One Ring to Rule . . .

To everyone who offered advice on how I might remove my wedding ring, I thank you very much.

However, after using Windex, cooking oil, aloe, warm water, cold water, sticking my hand in a bowl of ice cubes for twenty minutes, and everything else, I just went ahead and had it cut off this weekend.

This was accomplished, remarkably, without fanfare or much prior planning.  I had my hair cut at the mall on Friday, and while I was walking over to C.J. Banks to pick up Mom,*** I passed the jeweler who had resized the ring before.  I swerved in for an estimate, and the goldsmith asked if I wanted it cut off right then at no charge. 

Uh, sure.

The clerk looked up my file while the goldsmith was locating her cutter, and it turns  out, I was wearing a size 5½,* which the goldsmith confirmed was embedded into my finger and probably would not have come off ‘naturally’ without some serious damage.  I believe the phrase she used was “skinning your finger,” which is a delightful image, let me tell you.

I think the clerk was curious, since the computer told her I’d had the ring sized downthree times, but she didn’t ask, and I didn’t feel the need to explain or offer excuses, although, “Misplaced pride goeth,” might have done.

The goldsmith suggested, after looking at the reddened, shiny-smooth indentation around my finger, that I wait for a month before determining what size I actually need.  This suits me, since I need to save up for the resizing anyway.***

My ring—after a whole day of being yanked out of my purse by panic-stricken, OCD  me—is now in our safety deposit box.  As I also spent the last couple days grabbing that finger because something wasn’t right, today I’m wearing one of my huge, tiger eye scarab rings on that finger, since the band is loose enough to not interfere with the healing.  I have a lot of fashion rings, actually, that I don’t usually wear so I might have a little fun swapping them out.

And I feel a sense of relief.  This was the right thing to do, the next step in separating myself from that past desperate craziness of trying to prove that I was still ‘winning,’ still shrinking, still pursuing the Fantasy of Being Thin.

Now, my wedding ring can go back to being a symbol of love, instead of a sign of self-hate.

____

*The original ring was, I think, an 8 or an 8½.

**Mom totally rocks the C.J. Bank’s reduced racks when she comes up here—her local C.J. Banks is still pretty new, and doesn’t have much of a back room collection to get rid of, yet. 

***It’s actually not that expensive to have a gold ring made larger—I called around and received estimates of between $36 - $50 for the first size, and  $6 – $15 for each additional size.

Tags: fat acceptance, self-acceptance