I can now no longer stomach it when bloggers talk about dieting
Let’s think about this.
Why would you tell someone else that you are thinking of losing weight?
Most obvious reason: Because you want to hear, “Oh, that’s a good thing. You may feel out-of-control right now, but dieting is a good thing. We all think it’s a good thing. You should definitely go on a diet. No really. I wish I could be as good as you. You are a good person for dieting. Good, good, good.”
Eat a Cheeseburger today posted about overhearing a conversation in a bathroom between two women talking about dieting. One of them was having some success in losing weight on Weight Watchers, and “…the other woman congratulated her on her weight loss and encouraged her to keep up the great work, to which the woman who had lost weight responded, ‘Well, thanks. I’m no size 0 or anything, but I never will be.’ And her friend responded, ‘Size 0 is overrated.’”
Tiffabee has one interpretation of this that is good to read, but it wasn’t mine.
What got me was this, what I hear that first woman saying when she bemoans the fact that she will never be a size 0 is, “Well, I know it’s a goal to be as small as humanly possible. I mean, who WOULDN’T want to be literally a size ZERO. In fact, I can’t achieve that. I won’t ever be able to actually disappear—become a real ZERO—but I’m trying as hard as I can and coming to terms with the fact that I take up space.”
So when a blogger writes, “I’m finally going to do it this time, I’m going to lose this weight,” I now get pissy because I don’t want to engage in this old story.
Before becoming a mom, I could just ignore it. Now, no can do. That privilege of mine has been shattered. And here’s the real kicker. If I want to say something about it, I have to get ready for hell to break loose, because even though there’s no one who’s going to shake me in my conviction that I am right…
The majority of people in the United States of America today are convinced that the WORLD WOULD FALL APART if we all decided that dieting was in fact a horrible thing.
I mean, WHAT WOULD WE ALL STRIVE FOR??
I guess that for many (even for me, once), if being the size that you are (fat, thin, somewhere in between) is OK, then the world crumbles, because the following sentence makes sense: “When I feel bad, I feel fat. And, while I believe I can control fat, I KNOW that I can’t control feeling bad, so it’s a good thing that they are related to one another. If I lose weight the BAD will disappear.”
But, while I agree that you can’t directly control feeling bad (drugs notwithstanding), I also believe that there is strong scientific evidence you can’t control fat (outside the 10-15 pounds around your set point…even WITH the drugs we have now).
There is this perception, you see, that diets work. That the reason that you gain weight after you diet is that YOU DID SOMETHING WRONG. That there is a behavior that you could achieve that would keep you thin.
But here’s the thing.
There isn’t.
And I can see how that could be so, so painful.
So, I’m taking away hope for happiness when I say, “Diets don’t work. Not in the short-term. Not in the long-term. They are a form of self-punishment meant to purge your soul of some OTHER sin.” I suppose I could also be nicer in my terminology. That might help.
But, “Diets don’t work” is not the same thing as, “There’s no hope for you.”
In order for anyone I don’t know to hear what I mean, though, I’d have to have a sustained conversation with them and I can’t do that in a blog comment.
