18 - My Fat Friend

Recently I lost a friend. Not in the traditional sense, but a shift in her life has occurred that has precipitated a slight shift in our relationship. As a result she no longer fills a specific role in my life: that of the “fat friend.”

The woman in question happens to be my sister, my closest sibling and probably my closest friend. Now to clarify, because I managed to offend the hell out of her with my shorthand, I don’t mean that she’s the fat friend who makes you feel so awesome about how you look because she looks worse. What I mean by “fat friend” is the person who affirms your decision not to work on your weight by their decision not to work on theirs. I didn’t care if our reasons for not working at it were the same; misery loves company and I enjoyed her company down here in the overweight trenches a great deal.

Allow me a little history if you will. My sister moved to Toronto in 2000, just after a family reunion. And at that family reunion a photo was taken. In it, the whole family is standing except the two of us; we’re seated and (I blame the camera angle now) neither of us looked our best. I remember feeling absolutely mortified at that picture when I saw it later. In fact, I’m fairly certain that photo precipitated my first foray into Weight Watchers. Soon after my sister’s move, she started the Jenny Craig program, and since then we’ve kind of mirrored each other in our weight gain and loss.

Over the past nine years, we’ve both yo-yo’d around and taken stabs at getting the weight issue under control. We did Myrtle Beach together last year in our belle grande bathing suits (though admittedly she was wearing one of my old “skinny” ones—I’ll always be the “big” little sister). Later that year we went home to attend an anniversary party for our parents and while her dress was way better than mine, we were both carrying more weight than we wanted to be at the time.

But now, all of this is about to change because my sister has signed up for Weight Watchers. While I have no great faith in the efficacy of the program, I know there are exceptions to the rule and it’s entirely conceivable that my sister will be one of them. Even in the worst case scenario that she isn’t the exception, I’m sure she’ll lose a significant amount of weight to begin with. She’s down about 6lbs after three weeks which is right on spec for the program. Assuming she continues to lose at this rate with no major setbacks, in six weeks she’ll be down 18lbs. That’s the kind of difference you can see—especially at another family event.

You got it. In a scant six weeks, we’ll both fly home for our mom’s 70^th birthday. All of my tall, thin brothers will be there. And this time I’ll be the only fat sibling.

Being with my family is emotionally exhausting at the best of times, but when I’m already stressed out, it’s hell on earth. Around my family I revert back to some out-of-control eighth grader begging to be understood, respected and listened to and it usually culminates with me having just the temper tantrum to prove that I’m still an out-of-control eighth grader who doesn’t deserve to be understood, respected or listened to. So yeah, that, on top of being the only fatty—not looking forward.

With all this in mind, I’ve begun to wonder if I have the wherewithal to be fat alone, not only with my family but everywhere else as well. Will I be able to calmly stand up to the well-intentioned (I like to think) prodding of certain family members to shed the pounds? Will I manage to enjoy what little I can of my family without worrying about how I look the entire time? Can I manage to not make the entire trip about my weight?

And out here in the real world, can I fight the temptation to change for shitty reasons? I’ve taken a long hiatus from working on my weight and it hasn’t just been the result of sheer laziness. In fact, it’s been a concrete decision based on, what I believe, to be a valid reason. Tempting though it is to do something drastic, I refuse to start another weight loss regimen that I don’t think is healthy or that I don’t see myself maintaining for life; and that nixes a lot of conventional programs. I won’t eat packaged Jenny Craig or NutriSystem food forever; I won’t spend the rest of my life running off to Dr. Bernstein to get shots in my ass; I won’t cut out carbs for the rest of my life; I won’t even count points and go to meetings a la Weight Watchers for the rest of my life. And so far at least, Paul McKenna can’t make me thin. So knowing my failure rate with at least one of these methods and my aversion to the rest of them, there’s little point in starting them. I’m sure I could lose weight in any one of these programs but the likelihood that I would keep it off is so low that I’m not willing to participate. I’ve done enough of the lose/gain cycle and I refuse to subject my body to it. Until I know I’m ready to deal with all my emotional triggers around food, I’m just not going to make some half-assed attempt. But in the mean time, I remain overweight and not terribly happy about it. And now there’s no one along for the ride. My human pillar of affirmation has left the building.

I guess I should be thankful that I’m so tired of the weight gain/loss treadmill because I haven’t been strongly tempted at all to do anything. I’ve had crazy thoughts of just starving myself until July 18, being trim for a weekend and then piling it all back on. But those are thoughts that remain nothing more than fucked up fantasies. So fat I am now, and fat I shall be on July 18.

There have been three positives in this though. The first is that I have quickly realized that my relationship with my sister will survive her losing weight without me; frankly I wasn’t sure I’d be able to be normal about it for a while there. The second is that I think she’s happier with herself and I basically just want my sister to be happy. The last is that I’ve been forced into the realization that I was never okay with not working at my weight in the first place. But what follows is not what you might anticipate.

Even with a friend along for the ride, I have been bound up in mess of self-loathing around my body that’s been pretty substantial and I hadn’t really been aware of how deep it went. I’ve never been in a place of acceptance about my weight but instead this terrible limbo; just waiting for the day when the rest of my life calms down enough to work on it and never really settling into this body in the mean time. Like moving into a house and never unpacking anything because you don’t plan to stay. In lieu of self-acceptance, I struck a deal with myself: it’s okay to not work at the weight as long as you hate yourself sufficiently for being overweight. And I’ve done a fabulous job at the hatred. Messed up, I realize.

So I’ve begun to wonder, can I just sit still and try to be happy at my present size? Can I manage to just work at accepting myself in the here and now, without a plan for the there and then? Can I refrain from continuing to disavowing all connection to this body? Can I stop thinking of my body and thus myself as something in need of major renovation?

I have a hope that being alone in this will make it easier to work on accepting myself on some basic level. It’s funny, but walking alone might lead to greater happiness.

14 - Latifah and Jenny: An Awkward Union

Whether it's an eating regimen, a magic pill, or an exercise machine, companies selling weight loss products tend to feature the users with the least typical results. In fact, that's one of the most smirk-worthy features of every weight loss ad—the tiny white print on the bottom of the TV screen: "Results not typical." From the 50 year old grandmother strutting around bikini-clad in old Bowflex commercials to Kirsty Alley's amazing (though disputed) shedding of 70 lbs, none of these people are an accurate representation of what will likely happen if you try this product. People desperate to lose weight fail to think through the fact that for any 50 year old woman to look that good, she's either got amazing genes or an amazing plastic surgeon...in addition to her Bowflex. I would hope that new users of the Jenny Craig program would pay attention to the fact that Valerie Bertinelli's JC blog is littered with asterisks indicating that her results aren't typical. In fact, all weight loss numbers shown on the JC site are listed as "not typical" because what's typical is that you'll lose and gain the same five to ten pounds for four months and then you'll quit the program no slimmer and a bit poorer. What it amounts to is false advertising, but what else is new?

However, if we want to talk about typical and atypical in the realm of people who actually lose weight and keep it off, most of us don't look like runway models when we're done with a weight loss program. Most people lose their weight and look like the typical size 12-14 woman that is the majority in North America; not the size 0-4 woman who entirely populates TV land. The former is about reality and the latter is about wish fulfillment. People don't pay good money for a product to produce reality in their lives; they pay for the fantasy. And that's why it's effective to show all the women who got down to size 4 (from a 12) in the NutriSystem commercials, or the incredible shrinking waistline of Valerie Bertinelli in the Jenny Craig spots.

It's this weight loss advertising reality that makes Jenny Craig's campaign featuring Queen Latifah really interesting. Admittedly, when I first saw the Queen in the Jenny ads I was dismayed. I was dismayed by the "urban" setting of her first ad, just to ensure that we know she's still "street" or whatever they were trying to convey. It bugged the hell out of me that the fan base that Queen Latifah first appealed to, the fan base that made her famous, probably can't afford to use the program. However, my objections to her role in the campaign aside, I have to be impressed with the tack they've taken: someone who's results actually appear attainable or even typical being featured on TV. Someone who is considered a success story who still happens to look like the rest of us. On her JC blog, Queen Latifah notes that she's lost 20lbs and her cholesterol has gone down 20 points. While the "cover our asses" asterisks also appear next to her results, deeming them atypical, from where I'm standing losing 20lbs is a lot more attainable than 40 or 70lbs—in fact I'd consider it almost typical.

One of Queen Latifah's JC ads has her grooving away on a treadmill talking about how much she loves feeling healthy. In fact, in all of her ads she is shown mostly speaking to "feeling good" or being a "size healthy." The amount of weight she's lost is referred to but unlike the ads featuring Bertinelli (the other Jenny Craig celeb spokesperson on the go at the moment) there are no before/after shots. In her blog she says that she thinks her body was fine the way it was and is fine now, but she's using the program to improve her health. What becomes clear very quickly is that the ad campaign featuring Latifah is not about wish fulfillment.

I would venture to say that this is the reason that Queen Latifah's blog comes up in a new window when you click on her name on jennycraig.com. I believe this is about reeling in a new, but smaller, group of clientele. The client who isn't interested in a dramatic weight loss (or isn't willing to admit that's their interest anyway). The client who has probably dieted so many times before that they are simply looking for a healthier lifestyle. The client who isn't willing to be openly disparaging about her body as it is. Typical Jenny Craig is about atypical results in order to sell the product. The Queen is about appealing to the consumer who thinks they're smarter than that. We're all getting duped but some get to walk away thinking they're above our weight obsessed society. At the end of the day though, it's Valerie Bertinelli's blog that's emblazoned all over jennycraig.com—not Queen Latifah's. Clearly featuring a woman who's lost weight, but still sort of looks like everyone else, remains a risky business.