Are you a BBW (Big, Beautiful Woman)? Are you striving to be this? Is this a goal in your life, something you've always wanted to be? Or is it something you are "saddled" with and being so "saddled" have managed to "deal" with the excesses of appetite and engorged fat cells by softening the jelly tissue with euphemism?
If being a BBW is your goal in life, then I do applaud you. I have always despised my fat body which I converted to thin these past three years and now feel a modicum of happiness for redeeming myself. I was born too late to be impacted by Carole Shaw's BBW Magazine in 1979 and the feminist or weightist movement of Fat Acceptance which is relentlessly crawling at a snail's pace toward enlightening a dark world. Nevertheless, it is disturbing the molecules of our culture in an attempt to right the scales of injustice away from the power dominance of thin chauvinists.
You do know there are websites where BBW and BBM can feel unloved no longer. (www.largeandlovely.com/ and www.bbwpersonalsplus.com/ ) And if the BBW and BBM truly, honestly and sincerely love their appearance, their soul and their health, then I am very happy for them. But what do they do when the jokes vampire their jugular? And the blood gougers do come to feast on obese carcasses. From where I sit, the culture does not prize FAT in any shape or form, regardless of how hard Fat Acceptance adherents strive to make it so.
The Urban Slang Dictionary defining BBW has posted many entries. (http://www.urbandictionary.com/definephp?term=BBW&page=4 ) And they are not pretty. On the first page of the site definition for BBW, an entry posted 2003 made me think that maybe attitudes toward obese women had gotten better seven years later. NOT! A June 2010 entry states a BBW is "delusional enough to think that she has any physically attractive qualities." Another entry states the acronym stands for "Big Blue Whale," another "Beast Beyond Whale." And these are the more gentle epithets.
So who cares? The urban slang dictionary is crude and most of the entries are made by younger contributors. (Somehow, I can't imagine the 55 year old making such comments.) My concern is that the posts are a very telling social barometer of youth and perhaps economic class. If you were an overweight teenage girl, how would you brace against such attitudes? If she were your daughter, would you keep yourself apprised of such terrorism to counteract it? How would you counteract it? With Fat Acceptance?
More on this next week...and the teenagers who made a suicide pact, one of whom had been bullied about her weight (and she was far from being obese).
Monday, May 9, 2011
Sunday, May 8, 2011
Stay Up to Date on The Fat and the Skinny
We are what we eat! We are what we think about food! We are what we think about our weight! Don't miss the upcoming weeks on this blog! It's about you and your loved ones!
BI -WEEKLY SCHEDULE
Mondays (twice a month) Controversial issues related to weight and health: i.e. Obesity vs. Fat Acceptance; Overweight and Fitness vs. Underweight and Unhealthiness; The Impossibility of Weight Maintenance, Feederism, Fat Fetishism, to name a few topics.
Tuesday (twice a month): American Cultural Assumptions about weight. (survey questions about people's perceptions related to weight issues.) Example: Obese women do not appear to be as industrious or intelligent as thin women. a)strongly disagree b)somewhat disagree c)somewhat agree d)strongly agree e)unsure
Wednesday: Testimonials Guests and volunteers will weigh in on their weight loss successes, failures, diets, weight loss tips, caveats, carbuncles, surgeries and will post before and after photos, or any other health issues related to fitness, dieting, recepies or meal plans that encourage healthy eating.
Thursday (once a month): Rotating topics: 1)All About Food Secrets: Share your secret stories related to food, i.e. a)foods you snuck to the dog when your parents weren't looking; b)foods you've binged on to excess; c)foods you pretended to eat and when the hostess wasn't looking put in a napkin and threw away; 2..Murphy's Laws for Fatties - A "law" will be presented and you and a guest will be asked to agree/disagree/discuss the "truth" of the law based upon experience.
3. Food List Five -Each week a list of 5 food items will be given based upon a central idea. Example: what are 5 food items your family goes through the quickest in a week?
Friday: Lifestyles Day (Alternative or otherwise) I will devote this day to reviewing books, websites, diets, recipes, restaurants, other resources, others' review posts about the above especially but not limited to organic, vegan, green, local, live, and forward thinking (books, music, recipes, restaurants, etc.) about healthy eating. I will also have, once a month, JUNK FOOD FIASCO FRIDAYS, devoted to reviewing junk food: restaurants, food items, Food TV shows that subtly promote junky food, advertisements, etc. Contributors will come up with egregious and hypocritical examples of junk food being promoted as healthy...but which is a masquerade of high caloric, highly addictive 0 nutritional refuse.
BI -WEEKLY SCHEDULE
Mondays (twice a month) Controversial issues related to weight and health: i.e. Obesity vs. Fat Acceptance; Overweight and Fitness vs. Underweight and Unhealthiness; The Impossibility of Weight Maintenance, Feederism, Fat Fetishism, to name a few topics.
Tuesday (twice a month): American Cultural Assumptions about weight. (survey questions about people's perceptions related to weight issues.) Example: Obese women do not appear to be as industrious or intelligent as thin women. a)strongly disagree b)somewhat disagree c)somewhat agree d)strongly agree e)unsure
Wednesday: Testimonials Guests and volunteers will weigh in on their weight loss successes, failures, diets, weight loss tips, caveats, carbuncles, surgeries and will post before and after photos, or any other health issues related to fitness, dieting, recepies or meal plans that encourage healthy eating.
Thursday (once a month): Rotating topics: 1)All About Food Secrets: Share your secret stories related to food, i.e. a)foods you snuck to the dog when your parents weren't looking; b)foods you've binged on to excess; c)foods you pretended to eat and when the hostess wasn't looking put in a napkin and threw away; 2..Murphy's Laws for Fatties - A "law" will be presented and you and a guest will be asked to agree/disagree/discuss the "truth" of the law based upon experience.
3. Food List Five -Each week a list of 5 food items will be given based upon a central idea. Example: what are 5 food items your family goes through the quickest in a week?
Friday: Lifestyles Day (Alternative or otherwise) I will devote this day to reviewing books, websites, diets, recipes, restaurants, other resources, others' review posts about the above especially but not limited to organic, vegan, green, local, live, and forward thinking (books, music, recipes, restaurants, etc.) about healthy eating. I will also have, once a month, JUNK FOOD FIASCO FRIDAYS, devoted to reviewing junk food: restaurants, food items, Food TV shows that subtly promote junky food, advertisements, etc. Contributors will come up with egregious and hypocritical examples of junk food being promoted as healthy...but which is a masquerade of high caloric, highly addictive 0 nutritional refuse.
I Just Want to Testify!
My father died in 1998 after a long, protracted illness during which my brother and I took care of him in the family home. By the end he needed care, 24/7, and my brother and I took turns being there for him, along with a home health care aide. We were happy he was at home and not in a nursing facility, but though the situation was stressful, his death was much more stressful because I ended up not only grieving my Dad, but my mom's death all over again. You see, she had died in a car accident when I was 23 and I never truly dealt with the pain of her loss. So as I grieved them both I expanded into an adipose balloon of almost 240 pounds, the heaviest I'd ever been.
By the way, I LOST WEIGHT on every single one of these plans using one or more of the endorphin exercise chasers to swallow the bitterness of the pill of "starving" my fat cells. Future blog testimonials will highlight the craziness and hilarity of some of my body imbroglios during these diets, but only if you promise to share yours. We could fill books with our humorous anecdotes about plumping down.
Fat Acceptance (http://www.naafaonline.com/dev2/ ) authors Kate Harding (http://kateharding.net/about/) and Marianne Kirby (http://www.therotound.com/) assert in their much appreciated and clever book, Lessons From the Fat-O-Sphere: Quit Dieting and Declare a Truce with Your Body, that you should accept that diets don't work. To that, I say Ha!!! Diets do work! Every diet works YOU over by helping you get weight off quickly. However, here is a HUMGOUOUS caveat. Why do you want to lose weight? If the answer comes from a well of darkness and shadow land of Gothic emotional chaos then Watson, you need to find your Sherlock and discover the "Why" by examining deep, deep, deep down, underneath all the layers to the onion's core. You see, once weight is lost, then what?
For me, shallow gal, I just was frantic about getting those numbers on the scale to ramp down at hyper speed. So I rampaged headlong into all these weight loss panaceas out of an emotional abyss of self-hatred at my fat APPEARANCE without asking these questions: 1) For how long am I going to lose? 2) Is this plan effective for keeping weight off permanently?3) Will I be hungry? (stupid question) 4)Will the plan stir up my will power or do I have to generate it myself? 5)Will I be bored out of my mind? 6)Can I fall off it and easily recover in one or two days or will I just give up? 7)Will the plan exhaust me? 8)Is my goal just to lose weight? 9) What is the plan's maintenance component? 10)How will I respond to stress, emotional lows, frustrations and petty life annoyances while monitoring my eating? 11)Does the diet allow for my food addictions or does it abjectly restrict them like a gestapo? AND the most vital of prodigiously vital questions: WHY AND THE HELL AM I SUBJECTING MYSELF TO SUCH PAIN? (Remember, a fat cell looks to be sated as it has always been and it howls in misery when it isn't. It knows nothing about BMI.)
Well, around 2005, I retired from my education career and my grieving became less and less acute. I traveled, played tennis, wrote a novel and had a blast. And in between I did my usual yo-yo dieting (losing the same 50 pounds so I weighed around 185) to "look good" on my trips to Italy to visit family. But in 2008 I was back up to 215 pounds. (At 5'5.6" my BMI was 35.1 Obese I and heading for Obese II, which is Morbid Obesity.) Obviously, I had stopped dieting.
Then, it happened and I'll never forget it. One morning I woke up startled and shocked after a frightening dream which I can't remember. I had an epiphany. I knew I had a fatty liver and I was unwell. I knew I was curtailing my life expectancy. I myself was doing it, no one but me. I had come to the end of myself. And now I had the answer to WHY. I had found my Sherlock!
That moment of revelation and panic saved me. I changed everything I did, including my eating patterns and selection of foods. I discovered I had a gluten allergy. I avoided all white flour products. I read books and having learned all my life about those various meal plans, I had the expertise to make up a plan that suited me and was convenient to my schedule and obligations. And I enjoyed playing tennis. During the course of two years, I lost over 100 pounds. And I wrote about my reactions and others' reactions to my weight loss (very surprising). And I eventually will publish my book (which is not the usual "How to lose weight and keep it off" book, nor is it a book elucidating what to do with yourself being fat). It is very different. I'm different.
After three years, my BMI is 21 and I still weigh 132. But this is today. Wish me luck. My story is ongoing and tomorrow is another day.
A chubbette since I was a kid, my fat cells cried like babies whenever I dieted. Like you or others you know who are buffeted by the winds of the latest dieting trends, I tried the Low Calorie Diet, the old Weight Watchers Diet, Atkins, The Watermelon Diet, The Milk Diet, Richard Simmons Weight Loss Plan, The Peanut Butter Diet, The Slimfast Diet Plan, The Low Carb Diet, The Salad Diet, The Low Fat Diet, The South Beach Diet, The Herbal Life Slim Shakes Plan, the Bologna Diet, The Grapefruit Diet, The Banana Diet, the No White Bread Diet, the No Sugar Diet, The Zucchini and Tomato Sauce with Parmesan Cheese Diet, The Health Bars Diet and I'm sure I tried others but I must have gone off them after the second week, because I can't remember. I bought the THE book about dieting or cooking low fat touted on TV whenever I watched Oprah or Phil Donahue (You probably don't remember him, but he and Oprah were rivals.) I tried Fasting, Diet Pills (in high school) The Stepper, Jane Fonda's Exercise Tapes, other exercise tapes, dance tapes, NOT EATING (that didn't last...I was "starving") Tony Robbins motivational tapes, The AB Lounger, Exercise Bands, free weights, gym memberships numerous times, tennis, badminton, Yoga, running, walking and calisthenics at home. I am proud to say at one point I got up to three hundred sit-ups. Yes, I did!
By the way, I LOST WEIGHT on every single one of these plans using one or more of the endorphin exercise chasers to swallow the bitterness of the pill of "starving" my fat cells. Future blog testimonials will highlight the craziness and hilarity of some of my body imbroglios during these diets, but only if you promise to share yours. We could fill books with our humorous anecdotes about plumping down.
Fat Acceptance (http://www.naafaonline.com/dev2/ ) authors Kate Harding (http://kateharding.net/about/) and Marianne Kirby (http://www.therotound.com/) assert in their much appreciated and clever book, Lessons From the Fat-O-Sphere: Quit Dieting and Declare a Truce with Your Body, that you should accept that diets don't work. To that, I say Ha!!! Diets do work! Every diet works YOU over by helping you get weight off quickly. However, here is a HUMGOUOUS caveat. Why do you want to lose weight? If the answer comes from a well of darkness and shadow land of Gothic emotional chaos then Watson, you need to find your Sherlock and discover the "Why" by examining deep, deep, deep down, underneath all the layers to the onion's core. You see, once weight is lost, then what?
For me, shallow gal, I just was frantic about getting those numbers on the scale to ramp down at hyper speed. So I rampaged headlong into all these weight loss panaceas out of an emotional abyss of self-hatred at my fat APPEARANCE without asking these questions: 1) For how long am I going to lose? 2) Is this plan effective for keeping weight off permanently?3) Will I be hungry? (stupid question) 4)Will the plan stir up my will power or do I have to generate it myself? 5)Will I be bored out of my mind? 6)Can I fall off it and easily recover in one or two days or will I just give up? 7)Will the plan exhaust me? 8)Is my goal just to lose weight? 9) What is the plan's maintenance component? 10)How will I respond to stress, emotional lows, frustrations and petty life annoyances while monitoring my eating? 11)Does the diet allow for my food addictions or does it abjectly restrict them like a gestapo? AND the most vital of prodigiously vital questions: WHY AND THE HELL AM I SUBJECTING MYSELF TO SUCH PAIN? (Remember, a fat cell looks to be sated as it has always been and it howls in misery when it isn't. It knows nothing about BMI.)
Well, around 2005, I retired from my education career and my grieving became less and less acute. I traveled, played tennis, wrote a novel and had a blast. And in between I did my usual yo-yo dieting (losing the same 50 pounds so I weighed around 185) to "look good" on my trips to Italy to visit family. But in 2008 I was back up to 215 pounds. (At 5'5.6" my BMI was 35.1 Obese I and heading for Obese II, which is Morbid Obesity.) Obviously, I had stopped dieting.
Then, it happened and I'll never forget it. One morning I woke up startled and shocked after a frightening dream which I can't remember. I had an epiphany. I knew I had a fatty liver and I was unwell. I knew I was curtailing my life expectancy. I myself was doing it, no one but me. I had come to the end of myself. And now I had the answer to WHY. I had found my Sherlock!
That moment of revelation and panic saved me. I changed everything I did, including my eating patterns and selection of foods. I discovered I had a gluten allergy. I avoided all white flour products. I read books and having learned all my life about those various meal plans, I had the expertise to make up a plan that suited me and was convenient to my schedule and obligations. And I enjoyed playing tennis. During the course of two years, I lost over 100 pounds. And I wrote about my reactions and others' reactions to my weight loss (very surprising). And I eventually will publish my book (which is not the usual "How to lose weight and keep it off" book, nor is it a book elucidating what to do with yourself being fat). It is very different. I'm different.
After three years, my BMI is 21 and I still weigh 132. But this is today. Wish me luck. My story is ongoing and tomorrow is another day.
Saturday, May 7, 2011
Mother's Day Memo: Stand Healthy or Give In?
Another celebration (Mother's Day) brings shudders to my lips and hips. How do I not overindulge on the sumptuous home made appetizer pastry puffs, barbecue ribs with special hot sauce, cajun grilled chicken, curried beef, veggie fritters, corn on the cob, cesear salad (with the real home made dressing) and for dessert, butter cookies, hersey vanilla ice cream topping lucious pecan pie or apple crumb pie and mocha creme cheese cake? (We haven't even discussed the alcohol, yet.)
I'm invited to a gathering. How can I enjoy these foods and not gain a pound, maybe two? I could resist and BMOF (bring my own food), eat the Caesar salad and have two low calorie dishes instead (http://video.about.com/lowfatcooking/Low-Fat-Black-Bean-Soup.htm) (http://video.about.com/lowfatcooking/Low-Fat-Mini-Chicken-Meatloaf.htm) keeping my backside to the desserts and my mouth facing forward and away from their alluring visuals. I could just eat the chicken and salad. Basta! But for me, it's never basta where home cooked meals are prepared. Maybe I could be fitted with a muzzle.
I wish we could just go out to eat at Blue Hill Farms restaurant (http://www.bluehillfarms.com/) for a superb made to order meal, completely organic, with small portions, a reasonable appetite controller. Or maybe Candle 79 (http://www.candle79.com/) organic, local, green, healthy, nothing supersized. Eating out is easier for me. I feel GUILTY not eating what others have labored hard to present beautifully and bountfully. And they always offer dishes for you to take home; too much food!
What are you doing for Mother's Day? Eating out or partying at home? If you are eating out, what is the restaurant, in what city or area, what are its great dishes and does it prepare organic, local or green fare? If you are eating at home or someone's house, how do you approach the holidays? Are you careful or do you sample everything and have seconds if it's exceptional, worrying about the calories tomorrow? After all, it's Mother's Day! You deserve it! Right? NOT!!!
I'm invited to a gathering. How can I enjoy these foods and not gain a pound, maybe two? I could resist and BMOF (bring my own food), eat the Caesar salad and have two low calorie dishes instead (http://video.about.com/lowfatcooking/Low-Fat-Black-Bean-Soup.htm) (http://video.about.com/lowfatcooking/Low-Fat-Mini-Chicken-Meatloaf.htm) keeping my backside to the desserts and my mouth facing forward and away from their alluring visuals. I could just eat the chicken and salad. Basta! But for me, it's never basta where home cooked meals are prepared. Maybe I could be fitted with a muzzle.
I wish we could just go out to eat at Blue Hill Farms restaurant (http://www.bluehillfarms.com/) for a superb made to order meal, completely organic, with small portions, a reasonable appetite controller. Or maybe Candle 79 (http://www.candle79.com/) organic, local, green, healthy, nothing supersized. Eating out is easier for me. I feel GUILTY not eating what others have labored hard to present beautifully and bountfully. And they always offer dishes for you to take home; too much food!
What are you doing for Mother's Day? Eating out or partying at home? If you are eating out, what is the restaurant, in what city or area, what are its great dishes and does it prepare organic, local or green fare? If you are eating at home or someone's house, how do you approach the holidays? Are you careful or do you sample everything and have seconds if it's exceptional, worrying about the calories tomorrow? After all, it's Mother's Day! You deserve it! Right? NOT!!!
Friday, May 6, 2011
Wednesday, May 4, 2011
Can we maintain a healthy weight, when "the whole world is watching?"
While we are in the first week's throes, still starry-eyed from the royal nuptials of Kate and William, I wonder if those of you who enjoyed the beautiful and awe-inspiring ceremony noticed how slender the Duchess of Cambridge looked. I don't normally follow celebrity weight gain or loss, however, for the brief moments I did watch the ceremony last Friday, I couldn't help but mark the reed-like, tapering waist of Kate in that fabulous, white gown. The style was slimming, by all means, but the slenderness was all Kate's as white actually portrays a heavier appearance.
Upon further investigation online, my suspicions were confirmed. I found numerous articles about her weight loss, her mother's weight loss and the frenzied weight loss of others who had been invited to the wedding. My heart went out to all who attended, even the Queen mother. For you see, all of the women knew the "whole world would be watching," (reportedly 1-2 billion people, probably more) and they were going to do their utmost to look the most beautiful, the most brilliant and the thinnest they could, because the pictures were going to be historic and extend in perpetuity. God forbid they should appear heavy, out of fashion or something other than they wished, i.e. downright unattractive.
Now, come on. You know you can identify. How many times have you lost weight for a special occasion because you absolutely refused to look other than your best in the photos that were sure to follow. And especially those candid shots when the photographer (regardless of his/her professionalism) just aims the camera at the bride or the one celebrated, and you happened to get in the shot and your flabby arms look worse than normal and you can't press the edit or delete button???? I can't tell you how many times that's happened to moi!
How much more celebrities and royalty must feel this! For them one step out the gates of Buckingham or Beverly Hills is one step into photography hell with the papparizzi demons voracious, salivating for any imperfection in appearance or behavior which will make profitable copy. Yes, I realize I am a poor little person, and who am I to feel pity for my betters? I may be just a cat, but even a cat can look at royalty and power and still feel sympathy. This wedding especially was one of those few times I could empathize and be thankful that I didn't have to be concerned with looking slender and fabulous before the cameras.
More and more, royalty, celebrity and yours truly are oppressed by what is now becoming the global "Culture of Thin." (Fat Acceptance groups excepted, perhaps and that might be a good reason for me to join one!!!) Come on, I mean even in Mexico where at one time the culture was more forgiving of overweight women, there has been a shift against the gorditas. (http://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/03/30/spreading-fat-stigma-around-the-globe/ ) God forbid if Kate showed up weighing in at 140 pounds at her 5'10" height! (BMI Normal range of 20.1) That weight "sounds" positively heavy in our thin obsessed culture, though doctors would say it is in the Normal range for her height, Normal being 18.5-25.9 on the BMI calculator. On that same BMI calculator which doctors use to determine whether one is Underweight, Normal, Overweight or Obese in addition to other factors, Kate's BMI number for 120 pounds, 5'10" is in fact Underweight 17.2. (www.nhlbisupport.com/bmi/ ) And I am not so sure I believe that she weighs 120 pounds at 5'10". One article I read said that was before the wedding and that she was continuing to lose weight right up until William kissed her in that stunning, never-to-be-forgotten romantic, "ahhh"...moment on the balcony of Buckingham. To photograph beautifully, as she did, appearing stately and lithe, she may weigh under 120 pounds. Only she knows for sure.
She looked fabulous, though, did she not? And she did what she had to to look that way. The problem is, she must still continue to look fabulous because then and for the rest of her life, "the whole world is watching," and she is a personnage who matters, someone who will influence the time from fashion trends to personal styles. Global populations of women all ages will observe her aging, her gaining weight, especially during her pregnancies, her behaviors...because her fame is profitable copy, and all the industries related to keeping her celebrity before us, including ancillary industries-the weight loss industry, the fashion industry, the advertising industry, etc., will use her celebrity to earn their keep.
What would you do if you were Kate at this point? Would you feel pressured by the media and global opinion to maintain the weight you lost recently? Or would you let yourself go and have that small bag of Doritos (Do royals eat junk food?) or have some lucious red velvet cake, let your cheeks plump up four pounds after the cameras have dimmed their lights for a session? Problem is, the next time she is photographed, if she looks a smidge heavier, one of the noxious British rags like The Globe and Mail or an American rag like Star will surely take a snap or two and the crest of rounded skin on her diminished angular cheekbone will be plastered world-wide and she will ruefully have to begin her Dukan Diet (http://abcnews.go.com/Health/dukan-diet-kate-middleton-linked-high-protein-weight/story?id=13404369 ) all over again. Such is the misery of a globally celebrated Duchess and potential future Queen. What an exacting price to be paid! Is it worth it in the long run? What's that you say? Of course, you dim wit!!!
Well, what about you? Are you happy at your current weight? Or would you like to lose a few pounds to look uber svelt like Kate? Or maybe more than a few pounds for that upcoming family or friend wedding or engagement party or special event or interview? Well, if you are interested in losing some extra fatty baggage reasonably and painlessly (I haven't tried it, so I am not vouching for this but Kate and her mom and others did and it worked and they didn't feel hungry, apparently) then this website will help you. www.dukandiet.com/ There you will find a way (I did this and was happy to discover that I didn't need to lose any weight according to Dr. Pierre, though I would still like to lose a few pounds. Doesn't everybody?) to figure out what the French author of the diet, Dr. Pierre Dukan characterizes as your "True Weight." (www.dukandiet.com/calculate-your-true-weight).
Let's face it...the French have a fairly good handle on their weight issues. Every time I went to France (when I was 100 pounds heavier) I felt like a chubbasaur (and I was) because the women in Paris and even in the countryside were slim. I think I saw one obese person the entire time I was there (two weeks) AND THAT WOMAN, GOD BLESS HER, WAS AN AMERICAN!!! I have a French Canadian buddy, Jacques, OK, granted he is French Canadian (but he's still French) and his eating habits are excellent. He never eats between meals and he makes sure to prepare himself home cooking with, bien sur, a glass of red wine for dinner. Relative to other men his age and stature, he looks good and has kept his weight in check.
Perusing the The Dukan Diet, what I really like about it is that it is low carb and low fat. I think that is important. If we are addicted to fats and carbs in combination, there is a greater likelihood that we will put weight back on after weight loss. Another thing I like about the diet is that it has stages (www.dukandiet.com/the-dukan-diet). At each stage, you are eating differently. This really beats the repitiousness of other diets which always bored me to death. Finally, I like the fact that there is an attempt to deal with maintenance. This is crucial. Maintenance is next to, if not impossible. I know. I have yo-yoed 12 major times in my life trying all sorts of diets (including Weight Watchers www.weightwatchers.com/ ) with little yo-yos in between. (Currently, I'm doing well with a 100 pound weight loss over 3 years.) How to not gain weight back? Another topic for another day. But at least the diet deals with maintenance, unlike a lot of other diets which, once you've lost your weight (if you ever got to your target...I almost got there once) throw you back to your starving fat cells without a battle plan or defense routine to thwart their cries of "feed me, feed, NOW!"
So, for Kate and for me and maybe for some of you, the problem is (depending upon profession and where we live...if it's in a relatively more obese state or not) the culture REQUIRES a THIN APPEARANCE, as the accepted way to be. And dear readers, I will be long dead before sanity will return to overthrow what may be our cultural obession with "Fat Think/ThinThink." and "Mirror, Mirror on the Wall, Who's the Thinnest One of all!" For now, it looks like it's Kate, Duchess of Cambridge. And potential future Queen.
That's The Fat and The Skinny for today, May 4, 2011 copywrighted Carole Di Tosti
Upon further investigation online, my suspicions were confirmed. I found numerous articles about her weight loss, her mother's weight loss and the frenzied weight loss of others who had been invited to the wedding. My heart went out to all who attended, even the Queen mother. For you see, all of the women knew the "whole world would be watching," (reportedly 1-2 billion people, probably more) and they were going to do their utmost to look the most beautiful, the most brilliant and the thinnest they could, because the pictures were going to be historic and extend in perpetuity. God forbid they should appear heavy, out of fashion or something other than they wished, i.e. downright unattractive.
Now, come on. You know you can identify. How many times have you lost weight for a special occasion because you absolutely refused to look other than your best in the photos that were sure to follow. And especially those candid shots when the photographer (regardless of his/her professionalism) just aims the camera at the bride or the one celebrated, and you happened to get in the shot and your flabby arms look worse than normal and you can't press the edit or delete button???? I can't tell you how many times that's happened to moi!
How much more celebrities and royalty must feel this! For them one step out the gates of Buckingham or Beverly Hills is one step into photography hell with the papparizzi demons voracious, salivating for any imperfection in appearance or behavior which will make profitable copy. Yes, I realize I am a poor little person, and who am I to feel pity for my betters? I may be just a cat, but even a cat can look at royalty and power and still feel sympathy. This wedding especially was one of those few times I could empathize and be thankful that I didn't have to be concerned with looking slender and fabulous before the cameras.
More and more, royalty, celebrity and yours truly are oppressed by what is now becoming the global "Culture of Thin." (Fat Acceptance groups excepted, perhaps and that might be a good reason for me to join one!!!) Come on, I mean even in Mexico where at one time the culture was more forgiving of overweight women, there has been a shift against the gorditas. (http://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/03/30/spreading-fat-stigma-around-the-globe/ ) God forbid if Kate showed up weighing in at 140 pounds at her 5'10" height! (BMI Normal range of 20.1) That weight "sounds" positively heavy in our thin obsessed culture, though doctors would say it is in the Normal range for her height, Normal being 18.5-25.9 on the BMI calculator. On that same BMI calculator which doctors use to determine whether one is Underweight, Normal, Overweight or Obese in addition to other factors, Kate's BMI number for 120 pounds, 5'10" is in fact Underweight 17.2. (www.nhlbisupport.com/bmi/ ) And I am not so sure I believe that she weighs 120 pounds at 5'10". One article I read said that was before the wedding and that she was continuing to lose weight right up until William kissed her in that stunning, never-to-be-forgotten romantic, "ahhh"...moment on the balcony of Buckingham. To photograph beautifully, as she did, appearing stately and lithe, she may weigh under 120 pounds. Only she knows for sure.
She looked fabulous, though, did she not? And she did what she had to to look that way. The problem is, she must still continue to look fabulous because then and for the rest of her life, "the whole world is watching," and she is a personnage who matters, someone who will influence the time from fashion trends to personal styles. Global populations of women all ages will observe her aging, her gaining weight, especially during her pregnancies, her behaviors...because her fame is profitable copy, and all the industries related to keeping her celebrity before us, including ancillary industries-the weight loss industry, the fashion industry, the advertising industry, etc., will use her celebrity to earn their keep.
What would you do if you were Kate at this point? Would you feel pressured by the media and global opinion to maintain the weight you lost recently? Or would you let yourself go and have that small bag of Doritos (Do royals eat junk food?) or have some lucious red velvet cake, let your cheeks plump up four pounds after the cameras have dimmed their lights for a session? Problem is, the next time she is photographed, if she looks a smidge heavier, one of the noxious British rags like The Globe and Mail or an American rag like Star will surely take a snap or two and the crest of rounded skin on her diminished angular cheekbone will be plastered world-wide and she will ruefully have to begin her Dukan Diet (http://abcnews.go.com/Health/dukan-diet-kate-middleton-linked-high-protein-weight/story?id=13404369 ) all over again. Such is the misery of a globally celebrated Duchess and potential future Queen. What an exacting price to be paid! Is it worth it in the long run? What's that you say? Of course, you dim wit!!!
Well, what about you? Are you happy at your current weight? Or would you like to lose a few pounds to look uber svelt like Kate? Or maybe more than a few pounds for that upcoming family or friend wedding or engagement party or special event or interview? Well, if you are interested in losing some extra fatty baggage reasonably and painlessly (I haven't tried it, so I am not vouching for this but Kate and her mom and others did and it worked and they didn't feel hungry, apparently) then this website will help you. www.dukandiet.com/ There you will find a way (I did this and was happy to discover that I didn't need to lose any weight according to Dr. Pierre, though I would still like to lose a few pounds. Doesn't everybody?) to figure out what the French author of the diet, Dr. Pierre Dukan characterizes as your "True Weight." (www.dukandiet.com/calculate-your-true-weight).
Let's face it...the French have a fairly good handle on their weight issues. Every time I went to France (when I was 100 pounds heavier) I felt like a chubbasaur (and I was) because the women in Paris and even in the countryside were slim. I think I saw one obese person the entire time I was there (two weeks) AND THAT WOMAN, GOD BLESS HER, WAS AN AMERICAN!!! I have a French Canadian buddy, Jacques, OK, granted he is French Canadian (but he's still French) and his eating habits are excellent. He never eats between meals and he makes sure to prepare himself home cooking with, bien sur, a glass of red wine for dinner. Relative to other men his age and stature, he looks good and has kept his weight in check.
Perusing the The Dukan Diet, what I really like about it is that it is low carb and low fat. I think that is important. If we are addicted to fats and carbs in combination, there is a greater likelihood that we will put weight back on after weight loss. Another thing I like about the diet is that it has stages (www.dukandiet.com/the-dukan-diet). At each stage, you are eating differently. This really beats the repitiousness of other diets which always bored me to death. Finally, I like the fact that there is an attempt to deal with maintenance. This is crucial. Maintenance is next to, if not impossible. I know. I have yo-yoed 12 major times in my life trying all sorts of diets (including Weight Watchers www.weightwatchers.com/ ) with little yo-yos in between. (Currently, I'm doing well with a 100 pound weight loss over 3 years.) How to not gain weight back? Another topic for another day. But at least the diet deals with maintenance, unlike a lot of other diets which, once you've lost your weight (if you ever got to your target...I almost got there once) throw you back to your starving fat cells without a battle plan or defense routine to thwart their cries of "feed me, feed, NOW!"
So, for Kate and for me and maybe for some of you, the problem is (depending upon profession and where we live...if it's in a relatively more obese state or not) the culture REQUIRES a THIN APPEARANCE, as the accepted way to be. And dear readers, I will be long dead before sanity will return to overthrow what may be our cultural obession with "Fat Think/ThinThink." and "Mirror, Mirror on the Wall, Who's the Thinnest One of all!" For now, it looks like it's Kate, Duchess of Cambridge. And potential future Queen.
That's The Fat and The Skinny for today, May 4, 2011 copywrighted Carole Di Tosti
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