Fat Tuesdays, Huge, and acceptance

Tuesdays are my weigh in day. Only because I signed up on a Monday night and started the next morning. For the last several months I have been in a weird pattern that exactly coincides with my monthly cycle. So for the first two weeks I maintain, the third week, as soon as the egg drops, I lose a pound or two, and the fourth week, when I am a raving, starving pms lunatic, I lose three or four. This week I lost four. I fed the beast. I used 20 weeklies, but went out three times, so it is likely some of those calculations were off. The last two months I have lost at least one pound every week, except last week when I had the one pound gain. So I lose about 6 pounds a month. This morning I was at 189, woo hoo! Which means in one month, I should be around 183. My next big milestone is 185. A. That will be 70 lost, and b. that puts me as "overweight" on the charts and not obese. I am trying to kick up the exercise, so maybe I will get there sooner!

So last week I see an ad with a picture of actress Nikki Blonsky, who is overweight, and the title HUGE. Of course I immediately think, wtf? It is a new show that premiered last night on abc family. Well, a few days ago they started talking about it on the WW message boards. The post I read was from someone that was afraid this show was going to make kids think it is okay to be obese. Insert BAER (big ass eye roll). As is the case with many posts on the WW message boards, and the one other message board I visit regularly, I had to back out of that one. I still had only a vague idea of what the show was about. Nikki plays a camper at a fat camp who smuggles in fattening foods and sells it to her fellow campers. Should be interesting. Because I really want to see how they are going to portray fat teenagers and how society treats them. The first episode was good, though I forgot and missed the first ten minutes. Nikki's character doesn't want to lose weight, she actually wants to gain. There are boys and girls of all sizes, all "overweight" but not all obese. Her character is named Wilhemina, wish I found hilarious, because that is what I would have been named if my dad(William) had his way. In the end, "Wil" runs away and finds herself in a diner sitting behind the director and the new cook, who is then revealed to be the directors dad. Wil doesn't eat the chocolate shake and fries she ordered, and goes back to the camp with the skinny doctor/director where we find out she was a camper there 20 plus years ago. Personally, so far, I think it is very well done. I don't think it is going to encourage kids to be obese. But I also hope it will make some kids/adults a little more accepting. Perfect.

Of course we all know that being overweight is unhealthy. Yet, there are a ton of behaviors that are unhealthy. The thing is, when you are fat, you can't hide it. It is like wearing a sign that says "I am an alcoholic" or, "I drive like a freaking maniac". But even those behaviors, almost any behaviors, are more accepted in society than being fat. Because we have such an emphasis on being beautiful and attractive. Some people treat overweight people with total disdain. My personal opinion is that is just a reflection of their own insecurities. Remember the old adage "putting others down to make yourself feel better"? It is so true. But making fun of fat people is socially acceptable. Being fat is not. Don't give me that shit about it being unhealthy. Really, that is besides the point. Because that is not why kids and adults look down on fat people. It is because to them we are unattractive, and putting us down makes them feel more attractive.

So while everyone tries to figure out the obesity epidemic and blames fast food, I blame society, and my arch enemy, the media. Yes, you may become overweight because you do not eat healthy. If your parents feed you chicken nuggets and Mcd's all the time, you are going to start gaining weight. But why do some people stop, and some don't? Umm, maybe because being made fun of is very depressing, and comfort is found in food?!

After looking for a diagnosis for years for a female problem that started at puberty, I was finally diagnosed in 1991 with pcos. Which stands for polycystic ovarian syndrome. This syndrome has a host of symptoms, which vary from person to person. It affects 1 in 10 women. Of course I got all of the worse symptoms. Weight in the middle, no periods, excess hair, insulin resistance, terrible mood swings, and infertility. I have been visiting a pcos message board for years, and one time I read a post from someone that exactly summed up how I felt. She said she eats when she is depressed, and she was fat, hairy and ugly, so of course she was depressed. Exactly. It is a vicious cycle. I was entering the 8th grade when I first started getting called fat. At first this made me try to subsist on Cheese Its and water. I lost some weight, but still since I had the tummy pooch, common with the pcos, I was unattractive. Really, I was far from fat. But that kind of feedback is very depressing, which made me eat more.

Imagine you are a slightly chubby ten year old, and not only are you mercilessly teased at school, you see everything in the media pointing to how awful and ugly fat people are. And you are getting called fat everyday, maybe even by your parents. Do you think that is going to make the ten year old want to lose weight? Chances are, they will just start eating more, or maybe develop another eating disorder. So while I think eating healthy in the schools and at home is very important, overweight kids still need to be told that they are beautiful as they are. We are never going to be a society with no fat people in it. And the thin people need to get over that. And the idea that everyone that is heavy sits in their car eating triple cheeseburgers, like they portray on the Biggest Loser, is frickin insane. There are people with a slow metabolism, insulin resistance and other issues that make maintaining their weight hard. If you have never been fat, you can not look at a fat person and assume you know how they got that way. Until smokers get made fun of on a daily basis and are treated like the sludge of society just because they smoke, lay the eff off the fat people. Nobody on this earth gets through life with out some bad habits, or even unhealthy ones. Everyone needs to accept everyone else as they are. Then, maybe society can come back down to reality and function as normal human beings, treating everyone with respect.