Gap Pants

When I grew up, our family had very little money. We had what we needed (e.g., food and shelter), but we did not have money for many things -- even some things like haircuts sometimes. And we certainly never had designer clothes! I always wanted an Esprit bag or clothes from the Gap but we could never afford them so I don't think I ever really even asked for these things.

As someone on my own, even as I began to be able to afford nicer things, I usually could not fit into them so once again I could not have the clothes I wanted growing up. It's not like I was super torn up about it, but it was disappointing and somewhere in the back of my mind I still wanted them.

I was in grad school the first time I lost weight. I got down to 229.5 as I've written a lot in the last few weeks. I remember one time I made a trip during grad school to the outlet malls. I was shocked to find that Gap made XXL clothes! I got a pair of yoga pants and a workout shirt. I loved them, even though I did not do yoga at the time. I used them mostly for lounging around in, and they became some of my favorite clothes. I was very sad when I grew so fat that I could not wear them anymore.

In fact, along with two pairs of jeans that were my favorites during the later part of grad school, these Gap pants were some of the clothes I was most excited about reclaiming as I lost weight. Awhile back (probably about 8 months ago), the pants fit. I love them, wear them pretty frequently, and still get compliments on them.

Saturday I wore these pants to go to Zumba class. Guess what? These pants are getting loose and I had to hike them up a few times for fear of losing them. I think these pants are now moved into the yoga/lounging only category, and out of the category of pants that can be worn to anything that requires hip shaking and/or jumping. In another 5-10 lbs, these pants will have to be retired for good.

While I will be sad to see them go, I am delighted that I will soon be able to buy whatever I want from the Gap because size will no longer be an issue. I love these pants that I think that I might keep them because of all that they mean to me, joining the pair of size 26 pants I keep as a reminder of where I started out on this fitness journey. Or, maybe I will think that is silly and they will join the mountains of bags of clothes I have donated this year because they are now too big. We will see. While I am sad to see them go, I am glad I am about to make it into new size territory that I haven't seen since high school and very early college (pre-freshman 15...and sophomore 20...and you get the idea).