Slime Mould

I am scared. Maybe this is not the place to admit to it, but I am. It is probably tied up in my sense of worth but nonetheless it won't go away. My health advisor has reached an impasse with me. He has spent six months where I have consistently failed to lose any significant weight. It is preying on my mind, that there will come a time, when they will just give up on me.

"Come back when you are ready to put the effort in, Mrs Williams," he will say. "The NHS can't justify wasting anymore resources on you. You're just not worth it. You're just not trying."

I get that tightness in my chest at the thought of being abandoned, but I suspect it will come. I have so much riding on this. For me, this was the way of solving my motivation problems. I would learn to focus and succeed where endless diets have not. I would learn the secret of self control. I could shed this outer layer of blubber and be, once again, the beautiful person I was. (Unlike many obese people, I was a normal weight until about seven years ago. This coincided with my last pregnancy and training to be a teacher.)

Of course, as a grown woman, I shouldn't be psychologically reliant on such a thing. I should be independent and confident. I should be coping with anything life throws at me; taking it in my stride, and all that.

Sorry, folks, I am a fragile flower that needs nurturing. Around seven years ago, my little blossom got moved from its comfy flower bed and dumped in a municipal wasteland where it gets trodden on every few hours. Is it any surprise it has turned from a bright blossom into a type of slime mould?

After a few years of being trodden on, the slime mould comes to expect it. This, I imagine, is where the fear of being rejected comes from. In its own green oozy way, the slime mould will cope with abandonment, but it won't be any closer to becoming a pretty flower again.