merry christmas & i have a question

Merry Christmas.  Oh and I have a question for you.  I'll get to it eventually.  Just be patient.

This photo is what I call A Christmas Miracle.  Two children both looking at the camera.  At the same time!  On the first try! Both smiling.  (One a little better than the other, but hey...)  Cue me some Hallelujah Music please.  

Don't let the cuteness fool you.

Yesterday my two year old stuck my old driver's license (the one where I was skinny!) into the toaster.  It caught fire and ruined the toaster, but even more sadly--it ruined the driver's license.  :(  Later in the day, he got ahold of my return address stamper and stamped our name and address all over our white bookcase.  Well, at least it will never get lost.  

Let's get something straight though.  When I refer to myself as 'skinny' that's a bit of a misnomer.  I've never been skinny.  I scratched and clawed myself to 142 pounds and hung on there for a few years once.  That's the 'skinny' I'm referring to.  At 63 inches tall, that's a BMI of roughly 25-point-something ---which borders on the Precipice of Normal and Overweight.  That's the geographical place I want to get back to (or so I say).  But yes, I confess!  I'd prefer to be more in the middle range of 'normal' weight---which would be 120 lbs.  Why?  I don't know.  Maybe it feels more secure---like I'm not on the edge of some stupid metaphorical BMI cliff.

Maybe I need someone to slap me upside the head.  

This will seem like another tangent at first, but I'll get to the point eventually.  Pinky swear.  When I went to college, I was lucky enough to attend 'one of them' schools where an A is an A.  No one cared about A minuses or A pluses or any of that.  Which was pretty cool because once I knew I'd locked up a particular letter grade, I did "just enough" when Finals Week rolled around to sit pretty and stay at that letter grade.  Super, because if I knew I had locked an A in Statistics (yes Math is my strong subject), then it gave me wiggle room to hit another subject (like History, grrr) really hard and give it my best effort, so I could hopefully pull myself up to the higher of the Two Letter Grade Precipice that I was teetering on.  

After all, an A is an A, right?

It was at The University of Texas.  It works for me.

Unless we're talking about my weight that is.  And then I can get to the category of normal (which is theoretically an A, right?) and then it's not good enough.  I want better.  I want to be more normal.  Why????   Well, in case you didn't quite catch it---that was the "point" I promised you, dear Faithful Reader.  Wow.  Earth-shattering, I know.  You want to subscribe now, don't you?

Okay, so I guess I didn't make any point at all.  It was a question.  So, to clarify:  Why isn't "normal" good enough?  What's wrong with a BMI of 25?  Why can't I just be happy with that?  Why am I already tempted to lower my goal?

A month or so ago, I attended a "support group" meeting after a weigh-in at Magee Hospital.  They are more like informational meetings (go figure).  This particular meeting was about the skin surgeries some people get after WLS.  The plastic surgeon had a slide about how BMI isn't the best calculator for obesity (but it's all we've got).   To prove his point, he said Jerome Bettis has a BMI of 36.  

Hmmm, so does Jerome Bettis get an A?  Or is he morbidly obese?  It's so much easier to grade other peoples' papers!  When you consider muscle mass and bone density, you have to give him an A.  Screw the BMI calculator!  Why didn't I realize this when I weighed 142 pounds?!?!

So, dear successful & succeeding-as-we-speak Lap Banders & Losers of All Forms, how did you decide your goal weight?  Did BMI have anything to do with it?  Once you got to your goal, did you lower it?  Why?  Why not?  

Tell me, teach me, whisper words of wisdom in my ear.  Please.