Friday, January 25, 2008
On body image and good health (and the trolls who confuse them)
| There's been a bit of a kerfuffle exploding over at the "body image acceptance" blog,Big Fat Deal, this week following their inclusion in a New York Times article on "fat acceptance" blogs. It brought a lot of people out of the woodwork to leave comments expressing, in no uncertain terms, their disgust for fat people and for their obviously wrong-headed and immoral insistence on--wait for it--liking themselves and having high self-esteem. GASP! Those whores! Yes, that last line, in case you're the sort who needs to be told, was intended as sarcasm. I think the most frustrating thing in reading the comments were those commenters who couched their negative opinions in terms of concern for the poor fat girls' health and well-being (not as disturbing as the ones who came right out and accused them of being, essentially, lazy, gluttonous deviants who deserve to have health problems, but those people are a lot easier to brush off as hateful jackasses and ignore). Either way, these comments share an underlying prejudice based on the assumption that if you don't conform to a certain body type, then it must be because you fail at diet and exercise and, somehow by extension, moral character. Um, yeah. I'll keep that in mind when I'm dragging myself out of bed at 4:30 AM to go swim a bunch of laps and do Pilates before sitting down to a healthy breakfast of low-carb oatmeal and lowfat cottage cheese. It's not my thyroid problem! It's not my genes! It's all because I'm lazy and I love food too much! Now, I'll admit, I DO love food too much. That's certainly something I struggle with. My husband and I are both foodies, and we enjoy trying new restaurants, new recipes, new ethnic dishes... and about once a month we'll splurge and gorge ourselves on pizza. We also enjoy our alcohol, especially beer, which isn't exactly light on the calories or carbs. We do it all in moderation, but I can admit that if we cut these things out completely, we'd probably both be healthier (and lighter) for it. But I can guarantee that we wouldn't be happier. And that's the thing: if someone isn't harming anyone (other than, arguably, themselves) and they're happy, then who are you to decide they have no right to be happy because they don't look or act the way you think they should? And who are you to judge whether or not someone is healthy? Newsflash: you can't tell whether someone is healthy and fit by their appearance. There are thin supermodel types who can't walk up a single flight of stairs without wheezing. There are normal weight people who have high blood pressure and high cholesterol. And there are fat people who work out regularly, eat right and are perfectly healthy. I'm not as big as I used to be. But I'm not thin, either. On the BMI scale I'm on the low end of overweight, just a few pounds shy of "normal." I've struggled with my weight ever since puberty. Last year I started seeing a doctor that figured out I have a thyroid condition that makes it extremely difficult to lose weight. She put me on a combination of medications to treat it that almost immediately caused me to melt off ten pounds. I'm eating healthy, for the most part, and I'm getting plenty of exercise, and I'm taking the best care of myself that I know how to take. I will probably never get below a size 10, which is, atrociously, still considered fat by a lot of people. But I'm healthy. My doctor says so. And I'm beautiful. My husband says so. The only other opinion besides theirs that matters to me is my own. It took a long time for that opinion to become a positive one. I'm okay with my size. I'm more than happy with my curves, and so is my husband. If I disgust you because of that, well, guess what? You disgust me, too. Labels: body image, fitness, food, mental health, weight, women's health |
Monday, January 21, 2008
Weekend diet confessional
| I did not eat healthy this weekend. I tried for the most part, but well, there was the baby shower. With cupcakes. And chocolate fondue. And yummy dip and delicious Little Smokies in blankets... and then there were leftovers. Oh Lord, the leftovers. I had help putting them away, but still. By Sunday morning I was in sugar headache hell. So naturally I'm eating by the Zone book today to make up for it. I didn't make it to the gym this morning, but only because it took me a long while to fall asleep last night, and I thought my brain would be better served by sleeping in an extra hour than by getting up to go swim. I should have an easier time getting myself up at 4:30 tomorrow, and then I can start swimming off the damage. The fancy work pants I bought almost a year and a half ago and haven't been able to wear for the past year until recently are still fitting, though, so I must not have gone too far overboard. That gets a yay. Yay! |