As you know, I am serving an eviction notice to about 60 extra pounds that have been following me around for the last several years. Decades, some of them. This venture includes a 90-Day Weight Loss Challenge at my gym, where they took these spectacular “before” pictures of me last week in my sexy purple Costco workout outfit.

[BTW, I have exactly four sets of workout clothes and I’ve been wearing them in regular rotation for almost two years. They are all from Costco, and all the same: comfy, fitted black pants with a convenient pocket in the reversible waist band, and a coordinating Lycra tank top. The only thing that changes is the color of the top: purple, green, blue and (for fancy workouts) black on black. I have two things to say about this: first, they have lasted amazingly long considering each piece was about $16 and I’ve worn and washed them pretty much weekly for more than two years. They’re probably made of a material that will one day be involved in a class action lawsuit for causing quadricep cancer or something. Second, obviously my creativity is clearly reserved for writing, not fashion. Third–no, wait, I have three things to say about this–I can have new workout clothes when I can buy them in a smaller size. Maybe I’ll even let someone with a little fashion sense pick them out for me.]

Anyhoo. Back to the pictures. When I started the challenge, the sweet trainer who is my accountability guru at the gym told me they’d be taking pictures and asked, “Do you want to do shirt on or shirt off?”

Fifteen minutes later, when I had stopped laughing, I was posing–purple tank top mercifully in place–and the lady

with the camera said, “you can stick your stomach out, look droopy… you know, make a sad face.”

Make a sad face.

And I get it.  In our culture, fat is supposed to mean sad. I’ve seen the morose-looking before pictures from previous years’ challenges on the walls at the gym and I’ve watched a million diet infomercials. The sad face (and the droopy) make for a more dramatic transformation between the before and after pictures. Before, I was fat and unhappy. After, I am thinner, healthier and happier.

Here’s the problem: I’m not sad.

In fact, life in the before picture has been pretty great, whether it was at 235 pounds or 200 pounds or 180 pounds. I’ve done some spectacular things in “before.” I moved across the country and back. I met and married my husband. I’ve earned two Master’s degrees and written four novels. I had babies and nursed them and watched my body change in fascinating and likely irrevocable ways as a result. I’ve had (shhh… don’t tell skinny people) AMAZING SEX. I’ve climbed mountains and run races and survived hardships and loved deeply and been hurt and inspired and challenged. I have wonderful friends from both “before” and “before before,” people who I know will love and support me whether I choose the almond butter on sprouted-grain bread, or dive face first into a vat of queso and chips.

I wouldn’t trade my life or its blessings for the beachiest of beach bodies. And if anything, 39 years of love and loss have taught me to appreciate how fleeting life is, how hard it is to put a pin in any moment and keep it forever. I no longer shy away from the camera like I did when I

was younger. I don’t try that awkward closed-lipped smile, hoping to hide my flawed front teeth, or suck in my gut and try to poke out my boobs to create the illusion that the latter are more prominent. I am who I am, and the people who love me don’t give a crap about that stuff.

That isn’t to say that I’m not committed to losing weight and getting healthier. And so far the challenge is going well.

I have tracked every day for a week, including the weekend when I went over my calories a bit, letting late-Saturday exhaustion and my affinity for cheese get the better of me. Before the cheese, I was down 4.4 pounds in “gym weight” (some of which is probably sweat and the big breakfast I ate before the initial weigh-in, but who cares?). That makes a total of around 15 pounds since I set the 60-pound goal in April.

I am looking forward to losing more weight. I want to be healthier, lighter and more able to do the things I love (and be with the people I love) for longer. The transformation of my body from the beginning to the end of the 90 days is definitely a motivating factor – and if I manage this you’ll be the first to see the before and after pictures in November. But, I also believe that to do something good for yourself, you have to have an intrinsic belief that you are worth doing it for. Good comes from good. Positive change from positive thoughts.

My life is already pretty awesome. I’m just refining things a little.

And if something goes awry and I fail at this, or I get hit by a bus before I lose the next pound, it will be with the knowledge that who I am today is not perfect, but pretty damn amazing. So I choose to smile.

MJ Pullen

M.J. Pullen is a distracted writer and the mom of two boys in Roswell, Georgia, where she is absolutely late for something important right now. Her books include quirky romantic comedies and playful women's fiction. She blogs erratically with writing advice, random observations, and reflections on raising very loud kids and dogs. Join her Distracted Readers newsletter list for updates, free content, giveaways and more.