Safety Net

It was pure inspiration, "if I was fat then he wouldn't like me". Perhaps I should share a little bit of background regarding this comment before continuing. . .

I was young and working at a job which required extensive travel. I found myself flying throughout the United States and Canada multiple times a week with more hours than I can count spent waiting in airports. I discovered that I thoroughly enjoyed people watching during these many hours. I would locate a busy spot in the airport with the most amount of people traffic I could find and then sit to watch. Before long I would be checking out the guys walking by and I would catch myself and make myself look for attractive women. . . however before long a cute guy would walk by and I was back to checking them out. This went on for quite some months. I had found a safe way of dealing with my attractions, widow shopping without touching the merchandise. Everything was great in regards to my new game, except having a little guilt once in awhile, until one day this man walked by and totally and completely "stole" my heart. There was something about him that touched heart strings which had never before been touched. Up until that moment I had never understood Love at first sight. But I had experienced it and it felt so wonderful, I felt giddy inside as I watched this gentleman take a seat not that far from where I was seated. For the next couple of hours I sat there completely twitterpated. I knew that I had an attraction to men but this was the first time I felt so completely in Love and it began to scare me to death. The thought came to me that if he were to ask me to "give" myself to him I might not be able to resist. Up to this point the temptations had always been present but because of my commitment to the church and its teachings I had not been tempted to actually fall. These feelings scared me and I told myself that if I were fat he probably wouldn't like me, that if I were fat I wouldn't be tempted to succumb. Looking back on those thoughts I realize how ludicrous they were but that is what I thought. As a safety net against the possibility of having someone else desire me I began eating and eating and eating until I eventually gained over one hundred lbs. My strategy worked, I so loathed myself that I would never be able to believe that it was possible for someone else to take a second look at me. I lived this way for a number of years before I finally came to the realization that being gay, yes even LDS and gay was a great thing. I accepted myself fully and completely for the first time in my life and began to realize what a stupid thing I had done in putting the weight on as my safety net against "falling". Very soon thereafter I began eating healthy and exercising and before I knew it over 60 lbs had dropped from this lovely gay body. I was well on my way to truly actualizing who and what I was. I no longer needed the "Safety Net".