I hate shopping for clothes. I love clothes, don't get me wrong, but I just hate shopping for them. For one thing, I am not a small person. So many of the clothes today that are super cute and fashionable would look utterly ridiculous on me. I like to stick with the classics. I have shoulders like an Olympic swimmer and biceps that can rival, and we'll lets just leave it at that. With that combination I know that the long dresses with the skinny straps and cinching at the boobs would just be a complete fright-mare. However, I have to go to two red carpet events and many appearances in between and something fancy is necessary. Can't I just wear my fancy, cozy workout outfits? "No!" is the loud answer from my team.
Another issue with shopping is that I am on a crazy budget. I don't even have a credit card or a check. Whatever I get has to be purchased with my hot green cash and with three boys in high school and middle school, are you kidding me?! I am down to quarters once they leave for school after they've rummaged through my pocketbook.
So here I am at Nordstrom Rack. I know what color clothes I like: black, dull black, faded black, dark gray and then again, black. After looking through rack after rack, I ended up with a pile over my arm and headed into the dressing room. With barely enough room to turn around I take off my sweats, my T-shirt and "my never leave the body" Target Spanx wanna be camisole. What's left on is a bra and g-string. As I begin to try on dress after dress, I am starting to get hot and sweaty. I can't bear to look in the mirror as my face is red, my hair is now half stuck to my cheek, half sticking up and held by a clip. The sight is not pretty. On and off go most of my selections until I get this one dress on. It is gray, mind you, and super cute. I can't believe I said that, but it was. I will post a photo of it at some point, but for now you will just have to use your imagination. So far that was the only thing on my "might buy" hook.
A sparkly black number was up next. It was really nice, perfect arms for me at 3/4 length, great neck and had that bling that might be nice for the red carpet walk. Mind you, before I even got into the dressing room I have checked all price tags where they have the sizes. I try things from size 8 to 12. I like to say that out loud because I want you all to know that that is what I wear. I don't consider myself obese but in the world of modeling, television, magazines etc. that is obese. REALLY!
Anyway, I pull the sparkly number over my head to have it get caught in my hair clip. This is the type of dress that has that zipper on the side under the arm, for what reason I don't know. I can't put my legs through that part or my arms, but what happened is that I got one shoulder into the dress and other one was now sticking out of that side zipper. My hair is now caught in the sparkly crap. I can see out of my one eye that still has visibility, my g-string is right there front and center, one boob has decided to join the shoulder in the side zipper, the dress is crooked on my waist, my arms are up over my head and I can't pull this damn thing up or down. How on earth can I possibly call someone in here to help. The sweat from a hot flash has now decided to pour and I am honestly either going to have a breakdown or use all my strength. Believe me when I said before that my biceps could rival anything. Well, this dress was about to be my next opponent. I took a deep breath and exhaled. I relaxed instead and shimmied my way out of this sparkly sequence freakin' disaster that I got myself into. I am sure the clerk who oversees the surveillance cameras had alerted the staff to come and watch the crazy lady in dressing room No. 22. I immediately grab my beloved sweat pants, my 15-year-old black T-shirt, and the previous gray dress I tried on. Before exiting the dressing room, I picked up the number that had trapped me only to see the tag IN the dress. It was a size 2!
I take it all in stride and right now, I'm having a chuckle over the whole ordeal. I'm also a firm believer that you should not weigh yourself all the time. The number on the scale can be misleading due to many variables that cause the weight to fluctuate on a daily basis. Do you know how crazy you would get if you saw an six pound gain or loss in one day? I keep in check with my weight gain or loss by how my clothes feel. When I put on my favorite pair of jeans, if they are tight, it is a signal to fine tune the eating and get a move on. If they are fitting just fine, I am on the right track. At the end of the day, if you do your best to live a lifestyle of being active and healthy eating, you will feel better inside. And never forget, black is always slimming.
The moral of my dressing room drama: Don't rely on the price tag for the size. Always check the label.
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