[Note: This a serious post, you have been warned. I put off hitting publish for days because it so emotional and close to my heart. Here goes nothing.]
Full disclosure: I have been overweight my whole life.
That's twenty years. Two decades. For some people, a lifetime.
I am staring at these words and I can't grasp thier truth. If I were to describe myself I would never say fat. 1) because it is shameful (or so the world has taught me) and 2) because I am more than my shell.
The reason I decided to write this post is because I don't think people talk about the truth of being overweight often. And those who do aren't often heard. The world doesn't seem to want to hear it.
The first truth: being overweight is painful. In the physical sense (low stamina, aching joints, muscles that cannot support their load) and the psychological sense.
As I look back on my life I am angered by how my weight has held me back. Every dream I ever had for myself has been relegated to the back of the line to make way for my most pressing dream: losing the weight.
In my head, from a very young age, losing the weight was a magical cure to all my problems. If I got down to XXX weight I would finally write that book I always wanted to. If I was normal sized I wouldn't be so shy, I would have more friends, I would become someone others wanted to know. After I lost the weight I would meet the love of my life, travel the world, discover a cure for cancer, blah blah blah. But not before I lost the weight, never before.
Somehow my weight made me unworthy of the things I desired for myself.
The second truth: people who are overweight are not lazy. Everyone meets challenges in life and different people chose different ways to deal with them. I chose to overeat, to spend the majority of my time sedentary, to lose myself in the stories of others. I avoided my problems. But I never looked in the mirror and was satisfied with what I saw. For some reason I never had the tools I needed to deal with my problems in a healthy way.
So for anyone who ever thought that a person is fat because they want to be or because they don't want to lose the weight you are wrong. You are so wrong.
Our culture is very firm on the fact that to be overweight is to be wrong. From someone who has personally experienced this I would edit it to say that to be overweight is to be separated from normality. A misplaced puzzle piece, sticking out like a sore thumb, someone to be pitied or ridiculed or ignored.
I have been on a quest to be "normal" since I was eight years old. I can remember being at summer camp, looking at everyone else, feeling depressed and deciding that I needed to lose weight. I was in fourth grade. And so for the next twelve years that was my mindset. I went on diets, started exercise programs, changed my "lifestyle". I joined Weight Watchers. Twice. I lost some, gained more back, lost some, gained more back.
To this date I have never been at a "normal" weight.
The third truth (a very recent truth to me): the number on the scale isn't the issue. And what I mean by this is that bigger people are taught that being fat is their problem, it is a result of their actions, only they can save themselves. Why is this okay?
All of a sudden being overweight is solely an internal problem and the burden of fixing it is all on you. This is very lonely. No wonder people who are overweight have higher rates of anxiety and depression.
Imagine being told to change your eye color or the way your brain functioned or structure of your bones. Science could surely offer you some drastic (and horrifying) solutions but who would you be in the end?
I have found that treating my obesity as a external problem can be very empowering. I was a child and countless adults allowed me to reach this point. The United States obsession with fast food. The thousands of channels of television. How healthy food is more expensive and harder to come by. That I was allowed to skate by in physical education. And the silence. The silence that was lent to the issue of obesity for so many years (silence that was similarly lent to teen pregnancy and homophobia and the failures of our school systems).
With those thoughts in mind I can breathe deeper, dig for more strength and see a clearer vision of my future. I am not my whole problem. Some of the pressure has lifted and I feel capable.
The fourth truth: I don't know everything.
I am not blaming any one person or group of people for what is being called "a national epidemic". I am not saying that I, or anybody who is overweight, should be left off the hook. I am my own person, I am responsible for my health.
But I am saying that obesity should not be regarded as an individual problem and treated as thus. This is isolating and cruel and misguided. I wish that I had been made to do more physical activity, I wish that healthier food was served in my school cafeteria and I wish that as children we were taught to love ourselves and others at any size.
So many of the pitfalls I have encountered could have been avoided if I was taught to treat my health as a precious and immediate thing. As it is I have had to discover this slowly until now when I am an adult and so much less open to change.
Already, the world is so different from when I was a child. Fast food restraunts are ushering in healthier menu items, the First Lady is working hard on getting children more active and there are big beautiful people popping up everywhere in pop culture. The kids of today live in a different world than I did. But it will be decades before we see if its enough.
I am no where near a success but I am smarter and more experienced and I know I will get there.
I put off writing something like this for years. Breaking the silence feels like my first full breath. It feels like I am letting the light out.
Readers, Internet, Universe: I am ready and eager to let your light in.
What are your thoughts on this topic? Do you see promising changes or are things the same as they always were? Would you have anything to add or something you disagree with?
Full disclosure: I have been overweight my whole life.
That's twenty years. Two decades. For some people, a lifetime.
I am staring at these words and I can't grasp thier truth. If I were to describe myself I would never say fat. 1) because it is shameful (or so the world has taught me) and 2) because I am more than my shell.
The reason I decided to write this post is because I don't think people talk about the truth of being overweight often. And those who do aren't often heard. The world doesn't seem to want to hear it.
The first truth: being overweight is painful. In the physical sense (low stamina, aching joints, muscles that cannot support their load) and the psychological sense.
As I look back on my life I am angered by how my weight has held me back. Every dream I ever had for myself has been relegated to the back of the line to make way for my most pressing dream: losing the weight.
In my head, from a very young age, losing the weight was a magical cure to all my problems. If I got down to XXX weight I would finally write that book I always wanted to. If I was normal sized I wouldn't be so shy, I would have more friends, I would become someone others wanted to know. After I lost the weight I would meet the love of my life, travel the world, discover a cure for cancer, blah blah blah. But not before I lost the weight, never before.
Somehow my weight made me unworthy of the things I desired for myself.
 |
| Me at 4 years old (in the pink) |
So for anyone who ever thought that a person is fat because they want to be or because they don't want to lose the weight you are wrong. You are so wrong.
Our culture is very firm on the fact that to be overweight is to be wrong. From someone who has personally experienced this I would edit it to say that to be overweight is to be separated from normality. A misplaced puzzle piece, sticking out like a sore thumb, someone to be pitied or ridiculed or ignored.
I have been on a quest to be "normal" since I was eight years old. I can remember being at summer camp, looking at everyone else, feeling depressed and deciding that I needed to lose weight. I was in fourth grade. And so for the next twelve years that was my mindset. I went on diets, started exercise programs, changed my "lifestyle". I joined Weight Watchers. Twice. I lost some, gained more back, lost some, gained more back.
To this date I have never been at a "normal" weight.
 |
| Sometimes I wear a mask. |
All of a sudden being overweight is solely an internal problem and the burden of fixing it is all on you. This is very lonely. No wonder people who are overweight have higher rates of anxiety and depression.
Imagine being told to change your eye color or the way your brain functioned or structure of your bones. Science could surely offer you some drastic (and horrifying) solutions but who would you be in the end?
I have found that treating my obesity as a external problem can be very empowering. I was a child and countless adults allowed me to reach this point. The United States obsession with fast food. The thousands of channels of television. How healthy food is more expensive and harder to come by. That I was allowed to skate by in physical education. And the silence. The silence that was lent to the issue of obesity for so many years (silence that was similarly lent to teen pregnancy and homophobia and the failures of our school systems).
With those thoughts in mind I can breathe deeper, dig for more strength and see a clearer vision of my future. I am not my whole problem. Some of the pressure has lifted and I feel capable.
 |
| Me at 19 years old |
The fourth truth: I don't know everything.
I am not blaming any one person or group of people for what is being called "a national epidemic". I am not saying that I, or anybody who is overweight, should be left off the hook. I am my own person, I am responsible for my health.
But I am saying that obesity should not be regarded as an individual problem and treated as thus. This is isolating and cruel and misguided. I wish that I had been made to do more physical activity, I wish that healthier food was served in my school cafeteria and I wish that as children we were taught to love ourselves and others at any size.
So many of the pitfalls I have encountered could have been avoided if I was taught to treat my health as a precious and immediate thing. As it is I have had to discover this slowly until now when I am an adult and so much less open to change.
Already, the world is so different from when I was a child. Fast food restraunts are ushering in healthier menu items, the First Lady is working hard on getting children more active and there are big beautiful people popping up everywhere in pop culture. The kids of today live in a different world than I did. But it will be decades before we see if its enough.
I am no where near a success but I am smarter and more experienced and I know I will get there.
I put off writing something like this for years. Breaking the silence feels like my first full breath. It feels like I am letting the light out.
Readers, Internet, Universe: I am ready and eager to let your light in.
 |
| I like to smile. |
