Dad, I'll never do any better. He's smart and funny and good-looking.."

Stephanie," he took both my hands, "how could you do any worse?"

Best rhetorical question ever.

The times in my life when I've been my thinnest, I've been a walking psycho wreck. Forget the fact that I was basically starving myself; skinny was usually due to some kind of loss. Death. Rejection. Divorce.

When we die, no one remembers us for what we weighed. Our weight isn't etched into our headstones.

There's something almost perfect in the ugly duckling syndrome. Because a sensitivity is tattooed on a part of you no one else can see but can somehow guess is there.

That's the thing about being a former fat camp champ: when asked if I'd change my past if I could, I always answer no. The pain of being an overweight kid, the humiliation, make you think twice before ever cutting anyone else down.

I'd heard it all the time, 'Live in the moment.' But if I did that, I'd weigh more than a dump truck. Losing weight wasn't about the moment at all; it was about having faith in the future. It was about knowing there would be another meal in a few hours.