No one told me that losing weight this fast would feel like walking around inside someone else’s body.

No one warned me that grief, shock, and wonder would live right alongside celebration.

And I can say, with certainty, that no one prepared me for the startling shift in how the world now sees me.

I’ve lost over 100 pounds in 10 months—not through surgery, not through starvation, but through a radical shift in nourishment and a deep healing process. People often ask what I did, expecting me to name a diet, a gym routine, a product. But the truth is, that’s not the story I want to tell.

I want to tell the story no one else seems to be telling—the story of what it feels like to change shape so quickly that your own hands forget your face. The story of subtle heartbreaks and strange reunions. The story of being seen differently by the world—and by yourself.

1. People Are Suddenly…Nicer

I hate to say this, but it’s true: people are nicer to me now. Much nicer.

I’ve caught more held doors, more lingering eye contact, more warm smiles from strangers in the last few months than in the past decade.

Fat phobia isn’t just an abstract social issue—it’s a lived experience, a thousand micro-aggressions a day. When I was larger, people were often abrupt, impatient, dismissive. Now? They offer help. They flirt. They see me.

It’s dizzying—and not entirely welcome. Because as I grow lighter, I’m carrying a heavier awareness of how conditional social kindness can be.

2. My Knees…Touched

One afternoon, I laid down and my knees brushed each other—and I gasped. It felt like two long-lost friends suddenly reunited. There had always been so much bulk, but the skin that used to touch has now shrunk to rejoin the back of my knee. With no ceremony or warning, the skin that used to be on top, suddenly meets.

This is one of the many small, intimate surprises of rapid weight loss. Parts of my body that hadn’t touched in years—or maybe ever—now connect again. My thighs, my arms across my waist, even the way I can cross my legs has changed. It’s tender, strange. A quiet rewriting of proprioception. A homecoming of flesh.

3. My Bruises Tell a New Story

I’ve always bumped into things. Doorframes. Chair corners. Life. But I never noticed. I had padding. I had a buffer. Now, my hips bruise. My shins wince. The bony truth of me hits the world more directly, and the world hits back.

What I didn’t expect is how emotionally vulnerable this physical vulnerability makes me. Without the softness, I feel more exposed. I carry less—less inflammation, less weight—but I also carry myself with more caution. More tenderness. There’s no longer a layer of invisibility or protection. It’s just me, raw and real.

4. I Sit Differently Now

My bum used to lift me. It was a built-in cushion. A throne of my own making.

Now, when I sit, I feel my tailbone pressing into the chair. It’s not painful exactly, but it is motivating. I stand up more. I shift. I walk. My body asks for movement. It won’t let me settle into old stagnancy. There’s less between me and the earth, and that gap matters.

5. The Bones Came Back

Collarbones. Wrist bones. The elegant lines of my feet.

They emerged slowly at first, like a sculpture being revealed beneath layers of clay. Then one day, I caught my reflection and couldn’t look away. I was…bare. Not just thin, but skeletal in places I had forgotten held such sharp beauty.

It’s disorienting. Sometimes people stare. Sometimes I stare. The physical structure of me feels more animal, more ancient. There’s a raw honesty in these bones that once hid beneath swelling and padding. I’m surprised by them daily.

I used to identify as a round earth mother—no longer buried beneath abundance, my collarbones now cut clean lines across my chest, delicate and stark, more sky than soil.

6. My Face, Unfamiliar

There were mornings I’d wake up and rub my face as I always did, only to freeze. My cheekbones had risen. My jaw was sharper. My hands paused, confused.

I didn’t recognize myself.

And that, too, is a kind of grief. The woman I used to be—who carried weight, yes, but also identity and story—has dissolved. And while I’m grateful for my health, my energy, my mobility—I also miss her, sometimes. She held so much. She shielded me. She knew how to endure.

I carry her with me now, inside these smaller clothes, these hollower cheeks.

7. I Miss the Woman Who Protected Me

She was strong. She carried so much. The version of me who wore that extra weight wasn’t lazy or broken—she was enduring. She was surviving. And she built a kind of armor that kept me safe when the world felt too harsh.

Now that she’s melting away, I feel both free and…strangely tender. I miss her sometimes. I miss her steadiness. Her ability to disappear in plain sight. I didn’t just lose weight—I lost a guardian.

And no one tells you how much that can hurt.

8. Visibility Feels Heavy Too

Yes, I’m receiving more attention—but not all of it feels good. More eyes linger. More comments come. There’s a new kind of exposure I didn’t anticipate, and it doesn’t always feel safe.

When you’ve lived a long time tucked inside yourself, being seen so vividly, so suddenly, can feel like walking into bright light after years in the dark. It’s disorienting. Sometimes it feels like power. Other times, like pressure.

I’m still learning how to carry this new kind of visibility.

9. I Don’t Know Who This Body Belongs To

There are moments when I catch my reflection and do a double take—not because I look bad, but because I look…unfamiliar. I’ve spent years building a mental map of my body. Now, it’s outdated.

I’m still bumping into furniture, still reaching for sizes that no longer fit, still startled by the sharpness of my own silhouette. The truth is, I don’t quite recognize myself yet. This version of me is still a stranger. And every day, I learn a little more about how to live inside her.

10. My Skin Hangs Like a Memory

It doesn’t cling—it hangs. Loose and low, like empty sacks once filled with survival. The stretch marks shine silver, like lightning etched into flesh. They’re beautiful. They’re brutal.

I didn’t realize how much of me there was until it wasn’t me anymore—just the soft drape of skin that once held all the weight. It’s grief and gratitude at once. Grief for what was required to survive in the before. Gratitude that I don’t need the armor anymore.

But still—sometimes, I miss the shield.

This is not a weight loss success story. This is a shapeshifter’s story. A story of returning to the body and realizing it never left you—it just got buried under years of survival.

I share this not to be congratulated, but to bear witness to the complexity of change. Because healing is not always light. And losing what once held you can be both liberation and loss.

So to those navigating their own body transformations—slow or fast, chosen or not—I see you. And you’re not alone in the strange, sacred space of becoming.

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