It took eight weeks, but I can finally say it: the size 14 jeans button and zip. As usual, just because they button and zip doesn't mean that they're public-ready, but getting in them at all is plenty of a victory, given how much I've struggled since mid-May.

(Need a refresher course? Take a look at the 'weighty issues' category page for a listing of all entries on the subject.)

To retrace my steps:

• January 13: began exercise program at a size 24.
• February 12: size 22
• March 27: size 20
• April 10: size 18
• April 28: size 16
• Today (June 27): size 14

This morning, when I took the 14s out of the closet for a hopeful try-on, I held them up to me and realized that I'd begun to perceive them as jeans that I might fit into soon. When I bought them (along with the sizes 16 and 18 in the same style) off of ebay in early April, I remembered attempting to tug these jeans onto my legs and stopping at mid-thigh, because my thighs wouldn't even fit into them.

It was depressing then to stick my legs into a pair of jeans I knew I couldn't wear, just so that several months later I could remember the feeling when a couple months later they did, in fact, finally fit my body.

* * * * *

"Once you stop thinking about how you're going to swim, you just end up swimming."
—Chris

The past 24 hours have been nothing short of fantastic. I know that I've not talked much about my decision to resume swimming after a decade's layoff (chronicled here and here), but it hasn't all been rosy.

It's been damned difficult, actually. My mind remembers that I once knew how to swim, and swim well, but my body has plainly forgotten much of what it once knew. Couple that with a decade's worth of changes on my body, and the continual, gradual changes that come from a workout regimen, the end result is someone who no longer has an accurate sense of her body's movement or placement in the water.

On June 1, after a heavy workout, I slipped into the pool and completed one lap before my muscles screamed in protest.

Yesterday, June 26, I did something I didn't expect to do until next month: I swam a quarter-mile. That's sixteen laps. Before yesterday, the largest chunk of laps I'd done contiguously was three; yesterday I did eleven, stopped to talk to Ashley for a little while, and decided to push on and do five more to make it to sixteen.

My right shoulder aches a bit today, but last night I dreamed of the water, that magical period of five laps yesterday in which everything clicked, and my mind remembered how to swim and my body just went along with it.

I knew I had it when my breathing slipped into cadence with my arms and stayed there, arm over arm in a backstroke that suddenly didn't feel like fighting or effort or struggle. I pulled myself through the water, and stared through the roof's glass panes to the clouds above, and watched, fascinated, as the view changed as I moved.

It was everything I remembered from so long ago.

* * * * *

It'll be a while before the size 14 jeans are worn out in public. Right now they're too constricting for comfort (or attractiveness!) - they're simply a pair of jeans to be kept in my closet and tried on every weekend, just as a benchmark to see how I'm doing.

Dragon*con is 67 days away. I can definitely make these 14s comfortable by then, but can I reach my wish of wearing a size 12 by 'con? I don't know, but I'm feeling a bit more encouraged to try.

My next assessment with Val is on Thursday. Maybe this is the promised week of rewards I've been struggling toward since May.

I can do this.

I can do this.

I can do this.

I can do this.