Numbers

Have you ever stopped to notice how numbers define our lives?

Some examples:
- Grades
- Bank account balance
- Credit score
- Likes on a social media post
- Facebook friends
- Blood pressure
- Weight

- And with COVID-19, temperature.

Those are just a few examples.

But have you ever gotten depressed over a number?

I have thought about this a lot throughout my life. If you have read much of my blog at all, or if you know me in person, it's apparent I am extremely overweight. My number phobia probably started in elementary school when they weighed every student. It might have been done in private but I think it leaked out. Or maybe I was just embarrassed that the number might get out. But either way, I remember it as being traumatic. 

Fast forward to a little later in life... the number still terrified me. However, I didn't know that it was possible to refuse to be weighed at the doctor, or at least to turn around so I didn't have to see the number on those few instances when it was necessary for them to get an accurate number. I would actually avoid going to the doctor for something like an ear infection because I knew hearing the actual number of my weight would spiral me into depression.

I deal with clinical depression and chronic, horrible anxiety, and have since I was a young teenager. When I say that it would depress me, I don't mean that it would make me sad... it would make me want to crawl into the bed and ironically, eat. This depression and unrelenting anxious thoughts related to it could last for weeks.

I know the saying that your weight is just a measure of the gravitational pull of the earth on a scale and it has nothing to do with your self-worth. That saying is really, really true... but it doesn't help my phobia - or my depression when I do hear that dang number.

In the past few years, I have been extremely diligent about avoiding hearing that information. But one day when I had to be weighed for a medical thing, I broke my rule. I asked what the number was (after telling them I didn't want to hear it). 

BIG MISTAKE.

Now I can't unhear it. 

I even dreamed about it last night, even though this happened a couple of months ago. I can't shake it. 

My depression is beginning to lift but it took a good month. It still fills me with so much shame and embarrassment. My boyfriend knows some of my biggest secrets - I tell him just about everything - but I just can't tell him this. I KNOW he won't love me any less for knowing it... but I just can't say it out loud. 

At the moment, I'm helping my mom who is an inpatient in the hospital after a small stroke, literally typing this on my laptop in the hospital room. Being in the hospital with her brought back up this issue of numbers. For her, the key numbers are sodium level, blood pressure, oxygen level, and heart rate. The numbers have got to be in an acceptable range before she can go home, so they are extremely important. 

Because of this importance, they also have the power to cause depression. But it's the kind that's more "just" sad, not an episode of clinical depression that can last for a long time. There is a difference.

Does anyone else deal with this? I know I can't be alone in this phobia but because I don't talk about it, I don't know of anyone else who deals with it. I would love for you to comment if so.

Maybe one day we will all be able to accept ourselves enough to actually know in our hearts that our self-worth isn't based on the number on a scale. I hope so...