Weight Loss 2016. Week 10. The Gift

In the early 1990s I joined a group called NAAFA, which stands for National Association for the Advancement of Fat Acceptance.  I saw them on the Phil Donahue show.  Their message was “love yourself.”  I liked it. 

Think I don't so look so big in that picture?  What about this one.  

This pictures depicts true happiness.  Graduating from law school is a joyous thing.

NAAFA immediately asked if I was willing to make media appearances for them.  I was a new lawyer.  I said sure.  So off they sent me, numerous times, to talk radio.  Do you know what talk radio is?  Hostile.    

One morning I’m on the radio with some rabid anti-fat person, along with a professional from an eating disorders center, where they are far more apt to be treating anorexics and bulimics than obesity.  The radio host has the rabid woman coming at me incessantly.  I never bite.  Then he asks the Eating Disorders Specialists if she thinks I have an eating disorder.  The Specialists says not necessarily.  She says she is not in a position to diagnose me.  During that appearance she spoke of something called “The Gift”.  The Gift is when you know to eat when you are hungry and stop when you are full.  Babies have this gift.  People can lose it.

I believe I lost the gift somewhere between first grade and fourth grade.  Sometime during that time period I went from skinny to heavy.  My grandmother and mother immediately started dieting me.  It didn’t work. 

Here I am on the first day of first grade.

This is my fourth grade school picture.

I did the exact opposite with my daughter.  I let her eat anything and everything she wanted.  The only exception being, and she gets angry at me for this to this day, is if she was going to bed and wanted to eat I told her to wait until morning, the kitchen is closed.  Now she eats whenever she wants.

When Lily was little my step-mother once cajoled her for not eating.  “You have to eat more.”  “NOOOOO.”  My father and I shouted in unison.  Dad added, “Leave her alone.” 

My lean daughter loves to eat.  She has the Gift.  She knows when to stop.  I have watched her closely.  I’ll give you an example.  Once we were driving just ahead of an ice storm.  I should have left Ontario the day before.  I was warned.  I wanted to celebrate New Year’s Day in Canada, so there we were, headed out in a little bit of freezing rain with the promise of much more later.  We were traveling for maybe an hour at a very low speed when Lily tells me she is hungry.  I tell her sorry baby doll, but we’re not stopping to eat.  I want us safely to Syracuse so we can catch a plane tomorrow morning.  My young daughter complained bitterly throughout that drive, but eventually I got us to a restaurant.  She ordered and ate maybe a quarter of what was on her plate.  She was full.  She stopped.  I was impressed.  I think one of the problems with people who diet for years is they get so hungry sometimes, when they get food, they over eat.  I hate to say this but my friends who have had weight loss surgery seem to have a much better long term success rate than the dieters.  My thinking is it’s because they have tiny stomachs. 

So how did my eating go last week?  I ate perfectly Monday through Saturday.  I ate just like when I lost the 110 pounds.  I brought all my food to the office.  I did not eat out.  I had salads and chicken and some prepackaged diet food.  I’m not naming the brand, because I’m not selling it.  I didn’t even like it.  I kept my calorie intake low.  I got 4 hours in at the gym.  My weight fluctuated within a four pound span all week.  It didn’t go down, it zig zagged like a roller coaster.  What a pisser.

Come Sunday morning I hang out with my friend Davilicious.  Davilicious, like Lily, has the Gift.  One of the first times he asked about going to eat I told him I don’t like to eat.  He said, “Yes, you do” as in everyone likes to eat, stupid.  Davilicious likes to drink, I told him I don’t like to drink.  “Yes, you do.”  I believe Davilicious thinks eating and drinking are among the pleasures in life.  Who wouldn’t like them?  Who?  People who have been dieting since they were eight years old.

So yesterday he took me on a journey of fun which included lots of eating and drinking pleasure.  First we drove up to West Palm Beach where we walked all around downtown and a marina.  It was a beautiful day with beautiful scenery.  Our first stop to eat was a gastropub where we each had a bloody mary and split an order of deviled eggs. I had two deviled egg halves.  He had three.  We shared everything that was ordered, at no time did we order separate entrees.

An hour later we were in Boynton Beach.  I drank water.  Davilicious ordered calamari.  Davilicious did all the ordering because I didn’t care what I ate.  Well, that’s only partially true.  There are foods I will not eat, like crab dip and oysters.  I had veto power, but I exercise that rarely.  I ate about 40% of the calamari.  Dave also ordered clams casino.  I had one. 

Next he takes us to the Two Georges in Boynton.  I had a frozen drink called a Dirty Banana.  It was the bomb.  Davilicious ordered shrimp.  I had one.  He said have more, but I was so full.  He asked how I could be full.  Davilicious has much greater capacity to eat and drink than I.  He is also much more muscular and a better driver.

An hour later we were at a bar in Deerfield.  I had a Sriracha Bloody Mary, so yummy.

A couple hours after that we were at another Two Georges, this time in Deerfield.  I had a Miami Vice.  I should have had another Dirty Banana, but I didn’t want to be repetitious.  We shared a tuna tower and two crab cakes.  Know how that day was?  Fun and delicious.  And where was my weight?  Still fluctuating within those four pounds. 

I want that Gift.  It’s a whole lot better than carting around tremendous volumes of salad and diet bars.