On Thursday past, I spent some time with a woman who has done the surgery I am getting ready to do. We talked a lot about what to expect, what the issues are, etc. Emotions that have been buried for a long time coming up and no longer apologizing for her actions, or for just being herself. I walked away from that conversation totally enlightened.

I realize that I have been doing that work already, and am so thankful for it. It's like I built my team of support around me to take on the next challenge. She said the most profound thing "You are lying there, before surgery, and you are trying to put together who you want to be, this newly created self that you are creating. And you are at your most tender, most vulnerable because to have a running start at a normal life you have to cut yourself open and reshape your insides to have a chance. And it's work, and as you lose weight, you become normal, or at least feel like normal, or have people look at you in a way that you no longer have to apologize for who you are."

I know it's hard to imagine, for all my bravado and seeming self confidence, but underneath all of this, I am apologizing for everything, every thought every feeling, every word or movement. Everything. I am apologizing silently as I walk the Great Wall, I am apologizing when I have to get out of a chair. I am apologizing for ordering the chocolate cake, I am apologizing for being in love. I am so busy apologizing that I am not fully living.

Enough.

So I am doing this surgery. I want a running chance. I want the underneath it all. I want to sit in a seat on the plane and feel like it's business class because there is room. I want to walk into a bar and have more assholes look at me. I want to stop being a big fat fetish. I want to have the energy to live my life. Day by day, mile by mile. I am no longer willing to ask for forgiveness.

Only from myself.