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Good morning and enjoy this rare Sunday article! I’m going to go back to waiting on Debbie hand and foot this fine Mother’s Day. She’s already enjoying a delicious breakfast feast and we shall see what the rest of the day brings. Happy Mother’s Day to all the moms out there!
Back in mid to late 2005, when Debbie and I were planning our wedding, we were trying to figure out what the hell we were going to do about wedding bands. I had not worn a ring since the time I had stupidly bought a middle school graduation ring and discovered I was very allergic to whatever metal it was made from.
On top of this, both Debbie and I worked in jobs where we constantly lifted boxes and moved stuff around. Me in retail and Debbie in an evidence vault. Any ring we got would be constantly banged around and scratched and scuffed and squished. So we wanted something sturdy, really hard to damage, and, essentially hypoallergenic.
That’s when I accidentally discovered that titanium wedding bands are a thing. And they’re oddly inexpensive. The fact that they’re practically indestructible was very appealing. We regularly joked that after the car crash, they could identify us from our dental records and our wedding bands which would still be in perfect condition.
It was even better because after we got them, we discovered that the rings fit perfectly inside of each other. That’s just how the size of our hands was at the time. It was very cute and romantic.
But then Debbie lost hers at work in the vault. Think of a large stock room with thousands of pieces of “merchandise” (evidence). It could have been anywhere. She looked for a very long time to no avail.
I ribbed her about this mercilessly for years. We got a replacement one, of course, but it wasn’t exactly the same size so it didn’t match the inside of my ring anymore. I would sigh with comic exaggeration and Debbie would punch me.
To our eternal surprise, six years later, loooong after Debbie had left that job and a few years after we had left the state, one of Debbie’s former co-workers found her ring. Yeah, what the actual hell?! She keeps it on her keychain now and we have a good giggle about it every now and then. I call it her “spare” in case she loses her new one. And she punches me.
So all of this background for me losing my ring this week and I’m extremely annoyed about it.
I was 275 pounds when Deb and I got married, lo these 18 years passed. My ring fit snuggly and was comfortable. Over the next several years, I put on a significant amount of weight, reaching a maximum of 330. My hands, naturally, got chubbier but my ring still fit so that was not a problem.
Buuuuut when I managed to scrape off 30 pounds, getting back down to 300 with the help of a few different appetite suppressant drugs, I noticed my ring had gotten loose. Very loose. Too loose. That didn’t make a whole lot of sense to me since I was still 25 pounds heavier than I was when I had first gotten the ring more than a decade earlier. It’s not like the titanium ring that is mostly indestructible had stretched.
Still, It wasn’t falling off so I went about my business. Then I started on Ozempic and just five pounds later, “Too loose” because “Cartoonishly loose.” I guess some of those five pounds came right off of my fingers because now the ring was falling off.
I got a little piece of plastic to clip on that made the ring tighter and all was right with the world.
Until I lost another 25 pounds and the ring was loose again. But it wasn’t too loose. Just kind of loose. So I didn’t think it was a problem.
I should have remembered that even a few more pounds can make a big difference for my hands. After months of being stuck at 270, I finally got under and have been there for several weeks. Just floating at 268 or so. But every pound is a big deal and yesterday, I went to spin my ring as I often do. I’ve been using it as a fidget toy well before I knew what that was.
And…no ring.
I knew immediately it had fallen off. I do not take my ring off and put it aside. Not in the shower. Not to go to sleep. Not for anything. I know some people do that. I am not one of them. My ring stays on my hand 24/7 and it not being there was entirely involuntary.
I tore the bed, the couch, and my desk apart. I’m having a hard time imagining it could have fallen off outside without me hearing the “TING” as it hit the ground.
I’m assuming it’s still in the apartment and we will find it. Eventually. It’s far too aggravating for me to consider anything else. If we don’t find it within a week, I will, begrudgingly, order a new one.
In the meantime, my finger feels unnatural and naked. It’s annoying how quickly the indentation is fading. I don’t like it. I’m seriously contemplating getting a ring tattoo in case this ever happens again and I’ve never seriously contemplated getting a tattoo in my life. Also, I can’t tease Debbie anymore about losing her ring. Possibly the greatest loss of all. Ha ha.
I will, however, have to console myself that I lost The Precious my ring for a good reason:
Still…we hates the hobbitses! We hates it forever!!!
I lost my wedding band once (I take it off nightly) and found it 3 years later in a place I’m SURE I looked before. Then during the brain fog of menopause, I put it on the wrong hand, and I couldn’t get it off no matter what I or the jeweler tried. Had to have it sawed off. But then I got a simple band I absolutely love and it’s been safe for the past decade! Good luck on your weight loss journey. I wish you good health and a long life!
I can understand how you feel. I lost the nearly 1 carat diamond from my ring. No idea where, when, or how. We replaced the stone with a much smaller gem from my grandmother's band, but it is not the same. I rarely wear my ring now because I'm paranoid I'll lose it again. On a positive note, the marriage is still going strong!