Fat Chance Page 4

  The agony finally came to an end, and I knew that if I never again saw another tennis ball in my life, I’d be perfectly content. As that thought made its way through my mind, I glanced sideways to find Margie launching those evil yellow spheres as far as her arm could throw them, one hundred of them in all. “Okay, ladies!” she cheered, with the annoying enthusiasm of someone who wasn’t about to have to run all over creation like a headless chicken. “As soon as you bring me all of the balls you see out there, class is officially dismissed!”

  With both hands on my hips, I eyed the giant Easter-egg hunt before me and said through grinding, gritted teeth, “You have got to be kidding.”

  In fact, she was not.

  I don’t know why it still surprises me when Margie pulls one of her frequent ultracruel and hyperactive stunts. She’d always been a bit crazy, even before I started to train with her. But “crazy” is what I was instructed by Jillian to find. “When you get home,” Jillian had said during my final days at The Biggest Loser campus, “I don’t want you to find some narcissistic diva to train you. I want you to find someone who is passionate about you and who is crazy about working out.”

  Margie, of course, fit that bill.

  I had known of Margie through a mutual friend before I even auditioned for the show, and word on the street was that she was so serious about physical fitness that she couldn’t find even one friend who would work out with her. “They’d throw up every time they went to the gym with me,” Margie later explained, as if perplexed by their distaste for abuse. “Finally they just refused to go.”

  When I returned to Florida from The Biggest Loser campus, Margie contacted me and said that she would love to help me maintain my newfound figure and that perhaps we should work out together. I could tell in one conversation flat that she was the trainer for me.

  As horrible as it seems to work out so hard that you throw up, it’s actually your body’s normal way of releasing toxins that are holding it back.

  That was a full year ago, I thought, as I forced my legs to race back and forth across the Easter-egg-dotted field. In a flash of insight, it occurred to me how different the previous twelve months had been compared to the thirty-five years leading up to them. Little more than a year ago, I couldn’t have brought in a sack of groceries without enduring severe heart palpitations and stress. Now I was sprinting across a soccer field with a (semi) smile on my face.

  Revelations like those are hitting me frequently these days, and they always pack an unexpected punch. They bring to mind the person I used to be, not the woman I am today. In my mind’s eye I see her—the overweight, underwhelming version of me—with the same fine-tuned clarity of a burglary victim who can remember every nuance of her ransacked house. I wore her skin and shame for so much of my life that I find it’s a daily battle to let her die—to let go of her self-doubt and fear—and let the new me be beautifully born.

  Even if you never learn to love exercise, you do learn to love how you feel afterward. Pride in your accomplishment, increased strength, additional endurance—what’s not to love about that!

  THE ROBBING OF MY CHILDHOOD

  Earlier this week, I drove the few miles to the park where Margie and I meet. The air was thick and cloudy, and partway through our workout, it started to rain. Margie is unfazed by bad weather, but I for one hate being wet. I considered dashing to my car to grab another layer, but the only available garment would have been the extra-small jacket I keep stashed in the trunk for Noah, who seems to lose everything he touches and seems always to be cold. It would help a little, I supposed, but the sleeves would be way too short. Quickly, I moved to other options, which is when it hit me: I could borrow something of Margie’s.

  Holy cow.

  I could actually borrow something from Margie—Margie, who has a flawless figure and no visible fat. I could borrow something from that woman. I could fit into something that Margie can wear. The revelation brought tears to my eyes and a distant memory back to mind.

  When I was a fresh-faced kindergartener, the other five-year-olds and I spent an hour every day in recess. I remember like it was yesterday playing outside one afternoon when it started to rain. Young, blonde, beautiful-in-every-way Mrs. Robertson raced toward the playground under the protective covering of an umbrella and ushered us kids through the doors that led back into Arlington Heights Elementary School, where we were instructed to select dry alternatives to our school clothes from the lost-and-found box.

  If my memory serves me well, and if the few pictures I still possess tell the truth, I wasn’t exactly obese at the tender age of five. But when every other girl your age is twiggy and wispy, somehow you gather that a shapely bottom and tree-trunk legs don’t contribute to a “look” that will work.

  I just thought too-small orange shorts would be my life’s worst fashion nightmare. In reality, wearing nothing but a skin-tight tank top and shorts on a giant scale before a national audience would top the list. Please tell me it doesn’t get worse than that!

  Grudgingly I tugged at a pair of pumpkin-hued shorts until they broke loose of the weight of the other clothes in that dreaded lost-and-found box, held them up in front of my young face and eyed them with intense suspicion. Would they slip over my already ladylike thighs? Would their snap-closure come together to confine my proudly plump tummy? Or would they be the source of ridicule all the rest of my kindergarten days? I knew then that I wasn’t at all like the person I was supposed to be. It was the start of a laundry list of what “fat” would steal from me.

  When I was little there were two options for children’s clothing: “regular” or “slim.” How sad that there is such pervasive childhood obesity today that clothing companies now actually manufacture plus-size clothes for kids.

  Childhood years are supposed to be innocent, carefree and fun. And yet these certainly are not the themes that I’d say marked the first decade and a half of my life. Just before I started kindergarten, my par-ents’ wildly flawed marriage dissolved into divorce. I don’t remember them ever being married. I don’t remember them ever living under the same roof. All I remember is the day that my dad left. My father had borrowed his buddy’s green El Camino and had backed up the car to the front door of our house, right onto the grass. I stood there watching as he loaded the car, emerging from the house with arms full of possessions each time. When he had finished reclaiming his belongings, he turned toward me and asked, “Jules, who would you like to go with?” Instinctively, I inched toward my mother, who looked down at my confused countenance and whispered, “Sweetie, if you pick me, I’ll give you a roll of Life Savers.”

  My dad, overhearing Mom’s offer, eyed me and said, “Honey, you come with me, and I’ll give you all the Life Savers you want.”

  Although Dad moved out that day, things wouldn’t really explode between them until a few years later, when a series of custody battles rocked the first few months of my third-grade year. They played me against each other, and when that didn’t work, they included my grandparents in the fight. I must have been a fairly resilient kid because despite the wobbly world in which I lived, I somehow maintained a fair degree of steadiness and even chose to develop a sense of humor about things. Little did I know how much I would rely on it through the years. “If I can get people to laugh with me,” I thought, “then maybe they won’t laugh at me.”

  I realize now that despite the dysfunction always inherent in divorce, at least I was lucky enough to be “wanted” by both my mom and my dad. Mom’s persistent care went deep with me during my growing-up years, and truly, some of my best childhood memories are of the many weeknights spent on “dates” with my dad. McDonald’s for dinner followed by movies like Herbie at the theater—it was a little girl’s dream come true. Sure, I craved an intact family. But I remain grateful for the bits and pieces of bliss I knew.

  In addition to handing me the shards of my undeniably broken family, the third grade also provided my first official realization that I was fat. Fo
r the entire school year, I obsessed about cresting one hundred pounds. A girl who had been in my class ever since the pumpkin-shorts fiasco three years prior was visibly, morbidly obese, and she, I had found out, weighed just over one hundred pounds. I compared myself to her daily, wondering if I was as fat as that.

  Finally I made it to the fourth grade, but unfortunately my inner anguish made it there too. In the evenings before bedtime, the nine-year-old version of me would squat over the too-hot water of my bath and, having nothing better to do while I waited for the water to cool, I would fixate on my chubby thighs and puffy, peaking breasts that were developing well in advance of my peers’.

  My hunch that I was already fat at age eight was validated by my mom’s enrolling me in a Weight Watchers program partway through my third-grade year. Not fond memories, to say the least.

  A healthy sense of self—self-worth, self-confidence, self-esteem—had been taken from me in a flash. Another victory I had unwittingly handed to that terrible thief who answered to the name “Fat.”

  Later, junior high brought with it a torment all its own. By that time I had ballooned to the point that I remember being afraid of not fitting into the yellow phys ed uniforms that were issued at the start of each grade. If the school did make one my size, I just knew it would come only by special order, and with an “XXXL” sneeringly printed on the tag. Still, that had to be better than the alternative: outsizing even their special-order offerings and being forced to drag my rail-thin mother to the local large-person clothing store to buy a plain yellow tee-shirt that we’d pay to have embroidered with the school’s name. The obvious distinction of that attire would clearly have been the end of me.

  It was during those same days that a boy in my eighth-grade class—I’ll call him Jimmy, because his name was Jimmy—bestowed upon me my latest nickname. Chicago Bears defensive lineman William “The Refrigerator” Perry was receiving a lot of press as a fan favorite at the time, and Jimmy thought it would be funny to dub me “The Freezer.” Sort of The Fridge’s equally enormous sidekick, I guess. Every single day I entered the class I shared with Jimmy, I heard him mockingly shout, “Hey, Freezer!”

  Ironically, Jimmy would wind up asking me out during my somewhat-thinner college years. In reply, I think my exact words were: “As if!”

  There was no comeback swift enough, no rebuttal fitting enough to match the depth of his crushing words. And so the funny fat girl would slip into her seat, silenced and rebuffed once more.

  I didn’t deal with Jimmy much after that, but I have bumped into a few other schoolmates over the past several years. When we were kids, I was the devastated recipient of their disdain. “Why are you so fat?” one had asked me. “What gives?” another probed. “Your parents aren’t that fat.” And then there was the girl who shooed me from her lunchroom table with four words that made her position abundantly clear: “Fat girls not allowed.”

  Interestingly, after my experience on The Biggest Loser, several of them tried to befriend me. I have a feeling they’d stand by their story that we were great friends in school, that of course they’d never done anything to harm me. But something in me simply stayed away, probably that same something that felt scraped out all those years ago, when cutting comments etched their way onto my soul.

  For many kids, high school days are the glory days, the last great hoorah, the lovely, melodic tune that sings them right into adulthood. But for me, those days were just the constant refrain of an all-too depressing dirge.

  To make matters worse, I spent that time living in a humid, ocean-side community in Florida, which meant that every birthday party was yet one more reason to convene at the pool or the beach. If only granny-style skirted one-piece bathing suits and oversize men’s T-shirts had been in vogue for a sixteen-year-old! Not only did I not own a bikini, but had I ever chosen to show up in one, I felt sure everyone in the immediate vicinity would have cleared out in a heartbeat as my pasty-white lumps of flesh and I rolled and strolled our way by. Why hand over more ammunition, I figured, when I’d already been shot down so many times?

  It was for that same reason that I never, ever ate lunch at school. Instead, I would use my buck-forty’s worth of lunch money to purchase a doughnut or two before class started, and use the remaining thirty-five cents on a midday milkshake I’d sip all alone. Of course, I’d return home from school and devour everything in sight, but at least in my mind I hadn’t given people an obvious explanation as to why I was “that unbelievably fat.”

  I wanted to be thinner. I really did. Actually, I wanted to be “skinny”—that one word summed up my complete definition of all that it meant to be likeable, healthy and cool. But I was handed that goal from others in my life. “You could get any boy you want,” well-meaning family members would say, “if you’d just lose that weight.” (Translation: You’ll mean a lot more to this world when there’s a whole lot less of you.)

  I saw a survey that the TV show 20/20 did one time, where they asked kids to look at photographs of two people and select the more attractive person. In every instance they chose the thinner one, even when the heavier person was drop-dead gorgeous.

  Eventually, I did lose a few pounds. Needing a way to look acceptable for the prom I would never attend, I fad-dieted and deprived my way to a “me” two dress sizes down. Sadly, though, my also-fat friends and I would always fall back into the trap of using food as our comforter. Which is how I know that even at the bargain price of four boxes for a dollar, mac-and-cheese can’t satiate a starving soul.

  These days, I look back and realize that my upbringing wasn’t all bad. There were youth-group trips and dances and Christmas parties. But when I catch sight of photos of those “fond memories” and see a big, fat cow in the frame, the fondness somehow fades a bit. What’s more, now that I have hindsight on my side, I see more clearly the reason I became fat in the first place. I’m sure that psychotherapists would have a heyday analyzing my background and linking every major event to the cause of my obesity, but in my heart of hearts, the only theme I know to be true throughout my childhood and beyond is this: I was fat because I did not believe that I was worth the effort it would take to be fit.

  I’d learn the hard way throughout my life that “event dieting” never works. As soon as the event has come and gone, so has your motivation for losing weight.

  Sadly, it would take me until age thirty-five to adjust my views on that.

  THE ROBBING OF MY WOMANHOOD

  When I was in my early twenties, I got my five-foot-two frame all the way down to one hundred and forty pounds and tried my hand at pageants. Admittedly, it was a lark. I had thick legs, as you’ll recall. And by this point, I also had quite a robust bust—some of which was natural and some of which was due to the extra padding I added in an effort to bring my wide hips into proportion. In fact, on the heels of one especially disappointing swimsuit competition, the strongest “affirmation” I received came from a female judge who said, “I see how those breasts balance out that backside, Hon, but my word …” This was uttered mere moments before I learned that while everyone else had received eights and nines in that part of the competition, I had been granted a three. Lovely.

  These days I’m learning not to allow myself to be defined by a number that shows up on the scale. If I were to go by the standard height/weight charts, I should weigh between 105 and 110 pounds. Yeah, right.

  The evening-gown portion was no better, really. I couldn’t fit into traditional, beaded gowns, and so I opted instead to debut the A-line dress. This was before anyone knew about A-line dresses, so I got points for trendsetting. But that was about it.

  “You could be Miss America! If only you’d lose some weight.” “You have such a pretty face! It’s just that you’ve got all that weight.” “What a lovely dress! It covers your flaws nicely.” I’d heard a version of the judges’ comments throughout my entire life. Would “fat” be my reality forever?

  It will come as no surprise to you that I never wo
re a crown. (Although I did do quite well in the “interview” portion, thank you very much.) But I took home a prize of another kind from those odd, odd pageant days: my wonderful husband Mike.

  Mike was perhaps the only person in that pageant audience who saw more in me than what meets the eye. We were friends for five years, and although I had a terrific crush on him, my self-defeating ways caused me to keep that under wraps. Instead, when he confided in me as his friend that he was interested in one of the other “pageant girls” we knew, I’d enthusiastically prod him to ask her out. “Oh, she’s gorgeous!” I’d rave. “You should date her!”

  At my recommendation, he usually did. And as each girl came into his life and then left, I died another death. When would it be my turn?

  When longing finally turned into reality and reality eventually produced a stunning engagement ring, I experienced a euphoria I had never previously known. At our engagement party, a mutual friend nodded toward me and said to her date, “She looks like a Mike Hadden wife.” I soared on her words for hours. I knew the incredible women Mike had dated. And I was elated to be the last one among them.

  Although I wasn’t thin when Mike and I got engaged, I was the thinnest I’d ever been. Still, something in me said I was fat. As soon as we got married, I allowed the self-fulfilling prophecy to run its course, gaining pounds, it seemed, by the hour.

  Just as quickly as I put back on the weight, Mike put on the role of my enabler. I didn’t weigh myself very often, but I always knew when I had gained a lot of weight because my clothes no longer would fit. My dismay over my returning obesity became a constant topic of conversation between Mike and me, and when he just couldn’t take my moaning and groaning any longer, he would come home from work with a treat. Mike’s treats were always the best, because he knew exactly what I liked. Nachos, southwestern eggrolls from Chili’s, a blooming onion from Outback, gooey chocolate cake—these always did the trick.