Belated thanks for the kind and thoughtful responses, all! I haven't had time to check in, and am in a strange place regarding No S and the whole thing of controlling my eating. I really identify with what you said, Linda, about us not actually having much (if any) control over our weight. How would we feel if we stopped trying, and accepted - THIS IS HOW I AM. But as you say, thin privilege is real - and here we all are, in the midst of this human tribe, trying to hold our own, be respected, be part of this society.
I have pretty much been the same size all my life. Dieting - even on the one or two occasions when I was successful - never really changed anything, and I never lost more than 3/4 of a dress size even on radical fat-free plans or calorie counting. So it's hardly surprising that here I am at 55, still looking like Mrs Average (ie. at the very top of the 'healthy' weight range), unable to lose more than a couple of pounds.
I think I mentioned that I've been reading Menopause Without Weight Gain by Debra Waterhouse. It's a deceptively-titled book, because her basic hypothesis is that there is no avoiding weight gain at menopause! She's all about losing that REALLY excess fat, by eating small regular meals and doing 1 hour of aerobics at a time, 4 times a week, plus 1 hour of weights. And for the aerobics, she says that walking is unlikely to do the trick. I sort of agree. I suspect that many of us are walking regularly but not really seeing any changes. All the same, even in my younger days I could only bounce up and down for a maximum of 40 minutes. So I've put the book away, thinking Forget it, sister! I'll take the weight gain.
Perhaps I already fit into her category of someone who has gained an appropriate amount of weight at menopause. Who knows.
Annoyingly, Debra Waterhouse has now vanished from the internet so I can't check out whether her hypothesis has changed, or how she might be reacting to the latest research on women's weight.
I'm currently finding that a 15' shovelglove-type routine - ie. every day, brisk and energetic - plus 15' of stretches, weights, plank etc etc. really energises me. Maybe I should stick to doing what my body seems to like. As for eating, I think I need to move on from the No S pattern of getting through the week using willpower, then letting off massive amounts of steam at the weekend. But I feel suspicious about setting any more rules for myself. I will only break them. I need to somehow notice what is working, keep my attention positive, focus on the good I can do. But motivation is lacking, in terms of both vanity and health. I can be eating healthily and not feeling great, eating badly and feeling super, putting on weight but feeling attractive. It's all so random! The results of doing anything are so delayed - by the time we notice a positive or negative change, a whole load of other variables have been thrown into the equation.
On a lighter note - DH started fretting about his weight, having been oblivious to it all his life. He is tall and slim. But yes, he has got bigger despite still wearing the same trousers etc.. Anyway he said he'd been feeling thirsty a lot so started panicking about diabetes, and went online to check out other symptoms. One quiz told him to weigh himself. So he got out my scales and put them on the carpet [AMATEUR MISTAKE], and they said he was 10 stone 8. Not noticing any anomaly here, he innocently entered this figure into the quiz. YOU ARE UNDERWEIGHT, he was advised. He came to me in a real tizz. I laughed when I realised what he had done. He is 6 foot 4! We weighed him again on the kitchen floor and he was over 14 stone, and yes, getting to the top end of 'healthy'. But it was so hilarious how he had no clue what was a realistic weight for him. Ah, the innocence! Imagine being like that!
SW: 210 lbs
Why don’t they let us stick the speculum up there ourselves? They can do the scrapy bit. Anyone want to join me in the International Campaign for Speculum Self-Insertion? 
