An update, getting a little personal.

If you visit my blog regularly then you have probably noticed that I havent been a great blogger recently. I have said from the beginning that I only blog when I want to rather than to please other people (hence my whopping 5 posts per month, in recent months!) but I have been blogging even less lately. I think my last post was approx 3 weeks ago and nothing since then. I still check my blog daily and read other blogs, but I havent been posting and there are reasons, which I think I need to share because I owe that to the people who actually keep coming back to my blog and send me so many wonderful comments, emails, etc. Firstly I havent been very well in recent months. Im not looking for sympathy but when I feel sick the last thing I want to do is take pictures of myself and fake a smile (real ones are much better)! I mentioned briefly on here about being sick before but I have problems with both of my ears, a recurring infection and a problem that may require surgery. I have also been getting TOTM twice a month which means I am miserable for 3 out of every 4 weeks. Sickness aside, there is another reason I havent been blogging. Probably the main reason, actually...5 weeks ago I decided to lose weight. I know a lot of peoples first thought will probably be.. "but I thought you were comfortable with your body? I thought you were confident and loved your body and didnt want to be skinny?" but let me explain..I am. I have spent most of my life as an overweight girl and it took me a long time, but I finally gained confidence. I lost weight as a teenager by barely eating (less than 500 cals a day) and making myself sick to "slim down" to a UK size 12/USA size 8. Thats the smallest I have ever been my entire teenage/adulthood life. My goal back then was to be "skinny" and I didnt care about hurting my body. After getting comfortable with food again and gaining the weight back (and more!) I learned to love my body and gain confidence, despite my size. But after a talk with my doctor and thinking about my future...I might be confident and love my body on the outside, but if im overweight and thats doing damage to my insides, surely that means I dont love my body as much as I say I do. That doesnt mean I fill my body with junkfood 24/7, because I dont and never did, but I just need to start caring for me better...not just what people see on the outside but whats inside too.I am not losing weight to become "skinny" - I just want to be healthy. I am not doing it to fit into certain clothes, I honestly own my dream closet already and had many debates in my head about losing weight just because I love my clothes so much. I am not doing it for men, I am seeing someone and even if I wasnt - I couldnt care less about someone who just liked me because im a smaller jean size. I am doing it for me - because I want to live a long life. I want to be healthy, I want to be able to walk up the stairs without feeling like im going to pass out. I dont want to have diseases, surgeries, etc. because of my weight in the future. Two of my relatives died young from complications related to type 2 diabetes, I dont want that to be me. So with all of that talk out of the way, I just want to say that this blog never has been about my weight so I will not be posting about my weight loss here. I have made a separate blog to help keep me motivated (I lose motivation very easily!) and if anyone wants the link I would be happy to share but please email me (pearlslaceandruffles (at) gmail (dot) com) and include the link to your blog. If you dont have a blog then I probably wont share the link. I hope that doesnt sound rude but I would just rather know who is viewing it! What this means for pearlslaceandruffles is that I probably wont be posting outfits with new clothes too often for the next couple of months. I am trying my very best to wear the clothes I already have as much as possible while they still fit, and I havent been shopping in months. I dont want to buy clothes until I lose more weight because it seems pointless! I will still post but not as many outfit posts as before. I am considering adding beauty posts/reviews to make up for it, but im not 100% sure if people would be interested as there are so many beauty blogs out there already? Sorry for the long post but I had a lot to say and wanted to make sure I didnt forget anything. To those of you who actually read it all, thank you! xoxo