I can certainly relate to waiting to lose weight before I start my life and I also have said to myself the two or three times I lost any substantial weight in my life, "'I'll never gain in back"

I also have an xl shirt by calvin klein I bought at macy's that stretches and still looks good on my 4X frame. We need to find out what this magic fabric is and invest!

Anyway, your words of loving yourself and accepting yourself more than ever at your heaviest are what I am going for. With the help of the FA community I am beginning to see that might be an achievable goal.

I am actually working on an exercise similar to the one you suggested. What I am seeing from that is I carry my own personal story with each item on my list. I realize as I am writing out all the thoughts, memories and situations that lead me to feelings of unworthiness, I am giving myself the option of looking at them in a different way.

example: last week I mentioned how much my large belly has been on my mind. On saturday I walked the farmer's market here in Union Square at 330pm. It was wall to wall people. This kind of a situation would often churn up the unworthiness dial for me. However, this past Saturday, instead of avoiding the market, I walked it nice a slowly. I took up my space, space I have a right to take up, and I did my healthy shopping. My mind was free of the insane chatter about my size and my worth. I was there for some fresh, delicious vegetables and to enjoy my neighborhood. I even was wearing a new shirt with horizontal stripes!!

When walking in crowded places, I used to watch everyone's eyes for signs of disgust or repulsion not realizing that how I choose to look at myself was bringing on those heartbreaking glances from others.

I'm glad to be on this journey of self acceptance and I still have a way to go. I still am working on getting a handle around all the facts and the essence of our movement.

What I do know is that I am going in the right direction.

This, perfectly! So many of us attach limitations or "only when" conditions to self-acceptance!! For me it has been a variety of things from particular weights, fitting into a certain piece of clothing, getting a specific grade… and you know, even if/when I DID reach whatever limiting condition I'd put on my own self-love and happiness…I'd change the rules on myself and make up a whole NEW set of even more narrowly restrictive conditions…

Huzzah for getting to the "unstoppable" feelings finally and putting aside that feeling that there is always some other limit, just out of reach, beyond which true happiness lies!

And it's very well-written, too. ;)