Comfortable in my own skin (mostly)

When I was in high school and really until I hit my junior year in college, I had a pretty kick-ass body. I was skinny, through no effort of my own, and I had some particular physical endowments that kinda made the boys like me.
However, I was riddled with self-consciousness, a terrible body image and general loathing of looking at mirrors most of the time. I have no explanation for this, except for the stupidity of adolescence and if you're a girl, you're sort of programmed to think that you're inherently unattractive. I even went so far as to develop an eating disorder of sorts, just so I wouldn't go above 100 pounds, which is so ridiculous when I think about it now.
Then, toward the end of college, I started to gain weight, mainly because I abhor any form of exercise that doesn't involved a tennis racket or yoga positions, and I have always eaten like a 16-year-old boy trying to gain weight for the wrestling team.
Much to my chagrin, I basically went from a size 6 to a size 14 in the span of about three years, and it sucked. My ex-fiance, may he burn in hell someday, made comments about it. I believe the compassionate phrasing was, "Why do all girls I get involved with pork up"? Yeah, anyone who wants to take on a contract killing position can get in touch with me.
Anyway, I didn't need him to point it out; I already knew. But, except for his toxic presence in my life, I was actually happy. I was at a new college, making awesome friends and being academically challenged, and although I would get frustrated picking out clothes and such, it really kind of became a peripheral issue to me.
So, after that relationship inevitably fell apart, and I moved back home, it did start to bother me more, mainly because the other areas of my life obviously weren't giving me the same satisfaction.
What ended up happening is really quite funny. About a year and half ago, as I mentioned in a previous post, I broke my ankle. Well, I think most people who break bones that hinder their walking ability probably gain weight. Not me.
Because I had exercised so little, the physical act of hoisting myself around on crutches acted as some sort of catalyst for the weight loss that was soon to follow. Plus, since this was in the middle of the Mississippi summer, I was so hot and exhausted all the time, I hardly felt like eating.
So, I lost about 10 pounds doing that and actually had arm muscles for a little while, which I'm sad to say have returned to their jiggly state, but it was nice for a while.
But, the real change occurred when I moved to Pennsylvania. I began walking for my job five days a week, five hours a night, not to mention just the miscellaneous walking I was doing because you can't park right where you want to go in the city, and I lost a whopping 20 pounds, not to mention firming body parts that I thought were just naturally kind of squishy.
And what's really funny about all of that is, that even if I weighed the most that I did when I was with my ex and being berated about it, I don't think I would care right now. Granted, I feel better because I look better, but I am so much happier with myself these days, that my physical appearance has little to do with my frame of mind.
I honestly think there's a point in every woman's life where she has to accept that. You can't trade on your looks your entire life, and you shouldn't want to anyway, and you just have to realize that if you're not happy with yourself and your personality and chutzpah doesn't come through at all times, people are ultimately not going to like you anyway.
So, it's not like I don't still take a fair amount of care with my appearance, but I would be much more offended if someone said I was stupid or boring than if they said I wasn't pretty.
But they still shouldn't say that..I am considering purchasing that taser gun.