Saying No to Noah

"No." I said, a little more firmly than I ever believed I could. "No, thanks but no."
The No-ee, let us call him "Noah," shook his perfectly chiseled head and blinked perfectly shaped dark, mysterious long lashed eyes in real disbelief.
"No? Really? No?" Noah even knew my story, and being himself a fitness professional was aware that formerly overweight people often have self esteem issues and ensuing trouble saying no. Besides which, he was, well he was Noah.
Noah. The hottest thing on the slightly overripe singles scene in that raging metropolis known as Sacramento. Noah has a fast, though as he will tell you at some length, very environmentally friendly shiny, metallic vehicle. Noah has shiny shoes and fashionably tailored collars he wears with ties with shiny metallic stripes on them and shiny cuff links which are both stylish and expressive of his personal style. Noah is six foot something and built like a meat refrigerator. Noah has a gaggle of semi speechless, often babbling, rambling, giggling divorced GenExers dangling from either arm like belly dancer bangles.
Noah is smokin hot.
Noah is popular.
Noah can dance.
Noah is - and this is unanimously agreed upon by every man, sane woman and small child who has known him longer than 15 minutes - a pompous douchebag.

Of course I did not know that when I stood at the bar guzzling my Friday night diet coke, listening to him educate me on the best process for training "serious runners," (I and my 3 hour 58 minute marathon being of course mere fooling around), the proper nutrition for best strength resistance training results, why my brand of dance shoe was actually unacceptably constructed for safety and comfort.
I shot a glance at my favorite barman. I asked for a refill, the hard stuff: maybe the shot of sugar from regular coke would chase away whatever blood sugar issue was barring me from having the pants charmed off me like every other girl that Noah had deigned to turn his attention toward.
He was, after all, THE hottest non-married, non-gay non-Rick-the-barman in a 50 mile radius.
And he is, I repeat, a pompous douchebag.
Which you must understand would not have made a difference to me just a few short years ago. In fact the last time I found myself exploring the dating scene I was hung up on (in chronological order) a Serbo-Croatian tax accountant who admitted after the first date that he really just liked me because I looked like his ex-girlfriend. Then showed me a picture he carried in his wallet. There was the sicialian who called his stock broker in the middle of a lunch date to make sure he'd sold whatever he was supposed to sell and went around telling everyone how he did something with cell phones that was "very lucrative.". He did not specify "and did not require anything to fall off any trucks," but that went without saying. And an engineer who swore he wasn't married, no, he just had to visit his sick mother up north every weekend. And no, I couldn't come. It wasn't advisable. Mother was contagious. What was it? It was rare. He forgot what they called it. But deadly. Except for family members. They were immune. And wives, of course.

Yes, with a few exceptions my dating life had been Filled with pompous douchebags. And looking at Noah, I realized now why that was.
In all those years, in all that time I had never said "no." I had never had a line on one side of which was, "acceptably confident and admirably self assured," and on the other, things like "slightly pathetic schmuck," "arrogant weasel," and "pompous douchebag."
The reason I had never drawn that line was that I had so wanted to be wanted, wanted to be in a fulfilling relationship with somebody everyone thought was really great that I would do, say and put up with anything, alright almost anything, to get it.
I listened while a cute but very sad man explained that I just wasn't his type but I looked so much like her I could certainly hang around him as long as I liked. I put up with the announcements about the lucrative truck accidents and the sick mother with cheap-mistress-itis.
But I drew the line at Noah. I hadn't been a pro very long but I'd been, for all intents and purposes a student of diet and fitness all my life. I knew more about nutrition than most, practically had a degree in how to run hill repeats for speed training. And my dance shoes had served me quite well thank you very much. Almost as long as I'd been dancing. And they were kind of hot, too.
Finally, I had found a place to draw a line. Something you couldn't do, somewhere you couldn't go no matter how how many other women's pitter-pattering hearts you'd just smashed to smithereens in my favor.
You could not be a pompous douchebag to me and still have the privilege of buying me dinner. Or even a diet coke. Ever.

Since saying no to Noah I find myself saying "No" all the time. Not just throwing "no" around like confetti. Using judgment. Examining when no is really necessary. Thinking that "no" is actually a great screen.
It turns out people who love me - even people who just like me a lot - do not jump up and run away whenever I tell them no. When I'm too overworked to cook dinner my house mates do not dream up excuses to banish me. When I forget to stop by gramma's house she does not change the locks and shutter the windows for my next visit. If I tell the guy I'm dating I cannot see him anymore because he is a pompous douchebag he does not run around town spreading rumors that I stuff my bra. Though I am down one dance partner. Which of course, is worth the risk.
And that's the rub, isn't it? A lost dance partner is nothing compared to the lost self respect, the sacrificed identity that goes into accommodating a pompous douchebag. So much of yourself has to be swallowed, and quite literally swallowed - often in the form of cake and ice cream - that you can hardly breathe for discomfort. It's no wonder that when you can't consciously draw your boundaries, when you can't stand on one side of the degrading, patronizing, demeaning jerk line and wield your extra powerful battle axe of "no," your body does it for you. It draws the line in the form of physical distance. Maybe, it hopes, when you have a few inches around your middle everybody will Go Away and Leave You Alone with all the demands you can't meet and behavior you should never, ever have to tolerate. In other words, if you don't draw the line, your body will help you out.
It will certainly get rid of all the pompous douchebags. Pompous douchebags have no regard for overweight people.
So learn to say "no" when "no" is needed.
Even when you're worried it will make the no-ee abandon you. Or hate you. Or never want to see you again.
Because if the no-ee is a decent person who really likes you he/ she won't abandon you. Or hate you.
And if he/she isn't? He may abandon you. He may take off in a huff almost spilling your diet coke all over your barely visible skirt.
And good riddance.

Whole Health Renovation Specialist
209-740-7898

"Small steps can be agonizingly slow but how much better a small step in the right direction than a giant leap in the wrong one." -Me