"Rethinking Thin"

I was so hesitant to read Rethinking Thin, by Gina Kolata.  I think I'd briefly read a prepub alert about it in Publisher's Weekly, and I think it might have been in the news/blogs for a short while, but I'd never considered reading it.  I even passed it by a few times at the public, thinking I would hate it.  But I gave in a few days ago and checked it out, and then I steeled myself, and when every other book I tried to read sucked, I started it.  I'm so, so glad I did.  I've struggled very much lately with body issues, on the heels of my abandonment wholesale of WW.  I've been feeling guilty daily for what I've been eating, even as I rationally know that I can't ever go back to a steady diet of lean cuisines, egg whites and broccoli, with a kicker of one 100 calorie pack a day.  It's weird, too, because some days I've felt corpulent and bloated and hideous and every bad word you can think of for a fattie.  And other days--well, I've felt gorgeous and sexy and perfectly myself.  And a whole host of other things that go along with that territory. 

Rethinking Thin was good for me, partly because it confirmed my choices.  I'm not saying that this is a book that's about fat acceptance or glorification (because it's not, first of all), but it's a book about the realities of diets, and the realities of fat.  It's confirmed for me, too, what I've suspected for a long time--that no matter how much I eat or don't eat, I'm never going to fall within society's definition of acceptable weight.  Even if I went back to that egg and broccoli diet (effectively starving myself), I don't believe my body would let go of all the weight.  And I think that this book, medically, is saying that's not odd.  That this is the case with many, many overweight people.  The book barely dips its toe into all the medical studies that have been done about obesity or that are being done right now about obesity, but it gives you an overview.  And it's a very illuminating overview.  I can't even begin to explain all the results, but the studies seem to prove (at least to my untrained eye) that these issues aren't issues of willpower, or personal failure.  These are issues of complex interactions between hormones and nerves, between our bodies and our minds, and these, in some cases, are genetic issues.  I'm not saying I'm one of those people who doesn't produce leptin (I mean, clearly that's not the case.).  But why is it that I never feel full for more than 30 min, even after eating what is clearly enough food?  Why am I always hungry? 

I never did think it was because my brain was tricking my stomach, not mentally.  I never thought it was because there was something wrong with me mentally.  I don't stress eat (and in fact rarely can bring myself to eat when very stressed and upset), and I don't self-medicate with food, not really.  I'm just always hungry.  Those physical aches that are hunger pains?  I live with them nearly constantly, and did all the way through the months of WW diet.  It's not normal, but it's not in my head, either.  I'm hungry when I wake up, and then I'm hungry about a half hour to an hour after breakfast.  And then I'm hungry about an hour after lunch and that lasts until dinner.  Then, an hour after that, I'm hungry again.  Take it from me--I don't eat every time I'm hungry, because if I did, I'd weight A LOT more.  I do have an iron sense of willpower in that sense (and I do have some willpower: I gave up smoking and have been effectively done with it for two years?  Three?, and can easily choose to have one cigarette every six months if I want.  No issues.  I also keep to a rigid sleep schedule that I KNOW works for me, and am so insane about it that I even kept to it in Italy, on vacation.); I can keep myself from snacking if I really want to.  I'm not saying I'm a pleasant person to be around at 4:30 pm if I haven't snacked, but I can absolutely abstain from eating then if I want to.  It's just that there are gnawing hunger pains and medusa-like mental wrecks if I do so.

I'm not trying to make excuses for being fat.  Except that I kind of am, because I really don't think being fat is the kind of thing that you should be forced to make excuses for.  Does that make sense?  At the end of the book, the author describes a conversation with a friend:

"I told a skinny acquaintance about the Penn dieters I had been following and the sad, but predictable, outcome of their attempts to lose weight.  'Did they really, really try?' he asked.  I drew in my breath.  It was like a slap.  'Yes, of course they really, really tried,' I said.  Of course, of course.  How could they have tried any harder?"

Isn't this it?  Isn't this the attitude that most of America has about us, the fat people?  If you only tried harder, ate less, exercised more.  If you only didn't FAIL so much, then you'd be just like us, the pretty ones.  The acceptable ones.  I just...I don't think that's true, not anymore.  Maybe I did at one time, I don't know.  Maybe I thought that I was fat because I was morally and mentally weak.  It's hard to feel good about yourself when you feel so inferior to people, and not just physically.  It's very hard to love a self that you're convinced no one else can love.  I know I've said this before, but I mean it even more vehemently now: I'm going to stop beating myself up about this stuff.  I have to.  I'm no longer convinced that if I were a better person I'd be skinny.  I'm no longer sure that other people in my situation would be strong enough to live through a lifetime of egg whites and broccoli.  And I'm not sure that there's much that would help me lose weight.  Even a life that left me hungry for real food, all the time, constantly.  Even a life that took up all the space in my brain, leaving me no time to think about anything except food.

There's no answers in this book, either, except for one: sometimes, you are who you are.  Sometimes all the effort in the world will produce very few changes.  And maybe, just maybe, that's ok.  The jury's still out, health-wise.  Maybe there's a glimmer of hope in that.  I don't know.  I don't think there's any sort of hope that society will start treating fat people better, and I don't think all the studies in the world showing it isn't about health will change things, either.  Prejudiced people cling to that myth so hard, so hard, because if it wasn't there, they'd have to admit that they just find it ugly.  And I'm not sure you can change that, not ever.  We've bred that repulsion into ourselves.  But me?  I find peace in the idea that there may be absolutely nothing wrong with me (and remember that doctor's appointment years ago where they couldn't believe that my ECG [EKG, can't remember which.  The heart one.] was so good?  Because I'm fat?  Yeah.  That.), and that I may just be this (beautiful) person forever and ever.  If you're the kind of person who looks at me and can't see that?  Well, I guess...look away.  And leave me alone.  And go read Rethinking Thin.

Comments

[Dadmo]

Your body type is your body type. I hated my stumpy body at one point in my life. But I have learned to love it. It's mine. The health of your body is the only real issue. I don't care what strangers think of the way I look and the ones that love me hopefully love me for everything but my looks. I hope to live long enough to look like the incredible shrinking prune grandpa type. I can't imaging anyone changing their opinion of me because age is doing it's thing. Body type prejudice is as ignorant and heinous as any of the misplaced biases we humans seem to find time for.

It makes me really happy to know that you are resigned to being comfortable with who you are. You are full of wonder. I know I'm biased but when I looked at you at the wedding Friday I thought to myself..boy she looks pretty. I guess I should have shared that right then but we were gabbing and I lost the thought somewhere. It's not the first time I have thought it and not said it.

I like the direction of your thinking...

[Rita]

I think that in the near future the medical community will conclude that body weight is not the best indicator of health, and it is health that is important. My body type is different than yours but also far from society's ideal. According to the ludicrous height/weight charts, I'm more than thirty pounds overweight and, while I could healthily lose ten more pounds, there is no way I could weight thirty less than I do now. Not without starving and endangering myself.

Obesity is a problem when it affects your health, but the current definition of obesity is based on the height/weight charts that don't reflect total health. If your heart is healthy, you have good cholesterol levels, if all of those sorts of factors are where they should be, then your weight is probably also where it should be. Quality of life is important, and part of that is accepting and loving who you are. It's not easy for me - I've definitely got a ways to go - but it is something we all have to work on. Realizing how unrealistic societies standards truly are is the first step. That the beautiful people on the magazines are a)genetic freaks (and I'm not kidding, they are rare) and b) altered by Photoshop.

I've become a big fan of jezebel.com, and their thing on Faith Hill (who, ok, is not a model, but pretty damn hot) on the cover of Redbook really opened my eyes. I knew that they touched up photos for magazines. I mean, I saw pictures of Britney Spears when she was pregnant the second time, and the pictures of her in Vogue or whatever were NOT what she really looked like. But I didn't realize the extent to which they literally thin out legs and arms and just cut off whole sections of a person's body. I figured that they, you know, smoothed out cellulite or wrinkles, not changed the person altogether. I realized that what my perception of beautiful is, is based on this false presentation. The saddest part is that I see my friends and think about what amazing, intelligent, truly beautiful women they are, but I can't see that in myself, because all I can see is the many ways that I don't measure up to the standard of beauty set by magazines. Not that I ever consciously said "I don't look like Kate Moss, therefore I'm crap" but, you know. My belly is too fat, my forehead too high, my boobs not quite big enough, my thighs to thick. The list goes on and on. It was such a wakeup call to realize that, quite literally, NO ONE has thighs that thin. Except maybe the starlets who are quite obviously starving themselves to death.

Ugh. I tend to ramble in your comments. Sorry about that. The point: it is health that's important. A person who eats an unhealthy diet, who doesn't move much during the day, that person is going to have health problems. But if you eat the way a normal person should - you eat vegetables, and fruit, and lean meats regularly, and enjoy the occaissional dessert and big ol' steak, you'll be ok. Moderation is the key to everything, in my opinion. You can't live on egg whites and broccoli. Your body NEEDS some fats. It just doesn't need french fries and greasy fast food. You know? Skinny people who eat fast food everyday are NOT healthy.