I am increasingly convinced that fat women need each other. There are certain conversations "we" can only have with someone who's been there.
By "there," I mean facing increasingly limited mobility, the loss of prerogatives like a seat on the subway or a middle seat on an airplane, shopping on the main floor of Macy's and being able to cross our legs. Someone who has been relatively thin all his/her life may listen in sympathy but it's the wrong kind of sympathy. At best, it's pity tinged with wonder, and at worst...
Well, I don't have time to talk about the worst.
My friend Diane is "there," and she called yesterday to chat about her Easter plans and my tantrum of disgust with a television series and various innocuous matters. She told me her life is going pretty well except that she's gaining weight and has nothing to wear and is feeling it in her knees.
"But I'm hoping to go on vacation with some friends," she added. "That's my motivation for losing."
"M'mmm," I stalled, thinking it a faulty motivation but not wanting to damage whatever resolve she was mustering. "Better think about some other things you want as well."
Motivation should be removed from the weight loss vocabulary because it is too often a finite prod. I hear it all the time: I want to be thin for my daughter's wedding or my 20th reunion is coming up. The dieter either gives up because she realizes she won't fit the fantasy evening gown in time or she gets down to her cheerleader uniform size but eats the entire breakfast buffet.
What will Diane do once she goes on vacation or is unable to go?
Eight weeks ago, I began weighing and measuring my food and I gave up sugar and flour. I guesstimate I've lost 25 - 28 pounds. I'm unsure because when I worked up the nerve to weigh myself, I had a dial scale. The needle went past its top weight and was nearly at zero. I have a digital scale now but I'm also trying to give up weighing so I don't know what I weigh today.
I have some motivations -- a family visit in June, author photos, publicity I'll be doing in the coming year -- but they aren't what keeps me evening off my yogurt each morning. The shame of that needle is far more present, as is taking my binge boxes to a building where I was dog-sitting and putting them in their recycling bin. Shame is a running away from rather than a running to.
I've also discovered I have some dreams and that dreams had gone missing in my life in the last six years of relapse. I want to move to Seattle. I want to move to Seattle in order to hike and ski. I want to write a novel. I want to stop being the Queen of Weight Loss and Weight Gain.
They're really good dreams because they're infinite. The Cascades hold more than one hike and one novel, I hope, will lead to another. There are thousands of things to talk about besides weight.
I hope Diane comes up with some dreams. They're much more stable than motivations. I know this because, for eight weeks, at the end of each day I ask myself not how many calories I ate but what did I do toward moving to Seattle. Sticking to my food plan is only one part of the Seattle Diet because I have to make and save money to move, get rid of hundreds of pounds of clutter, work on my friendships in Seattle and fatten up my resume.
The Dream Diet has no end. I highly recommend it.
