t as large and don’t face the same challenges. Cap sleeves may look flattering on someone with thin arms, but not me; finding clothing with short sleeves that are not cap sleeves is frustrating. I have huge arms, and they’re just not flattering on me. But if that’s what’s available, that’s what I have to get if I want comfort. It’s a compromise.

It’s also a compromise to thrift store shop when you’re losing weight and considering how long you might be wearing something. When the lifetime of a garment was only a couple of months, I didn’t worry much about whether I just absolutely loved what I wore. When the lifetime of a garment extends to a year or more, though, it’s time to think again.

I will still have plenty to wear as I decrease in size; like most people, I tend to stick to a small group of clothes that I wear over and over again, despite what’s in the closet. I just recently went through the enormous stash of clothes, again, and made the decision to part with probably 75% of what was left.

And this is why.

Wearing clothes that I don’t love, that I’m wearing just because I already own them and they happen to be the right size, is like punishing myself for being where I’m currently at in my journey. Feasibly, it’ll take years to reach my destination; I will no longer tolerate the thought that I’ll only be worthy of wearing clothing I truly enjoy when I reach that end goal. Wearing things I don’t like just because of current circumstances is just reinforcing the idea that the current me isn’t good enough or deserving enough to wear things that flatter me and that I enjoy.

That doesn’t mean I’m going on a mad shopping spree. (I’m sure my husband, who often reads my blog, will be happy about that.) What it does mean, though, is that when I do need clothing in the future, I’m going to take the time to get things that I really love.

I’m no fashionista, and I’m not an extravagant person by nature — but I need to stop thinking of myself in terms of only being deserving when I reach my goals. That carries over to a lot of things, not just clothing. None of us know how much time we have on this earth; spending too much time looking years in advance, instead of what currently surrounds us, is time wasted.

I am who I am, today, and who I am isn’t at all bad. It’s time to stop making compromises for it.