I chose this picture, because it kind of looks like our prehistorical godmother here is flipping the bird, and that's what I'd like to do to people who are constantly bleating at me about how concerned they are over over my weight.
Be honest. You don't care about my health. Because if you did you wouldn't be advocating potentially harmful diets or advocating dieting at all to someone in recovery for an eating disorder which is probably a good 50% of the reason I weigh as much as I do now after well and truly screwing up my metabolism with excessive exercise and starvation.
Currently, as they have been for the last 10 years, my blood sugar, cholesterol and blood pressure are good. In fact at my last doctor's visit, I apologized all over the place for how high my blood pressure must be after running late to get there and having to deal with A. a raised drawbridge and B. a bus driver who nearly took out my car. The PA actually said, "Wow, if this is high, I'm afraid of your normal reading." The joint pains that everyone and their dog ascribes to my weight began when I was at my lightest weight, because of the obsessive exercising aggravating a sports related injury from my youth and hereditary arthritis. Now, I'm not going to tell you my weight because I don't know how much I weigh, no matter how low the number might be knowing what it is causes major depression and sends me into eating disorder relapse. Also, if I told you what I thought I weighed, the picture you would form in your head would be utterly inaccurate because people really have no idea what certain weights look like. Let's just say I wear an American size 20-22 and leave it at that.
I go out of my way to walk extra distances, particularly when my schedule doesn't allow for trips to the gym. I do weights at home, crunches and yoga stretches. Honestly, I don't do as much cardio as maybe I should, but that's because it's boring. I'd much rather play with weights and machines than ride a bike or walk in place. Granted, when I can get to a pool just try to get me out of the water. And I freaking LOVE veggies. After my husband was diagnosed with diabetes, we cut all high fructose corn syrup and most sugar out of our diet, we mostly eat home-cooked meals that my husband makes (he's a far better cook).
However, at a glance you aren't going to be able to tell me from the fat person who doesn't do any of those things. That's because people don't come with stat bars over their heads like they do in MMORPGs. Just as you wouldn't be able to tell by looking at my super skinny friend D that vegetables are kryptonite to his people, and the only exercise he gets is raiding in those selfsame MMORPGs and 12 ounce curls (pop, not beer). Oh, btw, he DOES have a whole host of health issues related to his inactivity and diet, but I guarantee you that if you saw the two of us standing side by side, you'd automatically assume that I was the less healthy one.
Now while the weight issue is onerous for all fat people, it can be particularly onerous for women, and a big part of that is amply illustrated in the comments section of any article which dares suggest that just maybe dieting is bad for you, or being fat isn't the death sentence people seem to think it is. Amid all the concern trolling about the health of those poor fatties, you find the real motivation behind it all, the guys (mostly) who have to tell everyone that they don't find fatties attractive and never will.
Well, that's great, Sunshine, I probably don't find you attractive either. The difference being that I don't ASSUME you should care. Erin who writes the Dress a Day blog has an awesome post on this. My favorite quote is, "Prettiness is not a rent you pay for occupying a space marked 'female'." Too often, as women, we believe that we owe it to other people to constantly be attractive when out in public. Lifelong Feminist that I am, I do not leave the house in my yoga pants or other slopping around the house clothes, unless I'm going to the gym. This feeling that we must be "put together" in public is especially acute in fat women, who feel that they have to go that extra mile to not be immediately judged as "slovenly fat." When a skinny woman is running errands in grubbies, it is assumed she threw on what was at hand for a quick errand. When it's a fat woman, the assumption is that she always looks like that.
One of the major issues I have with this society is the sense that a woman's worth lies primarily in her fuckability. This issue came up during the presidential campaign with Sarah Palin and Hillary Clinton, and comes up constantly for women all over the world in a multitude of fields and professions. And it's a double edged sword. If you're unattractive, you don't care about yourself and by extension everything else, so they don't have to listen to you. If you ARE attractive, you obviously slept your way to your position and don't really know what you're talking about, so they don't have to listen to you. It is completely and royally fucked.
Every time I blog about weight, Health At Every Size or my refusal to diet, I get comments from men that they're sorry they can't find my fat ass attractive (who the hell asked you, faceless interweb drone?) and from women that they just can't "give up" on themselves like that.
Give up? Ok, you're talking to the person who has minor meltdown if her underwear don't correspond with the rest of the outfit. You're talking to the person who will not wear her contacts without eye make up because she thinks she looks "squinty" without it. I have been known to burst into tears if my hair won't go "right." Yeah, that sounds like someone who's given up all right.
"You just can't help who you're attracted to," is a common cry. And this is true. However, where in all this ranting did I ask you to find me attractive? Oh, that's right. I didn't. I don't care if complete strangers find me fuckable. I do care if they can't be bothered to treat me with a baseline of civility because they've convinced themselves that they're "tough love" helping all of us delusional fatties who won't quit walking around being fat at them. Seriously, here's a radical concept: Treat all human beings like human beings regardless of your genitalia's opinion of them. That way you don't have to look like a douchebag, and I don't have to verbally humiliate you in public.
Oh, and just a note, the first person to say that they're sure I THINK I'm healthy, but I'm deluding myself, to say "Well, yes but..." or to make a comment on their perceptions of my fuckability owes me a new pair of Fluevogs. This place does log IPs so I can hunt them down, right?
Mickey Schulz is a guest author for the California NOW blog; her opinions are not necessarily those of California NOW. Copyright Mickey Schulz, with permission granted to California NOW for use on this site.
Comments