This was the first incident in my life that made me think I wanted to get a blog, and be even in the smallest, least-noticeable way, an activist. Due to length and so I won't have to stare at this stupid thing every time I look at my blog, almost all of this is going under a cut.
At some point last semester at school, there went up a new sign. I'm a student at NYU, in New York City, the home of the fast-food calorie count (which I'll discuss another time, I'm sure). Evidently, this sign wasn't just going up at my school, but all around the city. It shows a stick-figure going up a flight of stairs with the text: Burn calories, not electricity! Take the Stairs! Walking up the stairs just 2 minutes a day helps prevent weight gain. It also helps the environment."
Friday, January 28, 2011
Sunday, January 23, 2011
Jeans
Does anybody know anywhere that still sells at-waist jeans that actually come up to the waist?
I was at home last weekend and discovered a pair of jeans in my closet that still fit (I've been a size 16 since about 16 years old - for the longest time, I thought that your pant/dress size was SUPPOSED to correspond to your age). Great, since I'd just worn out a different pair of jeans and this meant I didn't have to buy one. So I brought them back to school with me.
And I realized, these jeans are incredibly comfortable. And finally I figured out why, in the last few years, after an entire life of size 16 at-waist jeans being the most comfortable thing in the world, my jeans have been squishing me and on a really bad day painful to wear. (barring the possibility that I've gone up a pant size, or that vanity sizing is screwing with me...)
My old at-waist jeans were from back when Old Navy made at-waist jeans. And they came all the way up to my waist. I have to wear a belt with these because my waist is a good several inches smaller than my hips. Using the same belt, on my Land's End "at-waist" jeans, I can get it to go maybe two notches in, three if I feel like squishing myself. On the Old Navy, I can get four or five with perfect comfort and ease. So I think at least part of the reason I've felt so fat and uncomfortable in my jeans lately is that they're measuring a different part of me and calling it "waist".
The faux-at-waist jeans come up about to my belly button. Which means that they basically cut my belly in half. Half of it is tucked under the belt line, and the other half muffin-tops over, which is painful in addition to making me feel unattractive. At-waist jeans come up those few inches higher and cover basically all of my belly, tucking it all comfortably inside.
Dear Fashion Industry,
I do, in fact, have a waist. It is not my hips. It is several inches higher than my hips. Please bring your at-waist pants up to my actual waist. Just because I'm fat doesn't mean I don't have a shape, and even if I were thin I happen to like feeling covered.
So, serious question, does anyone know of any company that still sells at-waist jeans that come to the waist? Old Navy stopped making them long ago, and I am sad.
I was at home last weekend and discovered a pair of jeans in my closet that still fit (I've been a size 16 since about 16 years old - for the longest time, I thought that your pant/dress size was SUPPOSED to correspond to your age). Great, since I'd just worn out a different pair of jeans and this meant I didn't have to buy one. So I brought them back to school with me.
And I realized, these jeans are incredibly comfortable. And finally I figured out why, in the last few years, after an entire life of size 16 at-waist jeans being the most comfortable thing in the world, my jeans have been squishing me and on a really bad day painful to wear. (barring the possibility that I've gone up a pant size, or that vanity sizing is screwing with me...)
My old at-waist jeans were from back when Old Navy made at-waist jeans. And they came all the way up to my waist. I have to wear a belt with these because my waist is a good several inches smaller than my hips. Using the same belt, on my Land's End "at-waist" jeans, I can get it to go maybe two notches in, three if I feel like squishing myself. On the Old Navy, I can get four or five with perfect comfort and ease. So I think at least part of the reason I've felt so fat and uncomfortable in my jeans lately is that they're measuring a different part of me and calling it "waist".
The faux-at-waist jeans come up about to my belly button. Which means that they basically cut my belly in half. Half of it is tucked under the belt line, and the other half muffin-tops over, which is painful in addition to making me feel unattractive. At-waist jeans come up those few inches higher and cover basically all of my belly, tucking it all comfortably inside.
Dear Fashion Industry,
I do, in fact, have a waist. It is not my hips. It is several inches higher than my hips. Please bring your at-waist pants up to my actual waist. Just because I'm fat doesn't mean I don't have a shape, and even if I were thin I happen to like feeling covered.
So, serious question, does anyone know of any company that still sells at-waist jeans that come to the waist? Old Navy stopped making them long ago, and I am sad.
Thursday, January 20, 2011
Cravings
I think one of the fundamental questions of the human experience is, "does this happen to other people?" So I'm curious, and I want to talk about cravings for a little bit.
This is coming into my head right this minute because, after a few weeks of having my eating all messed up due to an early class and no lunch break (been scarfing down peanut-butter sandwiches in 5-minute breaks and starving by the time i get home), I think I'm finally identifying the point in intuitive eating where my body starts telling me it needs more variety. My last couple meals haven't been very veggie-friendly, and I'm thinking later tonight I need to go get a salad. It's a great change of pace for me, to be really wanting this in more than an "I should be eating better" way.
But here's where the question comes in - I'm not craving any kind of salad flavor. I want Crunchy, and Cold.
I tend to get texture cravings far, far more strongly than taste cravings, and this is what I wonder what other people experience. I want Crunchy Cold right now, so some nice crisp stringy celery, or carrots, or baby corn, or bell peppers, would all be great. I remember a time in my past when I wanted Gooey Warm - what I had in my head was "brownies", but there weren't any even remotely close to avaliable. So I put a banana in the microwave and drizzled it with chocolate syrup. Not really all that close to being a brownie, but it was the right texture and chewiness. I get Baked Good cravings a lot of the time, probably more often than anything else; if I'm craving Chocolate Cake, then vanilla cake will satisfy the craving better than a piece of chocolate or anything else chocolate-flavored.
So does that sound familiar to anyone? How often do you think your cravings match up to what your body is missing, and how often are they more comfort-oriented (I've got a feeling that my Baked Good moments are comfort food moments, since I get them so often)? Textures, or tastes?
This is coming into my head right this minute because, after a few weeks of having my eating all messed up due to an early class and no lunch break (been scarfing down peanut-butter sandwiches in 5-minute breaks and starving by the time i get home), I think I'm finally identifying the point in intuitive eating where my body starts telling me it needs more variety. My last couple meals haven't been very veggie-friendly, and I'm thinking later tonight I need to go get a salad. It's a great change of pace for me, to be really wanting this in more than an "I should be eating better" way.
But here's where the question comes in - I'm not craving any kind of salad flavor. I want Crunchy, and Cold.
I tend to get texture cravings far, far more strongly than taste cravings, and this is what I wonder what other people experience. I want Crunchy Cold right now, so some nice crisp stringy celery, or carrots, or baby corn, or bell peppers, would all be great. I remember a time in my past when I wanted Gooey Warm - what I had in my head was "brownies", but there weren't any even remotely close to avaliable. So I put a banana in the microwave and drizzled it with chocolate syrup. Not really all that close to being a brownie, but it was the right texture and chewiness. I get Baked Good cravings a lot of the time, probably more often than anything else; if I'm craving Chocolate Cake, then vanilla cake will satisfy the craving better than a piece of chocolate or anything else chocolate-flavored.
So does that sound familiar to anyone? How often do you think your cravings match up to what your body is missing, and how often are they more comfort-oriented (I've got a feeling that my Baked Good moments are comfort food moments, since I get them so often)? Textures, or tastes?
Tuesday, January 18, 2011
Memories of Binge-Eating
Okay, this is a big one.
I think I missed the boat on actually getting any kind of diagnosis, and I can't say for sure that I had Binge Eating Disorder specifically. But I've learned about it somewhat in recent years - really recent, just the last one or two - and I know that when I was younger I had binging episodes. I have some strong memories of what it felt like to binge, and I think it's important enough to write up. Because I can't really know what someone who's never been through it imagines a binge to be. It's not mindless snacking in front of the TV and before you know it, the bag of chips is empty. And it's not a big meal. And it doesn't have to come with purges - mine didn't. But I'll describe as best as I can....
I think I missed the boat on actually getting any kind of diagnosis, and I can't say for sure that I had Binge Eating Disorder specifically. But I've learned about it somewhat in recent years - really recent, just the last one or two - and I know that when I was younger I had binging episodes. I have some strong memories of what it felt like to binge, and I think it's important enough to write up. Because I can't really know what someone who's never been through it imagines a binge to be. It's not mindless snacking in front of the TV and before you know it, the bag of chips is empty. And it's not a big meal. And it doesn't have to come with purges - mine didn't. But I'll describe as best as I can....
Tuesday, January 11, 2011
Beauty and Alienation (a ramble)
Katja's post from today goes through a new weight-loss book endorsed by Oprah. She had a good analysis of what's going on, but the part that stuck out to me was her summary of the kinds of things that the "Not-Thin-You" in the book is:
"The letter to “Not-Thin-You” (180 pounds btw) describes her as unable to do cartwheels, doomed to wear flats, shouldn’t “rock the dance floor,” only to brag about how now she has avocados in the fridge, dreaming of 100 sit-ups and will soon say Good-bye to NTY…"
Out of all that, the bit that got my blog juices back going (after a week and a half of serious reading loads for a winter Intensive course at my school) was "doomed to wear flats."
I've never been a very beauty-conscious person. I can't tell you why. When I was in high school, I knew that there were girls who did their hair and make-up every morning and there were people who seemed to gravitate to them. But I also knew they woke up at 5am to get it all done, and I just didn't care. I knew that I was most comfortable wearing jeans every day and t-shirts. That's stuck with me so far. I wear pendant necklaces, but usually no other jewelry, I braid my hair to keep it the hell away from my face, and that's about it. I wear sneakers every day, unless I'm not walking anywhere and I can get away without shoes at all.
So I see that the hypothetical fat girl is "doomed to wear flats", and I can only blink. That's a doom, now?
It just feels so blatant, this weight-loss book. When it talks about "rocking the dance floor" and wearing high heels when you're finally thin, it just highlights that this is about fashion, and conventional beauty and girlishness and not any real semblance of health and empowerment.
But it also brings up a tangential topic, and that's that I end up feeling kind of alienated sometimes even from fat-friendly feminist spaces. It's not anyone's fault, not by a long shot, and I don't think there's anything these kinds of things could do to make it better.
For example. For a while, I was reading the blog Beauty Schooled, written by a woman as she goes through Beauty training and learns about the industry. I found it fascinating, and there were many interesting and informative posts about beauty myths and the inherent strangeness of some practices. But there was also a lot about the money and time and effort that the average woman puts into her appearance. I don't doubt that the statistically average woman does put in a lot of work, but I don't. So post after post about how wasteful these things are just kind of went over my head. Posts about "national no-make-up day" mean nothing to me - I could do a no make-up year and never notice.
I know that those posts were useful for tons of other people and I don't begrudge it to them. But I ended up feeling far enough away from that world to stop reading regularly. I'm just not part of that part of the Feminine Experience.
Similarly, I'll see posts about street harassment and how surely every woman has been through these things. And I don't doubt that a vast majority do. But if I've ever been cat-called, I didn't realize that someone was targeting me. I've also never had a crush on a male friend (that didn't end happily) or spent hundreds of dollars on shoes or dresses or a thousand other things that plenty of women do go through.
So I suppose seeing that flats line tapped into that sense of alienation. I know rationally that I'm still a real woman even if I just never felt the pressure to dress up pretty and wear make-up. I certainly don't WISH to be sexually harassed. I know that posts talking about things that aren't my experience just aren't talking about me. But sometimes it feels very odd to see other women talking about the female experience that I've never had.
As for the book itself, as I said, it's just so blatant in my mind. I'm a little more than the 180 pounds that the Not-Thin-You is supposed to be. And sometimes I do want to lose weight. Not that I want to diet and exercise and strain myself. But that if there were a magic pill, hell yes I'd take it. I fantasize some nights about just cutting out the parts of my thighs that press together and chafe so I can finally wear skirts and actually walk around in them, or tucking that little flap under my tummy away so it's not there anymore. It's because sometimes my fat is uncomfortable, and because sometimes I still feel like I can't be pretty at this weight, and sometimes just because no reason at all.
It's never because I feel doomed to wear flats.
"The letter to “Not-Thin-You” (180 pounds btw) describes her as unable to do cartwheels, doomed to wear flats, shouldn’t “rock the dance floor,” only to brag about how now she has avocados in the fridge, dreaming of 100 sit-ups and will soon say Good-bye to NTY…"
Out of all that, the bit that got my blog juices back going (after a week and a half of serious reading loads for a winter Intensive course at my school) was "doomed to wear flats."
I've never been a very beauty-conscious person. I can't tell you why. When I was in high school, I knew that there were girls who did their hair and make-up every morning and there were people who seemed to gravitate to them. But I also knew they woke up at 5am to get it all done, and I just didn't care. I knew that I was most comfortable wearing jeans every day and t-shirts. That's stuck with me so far. I wear pendant necklaces, but usually no other jewelry, I braid my hair to keep it the hell away from my face, and that's about it. I wear sneakers every day, unless I'm not walking anywhere and I can get away without shoes at all.
So I see that the hypothetical fat girl is "doomed to wear flats", and I can only blink. That's a doom, now?
It just feels so blatant, this weight-loss book. When it talks about "rocking the dance floor" and wearing high heels when you're finally thin, it just highlights that this is about fashion, and conventional beauty and girlishness and not any real semblance of health and empowerment.
But it also brings up a tangential topic, and that's that I end up feeling kind of alienated sometimes even from fat-friendly feminist spaces. It's not anyone's fault, not by a long shot, and I don't think there's anything these kinds of things could do to make it better.
For example. For a while, I was reading the blog Beauty Schooled, written by a woman as she goes through Beauty training and learns about the industry. I found it fascinating, and there were many interesting and informative posts about beauty myths and the inherent strangeness of some practices. But there was also a lot about the money and time and effort that the average woman puts into her appearance. I don't doubt that the statistically average woman does put in a lot of work, but I don't. So post after post about how wasteful these things are just kind of went over my head. Posts about "national no-make-up day" mean nothing to me - I could do a no make-up year and never notice.
I know that those posts were useful for tons of other people and I don't begrudge it to them. But I ended up feeling far enough away from that world to stop reading regularly. I'm just not part of that part of the Feminine Experience.
Similarly, I'll see posts about street harassment and how surely every woman has been through these things. And I don't doubt that a vast majority do. But if I've ever been cat-called, I didn't realize that someone was targeting me. I've also never had a crush on a male friend (that didn't end happily) or spent hundreds of dollars on shoes or dresses or a thousand other things that plenty of women do go through.
So I suppose seeing that flats line tapped into that sense of alienation. I know rationally that I'm still a real woman even if I just never felt the pressure to dress up pretty and wear make-up. I certainly don't WISH to be sexually harassed. I know that posts talking about things that aren't my experience just aren't talking about me. But sometimes it feels very odd to see other women talking about the female experience that I've never had.
As for the book itself, as I said, it's just so blatant in my mind. I'm a little more than the 180 pounds that the Not-Thin-You is supposed to be. And sometimes I do want to lose weight. Not that I want to diet and exercise and strain myself. But that if there were a magic pill, hell yes I'd take it. I fantasize some nights about just cutting out the parts of my thighs that press together and chafe so I can finally wear skirts and actually walk around in them, or tucking that little flap under my tummy away so it's not there anymore. It's because sometimes my fat is uncomfortable, and because sometimes I still feel like I can't be pretty at this weight, and sometimes just because no reason at all.
It's never because I feel doomed to wear flats.
Wednesday, January 5, 2011
My (luckily, only) doctor story
About a year ago, I was at the school health clinic, and the doctor who I saw seemed if not fat-positive, then relatively fat-neutral, enough that I felt safe and at ease. I had mentioned that a medication of mine seemed to go through my body kind of fast, and she said that it might be because of my size, but immediately followed up by saying she has the same thing happen to her, and she's thin, so who knew? This was also the doctor who, after several hiccups and follow-ups about my blood pressure being slightly elevated, finally measured me with the large-sized cuff and declared it perfectly fine.
So I picked the same doctor when I went this year to get myself examined.
It was going basically well at first. Then she noticed that, yet again today, my blood pressure reading was high. And it wasn't until after a whole speech, asking me if I was watching my salt intake and giving me tips on how to do so, and bringing my weight up, only after all that did she think to ask if they'd used the right cuff. They hadn't, of course, and I get nervous enough in examinations that I forgot to insist to the nurse that she use the right size. The doctor took my pressure again, and it was fine, and we continued.
Except, my weight wasn't off the table for discussion.
"You really do need to think about your weight, would you like to see the nutritionist?"
I don't think a lot of doctors understand what they're saying when they say things like that, in the same breath, as the same question.
You are overweight, therefore, you should talk to the nutritionist.
You are overweight, because you eat too much/ the wrong things.
You are overweight, because you've somehow managed to live ten years as a fat person without anyone ever telling you how to eat "properly".
If you only weren't so ignorant and knew how to eat "properly"/ too lazy or unhealthy to follow through with eating "properly", you wouldn't be fat.
I told her that I was eating well, more vegetables than I used to, that I have too many emotional issues with dieting to willingly take on a weight-loss plan right now. But that I am focused on exercising more (easier living in NYC) and eating more nutritionally. I even mentioned the fact that, finally, I've gotten to the point of craving fruits and vegetables and nice filling starches rather than sweets and cake and candy, and explained that it was because by actively NOT dieting, there wasn't anything off-limits that I wanted and nothing that I forced myself to eat, and it took the power away from the formerly-seductive "bad" foods. And she seemed okay with it.....until I clarified that by "eating more vegetables", I didn't mean "eating less meat/cheese/sweets". At which point she kind of laughed, mumbled "that's not healthy," and finally dropped it.
It's not a horrible experience. It left me a little rattled, but I remembered to eat dinner and didn't make myself feel bad later at night when I wanted more food. I'll stick to the permission that I gave myself to eat what I feel like. This story certainly doesn't rival anything at First, Do No Harm.
But it did kind of suck to have an initial good experience turn back into a normal-level iffy one.
So I picked the same doctor when I went this year to get myself examined.
It was going basically well at first. Then she noticed that, yet again today, my blood pressure reading was high. And it wasn't until after a whole speech, asking me if I was watching my salt intake and giving me tips on how to do so, and bringing my weight up, only after all that did she think to ask if they'd used the right cuff. They hadn't, of course, and I get nervous enough in examinations that I forgot to insist to the nurse that she use the right size. The doctor took my pressure again, and it was fine, and we continued.
Except, my weight wasn't off the table for discussion.
"You really do need to think about your weight, would you like to see the nutritionist?"
I don't think a lot of doctors understand what they're saying when they say things like that, in the same breath, as the same question.
You are overweight, therefore, you should talk to the nutritionist.
You are overweight, because you eat too much/ the wrong things.
You are overweight, because you've somehow managed to live ten years as a fat person without anyone ever telling you how to eat "properly".
If you only weren't so ignorant and knew how to eat "properly"/ too lazy or unhealthy to follow through with eating "properly", you wouldn't be fat.
I told her that I was eating well, more vegetables than I used to, that I have too many emotional issues with dieting to willingly take on a weight-loss plan right now. But that I am focused on exercising more (easier living in NYC) and eating more nutritionally. I even mentioned the fact that, finally, I've gotten to the point of craving fruits and vegetables and nice filling starches rather than sweets and cake and candy, and explained that it was because by actively NOT dieting, there wasn't anything off-limits that I wanted and nothing that I forced myself to eat, and it took the power away from the formerly-seductive "bad" foods. And she seemed okay with it.....until I clarified that by "eating more vegetables", I didn't mean "eating less meat/cheese/sweets". At which point she kind of laughed, mumbled "that's not healthy," and finally dropped it.
It's not a horrible experience. It left me a little rattled, but I remembered to eat dinner and didn't make myself feel bad later at night when I wanted more food. I'll stick to the permission that I gave myself to eat what I feel like. This story certainly doesn't rival anything at First, Do No Harm.
But it did kind of suck to have an initial good experience turn back into a normal-level iffy one.
Sunday, January 2, 2011
Making Changes
I've been living on my own at school for the last three and a half years, and with my own kitchen for two and a half, and it's made a big difference in some of the ways I eat.
The most significant thing that happened was I became free to keep my kitchen and desk drawers stocked with candy and cookies and sweets. If I crave baked goods, I can go get a few oreos or a brownie. If I want a chocolate, I can have a chocolate. Most days, one or two candies or a similar small serving is enough to feed the craving. And then - here's the important part - I can put the rest away, and know that any other time I have the craving, I can go feed it again.
Sometimes, I do get into a mood when I want more, and I do still try to curb myself before eating what feels like too much. Sometimes an assortment of different sweets makes it better - a couple different flavors of cookie, a mint chocolate and a milk chocolate. Sometimes all I really want is to chew, and I keep plenty of gum on hand - some days it really just is about having a lot of stuff in my mouth (minds out of the gutter, please) and two or three pieces of gum makes me really happy. Sometimes a nice sweet tea will give me something sweet to taste if I'm full up and still want flavor.
These are all okay, as is, if all else fails, a few more cookies or chocolates.
One thing I've learned to do is to try not to eat desserts or sweets when I'm actively hungry. I certainly don't want to say this is what everyone should do, but it works for me. If I'm legitimately hungry, I try to go for something a little more substantial. Peanut-butter and pretzels, can of tuna fish, a serving of pasta, depending on what I'm up for actually making. The first thing this does for me is help me enjoy my sweets more, since I'm not hungry enough to eat too fast to taste. The second is, I feel it helps me fill up faster. It takes an awful lot of chocolates to feel full on.
Another thing I've gotten better at is saving leftovers. Tonight, for example, my dinner portion was pretty huge, and more than I felt like eating all in one sitting. It wasn't necessarily too much food for the night, though. And I realized, as I packed up the last third of dinner and put it in the fridge, what a little, obvious thing it is that took me so long. It stems from the same source, though: the idea that there will be more later. I can eat as much as I'm hungry for now, and know that when I'm hungry again in an hour, two hours, three, or the next day, I can go get the rest. There's no obligation to fill up at any one meal as though there won't be chances to eat again.
When I lived at home, there were stricter rules about what was allowed to be eaten at what time of day. True hunger after dinner time had to be addressed with snacks, rice cakes, fruit, general small servings. As illustrated by The Potato Incident, an attempt to fill up on a meal-sized portion of food would not be met well. But since childhood, "last snacks" were when my brothers and I were allowed to have our sweets for the day. We would get one, and only one, dessert opportunity, and it was before going to bed. So I got used to eating my sweets late in the day, when it was the most filling thing I was allowed to eat.
That's all gone now. Part of the reason I was so angry about the potato thing was how long it took me to get used to the idea that substantial food is okay to eat after dinner time, especially when I don't wake up early enough to eat breakfast. It's okay to eat when I'm hungry. And for that matter, it's okay to eat for pleasure when I'm NOT hungry. I don't have to wait until I feel hungry again to allow myself a piece of chocolate. I'm allowed to just eat it and enjoy.
A lot of people are making diet resolutions right now, and I don't think I'm going to post about it directly. But these are some of the ways I've changed my own habits for the better.
The most significant thing that happened was I became free to keep my kitchen and desk drawers stocked with candy and cookies and sweets. If I crave baked goods, I can go get a few oreos or a brownie. If I want a chocolate, I can have a chocolate. Most days, one or two candies or a similar small serving is enough to feed the craving. And then - here's the important part - I can put the rest away, and know that any other time I have the craving, I can go feed it again.
Sometimes, I do get into a mood when I want more, and I do still try to curb myself before eating what feels like too much. Sometimes an assortment of different sweets makes it better - a couple different flavors of cookie, a mint chocolate and a milk chocolate. Sometimes all I really want is to chew, and I keep plenty of gum on hand - some days it really just is about having a lot of stuff in my mouth (minds out of the gutter, please) and two or three pieces of gum makes me really happy. Sometimes a nice sweet tea will give me something sweet to taste if I'm full up and still want flavor.
These are all okay, as is, if all else fails, a few more cookies or chocolates.
One thing I've learned to do is to try not to eat desserts or sweets when I'm actively hungry. I certainly don't want to say this is what everyone should do, but it works for me. If I'm legitimately hungry, I try to go for something a little more substantial. Peanut-butter and pretzels, can of tuna fish, a serving of pasta, depending on what I'm up for actually making. The first thing this does for me is help me enjoy my sweets more, since I'm not hungry enough to eat too fast to taste. The second is, I feel it helps me fill up faster. It takes an awful lot of chocolates to feel full on.
Another thing I've gotten better at is saving leftovers. Tonight, for example, my dinner portion was pretty huge, and more than I felt like eating all in one sitting. It wasn't necessarily too much food for the night, though. And I realized, as I packed up the last third of dinner and put it in the fridge, what a little, obvious thing it is that took me so long. It stems from the same source, though: the idea that there will be more later. I can eat as much as I'm hungry for now, and know that when I'm hungry again in an hour, two hours, three, or the next day, I can go get the rest. There's no obligation to fill up at any one meal as though there won't be chances to eat again.
When I lived at home, there were stricter rules about what was allowed to be eaten at what time of day. True hunger after dinner time had to be addressed with snacks, rice cakes, fruit, general small servings. As illustrated by The Potato Incident, an attempt to fill up on a meal-sized portion of food would not be met well. But since childhood, "last snacks" were when my brothers and I were allowed to have our sweets for the day. We would get one, and only one, dessert opportunity, and it was before going to bed. So I got used to eating my sweets late in the day, when it was the most filling thing I was allowed to eat.
That's all gone now. Part of the reason I was so angry about the potato thing was how long it took me to get used to the idea that substantial food is okay to eat after dinner time, especially when I don't wake up early enough to eat breakfast. It's okay to eat when I'm hungry. And for that matter, it's okay to eat for pleasure when I'm NOT hungry. I don't have to wait until I feel hungry again to allow myself a piece of chocolate. I'm allowed to just eat it and enjoy.
A lot of people are making diet resolutions right now, and I don't think I'm going to post about it directly. But these are some of the ways I've changed my own habits for the better.
Saturday, January 1, 2011
Two Stories about Sausage
For years, and years, and years, I thought that sausage was by definition more healthy than bacon.
You see, whenever we went out to eat breakfast, itself a kind of rare occasion, my mom’s rule was that sausage was okay to order, but bacon was not. If my brothers and I did say we were thinking of bacon as a side, we were re-directed toward sausage instead.
As a kid, I thought I hated sausage. Perhaps not hated, but didn’t enjoy eating it, for sure. In all likelihood, this was simply because it wasn’t bacon. Bacon, this magical meat that everyone seems to use as a synonym for amazingly delicious, must be so much tastier than sausage if it was also so much worse for me that I wasn’t allowed to order it. Bacon was also, evidently, purely a breakfast food, while sausage was acceptable in grilled, thicker form in a bun for dinner sometimes.
It was only after I was an adult that I learned that nutritionally, they’re basically the same. I thought that perhaps sausage wasn’t fried, since I knew that bacon was, but that isn’t true. I thought sausage must not have as much fat, which isn’t really significantly true. So I started ordering the bacon that I wanted through my entire childhood.
And the magical thing is – I like them both about the same these days. I prefer bacon as part of sandwiches or otherwise other dishes, rather than by itself. Some days I do want bacon, and some days sausage is tastier. Now that sausage is allowed to be sausage in its own right, instead of “substitute for bacon”, it’s much better.
It still took me a really long time to realize how strange it was that my parents had this distinction. The only thing I can think of to make sense of it is that my mom couldn’t handle having to make a decision between two ‘equally bad’ choices. Somehow, she decided that sausage was the proper option to choose, and now it was easy. It didn’t have to be based on what she felt like eating that particular day, and she didn’t have to weigh the nutritional options each time we went to breakfast. The answer was sausage, end of story. One out of the two choices had to be better than the other for her to feel comfortable ordering it. And she passed that along to us. (And as much as this blog is going to mention my mom, my dad always supported her decisions and positions. He was just never as blatant about it.)
Speaking of sausage, have another example of food policing.
We were at a dinner with family friends, two families and a cookout, a pool, a nice summer evening. The sausage was homemade, which I don’t think I’d ever had before, and I was relaxed, happy, and eating. Dinner had gone on a good long while, too, although a lot of details have gone fuzzy in my memory by now. At some point, after having eaten a serving or two and waiting a little while, I asked my mom to please pass me the plate of sausages.
She told me no.
No, you’ve had too many already. I didn’t really know what to do, mostly because of how quickly awkward the situation was becoming. I tried not to look at our family friends to see how they were judging this interaction, and just repeated my request.
Please pass the plate, I’m still hungry. I won’t have a bun with it, will that make it okay? I’ll only have half of one, will that make it okay?
I think at that point, she relented, probably out of embarrassment because of how I was making her look. I’m sure I was embarrassing her with my gluttonous behavior. But I was 18 or 19 by then, and for the first time, she was embarrassing ME by trying to control my food intake. If we’d been at home instead of at friends’, I bet I never would have gotten the extra half a sausage. I probably wouldn’t have had the courage to ask for it.
Friday, December 31, 2010
Fat Dad, Nutritionist Mom
***trigger warning for fat-shaming, disordered eating and self harm***
I'm thlingan, a 21 year-old transgender college student and fat-positive thin ally. Samantha C. has invited me to contribute some stories of growing up and living with a thin, nutritionist mom and a fat dad. The focus for me will be on how my mom's treating my dad like a horrible food ogre affects our family relationships and what it's like to live with a nutritionist. In that vein, here's a glimpse of what it's like at my house... (Note: Instead of names, I put "husband", "wife", "thlingan")
A week and a half ago...
We're done eating dinner. My dad brought home some large holiday cookies a co-worker gave him (which earlier elicited scoffing-grunt noises and comments of "More cookies again!?" from my mom). We're all trying them and gushing about how delicious they are.
Me: These are amazing...
Dad: Seriously, I could eat like six of these n--
Mom: *interrupts my dad with a patronizing, judgey laugh* I know you could, husband... easily... Well, you--
Dad: ...but I don't, I don't...
Mom: --don't need to be eating six of them
Dad: I'm just saying they are really, really good cookies.
-only minutes later in conversation-
Mom: I really should just have eaten half of one, they're so big...
Days later...
The three of us are in the kitchen, my mom is reading some holiday dessert recipe and sings "'Tis the season for gaining weight..." in a belittling fashion...
Hours after that, I come into the kitchen hunting for ice cream, my parents can see me in the next room, where they are watching a movie...
Mom: You and your sister ate up all those peppermint cartons in like two days... jeez the two of you are going to be Two Ton Tessies...
Me: That is awful! That is belittling fat people and shaming them...
Mom: I was just kidding...
Me: No, that is being mean... You shame Dad just because he even WANTS to eat junkfood.. Newsflash --Everyone likes junkfood! It doesn't help for you to shame them for it...
Mom: *waving her hand at me as if to shoo me from the room, shaking her head patronizingly* Goodbye, goodbye
Next Day
Mom: Husband, you're having cookies again?!
Dad: I'm having a bite of some cookies...
Mom: "A few bites" doesn't matter! All that matters is the number of the scale...
An argument between me and my mother ensues...
Christmas Night...
As Jews, we were of course going to a Chinese restaurant after seeing a movie. We're sitting at a table in the lobby, waiting to go into the movie...
Dad: I'm getting an appetizer tonight...
Mom: *makes awful scoffing-grunt noise, seems about to make annoying comment*
Dad: I am.
Mom: *tone of voice implying my dad is being 'touchy'* Alright, get whatever you want...
Every. Damn. Day.
#1
Dad takes out some SugarFat (SugarFat=term I want to use for any food deemed 'unhealthy')
Mom gives him shame-stare.
Dad: *pretending he genuinely has no idea what Mom's deal is* What! I'm just having a little bite...
Choose from 1 or more of the following Mom responses:
- Eyeroll-scoff
- Husband, you already
met my arbitrary Horrible Food Ogre eating quota for todayhad some SugarFat/a huge meal/list of every-'bad'-food-he-ate today. - I'm sick of your 'little bites'!
- You're always 'having a little bite' of everything!
Mom: *scoff-grunt-stare*
Dad: *animal noise intended to be an impression of my mom's scolding*
#2
Dad gets a little second helping after dinner.
Mom: Husband! You're having MORE? You already had HFO dinner quota all that DinnerFood. Why don't you just wait and see if you're hungry?
#3
Dad mentions [Food-He'd-Like-to-Eat].
Mom: (Choose 1 or more)
- Yeahhh, you don't need to be eating [Food-You-like-to-Eat].
- No one else is going to want to eat that.
- We're having [list of scheduled meals] this week. You're not going to make [Food-You-Like-to-Eat].
- Are you kidding? We don't need to be eating a bunch of SugarFat.
I think the awfulness of the above examples is fairly self-evident. However, what seems particularly disturbing to me is my mother's blind assumption that my dad is fat because, without her policing, he would be a Terrible Cookie Fiend who orders tons of appetizers in restaurants and cooks only recipes where the primary ingredients are meat and cheese. Her attitude is always OF COURSE my dad would eat EVERY COOKIE IN THE WORLD, given the opportunity, and that this imaginary proclivity of his is deserving of sarcasm and shame-stares. She acts like she thinks thin people don't even like SugarFat and that my dad's enjoyment of it is some kind of taboo sexual fetish. Then, when faced with the evidence that two of her thin children are, in fact, fiends for SugarFat without gaining weight from it, she "jokingly" warns us that we are going to get OMGTEHFATZ. My mom just thinks that, obviously, since my dad is fat, he has no idea what his body needs and that he has a super-human desire for SugarFat.
What's truly bizarre is that my dad has actually lost a lot of weight recently. He had a minor stroke a few months ago (which the doctors said was completely unrelated to his weight) from which he is now completely recovered. After the stroke, my dad started getting really serious about losing weight to reduce his chances of having another stroke or other health problem. My dad has gone through a flerbillion cycles of losing weight and then gaining it back. He is now in the most persistent weight-loss phase I have ever witnessed him going through. Thus, my mom is pleased. So what I think is bizarre is that she still shames my dad for even liking SugarFat and treats him like he's some insufferable pain-in-the-ass whose behavior she's forced to police. Like.. what does she want? For him to be a Food Vulcan who eats only for sustenance and takes no pleasure in SugarFat? That is clearly unreasonable.
My mom is perhaps unusual in that her obsession with fatness is genuinely unrelated to beauty norms. She dated and married my dad while he was fat, he's been fat their whole marriage and I've never once gotten the message from her, subtly or explicitly, that fatness makes someone unattractive or that beauty is a good reason to lose weight. In fact, my mom even believes that some people can be fat and healthy. However, she also believes that anyone who is fat and has certain health problems (like my dad) MUST lose weight to improve those health problems. Thus, supposedly, central to her obsession with my dad's weight is his health. While I believe that my mom is genuinely motivated by concern for my dad's health, I think she's also motivated by fat hatred. If it were just about health she wouldn't treat him the way she does. To demonstrate my point, consider the following:
My mom's Why-My-Dad-Is-Fat Theory is this: My dad is ultra-stressed out all the time and also never really learned healthy eating habits. As an outlet for his stress, he eats tons of SugarFat, causing him to gain weight. This weight gain will ultimately lead to a premature and horrible death. Now, if we assume this theory is accurate, does my mom's behavior make sense? To fat-hating folks, it probably makes sense: she needs to correct him on his eating because obviously he doesn't have the self-control to regulate himself. In this hypothetical situation, my dad's eating habits are self-destructive and slowly killing him. In the media, out in the world and in my own house, fat-hating folks are constantly claiming that obesity is literally the same as being addicted to drugs and that it's an epidemic of death equal to a fatal disease. My dad's at an age where a lot of these supposed fat-related deaths tend to occur. If the anti-obesity folks genuinely believe the dire claims they say they do, you'd expect their behavior to match up, especially when it comes to people who they think may die in the next few years. So, let's consider whether my mom's behavior would be considered health-motivated and reasonable if my dad was actually engaging in potentially fatal, self destructive behavior...
Revisiting my mom's Why-My-Dad-Is-Fat Theory...
My mom's Why-My-Dad-Self-Harms Theory is this: My dad is ultra-stressed out and depressed all the time. As an outlet for his feelings, he cuts himself. Although he is not actually suicidal, there is reason to believe his self-harm will slowly kill him.
My mom's Why-My-Dad-Is-Anorexic Theory is this: My dad believes his worth as a person is tied up in whether he meets certain beauty standards, he's stressed out, feels like his life is out of control and deals with it by controlling what he eats.
In either of the above two situations, would scoff-grunts, shame-stares, eyerolls and belittling be considered appropriate responses when someone shows signs of a self-destructive behavior? If you noticed someone with anorexia not eating, would it be reasonable to give them an I-Can't-Believe-You're-Being-So-Obnoxious shame-stare and then say, voice dripping with disdain "Jeez! You already skipped breakfast today, now you're not going to eat lunch?" or "I know you would eat just lettuce for a meal." If I'm meant to take seriously the claim that my dad's alleged compulsion to eat too much could kill him at any minute, most likely within the next few years... shouldn't I be horrified at the way my mother and other people treat him? Supposedly he has this stress-induced compulsion that endangers his life, but instead of sympathy and understanding, instead of acting like the situation is tragic or serious in any way, people basically just scold him and act disgusted. I am of course not arguing that people SHOULD act like my dad's fatness is tragic, since it's not. What I am saying is that, on some level, the obesity-panic people, including my mother, can't really believe what they claim to believe. Or, if they do, they're cruel hypocrites. Rather, I think people who behave this way toward fat family members, including my mother, are mostly just policing fat people for Being Fat because that is Bad and Gross. I basically feel like my mother's reaction to my dad's eating things is nearly indistinguishable from her reaction to the fact that my sister and I are unmanageable slobs. Furthermore, my mother isn't some horrible exception and her behavior doesn't represent any big departure from the message of mainstream fat policing. I want to make clear I'm not singling her out as being particularly awful because, sadly, she's not. She's just another example of the norm. As a result, ultimately, I think, the message I receive about my father from fat-shaming concern trolls is that a person I love is slowly dying in front of me, but that I shouldn't take it seriously or empathize with him because he's fat.
Thursday, December 30, 2010
Current Most Annoying Commercial
So there’s this line of commercials for a no-calorie sweetener called Truvia that drive me completely up the wall. I’m going to link to one in particular, but with a warning that this jingle will not leave my mind and that’s part of the reason the campaign makes me so mad, so know what you’re getting into. Thankfully this post came up in a quick google search to not only confirm I’m not the only one who hates this, but to give me a transcript for those who don’t want the jingle stuck in their head. Thanks!
I loved you sweetness
but you're not sweet, you made my butt fat.
You drove me insane,
self-control down the drain.
We're over I'm so done with that.
I found a new love,
a natural true love
that comes from a little green leaf.
Zero calorie guilt free
no artificiality,
my skinny jeans zipped in relief
it's name is truvia
I had no idea
no more sprinkling my coffee with grief.
Truvia: Honestly Sweet.
Possibly the worst part is that I like the rhyme scheme enough to break up the text this way. It’s a very clever little song, and I hate it.
First thing: what is the “self-control down the drain” supposed to be? It shows her eating an entire piece of cake, albeit kind of fast. Is her mistake supposed to be in wolfing it down in a few bites? In finishing an entire piece (gasp!)? In eating cake to begin with? I don’t know, but as someone with a history of binge-eating episodes, even if the commercial never intended to bring up that idea (which I’m sure it did, as of course all we fatties binge) I felt the experience very trivialized. I’m going to write about that experience another day – I’m still on vacation, and in too good a mood this week to bring that back up.
But even more than the idea that I should feel guilty for eating real sugar because it will make me fat, there’s something about the metaphor of sugar as a bad boyfriend that….well, I can’t find a more technical way to say this, but icks me out.
The commercial sets a dichotomy between real sugar – who seems sweet but actually hurts the singer and was psychologically abusive – and Truvia, who puts her back to “normal”. For some reason, that’s the thing that I hate most about the commercial. There are others in the line that focus more on the sugar aspect, and they’re still annoying but not so creepy.
Sugar is not abusive.
Eating things made with real sugar does not in and of itself make you fat. And eating fake sugar doesn’t in and of itself make you thin. And frankly, gaining a pant size is not at all the same thing as being emotionally abused.
It’s more of this weird advertising correlation between sweets and relationships when they market to women. It’s just weird. And it’s so blatant. Really, Truvia, I promise that women who really binge, women who are actually fat, even women who are as thin as your model there, don’t treat sugar like they treat a significant other. It’s creepy. Stop it.
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