Teams! Between teams in middle school and a mention of Tom Raper RVs a few years ago, I’m feeling the Indiana love.

I, too, lived in Louisville as an adolescent – from 3rd grade through 9th – and was on the QR team. Even captain, at one point – could it get any geekier than that? Ah, the days of buzzing in, using Commodore 64′s to power the system. Although you’re little younger than me, so maybe by then they had upgraded?

Of course you’re never going to read this, but I just wanted to say that, even though I already love your blog, I love it more now. :)

Heather – They wanted to hold me back too! My mom would have nothing of it though.

Hmm…, my friends always tease me that only man I’ll ever go to the door to meet will be carrying a flat square box that smells of pepperoni!

You have to ask, if he is hiding under your coach, is he really the right one for you? I tend to not get on so well with stalkers myself. :)

Gotta be careful about not being outgoing when you are younger. They wanted to hold me back in Kindergarten. Yes, despite testing gifted… because they thought I wasn’t social enough. *facepalm*

Consequently, I didn’t leave myself open to having friends, male or female. I shut myself off from the world. Fortunately, I had a tribe full of brothers and sisters so I wasn’t exactly isolated in my room.

But, in high school it was really rough. At that time, most guys who showed interest in me did so because they felt I would be “easy” because, after all, I was fat so I would do anything to be liked by a boy. (This was not my imagination … or low self-esteem. My sister and I are only 15 months apart and she was the typical blue-eyed, blonde hair beauty. She told me that this guy who did want to date me said that very thing, that I’d do anything with him because I was fat and desperate!)

That put me in a downward spiral that lasted for 10 years, at least.

Of course, it didn’t help that my own mother (she was an alcoholic at the time) made fun of me in front of people and encouraged my slimmer brothers and sisters to do the same.

So, I never had a date in high school or college. I didn’t care. I wanted to be loved and to fall in love, but not at the price of my dignity.

My head is in a better place now. My body is a little slow to follow, but getting better every day.

I didn’t. Not really. There were times when I liked the idea of having a boyfriend, but the idea of having to be with someone that often… and having to kiss them… yuck!

Until I met my husband (who fortunately pursued me) and found out it wasn’t yuck. But he is still my one serious relationship. I went out with another guy before him, and didn’t treat him as well as I should have, partly because I didn’t fancy him and partly because I felt he couldn’t really fancy me.

I’m sure that part of the non-interest in boys was down to my low self-esteem at the time – I honestly couldn’t imagine anyone wanting to go out with the very prim, rather awkward person I was. And weight was part of that, yes. But I now think I was just a late developer.

I’ve been socially programmed to want to be pursued, but in the absence of that pursuit, I’ve done some chasing myself, with bad results. I actually had the chance to date a guy who I had the worst crush on (I had a crush for three years and then we dated for three more) and it was disastrous for me. The adage “Be careful what you wish for” is true indeed. Believe me, it’s better to have no or little experience than to have a rotten one.

The funny thing is, I’ve found that when I HAVE been pursued, it’s given me a yucky feeling. Like I want to ask the guy to either 1) stop making fun of me, or 2) if he has some sort of disability or something.