The Amazing Adventures of Dietgirl (10 page)

“You go ahead,” I said. “I’ll come and pick you up later.”

“I’m not going without you.”

“I’m sorry.” I started to cry, my sobs making my wobbly body wobble even harder. “I’m sorry.”

I bawled all the way home, just like that first night at Weight Watchers. I may be almost a hundred pounds lighter, but all that shame and revulsion is still there. It almost felt worse, because at least on the scale you can cover your flabby bits with clothes.

Some days I’m positive and proud to have come this far. But some days my confidence and resolve feel flimsier than those string bikinis, ready to come undone at the slightest hint of a breeze.

Last week I turned twenty-four. My gift to myself was a restaurant meal with friends, finished with half a slice of orange and poppy-seed cake. My gift from the scale was a two-pound gain.

“Two pounds?” I squeaked indignantly to Donna. “I didn’t even have the garlic bread!”

Hopefully this time next year I’ll be at my goal weight and too drunk at my party to care about the stupid scale numbers.

I’ve finally struck gold on the exercise front. Operation Swimming Pool may have been a stinking failure but I’ve fallen in love with two new classes!

First up was BodyCombat on Saturday morning, a martial-arts-inspired workout. Oh my Lord. Fit Ball is a casual bounce in the park compared to this. I was dripping with sweat just from the warm-up. But safely hidden in the back row, I was determined to carry on and not have a Fat Girl Freak-Out.

I muddled along at my own less than stellar pace, doing my best approximation of kicking and punching. I felt ridiculous at first, but when the instructor told us all to yell and scream and pretend to be wounding mortal enemies, I really got into it. Pretend violence and thumping techno music, what a winning combination! Finally, after fifty minutes, we flopped to the floor for the abdominal workout and cool-down. My face was so red that the instructor asked if I was OK. I grinned and gave a feeble thumbs-up.

The next day I woke up in delicious agony, my back and shoulders screaming from all the hooks and uppercuts. But there was no time to moan because on Monday night we were off to BodyPump.

This was a whole new world of pain! Using a barbell, we worked one body part per song—squats for legs, then chest, back and hamstrings, triceps, biceps, lunges (legs again) and shoulders, finishing with abs and stretching. Although I only had a tiny one-kilo weight on each end of the bar, it was far more intense than the weight machines we’d been using for the past month. My limbs were jelly and the next day I could barely sit down on the loo.

The class instructors are so inspiring. Out on the gym floor my concentration always wanders—I read magazines, scratch my butt, or get absorbed in an episode of
Neighbours
. But there’s no hiding in the class, and the instructors keep you working for a whole hour. By the time I collapsed into the cool-down stretches, I knew I’d found my Holy Grail of fitness. I’ve already been back twice. No more Vampire Method for me!

I’m excited about exercise for the first time in my life. The classes marry my fanatical love of music with my profound laziness. All I have to do is show up and a nubile wench will cheer and scream and tell me exactly what to do. It’s fun and efficient. Best of all, I can lurk at the back of the class unnoticed and let the skinny girls hog the mirrors.

It’s taken many months of trial and error, but I think I’ve finally figured out what exercise is going to work best for me. I always told myself those classes were reserved for hardcore gym bunnies, so I couldn’t join in until I got skinny. I’m so glad I got the nerve to step inside and prove my Fat Girl beliefs wrong. I may be big, slow, and uncoordinated, but I have every right to be there.

Hooray! Another pound off, and only eighty-eight to go. Eighty-eight! Two fat ladies!

So when the powers that be start telling everyone to prepare for “redeployment,” what the hell does that mean in this dot-bomb crazy world? It sounds like I’ll be stuffed into a cannon with a laptop tucked under my arm and blasted off into the ether, then wherever I land, I’m to dust myself off and get straight back to work.

Whatever it means, the winds of change are a-blowing at work. The department workload has dwindled over the past few months, so it hasn’t come as much of a surprise. But I worry because I have no idea what they’ll do with me, or where I’d go if I left the company. I’ve been so caught up in my fat-blasting efforts this year that I’ve just worked like a zombie and not thought too critically about it. I’ve been a professional cut and paster for the past two years, so I’m not exactly brimming over with marketable skills. I do have that journalism degree, but no experience (or interest) to accompany it. Oh shit. Who the bloody hell would employ me?

It’s December and I feel good. Normally I dread this time of year, the start of the Sweaty Skin and Chafing Thigh season. But this year, two sizes and 98 pounds smaller, I’m slightly better equipped to handle the heat.

I’m officially hooked on BodyPump and BodyCombat. I did three classes this week! I can feel the benefits already—my quads feel firmer and my biceps are growing. They’re all disguised by a giant layer of blubber, but it’s a start, right?

Exercise gives me a genuine sense of purpose and achievement. I’m euphoric every time I put a heavier weight on my barbell, or do a lunge without falling over, or make it through a whole BodyCombat track without needing to stick my head out the window and gulp for air. Each tiny change spurs me on. And it’s such a healthy approach too—I’m focusing on getting fitter and stronger, rather than obsessing about points and numbers.

Witness the sad case I have become: our Monday night BodyPump class is at 6:30, which means we have to Weigh and Run at our six o’clock Weight Watchers meeting then zoom across town to the gym. We arrived last night to find there were no barbells left, despite the fact that we’d reserved a place for the class a week ago! They’d either overbooked or a pair of evil bitches had sneaked into the class.

Rhiannon and I were outraged. We stomped off to the car and ranted all the way home. But I had to laugh. Who’d have thought that I—breathless from a walk to the fridge ten months ago—would wind up hysterical because I couldn’t exercise?

I was already in a rotten mood, having maintained my weight at Weight Watchers. I was positive I was due a big loss because I’d been feeling so smug and slinky! Damn those misleading exercise endorphins. Sometimes I feel like running away from Weight Watchers. The scale is not my friend. At least the exercise makes me feel I’m getting somewhere. Maybe I should just swap my scale obsession for an exercise obsession.

Tonight our house was full of girls. There was the gorgeous Rhiannon, the gorgeous Jenny and Emily, two of Emily’s equally gorgeous friends, and lardy old me. The purpose of the gathering was to consume a lot of alcohol, dress up foxily, then take on the Canberra night life.

I had a handy excuse not to drink, because I’m doped up on antihistamines, thanks to my hay fever. I had to blow my dripping red nose after every song in BodyCombat this morning.

It’s strange watching people get drunk. The gradual loosening of tongues; the unraveling of inhibitions. The more they talked, the more I wished the couch would swallow me up. I had nothing to contribute to their anecdotes of blokes at the bar and ill-advised flings. Instead I laughed too loud and nodded a lot, trying to hide my stomach behind a cushion and hoping no one would notice I wasn’t contributing to the conversation.

After a few hours they clambered into high heels and put on their lipstick.

“Shauna dear,” Emily said, “why haven’t you changed yet?”

“I think I’m going to stay in,” I said casually. “My hay fever is rotten today.”

“You have to come out!” Rhiannon was tipsy but she could still detect a Fat Girl Freak-Out. “You can’t stay here!”

“But my Rudolph nose! I just don’t feel up to it.”

There was a slurred chorus of “Aww!”

Luckily, the taxi arrived and I took the role of Mother Hen. “Chop chop, girls! Meter’s running!”

“Next time, Shaun!” said Jenny.

“Of course!” I smiled and shoved them out the door.

I just couldn’t do the Fat Girl on the Town routine tonight. For starters, I have nothing to wear. I may have dropped a few sizes but I still look enormous, especially when standing next to my slender comrades. And I’ve tried drinking to numb my insecurities, but no amount of alcohol can make me feel good. This large body sobers up far too quickly. I’d wind up sitting on the sidelines with my fake smile pasted on, fake laughing and waving to my friends with their slinky tops and entourage of male admirers. Then there’d be that inevitable moment when Jenny or Emily beckoned me on to the dance floor, and after ten minutes of protest I’d waddle my way into their circle and do a graceless boogie in my Big Is Beautiful trousers.

As soon as the girls left I burst into tears, and I’ve barely paused for two hours. If my face weren’t so red, I’d go to McDonald’s for a couple of soothing sundaes. I feel so fucking ugly and hopeless. And undesirable. It’s been years since I felt that someone was attracted to me. I forget what it feels like.

I’m angry because part of me so badly wants to be out there enjoying myself. I want to act like my twenty-four years, instead of holing up in the house like a sociopath. I want to dress up and dance and go wild. But even if I could find something to wear, my vodka-induced confidence would only last thirty minutes before the awareness returned and I’d be looking for the nearest exit.

I hate feeling like this. I thought I liked being me these days. But that only seems to be true under cover of darkness, or in the safety of the back row of BodyPump class. Am I ever going to like myself all the time, in every place?

“So,” said the Mothership, “what’s new?”

“I already told you … nothing.”

“Are you sure?”

We were sitting in the foyer of Parliament House, waiting for Rhiannon’s graduation ceremony to start. She actually graduated last year, but was coming back to receive the Dean’s Award.

“It’s so hot today,” Mum went on. “I hope she’s wearing a good deodorant, especially under that heavy gown. Do you think she’s got a good deodorant on?”

“Let’s pray that she does.”

“Can you imagine how many of our tax dollars it took to pay for all this marble?” She pointed to the foyer floor. “Aren’t you glad you’re not the one who has to polish it?”

“Mmm.”

“What’s wrong with you?”

“Nothing, just premenstrual grumpiness. I feel like a blob today.”

“Well, you’re quite an attractive blob.”

“Um. Thanks.”

“See, don’t you just love me? This is why you bring me places.”

Then five minutes of blissful silence.

“So what’s new?”

“Nothing!”

“Well, there has to be something!”

“There isn’t!”

“Well. All right. Hey, I see you are wearing a skirt today.”

“Excellent observation.”

“It’s nice to see you wearing a skirt.”

“It’s nice to be wearing one!”

Today is the first time I’ve displayed my calves since my high school uniform. For six years I’ve hidden my pale, trunklike pins in long trousers, even in the height of summer. But on a surprisingly successful shopping trip last week, Rhiannon persuaded me to try on a skirt, just below the knee, in a loud purple. I grumbled and bitched, saying my ankles were “too thick” for such a thing, but she made me try it on. It looked great. And it was a size 18!

It’s been five years since I could get into a size 18. I’ve lost five years of fat! And my legs don’t look too bad either. They’re still chunky, but they’re starting to develop a hint of shape, thanks to all those squats and lunges. I almost cried in the changing rooms. Me in a skirt!

So here I was at the graduation, feeling feminine and trendy for the first time in years, if slightly self-conscious about wearing something other than a shapeless sack. Could people see my cellulite? Were they counting the flab rolls on my back?

“The important question is,” said Mum, interrupting my thoughts, “are you wearing a petticoat?”

“What?”

She brought out her purse-lipped, overenunciated schoolteacher voice: “Are … you … wearing … a … petticoat?”

“Do you take me for some sort of a crusty old spinster?”

“You should wear a petticoat if you’re going to wear a skirt,” she sniffed. “You may as well be naked without one.”

Mercifully, the ceremony began, and when Rhiannon received her award, we were misty-eyed with pride. While she handed back her robes and cap, I sneaked off to Weight Watchers for a quick weigh-in before we all went out for dinner.

“Look at you!” cried Donna as I sashayed to the scale.

“Ahh!” I waved off her compliment.

“Will you stay for the meeting and talk to everyone about your achievements?”

“Why? I’m nowhere near my goal!”

“How many times must I tell you, it’s all about the journey! You’re an inspiration.”

I squirmed. “I have to run. I’m meeting my mum and Rhiannon for dinner.”

“Two minutes, please?”

After all she’d done for me this year, holding my hand and wiping away my snotty tears, how could I possibly say no?

“Ladies, I want to introduce you to Shauna. She’s been with us since January and she is amazing.”

My face burned. Amazing?

“How much have you lost now, Shauna?”

“Ninety-eight pounds!”

There were gasps and stares. Some ladies frowned at me critically, perhaps trying to picture me with those extra pounds.

“I just want you all to see what you can achieve with hard work and determination. What do you say, Shauna?”

“Oh yes!” I was such a fraud. “Hard work. Determination. Just keep counting those points!”