The Underlying Anxiety

Okay, I actually have been sleeping fine, but I relate to this picture of anxiety. I find myself with running throughts in my head like this. So, why else did I pick this picture? I've been reflecting on what happened yesterday in group.

This has been a majorly difficult year for me, and the last thing that I need is for people to be picking on me. I am definitely commited to working on myself and improving myself, but I don't think that I'm in a good place to be making drastic changing, which it seemed to me the group yesterday was advocating.

So then last night, I'm IMing my friend who is getting married next month, and I ask him what the attire is. He tells me that I should wear a cocktail dress. Then he starts to give me a hard time for not shaving my legs (a feminist political thing that I've done, or not done, since high school).

Well I don't have any cocktail dresses anymore. I do have this dress that I wore in KC and left there, but nothing really fits me anyway so well since I've lost a bunch of weight in the last year or so (gone down 2 sizes). And I never get dressed up anymore at all, especially for something not related to my professional life. And finding a way to pull off a dress with the hair on my legs quite frankly is difficult sometimes - because I don't want it to be obvious at the wedding.

So, I ran over to Macy's and tried on all of these traditonal, age appropriate looking dresses and didn't look so good in any of them, until I found this one (see picture). It looks so good on me because it highlights my best feature (yeah just guess) but downplays my German belly (yeah a lot of Germans have bellys). The guy from the shoe department looked at it and helped me pick out this swanky, elegant pair of knee high black boots to wear with it.

But, today, when I think about it - maybe this dress is too risque? Maybe it isn't appropriate for a wedding? I don't know. I asked my sister about it (rare for me to ask her for advice). And maybe I need to go return it, but it felt so good to look in the mirror and have a sexy image look back at me.

Also, I realize that part of why I think that excites me so much is that I'm going to the wedding with *A*, and he doesn't notice me physcially anymore at all. I mean, he never noticed things ever really - in high school he wouldn't notice if I was wearing a beautiful formal dress or sweats or if I gained or lost weight. Well, I know he doesn't notice this now either, but it excited me to feel noticable, like there is something here worth noticing. I know it is a problem to think like this. I need to just find the self-confidence within myself.

So what do you think: Should I return the dress?

Link