Secrets of a Former Fat Girl (7 page)

I did all the family baking, not because I was “Mommy's little helper” but because I knew that inevitably a smidgen of dough or a dribble of batter would find its way into my mouth. And once the goodies were out of the oven, I'd use my sneaky skills to nibble away at them without anyone noticing (or so I thought). A sheet cake with a couple of pieces missing was an easy target. I'd find my way into the kitchen while everyone else was occupied and start trimming away at it. I'd never cut myself an actual piece—just a sliver here, a sliver there to “even out the row.” In the process, I'd end up eating half the pan. It was kind of like when you start plucking your eyebrows just to clean them up, and by the time you're finished, you look like one of those hairless cats fancied by people with allergies (and some New York socialites).

With every covert kitchen operation, my stockpile of shame grew larger. I was so ashamed of what I was doing, but I couldn't stop myself. You know how it is: You promise yourself never again. This is the last time, the last bite. And then your hand is back in the cookie jar again.
Just one more.
Shame is a powerful thing, but it's no match for the appetite of a Fat Girl.

Of course, everyone knew what I was doing. It was as obvious as my growing belly, butt, and thighs (not to mention the chocolate under my fingernails). I was the only one in the house who would even consider sneaking food. If my brothers wanted to eat something, they just went ahead and did it. They didn't skulk around in shame, afraid to acknowledge their appetite, humiliated by their lack of self-control. I had the corner on that market.

 

Little did I know that
all that secretiveness would become one of the keys to becoming a Former Fat Girl. Here's how it happened.

Every so often, starting probably around the fifth or sixth grade, I'd go on a diet. Maybe there was a boy who caught my eye, or maybe I caught sight of my increasingly chunky body at just the right (wrong?) angle in the mirror, or maybe it was getting to be more of a struggle than usual to button my pants. Whatever it was, something inspired me to stop the pounds from piling on.

At that time, “going on a diet” to me meant skipping dessert or snacking on celery instead of chips or stopping just short of eating until it hurt on the rare occasions that the family went out to dinner. Back then, in the early 70s, ten-year-old girls simply weren't sophisticated enough about the whole subject of dieting to know the ins and outs of plans like Atkins or Weight Watchers. Not like today when girls learn to live in fear of carbs and fat grams before they get their first training bra.

Of course, our moms knew the score. That was when Atkins first hit the scene, when even the toniest restaurant offered the diet plate (a bunless hamburger patty, cottage cheese, and cling peaches), and amphetamines were the drugs of choice for weight-conscious models and suburban moms. Not my mom. Despite the fact that she and I shared the same pear shape, I don't remember her being into any of that. But a woman whose four kids I used to babysit was always doing something to try to lose her postpartum pounds. In her pantry she kept a box of a “diet candy” with the unfortunate name of Aids. (I found it one night when I was foraging for snacks after the kids went to sleep—one of the Fat Girl perks for babysitting.) It was so named because they “aided” women who were trying to lose weight. Aids were half-inch, chocolate- or vanilla-flavored cubes almost as chewy as Tootsie Rolls but not nearly as tasty. I am sure they contained caffeine, at the very least, or maybe some now illegal appetite suppressant. The things never did much for me, but then I don't think they were meant to be taken as a chaser after a junk food binge, in the desperate hope that they would somehow undo the damage.

At the time I didn't realize what a mistake it was to “announce” that I was dieting. I wanted my family—Mom and Dad, especially—to know that I was trying. I could see how relieved and happy they were when I courageously passed up a second helping or a dish of the chocolate pudding Mom often made for dessert. I made a big show of it, feeding their expectations, winning their approval. After all, they desperately wanted to help me; they hated to see me miserable, lonely, and stuffing myself.

And that actually turned out to be the problem. By going public with my diet, I basically invited everyone in my family to “help.” Now they could voice, in the spirit of helping, all those hints, tips, and wise observations they had been keeping to themselves. They had free rein to police my plate, to point out any breach of the rules I had so publicly proclaimed. They didn't have to hold back: They could remind me how fattening mashed potatoes are and that Oreos aren't exactly diet food and that between-meal snacking really puts on the pounds. As if I didn't know.

“Are you
sure
you want that?” “Is that on your diet?” These were innocent questions, I know, posed with the best of intentions, but to me they sounded like stinging criticisms, expressions of doubt and distrust. I heard “You aren't strong enough to lose the weight on your own. You can't be trusted to make your own decisions about how to manage your appetite. You're a wimp.”

All those questions and comments simply confirmed what I already believed deep inside: I was weak. I couldn't do it. And they made me want to shove away the diet plate, tuck into the all-you-can-eat platter, and give up altogether.

My brothers only made things worse. They used my diet proclamation to push my buttons. “Some diet
that
is!” one might say when I put something decidedly undietlike on my plate. Or “
Mom
, is Lisa allowed to have a cookie?” Not quite the supportive atmosphere you need when you're trying to break a hardwired overeating habit.

To my parents I'd mumble something like “No, I guess I
don't
need a handful of chips while I watch the
Flintstones
.” To my brothers I'd react with a shrewish “Shut up!”—all the while planning a secret rendezvous with the snack jar the first chance I got.

When it was obvious that their help wasn't exactly helping, my parents held back their comments as best they could and tried to get my brothers to stifle theirs. But the damage was done. After the first or second time I “came out” as a dieter, I figured out just how alert the family became to every spoonful I put on my plate, every forkful that made it to my mouth. Their comments echoed in my mind as real as if they were repeated out loud. If I had any notion that telling them would help me keep my promise to myself, the reality was just the opposite: All it took was one look, a raised eyebrow, the flash of a frown, and my resolve to lose the weight would crumble. I'd go right back to sneaking food every chance I got.

The worst thing was that every time I failed to keep my vow to lose weight, I disappointed not only myself but my parents. To me, people-pleasing middle child me, that made my failure all the more devastating. I had gotten everyone's hopes up, not just mine, and then shot them right back down. Why put all of us through it again?

That was my thinking
when, years later, I finally started my journey to becoming a Former Fat Girl. I made a conscious decision not to tell anyone—neither my family nor my friends—about going to Jazzercise. After all, I would have to describe to them exactly what Jazzercise was, and I could imagine the visions they would conjure up. The fact that I was exercising at all would seem strange enough, let alone frolicking around in tights with my legs looking like bratwurst bulging out of its casings.

The only one who knew was Tracey, who got me hooked on the class in the first place. Tracey understood the whole Fat Girl thing because she was one, too. She knew what it was like to feel that someone was constantly monitoring you, just waiting for you to screw up. It was an unwritten, unspoken vow between us: I won't play that game if you won't.

I was living in Austin, and my parents were two and a half hours away by car in Houston, so it wasn't as if I had to sneak around for fear of being caught or anything. Even so, it was a struggle for me not to say anything, especially after I became a regular at Jazzercise. For one thing, I was excited about this new development in my life. I was discovering a part of myself, a seed of confidence, that I never knew was there. I wanted to gush about it to someone and even brag a bit. I yearned to see my parents' faces light up with that hope, that pride, that approval I knew they would feel at the idea that I was again trying to wrench myself out of that unhappy, unhealthy place I had been in for so long.

But I held back from them, from my brothers, and from my other friends. It was hard to hide for too long, of course. As I started to lose weight, it became obvious that I was doing something differently. Even so, I said very little. If anyone asked, I responded in the most nonchalant, off-the-cuff kind of way: “Oh, I've been going to some exercise class,” as if it were the most normal thing in the world when it was anything but. It was like saying you were “just going shopping” when you were really jetting off to Paris for the fall fashion shows.

I simply didn't trust myself to stick with it, to follow through. After all, I had never followed through in the past. Then when I started running, I became even more secretive. Running seemed so much more athletic and out of reach for a Fat Girl like me. I was no Olympian; who was I to think I could run? Not only did I go to the track under the cover of dark (note: not recommended for safety reasons; I never said I was smart about it), but I ran alone. For a very long time—long after I had started running every day, five miles a day, on the trail around Lake Austin that “real” runners frequent—I refused to run with anyone else. Frankly, I was afraid I'd be too slow or look too stupid. I was afraid of being judged and not measuring up. That sounds crazy, right? After all, other runners who happened to be on the trail at the time could see how fast or slow I was going, how goofy I looked in my shorts and tights. (Yes, I wore tights under my running shorts for years, afraid to let loose my thighs.)

It's funny, though. The strangers I could deal with. Somehow I talked myself into the idea that if I didn't make eye contact with the other runners passing me on the trail, I would be invisible to them. Looking them in the eye let them into my world, into my head, where they could pull up a chair, sit down, and proceed to destroy my budding confidence by ticking off all the reasons I didn't belong there. Averting my gaze sealed off that tiny sprout of self-esteem like a vault, protecting it so it could continue to grow.

Friends were a different story. If Tracey had been at all interested in running, I probably would have let her come with me. I trusted her more than anyone I knew at the time because of her status as a Fat Girl and the nonjudgmental way she was with me. Even so, what if she ran faster than me? I'd feel like a loser, like I did in junior high when I was always picked last (or next to last) by the team captains in gym class. Or what if she was slower? That would be almost as bad. I might have to use on her some of the mental energy I devoted to getting myself through the run. And I had none to spare.

No, I had to do it alone. I had to do it at my pace, in my way, with no one to compare myself to or to compete with. I didn't know it then, but I was really giving myself time and space to make exercise a habit. I was laying a foundation, allowing the cement to dry thoroughly before testing it.

 

The food thing was harder.
People are always so curious about what other people are eating. Have you ever noticed how in restaurants people crane their necks to see what the waiter is bringing out? The contents of your dinner plate are, I submit, even more snoop-worthy than what's in your medicine cabinet. It's even worse when you're a guest in someone's house. The cook is always checking what you're eating and how much—she measures the success of the meal by the size of portions, the number of helpings, and the quantities of leftovers on plates and in bowls. She notes the disposition of every morsel, doing a kind of mental calculus, urging her guests to eat more to tip the balance in her favor.

Normal people are food-focused in normal situations. Throw a dieting Fat Girl into the mix, and everyone is on high alert. In that case, it's not just the hostess doing the tabulating. All those who know your situation are, even if they're not boorish enough to say anything.

Solitary confinement at mealtime isn't the only way to get around this, but it's not such a bad idea if you can swing it, at least at first. Once I started my Former Fat Girl journey, I took a hiatus from going out with friends to eat (or drink, because we'd usually end up eating, too) for at least two months. I was living alone at the time, so in effect I ate solo at just about every meal for a while. I didn't have to deal with the prying eyes of my fellow diners. I didn't have to deal with the temptation posed by a companion's big, greasy bacon cheeseburger or platter of spaghetti when all I had was a bowl of greens, dressing on the side.

When I did start venturing out again, I tried to keep my dietary restrictions as inconspicuous as possible. Ordering at restaurants was tough; I did ask whether the chicken was fried or grilled and requested vegetables without butter. But I always tried to have a quick default option so that I wouldn't have to get into a lengthy negotiation with the waiter. (You know that tedious litany of questions and qualifications: Can I have the fish? Make it grilled, not fried, in just a drop or two of oil, not butter. I would like the side of vegetables that comes with the tenderloin, but not the cream sauce; maybe just a drop or two of vinaigrette.) Salad was my fallback solution. I choked down a lot of it in those days.